of things," and, as Charles Lamb said, "delighted to dally with
interdicted subjects." The form of the plays is loose and broken, and
yet there is a pervading larger unity, not only of dramatic action, but
of spirit. The laughter is loud and coarse, the terror unrelieved, and
the splendour dazzling. There is no question as to the greatness of this
work as permanent literature. It has long outlived the amazing
detractions of Hallam and of Byron, and will certainly be read so long
as English is a living tongue.

The next stage in this curious history is a peculiarly interesting one.
In former days there sprang up around every great work of art a forest
of slighter literature, in the shape of chap-books, ballads, and puppet
plays. By far the most popular of the puppet plays was that founded upon
Marlowe's _Faust_. The German version continued to be played in Germany
until three hundred years later. Goethe constructed his masterpiece
largely by its help. English actors travelling abroad had brought back
the story to its native land of Germany, and in every town the bands of
strolling players sent Marlowe's great conception far and wide. In
England also the puppet play was extremely popular. The drama had moved
from the church to the market-place, and much of the Elizabethan drama
appeared in this quaint form, played by wooden figures upon diminutive
boards. To the modern mind nothing could be more incongruous than the
idea of a solemn drama forced to assume a guise so grotesque and
childish; but, according to Jusserand, much of the stage-work was
extremely ghastly, and no doubt it impressed the multitude. There is
even a story of some actors who had gone too far, and into the midst of
whose play the real devil suddenly descended with disastrous results. It
must, however, be allowed that even the serious plays were not without
an abundant element of grotesqueness. The occasion for Faustus' final
speech of despair, for instance, was the lowering and raising before his
eyes of two or three gilded arm-chairs, representing the thrones in
heaven upon which he would never sit. It does not seem to have occurred
to the audience as absurd that heaven should be regarded as a kind of
drawing-room floating in the air, and indeed that idea is perhaps not
yet obsolete. However that may be, it is quite evident that such
machinery, ill-suited though it was to the solemnities of tragedy, must
have been abundantly employed in the puppet plays.