[In the following essay, Marsh-Lockett examines Jonson's efforts to educate King James on the tenets of successful monarchy through The Haddington Masque and The Masque of Queenes.]

In the canon of criticism of Ben Jonson's work, treatments of the masques and entertainments occupy relatively little space. For many years they were dismissed as subliterary types with little thematic significance, and only commentaries made by Jonson himself indicated a true appreciation of the literary merits of these works. In my consideration of the Jonsonian masque, however, I have found an apparent concern on Jonson's part with the idea of a “political Eden”; that is to say a concern with stable conditions of government. I have found, moreover, that the works fall into the genre of “Instructions to or Education of the Ruler.” Because I believe the masques are didactic, I see Jonson serving his intent by careful dramatization of the virtues and nature of political harmony in the masque and the dangers of chaos in the antimasque. Such didacticism, as the history of the period reveals, was inspired by James's failure to create harmony in England. Thus, the fictive James portrayed in the masques was actually an ironic contrast to the real James on the throne. The ideal ruler presented in the masque, then, may be read as a type of correction to the king, while the chaos of the antimasque, which more closely approximated the reality of Stuart England, may be viewed as a warning to James of the dangers of misrule.

Jonson's use of these royal spectacles in an expression of a consistent concern with the king and the climate of the Stuart court reflects the general Renaissance concern with good and effective government. Monarchy was believed to be the best form of government even for a world that was obviously changing. In an era that terminated the Middle Ages and heralded the beginning of modern scientific thought—an era that rejected scholasticism and began to adopt the empirical method of seeking truth—there was a challenge to the authority that for so long held sway over the minds of men. This challenge is reflected in Jonson's masques, not in terms of defiance, but in his attempt to admonish subtly the Stuarts concerning the responsibilities of the monarchy.

Jonson's admonition points to two characteristic notions which reflect a desire for order as opposed to chaos. The first is the Great Chain of Being, which represented the view of the structure of the universe from the Middle Ages through the eighteenth century. According to Arthur Lovejoy, the universe at that time was conceived of as “an immense … infinite number of links ranging in hierarchical order from the meagerest kind of existents [sic], … through ‘every possible’ grade up to the ens perfectissimum.”¹ Each link in the chain was believed to maintain its place whereupon the whole remained intact. The second notion, that of monarchy, is related to the first. If there were to be order and harmony, there would have to be a good monarch who would properly execute the duties of his office. Indeed, the age held high expectations of the monarch, expectations which are appropriately and poetically expressed in Charles Merbury's justification of absolutism: “A Brief Discourse of Monarchie as the Best Commonwealth: Tending unto the Dutiful Consideration or Rather Admiration of a Royal Princes Most Highe and Happy Estate” (1581). A brief excerpt illustrates the light in which the age regarded monarchy:

As there is nothing more comparable unto all living creatures, then to see the light and shining of the gladsome Sunne: So is there nothing more joyful unto all good subjectes, then to beholde the Glorie, and Maiestic of their soveraigne Prence. … If the Princes Power be in any pointe impaired or the brightnesse … his subiecte straight doth feele the Smarte and want thereof. … Even so the prosperous estate of the subiectes, is derived from the prosperitic of the Prince: their honour from his honour; their estimation from his estimation.²

Ben Jonson agreed fully with the foregoing concept of monarchy, namely that the well-being of his kingdom and his subjects depends directly upon the monarch's wisdom, justice, and goodness. This theme has not gone untreated by other critics whose influences have shaped my thinking of the masque. I have found, nevertheless, that the treatment of the notion of monarchy in the Jonsonian masque has been incomplete, for scholars have consistently either ignored the full implications of Jonson's wit or have inadequately analyzed it.

In this essay, therefore, I have set out to show how in The Haddington Masque and The Masque of Queenes Jonson has actively engaged in masking. That is to say, he exploits the idea from which the form takes its name. In so doing, Jonson goes beyond the masque's well-known use for entertainment and spectacle and makes it a mode of instruction. This “otherworldly” form, then, allows Jonson to provide James with covert instruction on his duties, to which end, Jonson has made use of every possible literary element of the masque. Such political concern is demonstrated in all of Jonson's masques and entertainments, inherent in the lines of which are the virtues to which James as monarch should have but did not appear to aspire.

We can, therefore, accept those critical views that hold that the Jonsonian masque may be classified as didactic literature. By using Jonson's own theory of the masque esthetic, however, we can refute the notion that Jonson was James's apologist. Indeed, in the light in which Jonson himself states that the masques should be read, they can be viewed as an attempt to educate James to the responsibilities of his office. But first, we must be mindful that Jonson's theory of hieroglyphics and very explicit instructions on the way in which the masques were to be read are carefully set forth in the Preface to Hymenaei (1608). It is here that the reader is informed of the serious nature of this literary form as well as Jonson's belief that the ultimate end of his masques is not spectacle and pageantry, but the promotion of the “poetic soul” of the form:

It is a noble and iust advantage, that the things subiected to vnderstanding haue of those which are obiected to sense, that the one sort are but momentarie, and meerely taking; the other impressing, and lasting: Else the glorie of all these solemnities hath perish'd like a blaze, and gone out, in the libeholders eyes. So shortliu'd are the bodies of all things, in comparison of their soules. And though bodies oft-times haue the ill luck to be sensually preferr'd, they find afterwards, the good fortune (when soules live) to be vtterly forgotten.³

For Jonson, then, the art of the masque was to be permanent, its implications far exceeding its external appearances. This was a conviction that Jonson took very seriously, for he would write also in Timber or Discoveries (1649) that the worthier part of art is that which addresses the understanding rather than the senses. According to Jonson, therefore, the function of the masque was to appeal to the eye but only as a way to stimulate the mind.

With Jonson's theory in mind, we must note that another significant quality of the Jonsonian masque was the fact that it was designed specifically for an aristocratic—indeed royal—audience:

This is hath made the most, royall Princes, and greatest persons (who are commonly the personaters of these actions) not onely studious of riches, and magnificence in the outward celebration, or shew: (which rightly become them) but curious after the most high, and heartie inuentions, to furnish the inward parts: (and those grounded vpon antiquitie, and solide learnings) which, though their voyce be taught to sound to present occasions, their sense, or doth, or should alwayes lay hold on more remou'd mysteries.

(ll. 10-18)

Intricately linked with the purpose and the appeal of the masque is Jonson's concern for statecraft, for his chief concern, particularly in these lines, is that through the masque, as he envisions it, should be revealed the concept or “more remou'd mysteries” of what statecraft should be. In this respect, he was in step with the emblem writers of the era. Both intended that their esthetics should be perceived and appreciated fully by learned audiences and thus be appropriately viewed. Jonson clearly sets forth this idea in The King's Entertainment at Fen Church:

Neither was it becoming, or could it stand with the dignitie of these shewes … to require a Truch-man, or (with the ignorant painter) one to write, This is a Dog; or, This is a Hare: but so to be presented, as vpon the view, they might, without cloud, or obscuritie, declare themselues to the sharpe and learned.

(ll. 259-65)

In this light, then, the noble audience at Whitehall would be expected to perceive and comprehend the “more remou'd mysteries,” the platonic ideals embedded in the voice and sense of each of these court hieroglyphics.

To achieve his end, Jonson, unlike his predecessors, made the masque a serious exercise in scholarship. The early masques, therefore, are extensively annotated by Jonson himself, and these annotations help dictate the reader's perception of Jonson's notion of statecraft. Such is the case with Hymenaei, in which his extensive footnotes reflect his political concerns, specifically his concern for the necessary union between king and state.

