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154 CHAPTER 3 Masques. Art, and Religion It Has Been Suggested In 154 CHAPTER 3 t k p Masques. Art, and Religion It has been suggested in the preceding chapters that Henrietta's type of preciosite, with its connection to Devout Humanism, influenced the -oral tone of Charles's court, and the tone of poetry and drama addressed to the Queen. In these contexts the fashion for "Platonic love" had only » general connection with the Queen's Catholicism. The language and ideals of Platonic love were, however, a bridge between the social and religious sides of the Queen's lov'e cult. The idealistic side of Platonic lovei found its strongest expressionccinn in courtcour masques of the 1630's, and it was m the masques that, tI helievebelieve, the social and religious sides of the♦v Queen's love cult met.* In the following discussion I shall suggest that the masques built on the connections I have outlined between the Queen's cult of love and her Catholicism, and that images of Platonic Beauty and Love took on a double significance: they express the social side Of the Queen's Platonic ideal, but they also express through visual imageryi ideals of Beauty andi Love +hatthat were connected^ with religion, and thattk had deep significance... rn-for the penoaperiod underunu discussion. The transition from the social to the religious side of the cult was made through the Visual images created for the King and Queen on the stage. An analysis - the masques in terms of- their.L •_ visualv images, and against the background Of connections between the arts and religion during the period, is therefore necessary to restore to the masques their full level of meaning. Early commentaries on Platonic love in the Caroline masques generally treated it lightly, and the Queen's masques in particular tended to be 155 t Recent criticism, however, dismissed as trifling examples of spec a . these masques of the doctrine of Platonic has emphasised the importance 1 k -id a personal mythology for the King and love, not only in helping to build a perso ., Tvoitical ideals of Charles s Queen, but in presenting to the court e R this oeriod, Stephen Orgel and Roy rule. In their discussions of masques Strong1 have pointed out that Platonic love, "which has u regarded as flippant and irrelevant, a mere courtly game," is, on the contrary, . political a s s e r t s - a c t * — ^ ^ u ..2 ,uSt as earlier in the century, Ben by, the King's absolute monarchy. » authority to the Neoplatomc philosophy Jonson’s masques had helped to give author y ♦ the Divine Right of Kings, so his two that underlay James I’s claims o (both „ . through Callipolis and Chloridia (both masques of the 1630's, L o v e ^ J ^ S E l i ------ 6------- j rtiitical implications of the Queen s 1631), set out in words the moral and pol ■ , . in Orgel's words, "about the Queen revolved all doctrine of Platonic love. In urg • ^ bv her Platonic beauty and virtue, as Passion, controlled and idealised by her , wint». thus Platonic love, in relation about the King all intellect and will , ^ — =.«t Tt also became a religious the Monarchy, became a political sta e - t . e n t , and 1 believe that Jones's aevelopment of the Meals W e * succeeding masques went beyond the vaguely religious assertion , . hv o-,,^ to a much more specific reference to Neoplatonism suggested by Org ■ t * the neriod. In this chapter I shall attempt religious issues and events of _*v,eT • * view of their visual images rather to approach the masques from the p o m which in most of these masques is of than from their literal meaning, which i „ Mv first aim will be to suggest that Jones created secondary importance. My _ . e Kine and Queen in terms of his own complementary sets of images or a that the qualities associated with arts, architecture and painting, an Telioions- t ■ties associated with the King and Queen’s religions, these arts were also qualiti , o-rrViitectural setting and stage for the secondly, to show that Jones's architectura 156 "fcsques had implicit connections with religion; and, thirdly, to suggest that Jones's ideal of Beauty, which he invests in the Queen, had reference to the ideal of Beauty in the Anglican Church. ^ Pictures with Light and Motion Court masques in the 1630's were dominated by Inigo Jones, whose emPhasis on stage spectacle over-rode the contribution of writers.4 Ben J°nson was dropped as a collaborator after the first two masques, Love's I^ifflph and Chloridia, and only in two other masques of the period, Thomas Carew's Coelum Britannicum and James Shirley's The Triumph of Peace (both 16J4) did the writers claim an equal share. In all the other masques Jones Was responsible for the design of the masque as a whole, for the written Ascription of the subject, the scenes, the costumes, and, of course, for aH the staging. Only the songs and verses were contributed by Aurelian Townshend to Albion's Triumph and Tempe Restored (both 1632), and by William ^avenant to the remainder of the masques, The Temple of Love (1635), ^ i t gnnia Triumphans. Luminalia (both 1638), and Salmacida Spolia (1640).