William Allan Neilson

“ Furness’s scepticism is not confined to the question of Euphuism at court. He has little sympathy with the attempts to identify the characters of Love ’s Labour ’s Lost with historical personages, as, for example, Holofernes with Florio. In this he will, we imagine, carry with him an increasing number of modern scholars. Less general assent will be won by his opposition to the view of Biron and Rosaline as the predecessors of Benedick and Beatrice. He admits that “Berowne and Benedick are in love against their will; Rosaline and Beatrice are irrepressibly fond of banter;” ”

“ He seems to forget that the compositor’s reader, if not the compositor himself, must still have used his eye, and so must have been liable to the same kind of mistake as was made at times by the compositor when he set directly from written copy. ”

“ No one seems to have questioned the belief. Sir Walter Scott held it, and on the basis of it made an unfortunate attempt to embody it in the character of Sir Piercie Shafton in The Monastery. Modern editors and students of Lyly, men like Mr. Bond and Professor Baker, Dr. Landmann and Professor C. G. Child, have committed themselves to it. And now, at this late date, Dr. Furness takes us all aback by telling us that he sees no good ground for believing it. ”

“ He exposes the weakness of the positive evidence, and produces negative evidence. The positive evidence consists solely, he holds, in the statement of a bookseller, Edward Blount, who issued in 1632 an edition of six of Lyly’s comedies. ”

“ Wilson, denouncing the use of “straunge ynkehorn terms” and other affectations, remarks that “the fine courtier will talk nothing but Chaucer.” “To whom,” asks Dr. Furness, “are we to give credence, Edward Blount, a bookseller, or Thomas Wilson, a courtier? ”