abound regarding what or who Falstaff is or what he was intended to be. The trends noted above only mark shifts and developments in the criticism, but certainly not consensus. The words of the critics themselves, though, will more ably reveal certain trends of criticism as well as the complexity of the issue:
1668, John Dryden: "As for Falstaffe, he is not properly one humour, but a Miscellany of Humours or Images drawn from so many several men; that wherein he is singular in his wit" (Dryden 5).
1702, John Dennis: "For in the second part of Harry the Fourth, Falstaffe does nothing but talk, as indeed he does nothing else in the third and fourth Acts of the first part. Whereas in the Merry Wives he every where Acts, and that action is more Regular, and more in compass than it is in the first part of Harry the Fourth. 'Tis true, what he says in Harry the Fourth is admirable; but action at last is the business of the Stage" (Dennis 6).
1744, Corbyn Morris: "It is impossible to hate honest Jack Falstaff…. It is impossible to avoid loving him; he is the gay, the witty, the frolicksome, happy and fat Jack Falstaff, the most delightful Swaggerer in all Nature" (Morris 9).