Concern with statecraft is fundamental to all of Jonson's masques and, in this estimation, far surpasses the need for spectacle alone. Again, he makes this commitment to the function of the masque clear in the Preface to Hymenaei when he addresses those viewers whose tastes and preferences differ from his own, those who “may squemishly crie out, that all endeavor of learning, and sharpnesse in these transitorie devices especially, where it steps beyond their little, or (let me not wrong ‘hem) no braine at all is superfluous … “(ll. 19-23). Here again, he has emphasized that the masque should be a stimulating intellectual experience for the royal viewers. For these individuals, Jonson resolves to furnish an “education”: “a few Italian herbs, pick'd vp, and made into a sallade,” which, he hopes, “may find sweeter acceptance, then all, the most nourishing and sound meates of the world” (ll. 26-28).

As in all of his other court masques and entertainments, Jonson's concern with addressing the virtues of kingship finds expression in The Haddington Masque, which was produced a month after Hymenaei. A wedding masque, The Haddington Masque, like Hymenaei, has the necessity of unity and order as its underlying themes. Produced at court on Shrove Tuesday night, 1608, The Haddington Masque was a celebration of the marriage of Viscount Haddington, formerly John Ramsey, to Lady Elizabeth Radcliffe, daughter of Robert, Earl of Sussex. Haddington is said to have saved James' life in 1600 when the Earl of Gowrie and his brother Alexander Ruthoen attempted unsuccessfully to murder him.⁴

The staging of the masque, in itself, could have aggravated an already poor relationship between James and Parliament. Having unsuccessfully broached the issue of union with Scotland, James would attempt to revive it in November 1606. Moreover, he would attempt to confer the status of nationalized Englishmen on “post-nati—people” born in Scotland after his accession to the throne of England.⁵ At the time of the staging of the masque, then, Englishmen were wary of James' relationship with the Scottish nobility.

Jonson, however, finds in his task of producing the masque an opportunity again to teach and to delight. Inherent in the masque, therefore, are notions of perfection and love. Jonson embodies these notions in an old legend: the tale of a runaway Cupid pursued by his mother, Venus, and her graces. The tale had been widely imitated in Italy and France, and Spenser had also used it in The Shepherd's Calendar.⁶ Jonson now uses Cupid's antics as the basis for an antimasque, a form on which Jonson would later elaborate. Thus, in this masque, we encounter, for the first time, a dramatization of discord which results when the proper kingly virtues are missing, and a resolution of the discord when the proper virtues are embraced. That Cupid should be separated from Venus means that there is discord in the world of the masque. He is not a Cupid from The Masque of Beautie (1605) who represents the Neoplatonic concept of love which results from the ability to perceive beauty. Jonson here uses an older concept of Cupid, Veneris filius, who gives rise to disorder:

Beauties haue you seen this toy,
          Called loue, a little boy
          Almost naked, wanton, blind
          Cruel now; and then as kind?

(ll. 86-89)

Cupid running rampant has very negative implications for the world of the masque—the transformed world of the Stuart court—as we are told by the three graces:

                                                            1. Grace
Still the fairest are his fuell
          When his daies are to be cruell
          Louers hearts are all his food;
          And his bathes their warmest bloud;
          Naught but wounds his hand doth season
          And he hates none like to Reason.
                                                            2. Grace
Trust him not: his wounds, though sweet,
          Seldome with his heart doe meet
          All his practise is deceit;
          Euerie gift it is a bait;
          Not a kisse, but poyson beares;
          An most treason in his teares.
                                                            3. Grace
Idle minutes are his raigne;
          The, the straggler makes his gaine,
          By presenting maids with toyes,
          And would haue yee think, ‘hem ioyes:
          ‘Tis the ambition of the elfe,
          To haue all childish, as himselfe.

(ll. 128-47)

The Cupid portrayed here represents a disorder, which in a political context is destructive. The masque as a genre applauds order. Therefore, Cupid must be reunited with Venus in order for there to be a proper enactment of love and for there to be order. In the political world, the sovereign had to be guided by divine love according to Renaissance dicta. Without this love, he could degenerate into tyranny, and chaos would ensue. Thus, Jonson, through the masque, argues that both within and beyond the context of the masque, there is a need for order.

