Chapter XXXVI: Canto I: , st. 41

[584] Prólogo to the “Obelisco.”

In a life thus extending to above fourscore years, nearly the whole of which was devoted to letters, Calderon produced a large number of works. Except, however, a panegyric on the Duke of Medina de Rioseco, who died in 1647, and a single volume of _autos_, which he printed in 1676, he published hardly any thing of what he wrote;[585] and yet, besides several longer works,[586] he prepared for the academies of which he was a member, and for the poetical festivals and joustings then so common in Spain, a great number of odes, songs, ballads, and other poems, which gave him not a little of his fame with his contemporaries.[587] His brother, indeed, printed some of his full-length dramas between 1640 and 1674;[588] but we are expressly told that Calderon himself never sent any of them to the press;[589] and even in the case of the _autos_, where he deviated from his established custom, he says he did it unwillingly, and only lest their sacred character should be impaired by imperfect and surreptitious publications.

[585] The account of the entrance of the new queen into Madrid,
in 1649, written by Calderon, was indeed printed; but it was
under the name of Lorenço Ramirez de Prado, who, assisted by
Calderon, arranged the festivities of the occasion.

[586] The unpublished works of Calderon, as enumerated by Vera
Tassis, Baena, and Lara, are:--

(1.) “Discurso de los Quatro Novísimos”; or what, in the technics
of his theology, are called the four last things to be thought
upon by man: viz., Death, Judgment, Heaven, and Hell. Lara
says Calderon read him three hundred octave stanzas of it, and
proposed to complete it in one hundred more. It is, no doubt,
lost.

(2.) “Tratado defendiendo la Nobleza de la Pintura.”

(3.) “Otro tratado, Defensa de la Comedia.”

(4.) “Otro tratado, sobre el Diluvio General.” These three
_tratados_ were probably poems, like the “Discurso.” At least,
that on the Deluge is mentioned as such by Montalvan and by Lara.

(5.) “Lágrimas, que vierte un Alma arrepentida á la Hora de la
Muerte.” This, however, is not unpublished, though so announced
by Vera Tassis. It is a little poem in the ballad measure,
which I detected first in a singular volume, where probably
it first appeared, entitled “Avisos para la Muerte, escritos
por algunos Ingenios de España, á la Devocion de Bernardo de
Obiedo, Secretario de su Majestad, etc., publicados por D. Luis
Arellano,” Valencia, 1634, 18mo, 90 leaves; reprinted, Zaragoza,
1648, and often besides. It consists of the contributions of
thirty poets, among whom are no less personages than Luis Vélez
de Guevara, Juan Perez de Montalvan, and Lope de Vega. The burden
of Calderon’s poem, which is given with his name attached to it,
is “O dulce Jesus mio, no entres, Señor, con vuestro siervo en
juicio!” The two following stanzas are a favorable specimen of
the whole:--

O quanto el nacer, O quanto,
Al morir es parecido!
Pues, si nacimos llorando,
Llorando tambien morimos.
O dulce Jesus mio, etc.

Un gemido la primera
Salva fué que al mundo hizimos,
Y el último vale que
Le hazemos es un gemido.
O dulce Jesus mio, etc.

How much resembles here our birth
The final hour of all!
Weeping at first we see the earth,
And weeping hear Death’s call.
O, spare me, Jesus, spare me, Saviour dear,
Nor meet thy servant as a Judge severe!

When first we entered this dark world,
We hailed it with a moan;
And when we leave its confines dark,
Our farewell is a groan.
O, spare me, Jesus, spare me, Saviour dear,
Nor meet thy servant as a Judge severe!

The whole of the little volume in which it occurs serves
curiously to illustrate Spanish manners, in an age when a
minister of state sought spiritual comfort by such means and in
such sources.

[587] Lara and Vera Tassis, both personal friends of Calderon,
speak of the number of these miscellanies as very great.

[588] There were four volumes in all, and Calderon, in his
Preface to the _Autos_, 1676, seems to admit their genuineness,
though he abstains, with apparent caution, from directly
declaring it, lest he should seem to imply that their publication
had ever been authorized by him.

[589] “All men well know,” says Lara, “that Don Pedro never sent
any of his _comedias_ to the press, and that those which were
printed were printed against his will.” Obelisco, Prólogo.

