Page:A study of Ben Jonson (IA studyofbenjonson00swinrich).pdf/110

 which has it is above all prose that ever was or ever can be written. And there never was a generation of Englishmen in which this magic was a gift so common as it was in Jonson's. We have but to open either of the priceless volumes which we owe to the exquisite taste and the untiring devotion of Mr. Bullen, and we shall come upon scores after scores of 'lyrics from Elizabethan songbooks' as far beyond comparison with the very best of Jonson's as Shakespeare is beyond comparison with Shirley, as Milton is beyond comparison with Glover, or as Coleridge is beyond comparison with Southey. There is exceptional ease of movement, exceptional grace of expression, in the lyric which evoked from Gifford the 'free' avowal, 'if it be not the most beautiful song in the language, I know not, for my part, where it is to be found.' Who on earth, then or now, would ever have supposed that the worthy Gifford did? But any one who does know anything more of the matter than the satirist and reviewer whose own amatory verses were 'lazy as Scheldt and cold as Don' will acknowledge that it would be difficult to enumerate the names of poets contemporary with Jonson, from Frank Davison to Robin Herrick, who have left us songs at least as beautiful as that beginning—'Oh do not wanton with those eyes, Lest I be sick