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27. K. Henry VIII. 1601.
This play ſeems to have been entered on the Stationers’ books, February 12, 1604, under the title of the Enterlude[1] of K. Henry VIII. It was probably written, as Dr. John{ls}}on and Mr. Steevens obſerve, before the death of queen Elizabeth, which happened on the 24th of March 1603. The elogium on king James, which is blended with the panegyrick on Elizabeth, in the laſt ſcene, was evidently a ſubſequent inſertion, after the acceſſion of the Scotiſh monarch to the throne: for Shakſpeare was too well acquainted with courts, to compliment in the life-time of queen Elizabeth, her preſumptive ſucceſſor, of whom hiſtory informs us ſhe was not a little jealous. That the prediction concerning king James was added after the death of the queen, is ſtill more clearly evinced, as Dr. Johnſon has remarked, by the aukward manner in which it is connected with the foregoing and ſubſequent lines.
It may be objected, that if this play was written after the acceſſion of king James, the author could not introduce a panegyrick on him, without making queen Elizabeth the vehicle of it, ſhe being the object immediately preſented to the audience in the laſt act of K. Henry VIII. and that, therefore, the praiſes ſo profuſely laviſhed on her, do not prove this play to have been written in her life-time; on the contrary, that the concluding lines of her character ſeem to imply that ſhe was dead, when it was compoſed. The objection certainly has weight; but, I apprehend, the following obſervations afford a ſufficient anſwer to it.
1. It is more likely that Shakſpeare ſhould have written a play, the chief ſubject of which is, the diſgrace of queen Catharine, the aggrandizement of Anne Boleyn, and the birth of her daughter, in the life-time of that daughter, than after her death: at a time when the ſubject muſt have been
- ↑ This appears to be one of the many titles by which plays were anciently deſcribed. “ An Enterlude, entitled the tragedie of Richard III (not our author’s) was entered on the Stationers’ books, by Thomas Creede, June 19, 1594; and in the ſame year, Mother Bombie, a comedy by Lilly, appears to have been entered under the deſcription of “ A booke entituled Mother Bumbye, being an Enterlude.”
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