lass at
most. "How greatly it is all planned!" the first requisite of all great
work, and one of which the highest genius possible to a greatly gifted
barbarian could by no possibility understand the nature or conceive the
existence. That Goethe "had thought of translating it" is perhaps hardly
less precious a tribute to its greatness than the fact that it has been
actually and admirably translated by the matchless translator of
Shakespeare--the son of Victor Hugo, whose labor of love may thus be
said to have made another point in common, and forged as it were another
link of union, between Shakespeare and the young master of Shakespeare's
youth. Of all great poems in dramatic form it is perhaps the most
remarkable for absolute singleness of aim and simplicity of
construction; yet is it wholly free from all possible imputation of
monotony or aridity. "Tamburlaine" is monotonous in the general roll and
flow of its stately and sonorous verse through a noisy wilderness of
perpetual bluster and slaughter; but the unity of tone and purpose in
"Doctor Faustus" is not unrelieved by change of manner and variety of
incident. The comic scenes, written evidently with as little of labor
as of relish, are for the most part scarcely more than transcripts,
thrown into the form of dialogue, from a popular prose _History of Dr.
Faustus_, and therefore should be set down as little to the discredit as
to the credit of the poet. Few masterpieces of any age in any language
can stand beside this tragic poem--it has hardly the structure of a
play--for the qualities of terror and splendor, for intensity of purpose
and sublimity of note. In the vision of Helen, for example, the intense
perception of loveliness gives actual sublimity to the sweetness and
radiance of mere beauty in the passionate and spontaneous selection of
words the most choice and perfect; and in like manner the sublimity of
simplicity in Marlowe's conception and expression of the agonies endured
by Faustus under the immediate imminence of his doom gives the highest
note of beauty, the quality of absolute fitness and propriety, to the
sheer straightforwardness of speech in which his agonizing horror finds
vent ever more and more terrible from the first to the last equally
beautiful and fearful verse of that tremendous monologue which has no
parallel in all the range of tragedy.

It is now a commonplace of criticism to observe and regret the decline
of power and interest after