The Alchemist

THE greatest of English dramatists except Shakespeare, the first literary
dictator and poet-laureate, a writer of verse, prose, satire, and criticism who most potently of all the men of his time affected the subsequent course of
English letters: such was Ben Jonson, and as such his strong personality
assumes an interest to us almost unparalleled, at least in his age.
Ben Jonson came of the stock that was centuries after to give to the world
Thomas Carlyle; for Jonson's grandfather was of Annandale, over the Solway,
whence he migrated to England. Jonson's father lost his estate under Queen
Mary, "having been cast into prison and forfeited." He entered the church, but
died a month before his illustrious son was born, leaving his widow and child in
poverty. Jonson's birthplace was Westminster, and the time of his birth early in
1573. He was thus nearly ten years Shakespeare's junior, and less well off, if a
trifle better born. But Jonson did not profit even by this slight advantage. His
mother married beneath her, a wright or bricklayer, and Jonson was for a time
apprenticed to the trade.