Because, however, the masque as an art form involves the resolution of discord, the chaos in The Haddington Masque has to be resolved. Here, it is the wanton Cupid who initiates the resolution. When Venus finally encounters Cupid, he is surrounded by twelve boys “most antickly attyrr'd” who represent “the sports and prettie lightnesses” that accompany love. Cupid boasts of a feat:

That hath so much honor wonne,
Vnto Venus, and her Sonne.

(ll. 181-82)

Cupid refuses to reveal the nature of his feat to Venus and, thus, allows for the entry of Hymen, whose rebuke of Venus opens the way for the statement of the theme of the masque: perfection which is tantamount to order. Hymen censures Venus for having left alone her star on a night when it should be crowned with her light since she is the prafect of marriage. This star, Aeneas, is James. In his note, Jonson accounts for his equation of James with Aeneas. It is an equation which states key virtues of kingship which, as the Oxford editors note, are also found in James's own Basilikon Doron:⁷

Aeneas, the sonne of Venus, Virgil makes through out the most exquisite patterne of Pietie, Justice, Prudence, and all other princely virtues, with whom (in way of the excellence) I conferre my Soueraigne. …

(Note b)

In dubbing James “Aeneas,” therefore, Jonson again attempts to instruct James on the virtues that he, as monarch, should embrace in order that there be an orderly and harmonious kingdom.

Cupid's feat has been to unite Venus with Hymen and to facilitate Hymen's didactic statement of what the monarch should be:

                                                            A prince that drawes
By example more, than others doe by lawes:
That it so iust to his great act and thought
To doe, not what Kings may, but what Kings ought.
Who out of pietie, vnto peace, is vow'd;
To spare his subjects; yet to quell the proud,
An cares esteem it the first fortitude,
To haue his passions, foes at home, subdued,

(ll. 216-23)

Hymen points out, then, that the ruler is bound to lead an exemplary existence, one in which he is motivated by duty rather than by will. He is bound, too, in the interest of peace rather than piety, to rule fairly, and in so doing control his passions. Only then can he reap the reward of being a good monarch.

In this light, Venus now undertakes her role. Divine love engenders royal renown:

I love and know his vertues, and doe boast
Mine owne renowne, when I renoune him most.

(ll. 237-38)

Cupid's role, then, is placed in its proper perspective:

My Cvpid's absence I forgiue, and praise,
That me to such a present grace could raise.

(ll. 239-40)

After the discourse between Hymen and Venus, Vulcan appears. Hymen has prepared us for Vulcan's role:

                                                            Vnderneath that hill,
He, and his Cyclopes, are forging
still
Some strange, and curious peece to adorne the night
And give these graced Nuptials greater light.

(ll. 250-53)

The hill, we learned at the beginning of the action, “was a high steepe, red cliffe, advancing it selfe into the clouds. … This cliff was also a note of height, greatness, and antiquitie. …” The hill is also decorated with icons of love, triumph, and victory.

Vulcan appears in traditional attire: “in a cassocke gift to him; with bare armes; his haire and beard rough; his hat of blue, and ending in a Cone: In his hand, a hammer, and tongs; as coming from the Forge” (ll. 254-58). Jonson himself illuminates Vulcan's role in the masque when, in an annotation, he cites the ancient poet's use of Vulcan as the masterful artificer of perfection. In this light, Vulcan's role is similar to that of the masque writer who uses the form to portray to his viewers his own rendition of the perfect and the ideal.

As the hill parts, it is revealed to us that Vulcan has forged the icon of perfection:

… an artificiall Sphere made of siluer, eighteen foot in the Diameter, that turned perpetually: the Coluri were heightened with gold; so were the Artick and Antartick circles, the Tropicks, the Aequinoticall, the Meridian and Horizon; onely the Zodiacke was of pure gold: in which, the Masquers, vnder the Characters of the twelve Signes, were plac'd answering them in number. …

(ll. 266-72)

Here we find an emblem of perfection and unity, ideals to which James as monarch would be expected to aspire. This emblem takes the form of the circle, which we remember along with its related forms from Beautie and Hymenaei. Moreover, the light and heat associated with Vulcan and his forging of this icon is in keeping with the occasion of the masque and its implicit theme of unity.

