Such wonders true poetry and passion can do, to confer dignity upon subjects which do not seem capable of it.

But Aspatia must not be compared at all points with Helena; she does not so absolutely predominate over her situation but she suffers some diminution, some abatement of the full lustre of the female character, which Helena never does.

Her character has many degrees of sweetness, some of delicacy; but it has weakness, which, if we do not despise, we are sorry for.

After all, Beaumont and Fletcher were but an inferior sort of Shakspeares and Sidneys.
_Philaster_ .-- The character of Bellario must have been extremely popular in its day.

For many years after the date of Philaster's first exhibition on the stage, scarce a play can be found without one of these women-pages in it, following in the train of some pre-engaged lover, calling on the gods to bless her happy rival (his mistress), whom no doubt she secretly curses in her heart, giving rise to many pretty _equivoques_ by the way on the confusion of sex, and either made happy at last by some surprising turn of fate, or dismissed with the joint pity of the lovers and the audience.