^ a i» these masques, four (Love's Triumph, Albion's Triumph, Coelum Britannicum, 411(1 Britannia Triumphans) were presented by the King, four by the Queen, and tlle last (Salmacida Spolia) was a joint masque of the King and Queen (I shali not make detailed reference to The Triumph of Peace, since it was Produced by the Inns of Court for a somewhat different purpose, and has been discussed elsewhere).6 In most of these masques it is probable that the Subject was arrived at by the King or Queen, or both, in consultation with Inigo Jones.7 These masques form a homogeneous group for study, not only h®cause they represent a deliberate policy on the part of Royalty to resume 157 iftsn and to use the masques to convey ideas regular masque-giving after 1630, an «- court, but also because they were that were felt to be important at the cour , • c w t time to an audience which changed little, Presented over a relatively shOTt time . vpmrrine themes in the masques, and which was therefore able to appreciate recurr g and to interpret their meaning on a number of different levels. Because of the dependence of Jones's masques on spectacle it is v ^f^-rentlv from Jonson's masques to discover necessary to approach them differe y tv, • t r^nn's which depended on a unifying poetic idea for theiT full meaning. Jonson s, wnic v ft j '-n a linear fashion because their meaning their "invention," can be read in unfolds from beginning to end. Jones's masques have to be approached from the "wrong" end, from the grand concluding spectacles which he added to masques after ,.30, and which sunned up the meaning of the performance. It * Tones's masques with Jonson before Love’s Triumph ls significant that none of Jones s m q Mno ^ectacle,9 although in two by other authors and Chloridia has a concluding spectaci , j i uocmip 1613 bv Daniel and Campion (Tethys' Festival, 1610, and The Lords' Masflue, 1613, by * was introduced after the masquers' dance respectively) a change of scene was V I, noniel gives is "to avoid the confusion which and revels. The reason which Daniel g i these shows" (11.311-12), and it is usually attendeth the dissolve of the ^ Kavo used them more often had they not been Possible that Jones would have usea * * thp masaue. After 1630, however, there was contrary to Jonson's concept of the ma q a c e l l i n g reason for Jones's addition of a final scene. In J— - the King was always present from the beginning of the performance (and the , -^ncidered), so that Jonson'& meaning could be Queen's pleasure was not much co , •_ the action to culminate in the discovery stated at the beginning, unfold in the actioi Of the masquers, and fold back into itself with dancing and a song at th. end. After 1630, either the King or Queen, or both, always took part xn it was no use Jones unfolding his meaning while half the performance: hence iv. was , • rm,Tt were still behind the scenes. The the important people in the court 158 -masques and the "action," therefore, which take up a disproportionate ^ount of space in the written version, helped to fill out the evening and a®use the spectators before the main business of the performance, the discovery of the masquers. Jones writes in Tempe Restored, for instance, *hat the performers who introduced the discovery scene took their place on the degrees by the lords and ladies, where they sit "to see the masque" ttl.180-81). it is only after the masquers have danced, and are safely Seated under the State, that Jones has the full attention of his audience r the spectacular final scene in which the full meaning of the masque is revealed. The pattern of Jonson's masques therefore is a circle, whereas the pattern of Jones's is more like a flight of stairs. Only when the top is reached does their full meaning unfold. In masques of the 1630's, Jones can be imagined starting his "invention" Wlth these concluding spectacles, fitting them to a "subject" which reflected *he wishes of the King or Queen, and then calling on the poet, musician, and dancing-master to supply their parts.
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