Nor is the Moral of this excellent tragedy less noble than the Fable; it teaches these two instructive lessons, viz., that human happiness is exceeding transient; and that death is the certain end of all men: the former whereof is inculcated by the fatal end of Tom Thumb; the latter, by that of all the other personages.
The Characters are, I think, sufficiently described in the dramatis personae; and I believe we shall find few plays where greater care is taken to maintain them throughout, and to preserve in every speech that characteristical mark which distinguishes them from each other. “But (says Mr D —— ) how well doth the character of Tom Thumb, whom we must call the hero of this tragedy, if it hath any hero, agree with the precepts of Aristotle, who defineth ‘Tragedy to be the imitation of a short but perfect action, containing a just greatness in itself’? &c. What greatness can be in a fellow whom history relateth to have been no higher than a span?” This gentleman seemeth to think, with serjeant Kite, that the greatness of a man’s soul is in proportion to that of his body; the contrary of which is affirmed by our English physiognomical writers. Besides, if I understand Aristotle right, he speaketh only of the greatness of the action, and not of the person.
As for the Sentiments and the Diction, which now only remain to be spoken to; I thought I could afford them no stronger justification than by producing parallel passages out of the best of our English writers. Whether this sameness of thought and expression, which I have quoted from them, proceeded from an agreement in their way of thinking, or whether they have borrowed from our author, I leave the reader to determine. I shall adventure to affirm this of the Sentiments of our author, that they are generally the most familiar which I have ever met with, and at the same time delivered with the highest dignity of phrase; which brings me to speak of his diction. Here I shall only beg one postulatum, viz., That the greatest perfection of the language of a tragedy is, that it is not to be understood; which granted (as I think it must be), it will necessarily follow that the only way to avoid this is by being too high or too low for the understanding, which will comprehend everything within its reach. Those two extremities of stile Mr Dryden illustrates by the familiar image of two inns, which I shall term the aerial and the subterrestrial.
Horace goes farther, and sheweth when it is proper to call at one of these inns, and when at the other:
Telephus et Peleus, cum pauper et exul uterque,
Projicit ampullas et sesquipedalia verba.
That he approveth of the sesquipedalia verba is plain; for, had not Telephus and Peleus used this sort of diction in prosperity, they could not have dropt it in adversity. The aerial inn, therefore (says Horace), is proper only to be frequented by princes and other great men in the highest affluence of fortune; the subterrestrial is appointed for the entertainment of the poorer sort of people only, whom Horace advises,
— dolere sermone pedestri.
The true meaning of both which citations is, that bombast is the proper language for joy, and doggrel for grief; the latter of which is literally implied in the sermo pedestris, as the former is in the sesquipedalia verba.
Cicero recommendeth the former of these: “Quid est tarn furiosum vel tragicum quam verborum sonitus inanis, nulla subjecta sententia neque scientia.” What can be so proper for tragedy as a set of big sounding words, so contrived together as to convey no meaning? which I shall one day or other prove to be the sublime of Longinus. Ovid declareth absolutely for the latter inn:
Omne genus scripti gravitate tragoedia vincit.
Tragedy hath, of all writings, the greatest share in the bathos; which is the profound of Scriblerus.
I shall not presume to determine which of these two stiles be properer for tragedy. It sufficeth, that our author excelleth in both. He is very rarely within sight through the whole play, either rising higher than the eye of your understanding can soar, or sinking lower than it careth to stoop. But here it may perhaps be observed that I have given more frequent instances of authors who have imitated him in the sublime than in the contrary. To which I answer, first, Bombast being properly a redundancy of genius, instances of this nature occur in poets whose names do more honour to our author than the writers in the doggrel, which proceeds from a cool, calm, weighty way of thinking. Instances whereof are most frequently to be found in authors of a lower class. Secondly, That the works of such authors are difficultly found at all. Thirdly, That it is a very hard task to read them, in order to extract these flowers from them. And lastly, it is very difficult to transplant them at all; they being like some flowers of a very nice nature, which will flourish in no soil but their own: for it is easy to transcribe a thought, but not the want of one. The EARL OF ESSEX, for instance, is a little garden of choice rarities, whence you can scarce transplant one line so as to preserve its original beauty. This must account to the reader for his missing the names of several of his acquaintance, which he had certainly found here, had I ever read their works; for which, if I have not a just esteem, I can at least say with Cicero, “Quae non contemno, quippe quae nunquam legerim.” However, that the reader may meet with due satisfaction in this point, I have a young commentator from the university, who is reading over all the modern tragedies, at five shillings a dozen, and collecting all that they have stole from our author, which shall be shortly added as an appendix to this work.
DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
MEN.
