A Christian Poet. 83 form a remarkably interesting structure, which will bear analysis. And all, moreover, is brought into harmony with probability, notwithstanding difficulties apparently insuperable in the original fiction. And this, after all, is the master spell of the dramatic poet, who borrows his stories, and discovers that he has to account for the anomalies of a legend crudely conceived, and never pretending to be a work of art. Particularly had he to amend the novelist's portrait of the heroine; and so makes her rather adopt, in the bold expedients she carrics so successfully out, the suggestions of others than act on her own inspirations. She thus retains a delicate womanly nature while acting a part that apparently, but apparently only, offends its leading attribute. The moral struggle implied, indeed, elevates the character, so as to draw forth from it an inherent nobility, which, but for the urgent pressure upon it, would not have been developed. The requisite reform in the character of Bertram, who likewise has ultimately to assert a nobility of nature better than that of birth, by which, in the first instance, it was overlaid and hidden, is at last effected. It is the progress of regeneration in the soul, under given conditions, that the poet traces; and to this great end every thing else is subordinated. Here we perceive that the poet of whom we are so proud is a pronounced Christian poet, and belongs to the reformed religion, which it was the spirit and purpose of the age in which he lived to initiate. That this regeneration is effected by means of the courageous love of a high-hearted woman, is also in G accordance with the same spirit, and with that par ticular purpose of it advocated by the poet himself in his immortal sonnets. The final object of the drama is to illustrate the compatibility between Rank and Virtue, however deeply or broadly an accidental wall of separation may previously have created a difference and a distance between them. There is nothing fatal in such disparities; for every thing is possible to love and to female energy. It was, of course, needful to such a design that Bertram's character should be portrayed under two aspects. First, in his unreformed state; and secondly, in his converted condition. They who have ventured objections against the character in its first aspect have been less wise than the poet who created it, not having recognised the philosophical grounds according to which it was fitting that it should be represented as unamiable. Bertram is not yet worthy of Helena, but he is to become so. There is an instinct in woman which enables her to pierce through the crude hardness of an undeveloped man, and penetrate to the inner possibility as full of promise when the ripened fruit shall have attained the mellowness that renders it pleasant to the taste. Familiar examples of this turn up in our experience every day; and women have married men who have been indebted for their ultimate civility to the influence which their wives have gradually exerted them in the daily exercise of the domestic charities. In referring to such an influence, and showing as it were the root of it in the far nobler nature of woman, upon and Poetry and Philosophy. 85 in the comparative innocence of her earlier training as well as in her precocious unfolding, Shakspere has justified the doctrine of his sonnets, and the mission of his era. In Bertram we are made to see the perils and temptations that beset a man in his rude unsuspecting youth; and in Helena the beneficial relationship of woman to man, on whose stubborn disposition her virtue and fidelity may at last make an impression calculated to promote and ensure his happiness here and hereafter. And thus, as the poet states, All's well that ends well. As a psychological poet, this play assuredly vindicates its author's position in a remarkable manner; but, in order to be such poct, he must be a psychologist. To be a great poet, indeed, a man must be a great philosopher; nor do I know an instance in which the characters are dissociated. Light, frivolous, and sparkling verses may bring reputation and profit to the spontaneous singer, who sings, as the ploughboy whistles, for want of thought. But the Dantes, Miltons, Petrarchs, Spensers, elaborate their divine verses from thoughts and feelings "that do even lie too deep for tears," and cannot be expressed in fluent and facile commonplaces. Such was the state of Shakspere's development when he composed this play. What, then, was he as a man? Was he the vicious man upon town of vulgar tradition; or was he the thoughtful, right-feeling, and right-acting laborious artist which his works indicate? The course of inquiry on which we are engaged decides directly for the latter view. We shall perhaps do well to bear this in mind when proceeding next to estimate the relation to their poet of Romeo and Juliet. In Arthur Brooke, whose steps he so closely followed, Shakspere detected a kindred mind, whose skilful unfolding of a popular love-tale might be safely adopted. The rise and course of the passion were already prescribed in the poem, and in the drama the action needed only to be condensed, and the dialogue to be enriched. In the latter, there is all the fervour of a youthful style, and some inflation also which has been felt to be indicative of an earlier period of composition than generally supposed. Indeed, there is evidence of successive draughts of the play (1597 and 1599), two of which are in print; but a far earlier draught is supposed to have existed, and there is internal evidence of the drama having been composed in 1591. The style of the work is mixed; the dramatic often passes over into the lyrical, and the phrases of older erotic poems are copied, so as to obtain a readier reception for the sentiment. In all this there is a concealed art; an art arising out of the dramatist's own poetic associations, and a natural instinct which veils the language of a sentiment that lives in its delicacy, and could only be preserved by extreme caution. In such instances we may recognise a poet, not blindly impulsive, but self-conscious throughout the process of creating; nor then trusting entirely to the immediate result, but at various intervals of time. revising his work, so that its finished execution might become more and more worthy of its original conception. The Infinite in Love. 87 In depicting Love in this play as an omnipotent passion, we must, then, believe that Shakspere was not led away by a boyish infatuation, but by a philosophical perception of its essential supremacy. Says Juliet: "My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep; the more I give to thee, It is this perception of the infinite in love, which, like other great desires of the mind, would push its gratification beyond the limits of sensuous power, and thus destroy the very organism by means whereof it obtains its wishes; which, in fact, rushes on ruin and death in order to overcome all opposition to its headlong will; it is such perception that guides and regulates the poet's course in the development of his tragic story. His moral is, the need of moderation, therefore, in the gratification of such desires as partake the attribute of the Infinite. In the want of such moderation consists the error of his lovers, whose human imperfection makes them the subjects of a tragic destiny. On the other hand, the sublimity of their love fits them for heaven, and renders them worthy of immortal fame. We have in this bipolarity of the passion a proof of the poet's universality. He gives us the two sides of the mighty question-the plus and minus opposites whereon hang, as in a balance, the issues of life and death. The wise poet, therefore, presents to us negative instances of character which permit the play of passion in imperfect natures, and therefore in a |