That Vulcan and the cyclops fashion a zodiac is significant both within and beyond the masque. In Hymenaei, Jonson had already used the circle as a symbol of perfection, and there he had stated that nuptials “affected Perfection of Life.” In The Haddington Masque, he restates the association of the circle and related forms with the notion of perfection in terms of a commonly known correspondence:

It is a spheare, I'haue formed round, and euen,
In due proportion to the spheare
of heauen
With all his lines, and circles;
that compose
The perfect'st forme, and aptly doe disclose
The heauen of marriage; which I title
it.

(ll. 276-80)

But Jonson's message remains clear if we remain mindful that marriage involves union. It is only in union that there can be perfection and continuation of life. If in the state there is to be perfection, there must be order; and if there is to be order, there must exist the union of subjects and the sovereign who is guided by divine love. This need, then, gives rise to perfection as a reason for celebration in the well-ordered kingdom just as it is hailed in the epithalamion.

The absence of such unity, however, gives rise to chaos and dissonance. This is the theme of The Masque of Queenes, in which Jonson dramatizes a chaos that ensues when a world is run by vice and misrule. Presented at Whitehall in 1609, Queenes represents the complete evolution of the antimasque form started in The Haddington Masque. In the masque of 1609, the queen's request necessitated the form. This would be the third time that she had made a specific request of Jonson, on this occasion requiring that he “think on some Daunce, or shew, that might praecede hers, and haue the place of foyle, or false-Masque …” (ll. 12-13).

Jonson could easily honor her request in addition to meeting the requirement of poetic and political decorum. He tells us that he has chosen as the argument a celebration of honorable and true fame bred out of “vertue.” Didacticism and praise, therefore, are present; and with the queen's request, Jonson is able to establish a startling contrast between the entities of chaos and disorder and a noble and ideal kingdom. He therefore proceeds to devise a show of twelve women “in the habite of Haggs, or Witches, sustayning the persons of Ignorance, Suspicion, Credulity, etc., the opposites to good Fame … not as a Masque, but as a spectacle of strangenesse, producing multiplicity of Gesture, and not vnaptly sorting w[i]th the current and whole fall of the Deuise” (ll. 17-22).

The spectators were familiar with the idea of witches, which were a part of English folklore. In 1606, the witches of Shakespeare's Macbeth had been the awful harbingers of tragedy in the Scottish kingdom. Jonson's witches, then, are akin to those of Shakespeare (except in their specific dramatic functions and in the quality of the poetry they utter). Nevertheless, their natures are the same. They represent a world where all is wrong—a world where evil ensues as a result of the violation of cosmic law. Indeed, when they enter, things become topsy-turvy: fair is foul and foul is fair.

When the masque opens, Whitehall represents the summum malum—an earthly hell in which run rampant ignorance, suspicion, credulity, and all other vices that can destroy a well-ordered kingdom. Both within and without Whitehall, therefore, Jonson's hell assumes appropriate significance. Jonson's hell is the only duly horrible seat of evil designed by Inigo Jones:

… that wch presented it selfe was an ougly Hell;
wch flaiming beneath, smoaked ynto the top of the
          Roofe.
And, in respect all Euills are (morally) sayd to come
          from Hell.

(ll. 24-27)

From this heel emerge witches bearing implements of magic and evil. Through charms, they summon up their dame. These charms represent evidence of Jonson's extensive research into demonology. The third charm describes disorder in nature which sets the stage for the entry of the dame:

The Owle is abroad, the Bat, and the Toade,
          And so is the Cat-a-Mountaine;
The Ant, and the Mole sit both in a hole,
          And Frog peepes out o' the fountayne;
The Dogges, they do bay, and the Timbrells play
          The Spindle is now a turning;
The Moone it is red, and the starres are fled,
          But all the Skye is a burning:
The Ditch is made, and or nayles the spayde,
With pictures full, of waxe, and of wooll;
Theyr liuers I stick, wth needles quick
There lackes but the blood, to make vp the flood.