For forty-five years of his life, however, the press teemed with dramatic works bearing his name on their titles. As early as 1633, they began to appear in the popular collections; but many of them were not his, and the rest were so disfigured by the imperfect manner in which they had been written down during their representations, that he says he could often hardly recognize them himself.[590] His editor and friend, Vera Tassis, gives several lists of plays, amounting in all to a hundred and fifteen, printed by the cupidity of the booksellers as Calderon’s, without having any claim whatsoever to that honor; and he adds, that many others, which Calderon had never seen, were sent from Seville to the Spanish possessions in America.[591]

[590] The earliest of these fraudulent publications of
Calderon’s plays that I have seen is in the very rare collection
of “Comedias compuestas por Diferentes Autores,” Tom. XXV.,
Zaragoza, 1633, 4to, where is Calderon’s “Astrólogo Fingido,”
given with a recklessness as to omissions and changes that is the
more remarkable, because Escuer, who published the volume, makes
great professions of his editorial care and faithfulness. (See
f. 191. b.) In the larger collection of Comedias, in forty-eight
volumes, begun in 1652, there are fifty-three plays attributed,
in whole or in part, to Calderon, some of which are certainly not
his, and all of them, so far as I have examined, scandalously
corrupted in their text. All of them, too, were printed as
early as 1679; that is, two years before Calderon’s death, and
therefore before there was sufficient authority for publishing
any one of them.

[591] Probably several more may be added to the list of dramas
that are attributed to Calderon, and yet are not his. I have
observed one, entitled “El Garrote mas bien dado,” in “El Mejor
de los Mejores Libros de Comedias Nuevas,” (Madrid, 1653, 4to),
where it is inserted with others that are certainly genuine.

By means like these, the confusion became at last so great, that the Duke of Veraguas, then the honored head of the family of Columbus, and Captain-general of the kingdom of Valencia, wrote a letter to Calderon in 1680, asking for a list of his dramas, by which, as a friend and admirer, he might venture to make a collection of them for himself. The reply of the poet, complaining bitterly of the conduct of the booksellers which had made such a request necessary, is accompanied by a list of one hundred and eleven full-length dramas and seventy sacramental _autos_ which he claims as his own.[592] This catalogue constitutes the proper basis for a knowledge of Calderon’s dramatic works, down to the present day. All the plays mentioned in it have not, indeed, been found. Nine are not in the editions of Vera Tassis, in 1682, and of Apontes, in 1760; but, on the other hand, a few not in Calderon’s list have been added to theirs upon what has seemed sufficient authority; so that we have now seventy-three sacramental _autos_, with their introductory _loas_,[593] and one hundred and eight _comedias_, on which his reputation as a dramatic poet is hereafter to rest.[594]

[592] This correspondence, so honorable to Calderon, as well as
to the head of the family of Columbus, who signs himself proudly,
_El Almirante Duque_,--as Columbus himself had required his
descendants always to sign themselves, (Navarrete, Tom. II. p.
229),--is to be found in the “Obelisco,” and again in Huerta,
“Teatro Hespañol” (Madrid, 1785, 12mo, Parte II. Tom. III.). The
complaints of Calderon about the booksellers are very bitter, as
well they might be; for in 1676, in his Preface to his _Autos_,
he says that their frauds took away from the hospitals and other
charities--which yet received only a small part of the profits of
the theatre--no less than twenty-six thousand ducats annually.

[593] All the _loas_, however, are not Calderon’s; but it is no
longer possible to determine which are not so. “No son todas
suyas” is the phrase applied to them in the Prólogo of the
edition of 1717.

[594] Vera Tassis tells us, indeed, in his Life of Calderon,
that Calderon wrote a hundred _saynetes_, or short farces; about
a hundred _autos sacramentales_; two hundred _loas_; and more
than one hundred and twenty _comedias_. But he collected for
his edition (Madrid, 1682-91, 9 tom., 4to) only the _comedias_
mentioned in the text, and a few more, probably twelve, intended
for an additional volume that never was printed. Nor do any more
appear in the edition by Apontes, Madrid, 1760-63, 11 tom., 4to;
nor in the more correct one published at Leipzig in 1827-30, 4
bände, 8vo, by J. J. Keil, an accomplished Spanish scholar of
that city. It is probable, therefore, that their number will
not hereafter be much increased. And yet we know the names of
nine plays, recognized by Calderon himself, which are not in
any of these collections; and Vera Tassis gives us the names of
eight more, in which he says, Calderon, after the fashion of his
time, wrote a single act. Some of these ought to be recovered.
But though we should be curious to see any of them, we should
be more curious, considering how happy Calderon is in many of
his _graciosos_, to see some of the hundred _saynetes_ Vera
Tassis mentions, of which not one is known to be extant, though
the titles of six or seven are given in Huerta’s catalogue. The
_autos_, being the property of the city of Madrid, and annually
represented, were not permitted to be printed for a long time.
(Lara, Prólogo.) They were first published in 1717, in 6 volumes,
4to, and they fill the same number of volumes in the edition of
Madrid, 1759-60, 4to. These, however, are all the editions of
Calderon’s dramatic works, except a sort of counterfeit of that
of Vera Tassis, printed at Madrid in 1726, and the selections and
single plays printed from time to time both in Spain and in other
countries. Two, however, have been undertaken lately in Spain,
(1846), and one in Havana, (1840), but probably none of them
will be finished. See notices of Calderon, by F. W. V. Schmidt,
in the Wiener Jahrbücher der Literatur, Bände XVII., XVIII., and
XIX., 1822, to which I am much indebted, and which deserve to be
printed separately, and preserved.