King Arthur, a passionate sort of king, | husband to queen Dollallolla, of whom he | stands a little in fear; father to Huncamunca,| Mr MULLART. whom he is very fond of, and in love with | Glumdalca. |
Tom Thumb the Great, a little hero | with a great soul, something violent in his | YOUNG temper, which is a little abated by his | VERHUYCK. love for Huncamunca. |
Ghost of Gaffer Thumb, a whimsical sort | Mr LACY. of ghost. |
Lord Grizzle, extremely zealous for the | liberty of the subject, very cholerick in his | Mr JONES. temper, and in love with Huncamunca. |
Merlin, a conjurer, and in some sort | Mr HALLAM.
father to Tom Thumb. |
Noodle, Doodle, courtiers in place, and | Mr REYNOLDS,
consequently of that party that is uppermost | Mr WATHAN.
Foodle, a courtier that is out of place, | and consequently of that party that is | Mr AYRES. undermost |
Bailiff, and Follower, of the party of | Mr PETERSON, the plaintiff. | Mr HICKS.
Parson, of the side of the church. | Mr WATSON.
WOMEN.
Queen Dollallolla, wife to king Arthur, | and mother to Huncamunca, a woman intirely | Mrs MULLART. faultless, saving that she is a little given | to drink, a little too much a virago towards | her husband, and in love with Tom Thumb. |
The Princess Huncamunca, daughter to | their majesties king Arthur and queen | Dollallolla, of a very sweet, gentle, and | Mrs JONES. amorous disposition, equally in love with | Lord Grizzle and Tom Thumb, and desirous to | be married to them both. |
Glumdalca, of the giants, a captive |
queen, beloved by the king, but in love with | Mrs DOVE.
Tom Thumb. |
Cleora, Mustacha, maids of honour in love with Noodle and
Doodle. — Courtiers, Guards, Rebels, Drums, Trumpets,
Thunder and Lightning.
SCENE, the court of king Arthur, and a plain thereabouts.
ACT I.
SCENE I. — The Palace. DOODLE, NOODLE.
Doodle. Sure such a day as this was never seen!
The sun himself, on this auspicious day,
Shines like a beau in a new birth-day suit:
This down the seams embroidered, that the beams.
All nature wears one universal grin.
[Footnote 1: Corneille recommends some very remarkable day wherein to fix the action of a tragedy. This the best of our tragical writers have understood to mean a day remarkable for the serenity of the sky, or what we generally call a fine summer’s day; so that, according to this their exposition, the same months are proper for tra
gedy which are proper for pastoral. Most of our celebrated English tragedies, as Cato, Mariamne, Tamerlane, &c., begin with their observations on the morning. Lee seems to have come the nearest to this beautiful description of our author’s:
The morning dawns with an unwonted crimson,
The flowers all odorous seem, the garden birds
Sing louder, and the laughing sun ascends
The gaudy earth with an unusual brightness;
All nature smiles. — Caes. Borg.
Massinissa, in the New Sophonisba, is also a favourite of the sun:
—— — The sun too seems
As conscious of my joy, with broader eye
To look abroad the world, and all things smile
Like Sophonisba.
Memnon, in the Persian Princess, makes the sun decline rising, that he may not peep on objects which would profane his brightness:
—— The morning rises slow,
And all those ruddy streaks that used to paint
The day’s approach are lost in clouds, as if
The horrors of the night had sent ‘em back,
To warn the sun he should not leave the sea,
To peep, &c.
]
Nood. This day, O Mr Doodle, is a day
Indeed! — A day, we never saw before.
The mighty Thomas Thumb victorious comes;
Millions of giants crowd his chariot wheels,
Giants! to whom the giants in Guildhall
Are infant dwarfs. They frown, and foam, and roar,
While Thumb, regardless of their noise, rides on.
So some cock-sparrow in a farmer’s yard,
Hops at the head of an huge flock of turkeys.
[Footnote 1: This line is highly conformable to the beautiful simplicity of the antients. It hath been copied by almost every modern.
Not to be is not to be in woe. — State of Innocence.
Love is not sin but where ‘tis sinful love. — Don Sebastian.
Nature is nature, Laelius. — Sophonisba.
Men are but men, we did not make ourselves. — Revenge. ]
[Footnote 2: Dr B — y reads, The mighty Tall-mast Thumb. Mr D — s, The mighty Thumbing Thumb. Mr T — d reads, Thundering. I think Thomas more agreeable to the great simplicity so apparent in our author.]
[Footnote 3: That learned historian Mr S — n, in the third number of his criticism on our author, takes great pains to explode this passage. “It is,” says he, “difficult to guess what giants are here meant, unless the giant Despair in the Pilgrim’s Progress, or the giant Greatness in the Royal Villain; for I have heard of no other sort of giants in the reign of king Arthur.” Petrus Burmannus makes three Tom Thumbs, one whereof he supposes to have been the same person whom the Greeks called Hercules; and that by these giants are to be understood the Centaurs slain by that hero. Another Tom Thumb he contends to have been no other than the Hermes Trismegistus of the antients. The third Tom Thumb he places under the reign of king Arthur; to which third Tom Thumb, says he, the actions of the other two were attributed. Now, though I know that this opinion is supported by an assertion of Justus Lipsius, “Thomam illum Thumbum non alium quam Herculem fuisse satis constat,” yet shall I venture to oppose one line of Mr Midwinter against them all:
In Arthur’s court Tom Thumb did live.
