usted its whole store. The
underlying thought in many passages, though not deserving Dryden's
contemptuous epithet, is sufficiently obvious. Chapman was not dowered
with the penetrating imagination that reveals as by a lightning flash
unsuspected depths of human character or of moral law. But he has the
gnomic faculty that can convey truths of general experience in
aphoristic form, and he can wind into a debatable moral issue with
adroit casuistry. Take for instance the discussion (II, i, 149-79) on
the legitimacy of private vengeance, or (III, i, 10-30) on the nature
and effect of sin, or (V, ii) on Nature's "blindness" in her workings.
In lighter vein, but winged with the shafts of a caustic humour are
Bussy's invectives against courtly practices (I, i, 84-104) and
hypocrisy in high places (III, ii, 25-59), while the "flyting" between
him and Monsieur is perhaps the choicest specimen of Elizabethan
"Billingsgate" that has come down to us. It was a versatile pen that
could turn from passages like these to the epic narrative of the duel,
or Tamyra's lyric invocation of the "peaceful regents of the night" (II,
ii, 158), or Bussy's stately elegy upon himself, as he dies standing,
propped on his true sword.

It can only have been the ingrained prejudice of the Restoration period
against "metaphysical" verse that deadened Dryden's ear to the charm of
such passages as these. Another less notable poet and playwright of the
time showed more discrimination. This was Thomas D'Urfey, who in 1691
brought out a revised version of the play at the Theatre Royal. In a
dedication to Lord Carlisle which he prefixed to this version, on its
publication in the same year, he testifies to the great popularity of
the play after the reopening of the theatres.

"About sixteen years since, when first my good or ill stars
ordained me a Knight Errant in this fairy land of poetry, I
saw the _Bussy d'Ambois_ of Mr. Chapman acted by Mr. Hart,
which in spight of the obsolete phrases and intolerable
fustian with which a great part of it was cramm'd, and which I
have altered in these new sheets, had some extraordinary
beauties, which sensibly charmed me; which being improved by
the graceful action of that eternally renowned and best of
actors, so attracted not only me, but the town in general,
that they were obliged to pass by and excuse the gross errors
in the writing, and allow it amongst the ra