CHAPTER II.

External corroborations-Shakspere's outer life from 1594 to 1601— An independent man, and therefore a free artist-The Ideal in the Real seen by him-Refinement and elegance—The Inward Vision— The light of an Idea-Revelation - Taste, its outward action sometimes injurious-Shakspere his own model-His liberty and mental quiet secured, an upward flight possible-Shakspere in 1598 an acknowledged poet-Data and proofs-"Sir John Oldcastle," by Munday, Drayton, Wilson, and Hathaway, attributed to himRobert Chester's "Love's Martyr"-The death of John Shakspere (1601)—The relation of morals and manners in Shaksperian comedy, and the predominance of the Ideal-Genius, nature, intuition, experience.

SHAKSPERE, now as a legalised "gentleman," and owner of " a place of lordship in the country," is no longer willing to do the task-work of the stage; but at once sets his fancy free to follow its own caprices. He naturally returned to comedy, and wrought with a degree of freedom which lends a charm to the production of the three years of which we have described the fruits in the preceding chapter. During that period he produced four plays, which is about the average extent of his productivity. Poetic works are not producible at a more rapid rate; prose plays, such as modern audiences are content with, may be dashed off at a heat; but poetry is distilled from the brain, and not discharged by the waste-pipe. Shakspere now, it must be remembered, was not writing for his

bread, and was independent of his theatre and of his public. Had Shakspere not been independent of popular influence, he might have been injuriously affected by it, as artists are generally who have not risen above the necessities of life, and are fain to work so as to please their customers. From the year 1594 to the end of his career, I see no signs of such a spirit in our Shakspere.

Comedy, of course, led him to study actual society; but whatever might be the Real that he there discerned, he regarded also with especial attention and affection the Ideal in it. He discerned it equally in mean and grand objects. And here let the reader not overlook the fact, that to do this a man first of all must have the Idea. Before he can perceive it in any object, he must have reflected it from his own spirit. Objects are but mirrors; the whole of nature but a looking-glass. Creation is not transparent; but gives us back our own likeness. We look on God's work, and perceive our own image; even as He looks on us, and sees His own.

Shakspere, by his practice, has sufficiently proved to the competent critic, that excellence can only be obtained in this way. We have found that it was the practice of our immortal poet, in taking his subjects from old chronicles or old plays, to commence by giving them a Central Idea, and then to modify or to regulate their treatment by its direction. In this one particular he differed from the earlier chronicle playwrights, who for the most part adopted the theme as they found it, and thought they had done enough

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when they had invested it with dramatic action. This was often clumsy enough. It needs the refinement which an idea imparts, as well as the light which it lends, before elegance can supervene on artistic production. No work can be nicely finished that is done in the dark—unless, perhaps, by the blind. But then these have an Inward Vision, which is just the very thing I claim for the artist, poetic or other; the light of an Idea. Such an idea is a light-bearer, for it contains the moral law, which not only illuminates but practically impels to action, and spontaneously directs the path in which action must work.

So long as the mind of the artist is left to its original influences, and these are guided by the operation of its own reasoning powers, that revelation, which always accompanies true art, will maintain him in the practice of the right. His effort will simply be to express the truth that he feels in the language of impulse, whether in form, colour, or words. This is the way with Genius; and especially with genius in the old world; but in the course of time what we call Taste is born, and this same Taste reacts on Genius. If it react on the poet or painter outwardly, it is apt to act in a measure injuriously; for it will seek to "shape its ends," when he should shape them for himself. Shakspere in this respect was happily exempt from undue influence. His own works were the only models that it was worth his while to consult; and these left him free to project improvements and modifications at will. Fortune, too, had elevated him above the crowd, and he was called upon in no

way to submit to persuasion or compulsion, or to surrender in the slightest degree his own judgment and free will to what he might think would please the majority and prove profitable. And the value of such independence is above all estimate. The artist who wishes to effect a compromise, and to please those by whom he would live, and yet to pursue his own way, will probably-I may at once say surely-reap disappointment only, and become fatally discouraged. Shakspere having, like Rembrandt, secured with his fortune liberty and mental quiet, cared for none of these things; and, as we shall find, in our future examination, pursued his upward flight, regardless alike of popular opinion or possible profit. He manifestly worked for himself, and himself alone; and gained an elevation in dramatic excellence, and particularly as a closet dramatist, which is shared by none other.

The year 1598, in which appeared the Palladis Tamia, is the inauguration of the epoch of Shakspere's independence. He is now an acknowledged poet. It is true that the age did not value him at the price which Ben Jonson had placed upon him. He is generally mentioned as the equal of other poets of his day—a day rich indeed in poets; but his immeasurable superiority was not perceived. Nor could we expect that it should have been; for, in the first place, the tale of his dramas had yet to be completed, and in the next, they had not been collected in a convenient edition, so as to be comparable one with the other, in the manner in which we can now study them with care, and, after repeated readings, arrive at a

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decided conclusion on the whole of the premises involved in the critical argument.

In 1599 the Historie of Henrie the Fourth was reissued; not now anonymously, but with the addition "newly corrected by William Shakspere" on the titlepage. His name on a title-page was now serviceable; and we find it this year attached to a small miscellany of entitled The Passionate Pilgrim, many poems,

of which were not written by him.

In the following year, his works are continually issuing from the press; fourth editions of Venus and Adonis and The Rape of Lucrece; two rival editions of Midsummer-Night's Dream, and two editions of The Merchant of Venice, Much Adoe about Nothing, The Second Parte of the History of King Henry IIIIth ; Henry IV., in two editions. The Chronicle History of Henry the Fift; Henry VI. part 2 (twice); and Henry VI. part 3 (once), were also published in 1600.

*

In books of Elegant Extracts Shakspere's works were now quoted: England's Parnassus contains ninety citations from Shakspere; and Bel-vedere, or the Garden of the Muses, and England's Helicon, also include several. Dramas, moreover, in which he had no part, began to be attributed to him. One, published in 1600, is entitled The First Part of the True and Honourable History of the Life of Sir John Oldcastle, &c. written by William Shakespeare. The conception

England's Parnassus: or the choysest Flowers of our Modern Poets. Published by Robert Allot, a literary bookseller of London, who boasted that he "had picked these flowers of learning from their stem" himself.