“But then,” says Dr B — y, “if we place Tom Thumb in the court of king Arthur, it will be proper to place that court out of Britain, where no giants were ever heard of.” Spenser, in his Fairy Queen, is of another opinion, where, describing Albion, he says,
—— — Far within a savage nation dwelt
Of hideous giants.
And in the same canto:
Then Elfar, with two brethren giants had,
The one of which had two heads —— —
The other three.
Risum teneatis, amici. ]
Dood. When Goody Thumb first brought this Thomas forth, The Genius of our land triumphant reign’d; Then, then, O Arthur! did thy Genius reign.
Nood. They tell me it is whisper’d in the books
Of all our sages, that this mighty hero,
By Merlin’s art begot, hath not a bone
Within his skin, but is a lump of gristle.
[Footnote 1: “To whisper in books,” says Mr D — s, “is arrant nonsense.” I am afraid this learned man does not sufficiently understand the extensive meaning of the word whisper. If he had rightly understood what is meant by the “senses whisp’ring the soul,” in the Persian Princess, or what “whisp’ring like winds” is in Aurengzebe, or like thunder in another author, he would have understood this. Emmeline in Dryden sees a voice, but she was born blind, which is an excuse Panthea cannot plead in Cyrus, who hears a sight:
—— —— Your description will surpass
All fiction, painting, or dumb shew of horror,
That ever ears yet heard, or eyes beheld.
When Mr D — s understands these, he will understand whispering in books. ]
Dood. Then ‘tis a gristle of no mortal kind;
Some God, my Noodle, stept into the place
Of Gaffer Thumb, and more than half begot
This mighty Tom.
[Footnote 1: Some ruffian stept into his father’s place, And more than half begot him. — Mary Queen of Scots]
Nood. — Sure he was sent express From Heaven to be the pillar of our state. Though small his body be, so very small A chairman’s leg is more than twice as large, Yet is his soul like any mountain big; And as a mountain once brought forth a mouse, So doth this mouse contain a mighty mountain.
[Footnote 1: For Ulamar seems sent express from Heaven, To civilize this rugged Indian clime. — Liberty Asserted]
[Footnote 2: “Omne majus continet in se minus, sed minus non in se majus continere potest,” says Scaliger in Thumbo. I suppose he would have cavilled at these beautiful lines in the Earl of Essex:
—— Thy most inveterate soul,
That looks through the foul prison of thy body.
And at those of Dryden:
The palace is without too well design’d;
Conduct me in, for I will view thy mind. — Aurengzebe.
]
Dood. Mountain indeed! So terrible his name, The giant nurses frighten children with it, And cry Tom Thumb is come, and if you are Naughty, will surely take the child away.
[Footnote 1: Mr Banks hath copied this almost verbatim:
It was enough to say, here’s Essex come,
And nurses still’d their children with the fright.
— Earl of Essex.
]
Nood. But hark! these trumpets speak the king’s approach.
[Footnote 1: The trumpet in a tragedy is generally as much as to say, Enter king, which makes Mr Banks, in one of his plays, call it the trumpet’s formal sound.]
Dood. He comes most luckily for my petition.
[Flourish.
SCENE II. — KING, QUEEN, GRIZZLE, NOODLE, DOODLE, FOODLE.
King. Let nothing but a face of joy appear; The man who frowns this day shall lose his head, That he may have no face to frown withal. Smile Dollallolla — Ha! what wrinkled sorrow Hangs, sits, lies, frowns upon thy knitted brow? Whence flow those tears fast down thy blubber’d cheeks, Like a swoln gutter, gushing through the streets?
[Footnote 1: Phraortes, in the Captives, seems to have been acquainted with King Arthur:
Proclaim a festival for seven days’ space,
Let the court shine in all its pomp and lustre,
Let all our streets resound with shouts of joy;
Let musick’s care-dispelling voice be heard;
The sumptuous banquet and the flowing goblet
Shall warm the cheek and fill the heart with gladness.
Astarbe shall sit mistress of the feast.
]
[Footnote 2:
Repentance frowns on thy contracted brow. — Sophonisba.
Hung on his clouded brow, I m
ark’d despair. — Ibid.
— A sullen gloom
Scowls on his brow. — Busiris.
]
Queen. Excess of joy, my lord, I’ve heard folks say, Gives tears as certain as excess of grief.
[Footnote 1: Plato is of this opinion, and so is Mr Banks:
Behold these tears sprung from fresh pain and joy.
— Earl of Essex.
]
King. If it be so, let all men cry for joy, Till my whole court be drowned with their tears; Nay, till they overflow my utmost land, And leave me nothing but the sea to rule.
[Footnote 1: These floods are very frequent in the tragick authors:
Near to some murmuring brook I’ll lay me down,
Whose waters, if they should too shallow flow,
My tears shall swell them up till I will drown.
— Lee’s Sophonisba.
Pouring forth tears at such a lavish rate,
That were the world on fire they might have drown’d
The wrath of heaven, and quench’d the mighty ruin.
Complete Fictional Works of Henry Fielding Page 252