hout
which our elder poets cannot be scanned. "Power," here, instead of being
one long syllable--pow'r--must be sounded, not indeed as a spondee, nor yet
as a trochee; but as - u u;--the first syllable is 1-1/4.

We can, indeed, never expect an authentic edition of our elder dramatic
poets (for in those times a drama was a poem), until some man undertakes
the work, who has studied the philosophy of metre. This has been found the
main torch of sound restoration in the Greek dramatists by Bentley,
Porson, and their followers;--how much more, then, in writers in our own
language! It is true that quantity, an almost iron law with the Greek, is
in English rather a subject for a peculiarly fine ear, than any law or
even rule; but, then, instead of it, we have, first, accent; secondly,
emphasis; and lastly, retardation, and acceleration of the times of
syllables according to the meaning of the words, the passion that
accompanies them, and even the character of the person that uses them.
With due attention to these,--above all, to that, which requires the most
attention and the finest taste, the character, Massinger, for example,
might be reduced to a rich and yet regular metre. But then the _regulae_
must be first known; though I will venture to say, that he who does not
find a line (not corrupted) of Massinger's flow to the time total of a
trimeter catalectic iambic verse, has not read it aright. But by virtue of
the last principle--the retardation of acceleration of time--we have the
proceleusmatic foot u u u u, and the _dispondaeus_ - - - -, not to mention
the _choriambus_, the ionics, paeons, and epitrites. Since Dryden, the
metre of our poets leads to the sense; in our elder and more genuine
bards, the sense, including the passion, leads to the metre. Read even
Donne's satires as he meant them to be read, and as the sense and passion
demand, and you will find in the lines a manly harmony.

Life Of Fletcher In Stockdale's Edition, 1811.

"In general their plots are more regular than Shakespeare's."

This is true, if true at all, only before a court of criticism, which
judges one scheme by the laws of another and a diverse one. Shakespeare's
plots have their own laws of _regulae_, and according to these they are
regular.

"Maid's Tragedy."

Act i. The metrical arrangement is most slovenly throughout.

"_Strat._ As well as masque can be," &c.--

and all that follows to "who is return'd"--is plai