(ll. 75-76)

Here we find the correspondences that the Renaissance knew. Natural disorder indicated political disorder. In this connection, we recall the natural portents which occurred on the night before Caesar's assassination in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar (1599). We recall, also, the heath scene in King Lear (1606). When as a result of his poor judgment Lear's kingdom collapses, he goes insane. Correspondingly, the discord in the political realm is reflected in nature's rebellion.

With the entry of the dame, a depiction inspired by Homer's depiction of Ate or Mischief, we, as would be the spectators, are prepared for the enumeration of the witches, their statement of purpose, and the recitation of their antics. In a chain-like fashion, each leads the other. The chain, indicative of the chain of causes and effects, begins with Ignorance. It includes Suspicion, Credulity, Falsehood, Nuisance, Malice, Rage, and Mischief. Their aim, as the opposites of Fame and Glory, is to create chaos within the world of the masque. The dame makes their declaration:

                                                            Vertue,
else, will deeme
Our powers decreas't, and thinke vs banish'd earth,
No lesse then heauen. All her antique birth,
As Iustice, Fayth, she will restore;
and, bold
Vpon or sloth, retriue her Age of Gold.
We must not let or natiue manners, thus,
Corrupt wth ease. Ill liues not, but in vs.
I hate to see these fruicts of a soft peace;
And curse the piety giues it such increase.
Let vs disturbe it, then; and blast the light;
Mixe Hell, wth Heauen; and make Nature
fight
Within her selfe; loose the whole henge of Things;
And cause the Endes runne backe into theyr Springs.

(ll. 136-50)

Therein lies the didacticism. The dame's statement—that within the realm of these vices lives ill—has far-reaching implications beyond the world of the antimasque. Superficially, she could, perhaps, be arguing the royal cause by referring to the discontent of subjects, but her speech also serves as a warning to James concerning the onslaught of chaos as a result of vice and misrule.

Jonson sustains the theme of disorder through the antics of the hags and the recitation of their antics, which perpetuates the idea of a reversal in the natural order of things. All of this chaos is brought into the immediate reality of Whitehall through the media of music and dance. To the tune of “strange and sodayne Musique,” the witches fall into a “magicall Daunce, full of praeposterous change, and jesticulation. …” Already we have considered the significance of the circle, the icon of perfection. The normal motion of the construction is clockwise. The witches, however, as Jonson states, “do all thinges contrary to the custome of Men. …” Therefore, while they dance in circles, they do so “back to back, hip to hip … theyr circles backward, to the left hand wth strange phantastique motions of theyr heads and bodyes” (ll. 348-50).

On this climactic note, the antimasque ends. The forces of chaos and disorder triumph and revel in their own well-being in the momentarily transformed world of Whitehall. So it was, also, that in the political reality of England, there existed chaos and disorder. Change, therefore, is necessary. We are mindful that the masque educates largely through praise. Thus, the revels of the witches are suddenly disrupted, and the hags, along with their hell, are banished and replaced by an immediate transformation scene. White-hall, therefore, becomes similar to Chaucer's House of Fame, in which are found “twelue Masquers sitting vpon a Throne trimuphall, erected in a forme of a Pyramide, and circled wth all store of light …” (ll. 360-63). In this environment we find the antitheses of the powers of darkness: Herojque Vertue and Fame. Both of these were considered attributes of a good monarch. It is fitting, therefore, that their appearance in the world of the antimasque should lead into the masque proper for the celebration of the ideal.

For their iconography, Jonson has turned to the classics. His annotation states that the Ancients portrayed Virtue as one of three classical figures who epitomize virtue and strength: Hercules, Perseus, and Bellerophon. In this instance, Jonson has chosen to portray Heroic Virtue as Perseus. It is from Herojque Vertue and his subsidiary Fame that the powers of darkness flee.