In examining this large mass of Calderon’s dramatic works, it will be most convenient to take first, and by themselves, those which are quite distinct from the rest, and which alone he thought worthy of his care in publication,--his _autos_ or dramas for the Corpus Christi day. Nor are they undeserving of this separate notice. There is little in the dramatic literature of any nation more characteristic of the people that produced it than this department of the Spanish theatre; and among the many poets who devoted themselves to it, none had such success as Calderon.

Of the early character and condition of the _autos_ and their connection with the Church we have already spoken, when noticing Juan de la Enzina, Gil Vicente, Lope de Vega, and Valdivielso. They were, from the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, among the favorite amusements of the mass of the people; but at the period at which we are now arrived, they had gradually risen to be of great importance. That they were spread through the whole country, even into the small villages, we may see in the Travels of Augustin Roxas,[595] and in the Second Part of Don Quixote, where the mad knight is represented as meeting a car that was carrying the actors for the Festival of the Sacrament from one hamlet to another.[596] This, it will be remembered, was all before 1615. During the next thirty years, and especially during the last portion of Calderon’s life, the number and consequence of the _autos_ were much increased, and they were represented with great luxury and at great expense in the streets of all the larger cities;--so important were they deemed to the influence of the clergy, and so attractive had they become to all classes of society; to the noble and the cultivated no less than to the multitude.

[595] Roxas, Viage Entretenido, 1614, ff. 51, 52, and many other
places.

[596] Don Quixote, ed. Pellicer, Parte II. c. 11, with the notes.

In 1654, when they were at the height of their success, Aarsens de Somerdyck, an accomplished Dutch traveller, gives us an account of them as he witnessed their exhibition at Madrid.[597] In the forenoon of the festival, he says, a procession occurred such as we have seen was usual in the time of Lope de Vega, where the king and court appeared without distinction of rank, preceded by two fantastic figures of giants, and sometimes by the grotesque form of the _Tarasca_,--one of which, we are told, in a pleasant story of Santos, passing by night from a place where it had been exhibited the preceding day to one where it was to be exhibited the day following, so alarmed a body of muleteers who accidentally met it, that they roused up the country, as if a real monster were come among them to lay waste the land.[598] These misshapen figures and all this strange procession, with music of hautboys, tambourines, and castanets, with banners, and religious shows, followed the sacrament through the streets for some hours, and then returned to the principal church, and were dismissed.

[597] Voyage d’Espagne, Cologne, 1667, 18mo, with Barbier,
Dictionnaire d’Anonymes, Paris, 1824, 8vo, No. 19,281. The _auto_
which the Dutch traveller saw was, no doubt, one of Calderon’s;
since Calderon then, and for a long time before and after,
furnished the _autos_ for the city of Madrid. Madame d’Aulnoy
describes the same gorgeous procession as she saw it in 1679,
(Voyage, ed. 1693, Tom. III. pp. 52-55), with the impertinent
_auto_, as she calls it, that was performed that year.

[598] La Verdad en el Potro, Madrid, 1686, 12mo, pp. 291, 292.
The Dutch traveller had heard the same story, but tells it less
well. (Voyage, p. 121.) The Tarasca was no doubt excessively
ugly. Montalvan (Comedias, Madrid, 4to, 1638, f. 13) alludes to
it for its monstrous deformity.

In the afternoon they assembled again and performed the _autos_, on that and many successive days, before the houses of the great officers of state, where the audience stood either in the balconies that would command a view of the exhibition, or else in the streets. The giants and the Tarascas were there to make sport for the multitude; the music came, that all might dance who chose; torches were added to give effect to the scene, though the performance was only by daylight; and the king and the royal family enjoyed the exhibition, sitting in state under a magnificent canopy in front of the stage prepared for the occasion.

As soon as the principal personages were seated, the _loa_ was spoken or sung; then came a farcical _entremes_; afterwards the _auto_ itself; and finally, something by way of conclusion that would contribute to the general amusement, like music or dancing. And this was continued, in different parts of the city, daily for a month, during which the theatres were shut and the regular actors were employed in the streets, in the service of the Church.[599]

[599] C. Pellicer, Orígen de las Comedias, 1804, Tom. I. p. 258.

Of the entertainments of this sort which Calderon furnished for Madrid, Toledo, and Seville, he has left, as has been said, no less than seventy-three. They are all allegorical, and all, by the music and show with which they abounded, are nearer to operas than any other class of dramas then known in Spain; some of them reminding us, by their religious extravagance, of the treatment of the gods in the plays of Aristophanes, and others, by their spirit and richness, of the poetical masques of Ben Jonson. They are upon a great variety of subjects, and show, by their structure, that elaborate and costly machinery must have been used in their representation.

Including the _loa_ that accompanied each, those of Calderon are nearly or quite as long as the full-length plays which he wrote for the secular theatre. Some of them indicate their subjects by their titles, like “The First and Second Isaac,” “God’s Vineyard,” and “Ruth’s Gleanings.” Others, like “The True God Pan” and “The First Flower of Carmel,” give no such intimations. All are crowded with shadowy personages, such as Sin, Death, Mohammedanism, Judaism, Justice, Mercy, and Charity; and the uniform purpose and end of all is to set forth and glorify the doctrine of the Real Presence in the Eucharist. The great Enemy of man, of course, fills a large space in them,--Quevedo says too large, adding, that, at last, he had grown to be quite a presuming and vainglorious personage, coming on the stage dressed finely, and talking as if the theatre were altogether his own.[600]

[600] Quevedo, Obras, 1791, Tom. I. p. 386.

There is necessarily a good deal of sameness in the structure of dramas like these; but it is wonderful with what ingenuity Calderon has varied his allegories, sometimes mingling them with the national history, as in the case of the two _autos_ on Saint Ferdinand; oftener with incidents and stories from Scripture, like “The Brazen Serpent” and “The Captivity of the Ark”; and always, where he could, seizing any popular occasion to produce an effect, as he did after the completion of the Escurial and of the Buen Retiro, and after the marriage of the Infanta María Teresa; each of which events contributed materials for a separate _auto_. Almost all of them have passages of striking lyrical poetry; and a few, of which “Devotion to the Mass” is the chief, make a free use of the old ballads.

One of the most characteristic of the collection, and one that has considerable poetical merit in separate passages, is “The Divine Orpheus.”[601] It opens with the entrance of a huge black car, in the shape of a boat, which is drawn along the street toward the stage where the _auto_ is to be acted, and contains the Prince of Darkness, set forth as a pirate, and Envy, as his steersman; both supposed to be thus navigating through a portion of chaos. They hear, at a distance, sweet music which proceeds from another car, advancing from the opposite quarter in the form of a celestial globe, covered with the signs of the planets and constellations, and containing Orpheus, who represents allegorically the Creator of all things. This is followed by a third car, setting forth the terrestrial globe, within which are the Seven Days of the Week, and Human Nature, all asleep. These cars open, so that the personages they contain can come upon the stage and retire back again, as if behind the scenes, at their pleasure;--the machines themselves constituting, in this as in all such representations, an important part of the scenic arrangements of the exhibition, and, in the popular estimation, not unfrequently the most important part.

[601] It is in the fourth volume of the edition printed at Madrid
in 1759.

On their arrival at the stage, the Divine Orpheus, with lyric poetry and music, begins the work of creation, using always language borrowed from Scripture; and at the suitable moment, as he advances, each Day presents itself, roused from its ancient sleep and clothed with symbols indicating the nature of the work that has been accomplished; after which, Human Nature is, in the same way, summoned forth, and appears in the form of a beautiful woman, who is the Eurydice of the fable. Pleasure dwells with her in Paradise; and, in her exuberant happiness, she sings a hymn in honor of her Creator, founded on the hundred and thirty-sixth Psalm, the poetical effect of which is destroyed by an unbecoming scene of allegorical gallantry that immediately follows between the Divine Orpheus himself and Human Nature.

The temptation and fall succeed; and then the graceful Days, which had before always accompanied Human Nature and scattered gladness in her path, disappear one by one, and leave her to her trials and her sins. She is overwhelmed with remorse, and, endeavouring to escape from the consequences of her guilt, is conveyed by the bark of Lethe to the realms of the Prince of Darkness, who, from his first appearance on the scene, has been laboring, with his coadjutor, Envy, for this very triumph. But his triumph is short. The Divine Orpheus, who has, for some time, represented the character of our Saviour, comes upon the stage, weeping over the fall, and sings a song of love and grief to the accompaniment of a harp made partly in the form of a cross; after which, rousing himself in his omnipotence, he enters the realms of darkness, amidst thunders and earthquakes; overcomes all opposition; rescues Human Nature from perdition; places her, with the seven redeemed Days of the Week, on a fourth car, in the form of a ship, so ornamented as to represent the Christian Church and the mystery of the Eucharist; and then, as the gorgeous machine sweeps away, the exhibition ends with the shouts of the actors in the drama, accompanied by the answering shouts of the spectators on their knees wishing the good ship a good voyage and a happy arrival at her destined port.

That these Sacramental Acts produced a great effect, there can be no doubt. Allegory of all kinds, which, from the earliest periods, had been attractive to the Spanish people, still continued so to an extraordinary degree; and the imposing show of the _autos_, their music, and the fact that they were represented in seasons of solemn leisure, at the expense of the government, and with the sanction of the Church, gave them claims on the popular favor which were enjoyed by no other form of popular amusement. They were written and acted everywhere throughout the country, and by all classes of people, because they were everywhere demanded. How humble were some of their exhibitions in the villages and hamlets may be seen in Roxas, who gives an account of an _auto_ of Cain and Abel, in which two actors performed all the parts;[602] and from Lope de Vega[603] and Cervantes,[604] who speak of their being written by barbers and acted by shepherds. On the other hand, we know that in Madrid no expense was spared to add to their solemnity and effect, and that everywhere they had the countenance and support of the public authorities. Nor has their influence even yet entirely ceased. In 1765, Charles the Third forbade their public representation; but the popular will and the habits of five centuries could not be immediately broken down by a royal decree. _Autos_, therefore, or dramatic religious farces resembling them, are still heard in some of the remote villages of the country; while, in the former dependencies of Spain, exhibitions of the same class and nature, if not precisely of the same form, have never been interfered with.[605]

[602] Viage, 1614, ff. 35-37.

[603] Lope de Vega, Comedias, Tom. IX., Barcelona, 1618, f. 133,
El Animal de Ungria.

[604] Don Quixote, Parte I. c. xii.

[605] Doblado’s Letters, 1822, pp. 296, 301, 303-309; Madame
Calderon’s Life in Mexico, London, 1843, Letters 38 and 39;
and Thompson’s Recollections of Mexico, New York, 1846, 8vo,
Chap. 11. How much the _autos_ were valued to the last, even
by respectable ecclesiastics, may be inferred from the grave
admiration bestowed on them by Martin Panzano, chaplain to the
Spanish embassy at Turin, in his Latin treatise, “De Hispanorum
Literatura,” (Mantuæ, 1759, folio), intended as a defence of his
country’s literary claims, in which, speaking of the _autos_ of
Calderon, only a few years before they were forbidden, he says
they were dramas, “in quibus neque in inveniendo acumen, nec in
disponendo ratio, neque in ornando aut venustas, aut nitor, aut
majestas desiderantur.”--p. lxxv.

* * * * *

Of _full-length religious plays and plays of saints_ Calderon wrote, in all, thirteen or fourteen. This was, no doubt, necessary to his success; for at one time during his career, such plays were much demanded. The death of Queen Isabella, in 1644, and of Balthasar, the heir-apparent, in 1646, caused a suspension of public representations on the theatres, and revived the question of their lawfulness. New rules were prescribed about the number of actors and their costumes, and an attempt was made even to drive from the theatre all plays involving the passion of love, and especially all the plays of Lope de Vega. This irritable state of things continued till 1649. But nothing of consequence followed. The regulations that were made were not executed in the spirit in which they were conceived. Many plays were announced and acted as religious which had no claim whatever to the title; and others, religious in their external framework, were filled up with an intriguing love-plot, as free as any thing in the secular drama had been. Indeed, there can be no doubt that the attempts thus made to constrain the theatre were successfully opposed or evaded, especially by private representations in the houses of the nobility;[606] and that, when these attempts were given up, the drama, with all its old attributes and attractions, broke forth with a greater extravagance of popularity than ever;[607]--a fact apparent from the crowd of dramatists that became famous, and from the circumstance that so many of the clergy, like Tarraga, Mira de Mescua, Montalvan, Tirso de Molina, and Calderon, to say nothing of Lope de Vega, who was particularly exact in his duties as a priest, were all successful writers for the stage.[608]

[606] These representations in private houses had long been
common. Bisbe y Vidal (Tratado, 1618, c. 18) speaks of them as
familiar in Barcelona, and treats them, in his otherwise severe
attack on the theatre, with a gentleness that shows he recognized
their influence.

[607] It is not easy to make out how much the theatre was really
interfered with during these four or five years; but the dramatic
writers seem to have felt themselves constrained in their course,
more or less, for a part of that time, if not the whole of it.
The accounts are to be found in Casiano Pellicer, Orígen, etc.,
de la Comedia, Tom. I. pp. 216-222, and Tom. II. p. 135;--a work
important, but ill digested. Conde, the historian, once told
me, that its materials were furnished chiefly by the author’s
father, the learned editor of Don Quixote, and that the son did
not know how to put them together. A few hints and facts on the
subject of the secular drama of this period may also be found in
Ulloa y Pereira’s defence of it, written apparently to meet the
particular case, but not published till his works appeared in
Madrid, 1674, 4to. He contends that there was never any serious
purpose to break up the theatre, and that even Philip II. meant
only to regulate, not to suppress it. (p. 343.) Don Luis Crespé
de Borja, Bishop of Orihuela and ambassador of Philip IV. at
Rome, who had previously favored the theatre, made, in Lent,
1646, an attack on it in a sermon, which, when published three
years afterwards, excited a considerable sensation, and was
answered by Andres de Avila y Heredia, el Señor de la Garena, and
sustained by Padre Ignacio Camargo. But nothing of this sort much
hindered or helped the progress of the drama in Spain.

[608] The clergy writing loose and immoral plays is only one
exemplification of the unsound state of society so often set
forth in Madame d’Aulnoy’s Travels in Spain, in 1679-80;--a
curious and amusing book, which sometimes throws a strong
light on the nature of the religious spirit that so frequently
surprises us in Spanish literature. Thus, when she is giving
an account of the constant use made of the rosary or chaplet
of beads,--a well-known passion in Spain, connected, perhaps,
with the Mohammedan origin of the rosary, of which the Christian
rosary was made a rival,--she says, “They are going over
their beads constantly when they are in the streets, and in
conversation; when they are playing _ombre_, making love, telling
lies, or talking scandal. In short, they are for ever muttering
over their chaplets; and even in the most ceremonious society it
goes on just the same; how devoutly you may guess. But custom is
very potent in this country.” Ed. 1693, Tom. II. p. 124.

Of the religious plays of Calderon, one of the most remarkable is “The Purgatory of Saint Patrick.” It is founded on the little volume by Montalvan, already referred to, in which the old traditions of an entrance into Purgatory from a cave in an island off the coast of Ireland, or in Ireland itself, are united to the fictitious history of Ludovico Enio, a Spaniard, who, except that he is converted by Saint Patrick and “makes a good ending,” is no better than another Don Juan.[609] The strange play in which these are principal figures opens with a shipwreck. Saint Patrick and the godless Enio drift ashore and find themselves in Ireland,--the sinner being saved from drowning by the vigorous exertions of the saint. The king of the country, who immediately appears on the stage, is an atheist, furious against Christianity; and after an exhibition, which is not without poetry, of the horrors of savage heathendom, Saint Patrick is sent as a slave into the interior of the island, to work for this brutal master. The first act ends with his arrival at his destination, where, in the open fields, after a fervent prayer, he is comforted by an angel, and warned of the will of Heaven, that he should convert his oppressors.

[609] The “Vida y Purgatorio del Glorioso San Patricio,” of
which I have a copy, (Madrid, 1739, 18mo), was long a popular
book of devotion, both in Spanish and in French. That Calderon
used it is obvious throughout his play. Wright, however, in his
pleasant work on St. Patrick’s Purgatory, (London, 1844, 12mo,
pp. 156-159), supposes that the French book of devotion was made
up chiefly from Calderon’s play; whereas they resemble each other
only because both were taken from the Spanish prose work of
Montalvan. See _ante_, p. 298.

Before the second act opens, three years elapse, during which Saint Patrick has visited Rome and been regularly commissioned for his great work in Ireland, where he now appears, ready to undertake it. He immediately performs miracles of all kinds, and, among the rest, raises the dead before the audience; but still the old heathen king refuses to be converted, unless the very Purgatory, Hell, and Paradise preached to him are made sure to the senses of some well-known witness. This, therefore, is Divinely vouchsafed to the intercession of Saint Patrick. A communication with the unseen world is opened through a dark and frightful cave. Enio, the godless Spaniard, already converted by an alarming vision, enters it and witnesses its dread secrets; after which he returns, and effects the conversion of the king and court by a long description of what he had seen,--a description which is the only catastrophe to the play.

Besides its religious story, the Purgatory of Saint Patrick has a love-plot, such as might become the most secular drama, and a _gracioso_ as rude and free-spoken as the rudest of his class.[610] But the whole was intended to produce what was then regarded as a religious effect; and there is no reason to suppose that it failed of its purpose. There is, however, much in it that would be grotesque and unseemly under any system of faith; some wearying metaphysics; and two speeches of Enio’s, each above three hundred lines long,--the first an account of his shameful life before his conversion, and the last a narrative of all he had witnessed in the cave, absurdly citing for its truth fourteen or fifteen obscure monkish authorities, all of which belong to a period subsequent to his own.[611] Such as it is, however, the Purgatory of Saint Patrick is commonly ranked among the best religious plays of the Spanish theatre in the seventeenth century.

[610] When Enio determines to adventure into the cave of
Purgatory, he gravely urges his servant, who is the _gracioso_ of
the piece, to go with him; to which the servant replies,--

I never heard before, that any man
Took lackey with him when he went to hell!
No,--to my native village will I haste,
Where I can live in something like content;
Or, if the matter must to goblins come,
I think my wife will prove enough of one
For my purgation.

Comedias, 1760, Tom. II. p. 264.

There is, however, a good deal that is solemn in this wild drama.
Enio, when he goes to the infernal world, talks, in the spirit of
Dante himself, of

Treading on the very ghosts of men.

[611] See Chapters 4 and 6 of Montalvan’s “Patricio.”

It is, indeed, on many accounts, less offensive than the more famous drama, “Devotion to the Cross,” which is founded on the adventures of a man who, though his life is a tissue of gross and atrocious crimes, is yet made an object of the especial favor of God, because he shows a uniform external reverence for whatever has the form of a cross; and who, dying in a ruffian brawl, as a robber, is yet, in consequence of this devotion to the cross, miraculously restored to life, that he may confess his sins, be absolved, and then be transported directly to heaven. The whole seems to be absolutely an invention of Calderon, and, from the fervent poetical tone of some of its devotional passages, it has always been a favorite in Spain, and, what is yet more remarkable, has found admirers in Protestant Christendom.[612]

[612] It is beautifully translated by A. W. Schlegel. A drama of
Tirso de Molina, “El Condenado por Desconfiado,” goes still more
profoundly into the peculiar religious faith of the age, and may
well be compared with this play of Calderon, which it preceded.
It represents a reverend hermit, Paulo, as losing the favor of
God, simply from want of trust in it; while Enrico, a robber and
assassin, obtains that favor by an exercise of faith and trust
at the last moment of a life which had been filled with the most
revolting crimes.

“The Wonder-working Magician,” founded on the story of Saint Cyprian,--the same legend on which Milman has founded his “Martyr of Antioch,”--is, however, more attractive than either of the dramas just mentioned, and, like “El Joseph de las Mugeres,” reminds us of Goethe’s “Faust.” It opens--after one of those pleasing descriptions of natural scenery in which Calderon loves to indulge--with an account by Cyprian, still unconverted, of his retirement, on a day devoted to the service of Jupiter, from the bustle and confusion of the city of Antioch, in order to spend the time in inquiries concerning the existence of One Supreme Deity. As he seems likely to arrive at conclusions not far from the truth, Satan, to whom such a result would be particularly unwelcome, breaks in upon his studies, and, in the dress of a fine gentleman, announces himself to be a man of learning, who has accidentally lost his way. In imitation of a fashion not rare among scholars at European universities, in the poet’s time, this personage offers to hold a dispute with Cyprian on any subject whatever. Cyprian naturally chooses the one that then troubled his thoughts; and after a long, logical discussion, according to the discipline of the schools, obtains a clear victory,--though not without feeling enough of his adversary’s power and genius to express a sincere admiration for both. The evil spirit, however, though defeated, is not discouraged, and goes away, determined to try the power of temptation.

For this purpose he brings upon the stage Lelius, son of the governor of Antioch, and Florus,--both friends of Cyprian,--who come to fight a duel, near the place of his present retirement, concerning a fair lady named Justina, against whose gentle innocence the Spirit of all Evil is particularly incensed. Cyprian interferes; the parties refer their quarrel to him; he visits Justina, who is secretly a Christian, and supposes herself to be the daughter of a Christian priest; but, unhappily, Cyprian, instead of executing his commission, falls desperately in love with her; while, in order to make out the running parody on the principal action, common in Spanish plays, the two lackeys of Cyprian are both found to be in love with Justina’s maid.

Now, of course, begins the complication of a truly Spanish intrigue, for which all that precedes it is only a preparation. That same night, Lelius and Floras, the two original rivals for the love of Justina, who favors neither of them, come separately before her window to offer her a serenade, and while there, Satan deceives them both into a confident belief that the lady is disgracefully attached to some other person; for he himself, in the guise of a gallant, descends from her balcony, before their eyes, by a rope-ladder, and, having reached the bottom, sinks into the ground between the two. As they did not see each other till after his disappearance, though both had seen him, each takes the other to be this favored rival, and a duel ensues on the spot. Cyprian again opportunely interferes, but, having understood nothing of the vision or the rope-ladder, is astonished to find that both renounce Justina, as no longer worthy their regard. And thus ends the first act.

In the other two acts, Satan is still a busy, bustling personage. He appears in different forms; first, as if just escaped from shipwreck; and afterwards, as a fashionable gallant; but uniformly for mischief. The Christians, meantime, through his influence, are persecuted. Cyprian’s love grows desperate; and he sells his soul to the Spirit of Evil for the possession of Justina. The temptation of the fair Christian maiden is then carried on in all possible ways; especially in a beautiful lyrical allegory, where all things about her--the birds, the flowers, the balmy air--are made to solicit her to love with gentle and winning voices. But in every way the temptation fails. Satan’s utmost power is defied and defeated by the mere spirit of innocence. Cyprian, too, yields, and becomes a Christian, and with Justina is immediately brought before the governor, already exasperated by discovering that his own son is a lover of the fair convert. Both are ordered to instant execution; the buffoon servants make many poor jests on the occasion; and the piece ends by the appearance on a dragon of Satan himself, who is compelled to confess the power of the Supreme Deity, which, in the first scenes, he had denied, and to proclaim, amidst thunder and earthquakes, that Cyprian and Justina are already enjoying the happiness won by their glorious martyrdom.[613]

[613] An interesting, but somewhat too metaphysical, discussion
of the character of this play, with prefatory remarks on the
general merits of Calderon, by Karl Rosenkranz, appeared at
Leipzig in 1829, (12mo), entitled, “Ueber Calderon’s Tragödie vom
wunderthätigen Magus.”

Few pieces contain more that is characteristic of the old Spanish stage than this one; and fewer still show so plainly how the civil restraints laid on the theatre were evaded, and the Church was conciliated, while the popular audiences lost nothing of the forbidden amusement to which they had been long accustomed from the secular drama.[614] Of such plays Calderon wrote fifteen, if we include in the number his “Aurora in Copacabana,” which is on the conquest and conversion of the Indians in Peru; and his “Origin, Loss, and Recovery of the Virgin of the Reliquary,”--a strange collection of legends, extending over above four centuries, full of the spirit of the old ballads, and relating to an image of the Madonna still devoutly worshipped in the great cathedral at Toledo.

[614] How completely a light, worldly tone was taken in these
plays may be seen in the following words of the Madonna, when
she personally gives St. Ildefonso a rich vestment,--the
_chasuble_,--in which he is to say mass:--

Receive this robe, that, at my holy feast,
Thou mayst be seen as such a gallant should be.
My taste must be consulted in thy dress,
Like that of any other famous lady.

Comedias, 1760, Tom. VI. p. 113.

The lightness of tone in this passage is the more remarkable,
because the miracle alluded to in it is the crowning glory of the
great cathedral of Toledo, on which volumes have been written,
and on which Murillo has painted one of his greatest and most
solemn pictures.

Figueroa (Pasagero, 1617, ff. 104-106) says, with much truth,
in the midst of his severe remarks on the drama of his time,
that the _comedias de santos_ were so constructed, that the
first act contained the youth of the saint, with his follies and
love-adventures; the second, his conversion and subsequent life;
and the third, his miracles and death; but that they often had
loose and immoral stories to render them attractive. But they
were of all varieties; and it is curious, in such a collection
dramas as the one in forty-eight volumes, extending over the
period from 1652 to 1704, to mark in how many ways the theatre
endeavoured to conciliate the Church; some of the plays being
filled entirely with saints, demons, angels, and allegorical
personages, and deserving the character given to the “Fenix de
España,” (Tom. XLIII., 1678), of being sermons in the shape of
plays; while others are mere intriguing comedies, with an angel
or a saint put in to consecrate their immoralities, like “La
Defensora de la Reyna de Ungria,” by Fernando de Zarate, in Tom.
XXIX., 1668.

In other countries of Christendom besides those in which the
Church of Rome bears sway, this sort of irreverence in relation
to things divine has more or less shown itself among persons
accounting themselves religious. The Puritans of England in the
days of Cromwell, from their belief in the constant interference
of Providence about their affairs, sometimes addressed
supplications to God in a spirit not more truly devout than that
shown by the Spaniards in their _autos_ and their _comedias
de santos_. Both felt themselves to be peculiarly regarded of
Heaven, and entitled to make the most peremptory claims on the
Divine favor and the most free allusions to what they deemed
holy. But no people ever felt themselves to be so absolutely
soldiers of the cross as the Spaniards did, from the time of
their Moorish wars; no people ever trusted so constantly to the
recurrence of miracles in the affairs of their daily life; and
therefore no people ever talked of divine things as of matters in
their nature so familiar and commonplace. Traces of this state of
feeling and character are to be found in Spanish literature on
all sides.