BOOK V ....................................................................................................................
I. A Ballad of Luther, the Pope, a Cardinal, and a Husbandman...............................
In the former Book we brought down this Second Series of poems as low as
about the middle of the sixteenth century. We now find the Muses deeply engaged in
religious controversy. The sudden revolution wrought in the opinions of mankind by
the Reformation, is one of the most striking events in the history of the human mind.
It could not but engross the attention of every individual in that age, and therefore no
other writings would have any chance to be read, but such as related to this grand
topic. The alterations made in the established religion by Henry VIII., the sudden
changes it underwent in the three succeeding reigns within so short space as eleven or
twelve years, and the violent struggles between expiring Popery, and growing
Protestantism, could not but interest all mankind. Accordingly every pen was engaged
in the dispute. The followers of the old and new profession (as they were called) had
their respective ballad-makers; and every day produced some popular sonnet for or
against the Reformation; The following ballad, and that intitledLittle John Nobody,
may serve for specimens of the writings of each party. Both were written in the reign
of Edward VI.; and are not the worst that were composed upon the occasion.
Controversial divinity is no friend to poetic flights. Yet this ballad of "Luther and the
Pope," is not altogether devoid of spirit; it is of the dramatic kind, and the characters
are tolerably well sustained; especially that of Luther, which is made to speak in a
manner not unbecoming the spirit and courage of that vigorous reformer. It is printed
from the original black-letter copy (in the Pepys Collection, vol. i. folio), to which is
prefixed a large wooden cut, designed and executed by some eminent master.
We are not to wonder that the ballad-writers of that age should be inspired
with the zeal of controversy, when the very stage teemed with polemic divinity. I have
now before me two very ancient quarto black-letter plays: the one published in the
time of Henry VIII. intitledEvery Man; the other calledLusty Juventus, printed in
the reign of Edward VI. In the former of these, occasion is taken to inculcate great
reverence for old mother church and her superstitions;[1] in the other, the poet (one R.
Wever) with great success attacks both. So that the stage in those days literally was,
what wise men have always wished it -- a supplement to the pulpit. This was so much
the case, that in the play of "Lusty Juventus,' chapter and verse are every where
quoted as formally as in a sermon. Take an instance:
The Lord by his prophet Ezechiel sayeth in this wise playnlye,
As in the xxxiij chapter it doth appere:
Be converted, O ye children, &c.
From this play we learn that most of the young people were New Gospellers,
or friends to the Reformation, and that the old were tenacious of the doctrines imbibed
in their youth: for thus the Devil is introduced lamenting the downfal of superstition:
"The olde people would believe stil in my lawes,
But the yonger sort leade them a contrary way,
They wyl not beleve, they playnly say,
In olde traditions, and made by men," &c.And in another place Hypocrisy urges,
"The worlde was never meri
Since chyldren were so boulde: