278 TIMON OF ATHENS. 1610. FROM a passage in a passage in "Jack Drum's Entertainment," Dr. Farmer conjectured that Timon had made his appearance on the stage previous to 1601. There was in the possession of the late Mr. Strutt, the engraver, a manuscript drama on the subject, and if the date, 1600, usually assigned to it be correct, the supposition of Farmer is confirmed. This play bears no more than a partial resemblance to Shakspeare's. It contains a scene resembling Shakspeare's banquet given by Timon to his flatterers. Instead of warm water, he sets before them stones painted like artichokes, and afterwards beats them out of the He then retires to the woods, attended by his faithful steward, who, like Kent, in King Lear, has disguised himself to continue his services to his master. Timon, in the last act, is room. followed by his fickle mistress, &c. after he was reported to have discovered a hidden treasure by digging the earth. There appears no objection to the belief that thus much Shakspeare was indebted to the old play; but it still remains a question where he acquired that knowledge which enabled him to construct the more material parts of his performance. His well-ascertained familiarity with Painter's Palace of Pleasure naturally suggests the idea that he made use of the twenty-eighth novel of the first volume of that collection; but the neglect of the novelist to account for Timon's hatred of mankind negatives the notion. Timon's story is shortly narrated in Plutarch's Life of Antonius, and there the omission of the novelist is abundantly supplied. "Because of the unthankfulness," says Sir Thomas North, "of those he had done good unto, and whom he tooke to be his friends, he was angry with all men, and would trust no man.' It may be contended that from this hint alone Shakspeare developed the origin of Timon's detestation of mankind; and it has been deemed a satisfactory conclusion that he derived none of his materials from Lucian, because no translation of the dialogue of Timon is * Page 943. known to have existed in Shakspeare's age. But it should rather have been inferred, from the many striking coincidences between the play and the dialogue, that Lucian had some influence over the composition of Timon, although the channel through which that influence was communicated is no longer to be traced. The following is Lucian's description of Timon :—“To speak the truth, his probity, humanity, and charity to the poor, have been the ruin of him; or rather, in fact, his own folly, easiness of disposition, and want of judgment in his choice of friends; he never discovered that he was giving away his all to wolves and ravens. Whilst these vultures were preying upon his liver, he thought them his best friends, and that they fed upon him out of pure love and affection. After they had gnawed him all round, ate his bones bare, and, if there was any marrow in them, sucked it carefully out, they left him, cut down to the roots and withered; and so far from relieving or assisting him in their turns, would not so much as know or look upon him. This has made him turn digger; and here, in his skin garment, he tills the earth for hire; ashamed to show himself in the city, and venting his rage against the ingratitude of those, who, enriched as they had been by him, now proudly pass along, and know not whether his name is Timon."* It is quite incredible, that a harmony so complete as that which exists between Shakspeare's portrait of Timon and the preceding passage, proceeded from the poet's expansion of the meagre materials of Plutarch, with no guide but the suggestions of his own imagination. Upon the expression, they left him, cut down to the roots and withered," it should be observed, that the dramatic Timon, contrasting his prosperous with his forlorn state, describes his friends as 66 "numberless upon me stuck, as leaves Do on the oak, have with one winter's brush Though there is no verbal coincidence, the image in both cases is the same. When Shakspeare's Timon is demanded by Alcibiades, What is thy name?" His reply * It would have been very easy to have furnished a fresh translation of Lucian, which would have made the coincidences between the dramatist and the satirist appear in a much stronger light. To avoid the charge of misrepresenting my author for the support of an hypothesis, I have quoted from the version of Dr. Franklin, who will surely escape the imputation of any sinister design. † Act IV. sc. 3. "I am misanthropos, and hate mankind," strikingly similar to the language of Lucian's Timon. "The fairest name I would wish to be distinguished by is that of misanthrope." * Lucian's Timon thus expresses his satisfaction on discovering gold in the earth. "It is, it must be gold, fine, yellow, noble gold, heavy, sweet to behold. * Burning like fire, thou shinest day and night: come to me, thou dear delightful treasure: now do I believe that Jove himself was once turned into gold: what virgin would not spread forth her bosom to receive so beautiful a lover?" The dramatic Timon exclaims "What is here? Gold? yellow, glittering, precious gold?" + And in his reflections on its all seductive influence, he indulges in a train of thought perfectly of kin to that of Lucian's imputation on the corruptible nature of the virtue of the sex: "thou bright defiler Of Hymen's purest bed! thou valiant Mars! Thou ever young, fresh, lov'd, and delicate wooer, That lies in Dian's lap!"‡ * Act IV. sc. 3. + Ibid. Ibid. |