For Fame, Jonson has consulted Ripa's Iconologia, from which he takes the image of Fama Bona. Fame thus appears

… attir'd in white, wth white Wings, hauing a collar of Gold, about her neck, and a heart hanging at it: wch Orus Apollo in his Hieroglyp interprets the note of a good fame. In her right hand she bore a trumpet, in her left an oliue-branch, and for her state it was as Virgil describes her, at the full, her feete on the Ground, and her head in the Cloudes.

(ll. 449-54)

Bearing the icons of glory and peace, Fame has both earthly and divine association. She is, moreover, the offspring of Virtue. Fame, therefore, would be the reward of the virtuous monarch; and with Fame would come other gifts, the same gifts that, within the transformed Banqueting Hall at Whitehall, would usher in the masquers upon Fame's instruction:

                                                            This is a night of nights.
In mine owne Chariots, let them crowned
ride;
And mine owne Birds & Beests in queeres apply'd
To draw them forth: Vnto the first Carre,
tie
Farre-sighted Eagles, to note Fame's sharp eye
Vnto the second, Griffons, that designe
Swiftnesse and strength, two other guifts of mine:
Vnto the last, or Lions, that implie
The top of graces, State and Maiestie.

(ll. 463-71)

At this point, then, the masque of queens (i.e., Queen Anne and her ladies) can take place. The paradigms of disorder have been dispensed with, and the masquers, led by Bel-Anna, here, Queen Anne herself, personate some of the most heroic and virtuous women of antiquity. Thus, the masque ends with a happy and well-ordered society celebrating its own well-being.

The irony of The Masque of Queenes, however, is clear. It lies in the establishment of the tension between the platonic conception of the main masque and the completely antithetical world of the witches which threatens the ideal. This establishment serves a decidedly didactic purpose when we consider the reality contemporary with the masque. In the main masque, Herojque Vertue makes the following address to James:

To you, most royall, and most happy King,
Of whome Fames house, in euery part
doth ring
For every vertue.
…
To you that cheris euery great Example
Contracted in you selfe,. …

(ll. 432-37)

This is an ideal king. The real monarch, however, provided a disturbing contrast for contemporary England; but we remember that because the masque educates through praise, the king is advised that he should be virtuous in order that the forces of chaos and disorder should be banished forever from England.

Between 1603 and 1609—Jonson's early masque-writing period, which began with James' accession to the throne—we see Jonson actively engaged in instruction in the masques. Initially, in his welcome to James, he presents those attributes that the nation could reasonably expect of its ruler. As the period progresses, however, we see a continuation of the trend in instruction, the need for which is supported by the actuality of James's conduct. We find, moreover, a note of urgency implied by the germ of the antimasque in The Haddington Masque. Indeed, this urgency is fully expressed with the complete development of the antimasque in the obvious meaning Jonson tries to convey to James in The Masque of Queenes.

Notes

1. Arthur O. Lovejoy, The Great Chain of Being: A Study in the History of an Idea (Cambridge: Harvard Univ. Press, 1957), p. 59

2. A Discourse of Monarchie as of the Best Commonwealth: Tending unto the Dutiful Consideration or Rather Admiration of a Royal Princes Most Highe and Happy Estate (London: Thomas Vautrollier, 1581), pp. 1-2.

3. Ben Jonson, Hymenaei, in Ben Jonson, 10 vols., ed. Charles H. Herford and Percy and Evelyn Simpson (1959; rpt. Oxford: Clarendon, 1961), Vol. VII, ll. 1-10. All further references to the masques are from this edition and are cited within the text.

4. Stephen Orgel, Ben Jonson: The Complete Masques (New Haven: Yale Univ. Press, 1969), p. 477.

5. S. Reed Brett, The Stuart Century: 1603-1614 (London: George Harrap and Company, Ltd., 1961), p. 33.

6. Herford and Simpson, II, p. 276.

7. Herford and Simpson, II, p. 276.