Essays

[Footnote 311: Elder English dramatists. The dramatists who preceded Shakespeare. In his essay on _Shakespeare; or, the Poet_, Emerson enumerates the foremost of these,--"Kyd, Marlowe, Greene, Jonson, Chapman, Dekker, Webster, Heywood, Middleton, Peele, Ford, Massinger, Beaumont and Fletcher."] [Footnote 312: Beaumont and Fletcher. Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher were two dramatists of the Elizabethan age. They wrote together and their styles were so similar that critics are unable to identify the share of each in their numerous plays.] [Footnote 313: Rodrigo, Pedro, or Valerio. Favorite names for heroes among the dramatists. Rodrigo Diaz de Bivar, known usually by the title of the Cid, was the national hero of Spain, famous for his exploits against the Moors. Don Pedro was the Prince of Arragon in Shakespeare's play, _Much Ado About Nothing_.] [Footnote 314: Bonduca, Sophocles, the Mad Lover, and Double Marriage. The first, third and fourth are names of plays by Beaumont and Fletcher. In the case of the second, Emerson, by a lapse of memory, gives the name of one of the chief characters instead of the name of the play--_The Triumph of Honor_ in a piece called _Four Plays in One_. It is from this play by Beaumont and Fletcher that the passage in the essay is quoted.] [Footnote 315: Adriadne's crown. According to Greek mythology, the crown of Adriadne was, for her beauty and her sufferings, put among the stars. She was the daughter of Minos, King of Crete; she gave Theseus the clue by means of which he escaped from the labyrinth and she was afterwards abandoned by him.] [Footnote 316: Romulus. The reputed founder of the city of Rome.] [Footnote 317: Laodamia, Dion. Read these two poems by Wordsworth, the great English poet, and tell why you think Emerson mentioned them here.] [Footnote 318: Scott. Sir Walter Scott, a famous Scotch author.] [Footnote 319: Lord Evandale, Balfour of Burley. These are characters in Scott's novel, _Old Mortality_. The passage referred to by Emerson is in the forty-second chapter.] [Footnote 320: Thomas Carlyle. Carlyle was a great admirer of heroes, asserting that history is the biography of great men. One of his most popular books is _Heroes and Hero-Worship_, on a plan similar to that of Emerson's _Representative Men_.] [Footnote 321: Robert Burns. A Scotch lyric poet. Emerson was probably thinking of the patriotic song, _Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled_.] [Footnote 322: Harleian Miscellanies. A collection of manuscripts published in the eighteenth century, and named for Robert Harley, the English statesman who collected them.] [Footnote 323: Lutzen. A small town in Prussia. The battle referred to was fought in 1632 and in it the Swedes under Gustavus Adolphus gained a great victory over vastly superior numbers. Nearly two hundred years later another battle was fought at Lutzen, in which Napoleon gained a victory over the allied Russians and Prussians.] [Footnote 324: Simon Ockley. An English scholar of the seventeenth century whose chief work was a _History of the Saracens_.] [Footnote 325: Oxford. One of the two great English universities.] [Footnote 326: Plutarch. (See note 264.)] [Footnote 327: Brasidas. This hero, described by Plutarch, was a Spartan general who lived about four hundred years before Christ.] [Footnote 328: Dion. A Greek philosopher who ruled the city of Syracuse in the fourth century before Christ.] [Footnote 329: Epaminondas. A Greek general and statesman of the fourth century before Christ.] [Footnote 330: Scipio. (See note 205.)] [Footnote 331: Stoicism. The stern and severe philosophy taught by the Greek philosopher Zeno; he taught that men should always seek virtue and be indifferent to pleasure and happiness. This belief, carried to the extreme of severity, exercised a great influence on many noble Greeks and Romans.] [Footnote 332: Heroism is an obedience, etc. In one of his poems Emerson says: "So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man, When Duty whispers low, 'Thou must,' The youth replies, 'I can.'" ] [Footnote 333: Plotinus. An Egyptian philosopher who taught in Rome during the third century. It was said that he so exalted the mind that he was ashamed of his body.] [Footnote 334: Indeed these humble considerations, etc. The passage, like many which Emerson quotes, is rendered inexactly. The Prince says to Poins: "Indeed these humble considerations make me out of love with my greatness. What a disgrace it is to me to remember thy name! or to know thy face to-morrow! or to take note how many pairs of silk stockings thou hast, that is, these and those that were thy peach-colored ones! or to bear the inventory of thy shirts, as, one for superfluity and another for use!" Shakespeare's _Henry IV._, Part II. 2, 2.] [Footnote 335: Ibn Hankal. Ibn Hankul, an Arabian geographer and traveler of the tenth century. He wrote an account of his twenty years' travels in Mohammedan countries; in 1800 this was translated into English by Sir William Jones under the title of _The Oriental Geography of Ibn Hankal_. In that volume this anecdote is told in slightly different words.] [Footnote 336: Bokhara. Where is Bokhara? It corresponds to the ancient Sogdiana.] [Footnote 337: Bannocks. Thick cakes, made usually of oatmeal. What does Emerson mean by this sentence? Probably no person ever met his visitors, many of whom were "exacting and wearisome," and must have been unwelcome, with more perfect courtesy and graciousness than Emerson.] [Footnote 338: John Eliot. Give as full an account as you can of the life and works of this noble Apostle to the Indians of the seventeenth century.] [Footnote 339: King David, etc. See First Chronicles, 11, 15-19.] [Footnote 340: Brutus. Marcus Junius Brutus, a Roman patriot of the first century before Christ, who took part in the assassination of Julius Cæsar.] [Footnote 341: Philippi. A city of Macedonia near which in the year 42 B.C. were fought two battles in which the republican army under Brutus and Cassius was defeated by Octavius and Antony, friends of Cæsar.] [Footnote 342: Euripides. A Greek tragic poet of the fifth century before Christ.] [Footnote 343: Scipio. (See note 205.) Plutarch in his _Morals_ gives another version of the story: "When Paetilius and Quintus accused him of many crimes before the people; 'on this very day,' he said, 'I conquered Hannibal and Carthage. I for my part am going with my crown on to the Capitol to sacrifice; and let him that pleaseth stay and pass his vote upon me.' Having thus said, he went his way; and the people followed him, leaving his accusers declaiming to themselves."] [Footnote 344: Socrates. (See note 187.)] [Footnote 345: Prytaneum. A public hall at Athens.] [Footnote 346: Sir Thomas More. An English statesman and author who was beheaded in 1535 on a charge of high treason. The incident to which Emerson refers is one which showed his "pleasant wit" undisturbed by the prospect of death. As the executioner was about to strike, More moved his head carefully out of reach of the ax. "Pity that should be cut," he said, "that has never committed treason."] [Footnote 347: Blue Laws. Any rigid Sunday laws or religious regulations. The term is usually applied to the early laws of New Haven and Connecticut which regulated personal and religious conduct.] [Footnote 348: Epaminondas. (See note 329.)]