TH UNIY6RS1TY Of CALIFORNIA LIBRARY Nsf SHAKE SPEAKE, FEOM AN AMERICAN POINT OF VIEW; . INCLUDING AN INQUIRY AS TO HIS RELIGIOUS FAITH, AND HIS KNOWLEDGE OF LAW: WITH THE BACONIAN THEORY CONSIDERED. BY GEORGE WILKES. NEW YORK: D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, 549 AND 551 BROADWAY. 1877. ENTEBED, according to Act of Congress, In the year 1877, BY D. APPLETON & CO., In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. PREFACE. THE following Essays were originally addressed to a public consisting for the most part of American readers : and it was the intention of the author to publish them first, in a collected form, in the United States. It, however, having become apparent, in the course of his researches, that it would be advisable to consult the British libraries, he concluded to issue the work in London. This was the more desirable, because a judgment rendered from the fountain head of English criticism, on what may be deemed a conspicuously English subject, would be more authoritative and satisfactory than if given from any other source. The author, therefore, takes this opportunity to say that the most rigorous criticism will not be unwelcome ; not, indeed, from any vain confidence in his own views, but because they are put forward in good faith, and in order to elicit truth concerning a genius who is the richest inheritance of the intel- lectual world. Should, indeed, his views be < controverted, the author must even in that event be a gainer in common with the other admirers of Shakespeare ; for it can never be a true source of mortification to relinquish opinions in favour of those which are shown to be better. Presenting these pages, therefore, rather as a series of inquiries than as dogmatic doctrine, the author strives to support them by only such an amount of controversy as is legitimately due from one who invites the public to a new discussion. G. W. 395700 CONTENTS. GENERAL CIRCUMSTANCES, HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL. CHAPTER I. PAGE THE RESPONSIBILITIES OF GENIUS .1 CHAPTEE II. SHAKESPEARE'S EAELY LIFE . . . . . .6 CHAPTER III. LORD BACON 13 CHAPTER IV. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE 18 CHAPTER V. SHAKESPEARE'S PERSONAL CHARACTERISTICS 28 CHAPTER VI. THE RELIGION OF THE SHAKESPEARE FAMILY 34 CHAPTEE VII. EVENING MASS . , 46 vi Contents. CHAPTER VIII. PAGE SHAKESPEABE'S CONTEMPT FOE PEOTESTANTS 62 CHAPTER IX. LEGAL ACQUIBEMENTS OF SHAKESPEAEE 71 THE TESTIMONY OF THE PLAYS. CHAPTER X. THE TEMPEST " .......... 81 Two GENTLEMEN OF VEEONA " ....... 84 CHAPTER XI. THE MEEET WIVES OF WINDSOE " ....... 93 MEASUEE FOE MEASUEE " ......... 95 CHAPTER XII. " COMEDY OF EEEOES " . . . . ...... 106 CHAPTER XIII. " THE MEECHANT OF VENICE " ........ 114 CHAPTER XIV. " THE MEECHANT OF VENICE " (CONTINUED) ..... 126 CHAPTER XV. " MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING " ........ 136 " As You LIKE IT "... . 139 Contents. vii CHAPTER XVI. PAGE " THE TAMING OF THE SHEEW " 145 " LOVE'S LABOUE'S LOST " 147 CHAPTER XVII. " ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL " 151 CHAPTER XVIII. " TWELFTH NIGHT ; OE, WHAT You WILL " 160 " THE WINTEE'S TALE " 164 CHAPTER XIX. THE HISTOEICAL PLAYS * 171 "KING JOHN" . . .177 CHAPTER XX. "RlCHABDlI." 182 CHAPTER XXI. " HENEY IV." PAET I__--T ^ -~-H* " HENEY IV." PAET II 199 CHAPTER XXII. " HENEY V." 207 CHAPTER XXIII. " KING HENEY VI." PAET 1 220 CHAPTER XXIV. " KING HENEY VI." PAET II 227 THE REBELLION OF WAT TYLEE 228 THE REBELLION OF CADE 232 CHAPTER XXV. " KING HENEY VI." PAET II. REBELLION OF CADE (CONTINUED) . 240 viii Contents. CHAPTER XXVI. PAGE " KING HENEYYI." PAST III 255 "RlCHAEDlII." 260 CHAPTER XXVII. " KING HENEY VIII." 267 CHAPTER XXVIII. THE TBAGEDIES. " TEOILUS AND CEESSIDA " 278 CHAPTER XXIX. " TIMON OF ATHENS " 288 CHAPTER XXX. "COBIOLANUS" 292 CHAPTER XXXI. * TITUS ANDBONICUS " 313 " PEEICLES, PEINCE OF TYEE " . . 322 CHAPTER XXXII. "MACBETH" 327 "CYMBELINE" 331 " ROMEO AND JULIET " 338 CHAPTER XXXIII. " JULIUS CJESAB" 345 " ANTONY AND CLEOPATEA " 359 CHAPTER XXXIV. " OTHELLO " 363 CHAPTER XXXV. "KING LEAK" .377 Contents. ix . CHAPTER XXXVI. PAGE HAMLET " . . 397 THE MUSICAL OR EUPHONIC TEST. SHAKESPEARE AND BACON*S EESPECTIVE SENSE OF MELODY, OE EAR FOE MUSIC. CHAPTER XXXVII. THE EUPHONIC TEST 423 CHAPTER XXXVIII. THE EUPHONIC TEST (CONTINUED) 437 CHAPTER XXXIX. RECAPITULATION AND CONCLUSION 465 POSTSCRIPT .... . . 462 $art 5. G-ENEBAL CIBCUMSTANCES, HISTORICAL AND BIOGRAPHICAL. SHAKE SPEARE, FEOM AN AMERICAN POINT OF VIEW. CHAPTER I. THE RESPONSIBILITIES OP GENIUS. THE question as to the authorship of what are known to the world as Shakespeare's plays, first raised in 1856, and projected in favour of Sir Francis Bacon, did not attract much attention until some time after it was propounded. Indeed, I had not heard that the Shakespearian authorship of these plays ever had been doubted until the year 1867, when in the course of a con- versation with General B. F. Butler, he asked me whether I had read "The Philosophy of Shakespeare's Plays Unfolded," by Delia Bacon remarking, at the same time, he thought her arguments to be of great force, and that he favourably regarded the Baconian theory. The judgment of so keen a critic for a moment staggered me, but the proposition was so utterly at variance with the settled convictions of my mind, that the influence of his opinion soon yielded to my prepossessions, and I readily attributed the General's Baconian inclination to a professional predilection in favour of one of his own craft. The question, therefore, when it was afterward raised by others, failed to engage my serious attention, until it was again broached to me, in Bacon's favour, by an American cavalry officer, during an afternoon lounge near Richmond, on the Thames, in the latter part of the summer of 1874. Just about that time, there had appeared in the August un American Point of View. number of Fraser's Magazine an exceedingly ingenious article, written by a young American, under the title of " Who wrote Shakespeare ? " and singularly enough my West Point friend and I accidentally met the author of this very article three nights afterwards, at a dinner party in London, which included a number of English and American literary men. On the following morning, I sought, at the bookstands, the magazine alluded to, but the edition having been exhausted, I w was obliged to have recourse to the politeness of the author, who kindly furnished me with one of six supplementary proofs he had procured to be stricken off for his own use, before the forms had been distributed. Soon afterward, stimulated doubtless by this publication, the controversy as to the authorship of the Shakespeare plays spread to the United States, and, under the manipulation of the Ameri- can Press, elicited a flood of multifarious opinion. Amid this ocean of expression, the article in "Eraser was by far the most notable for plausibility and force ; but what surprised me most in running through the views of all these writers was, that not one of them touched a fact which had long puzzled me concerning Shakespeare, and which had led me, several years before, to read his plays with laborious scrutiny, under the idea of writing an essay upon his character and principles, from an American point of view. Though not a blind worshipper of Shakespeare, I had always been among the warmest admirers of his genius, but I never had been able to comprehend why it was, that, unlike all the great geniuses of the world who had come before or after him, and who seem, as such, to have been deputized with the creative faculty of God, he should be the only one so deficient in that beneficent tenderness toward his race, so vacant of those sympathies which usually accompany intellectual power, as never to have been betrayed into one generous aspiration in favour of popular liberty. Nay, worse than this, worse than his servility to royalty and rank, we never find him speaking of the poor with respect, or alluding to the working classes without detestation or contempt. We can understand these tendencies as existing in Lord Bacon, born as he was to privilege, and holding office from a queen; but they seem utterly at variance with the natural instincts of a man who had sprung from the body of the people, and who, through the very pursuits of his father, and likewise The Responsibilities of Genius. 3 from his own beginning, may be regarded as one of the working classes himself. Bacon, through his aristocratic training, and influenced by the monarchical system under which he served, may barely be for- given, by even his most extreme defenders, for his barrenness of that beneficence, which genius is delegated, as it were, to bring to us from Heaven ; but the son of plain John Shakespeare has no such excuse. Dickens, who wrote mainly for the lowly; Byron, who, though a noble, fought for human liberty ; Cervantes, Junius, Eugene Sue, Le Sage, De Foe, Walter Scott, Victor Hugo, Oliver Goldsmith, and Sheherezade the never-to-be- forgotten Sheherezade, who talked to a Prince for a thousand and one nights in such sentiments as have made the literature of Arabia a hymn never forgot the hopes and joys and distresses of the poor. Shakespeare alone of these elevated souls prefers to be the parasite of the rich and noble, and seldom, if ever, permits the humble to escape him without a derisive jest or sneer. William Shakespeare nevertheless possessed a larger share of the divine creative faculty than any other mortal ; and let it not be said that too much is claimed for this poetic attribute. If the characters produced by mortal imaginations have not souls for divine judgment, they certainly have forms and shapes for human comprehension and for penal criticism. They are as much of the world as the world is of us. Othello, Manfred, Aladdin, Quasimodo, Meur de Marie, Gil Bias, Robinson Crusoe, Ras- selas, Micawber, Don Quixote, the Vicar of Wakefield, and Ivanhoe, are as actual to our appreciations as the real Mahomet, Csesar, Zenghis Khan, Napoleon, or Martin Luther ; as real, in fact, as are Vesuvius and JEtna to those who have never seen them. And the manner, consequently, in which these fictitious characters are developed to the reader, imposes as great respon- sibilities upon their authors, in the way of morals, as do the just presentation of the truths of history. The singular oversight of so salient a point as Shakespeare's aristocratic tendencies, by the Baconians, may perfraps be accounted for by the fact that their theory is still quite new, the ground having first been broken by Delia Bacon, of Boston, as late as 1856, and only languidly followed since by a few Ameri- can lawyers and aristocratic Englishmen, severally stimulated by 4 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. pride of profession, or conceit of caste. To the masses of the English people it is really a matter of no great importance whether one Englishman or another was the author of the Shakespearian dramas ; for the dust of two centuries has fallen so evenly on both of those who are now under our consideration, that all minor preferences are levelled out. With Americans, however, the question is somewhat different. The pamphlet of the American lady, who had been inspired to the Baconian theory doubtless by a mere pride of name, began to attract favourable attention from the English aristocracy in 1858, and some of its leaders brought themselves to the opinion, that it would be a good thing for the prestige of their order if the world could be made to believe that the great writer, who had dwarfed them all for over two hundred years, was a scion of their caste. It has always been the tendency of patrician politics, when the merit of the lowly-born cannot be underrated, to mask its origin by artfully recruiting it into its own ranks, so that talented poverty may file thereafter down the aisles of the future under the aspect of a lord. This policy has been so con- spicuous during the last hundred years, that there can hardly be a doubt that had the author of Othello lived a few generations later he would have figured upon the title-page of his immortal works as Lord Shakespeare, or Sir William at the least. The British nobility would have thus been spared the desire of adopting the American woman's theory in transferring the glory of William Shakespeare to Sir Francis Bacon. Conspicuous among the noblemen who favoured the Baconian theory in England was (as we are informed by the article in Fraser) " Lord Palmerston, who maintained that the plays of Shakespeare were written by Lord Verulam (Sir Francis Bacon), who had passed them off under the name of an actor for fear of compromising his professional prospects and philosophic gravity." On being opposed in this declaration (says the author of the article in Fraser) by the positive testimony of Ben Jonson as to Shakespeare's authorship, Palmerston replied, t( Oh, those fellows always stand up for one another, or perhaps Jonson" (added his Lordship) " may have been deceived like the rest." Here was the weighty authority of two prominent statesmen and lawyers, Palmerston and Butler, relatively of England and America, fencing the very threshold of my inquiry; and it The Responsibilities of Genius. 5 consequently behoved me to advance with wary footsteps into the shades of the enigma, and prove, at the very outset, if I desired to controvert them, that the author of the Shakespeare plays could not have been (like Bacon) either a statesman or a lawyer a proof that must, of necessity, be sought from internal evidence furnished by the plays themselves, since all contem- porary testimony had left these points unsettled. The only means remaining, therefore, after the lapse of two hundred years, was to question the souls of the departed Titans, as they still live and breathe, within their respective imperishable pages. 6 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. CHAPTER II. SHAKESPEARE'S EARLY LIFE. ONE of the objects of this inquiry will be an attempt to establish the degree of difference, if any, in which the Shakespearian volume should be regarded, relatively, in England and America, as a family text-book; and whether, as a household teacher, it should, among Americans, as with Englishmen, divide domestic reverence and authority almost with the Bible. And this inquiry will logically extend itself so as to comprehend the social and religious, as well as the political inculcations of the Shake- spearian volume. And following the inquiry still further, we shall endeavour to ascertain what difference, if any, in ff musical ear/'' or sense of music, is exhibited relatively in the Plays and Essays; so as to enable us to determine, with almost absolute certainty, whether one and the same man could have been the author of both. In this latter branch of my inquiry I shall be obliged to depend largely upon the mjisical experts. Dealing with almost any other poet than the author of Shake- speare's Plays, it would be a matter of comparative indifference what his ideas were as to the separation of the classes, or upon the science of government; but if we are to install a monitor within our homes as a domestic god, or adopt a writer as a political instructor, it is of some importance that we should know how much credit to concede to such an author's conscience and principles. It will readily be seen, therefore, that Shake- speare is a character of much more consequence to Englishmen, and especially to the ruling classes of Great Britain, than he can ever be to the republican citizens of the United States. With us, he is but the poet, mighty beyond all comparison; but to Shakespeare s Early Life. 7 the ruling classes of Great Britain he is not only the Poet, but the Patron of their order, and also thejtireless inculcator of those marvel _of Jh&jimlizficLworld, nnjer_ih.e,jilmost purely personal form of ^ngHsJbj^atriotism. The author of the Shakespeare plays has been, in this way, the unseen source, the incessant fountain, the constant domineering influence, which has done more to continue the worship of the English people for royalty and rank, than all other agencies combined. Well may the nobility of England be jealous of his pre-eminence, and defend him as the greatest genius ever given to the world. They have an interest in his popular supremacy, which they cannot afford to surrender, and he has been worth to them, during the last two hundred years, millions of men and billions upon billions of money. He deserves at their hands a monument more lofty than the Pyramids ; while it is very questionable, on the other hand, if the "Rnglir.li mnf-nnH QWA him anything beyond their .involuntary admiratioji-Jf4us...DjinjL- It suggests itself to me at this point, therefore, that it would perhaps be a better policy for the British aristocracy, to leave this mighty Voice to continue to speak from among The People, rather than as one of the aristocratic masters of The People. But we must not be beaten back by the awe of generations. We must demand boldly who and what this mighty genius was, what were his principles, his character, his faith, his motive in writing as he did, and what manner of man he was in his familiar way of life. And all this is necessary in order, first, to decide the question as between Shakespeare and Bacon, and then to assign to the actual writer of the Shakespeare plays the position, as a poet, moralist, and public teacher, to which he may be entitled among the English-speaking race of both sides of the Atlantic. The first objection to the authorship of William Shakespeare, which the Baconians raise, is that no man of such humble origin, deficient scholarship, and loose, easy-going way of life as Shake- speare, could have been possessed of such profound knowledge as he exhibited, and be capable of such transcendant imagery as these plays develope, nay, that no common play-writer could have possessed such a familiarity with court etiquette and with the language of nobles, and of kings and queens, as he. But the force of these objections is seriously damaged by the fact that 8 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. none of the disciples of the Baconian theory who have sprung- up since 1856, ever had the advantage of studying the manners or the "set phrase of courts/' themselves. And here I may be allowed to add that it may be considered certain that the writer of the Shakespeare plays himself spoke much better English than any prince or noble of Elizabeth's court. As to the character and morals of William Shakespeare, he certainly suffers nothing from a comparison with Sir Francis Bacon. Shakespeare commenced life as a deer-stealer and a drunkard/ had a child born to him in less than six months after 1 This latter seems to be a harsh declaration, but I find my authority for it in pages 8 and 9 of the Memoir of Shakespeare by the Rev. William Harkness, M.A., in Cooledge and Brother's New York edition of Scott, Webster, and Geary's London edition of the Works of Shakespeare. I need not say to Shakespearian scholars that the authority of Mr. Harkness is entitled to the highest respect. "The gaiety of his (Shakespeare's) disposition," says Mr. Harkness, " naturally inclined him to society ; and the thoughtlessness of youth prevented his being sufficiently scrupulous about the conduct and the character of his associates. ' He had, by a misfortune, common enough to young fellows, fallen into ill company,' says Howe ; and the excesses into which they seduced him, were by no means consistent with that seriousness of deportment and behaviour which is expected to accom- pany the occupation that he had adopted. The following anecdote of these days of his riot is still current at Stratford, and the neighbouring village of Bidford. I give it in the words of the author from whom it is taken. Speaking of Bidford, he says, ' There were anciently two societies of village yeomanry in this place, who frequently met under the appellation of Bidford topers. It was a custom of these heroes to challenge any of their neighbours, famed for the love of good ale, to a drunken combat ; among others, the people of Stratford were called out to a trial of strength, and in the number of their champions, as the traditional story runs, our Shakespeare, who foreswore all thin potations, and addicted himself to ale as lustily as Falstaff to his sack, is said to have entered the lists. In confirmation of this tradition, we find an epigram written by Sir Aston Cockany, and published in his poems in 1858 ; it runs thus : "'TO ME. CLEMENT FISHER, OF WINCOT. Shakespeare, your Wincot ale hath much renown'd, That fox'd a beggar so (by chance was found Sleeping) that there needed not many a word To make him to believe he was a lord : But you affirm (and in it seem most eager), 'Twill make a lord as drunk as any beggar. Shakespeare's Early Life. 9 marriage/ and lived in London during- all his theatrical career without his wife. He was so mean as to sue one man for a debt of 6, and another for 1 19s. 10^./ when he had an income of Bid Norton brew such ale as Shakespeare fancies Did put Kit Sly into such lordly trances : And let us meet there (for a fit of gladness), And drink ourselves merry in sober sadness. " ' When the Stratford lads went over to Bidford, they found the topers were gone to Eversham fair, but were told, if they wished to try then- strength with the sippers, they were ready for the contest. This being acceded to, our bard and his companions were staggered at the first outset, when they thought it advisable to sound a retreat, while the means of retreat were practicable, and then had scarce marched half a mile before they were all forced to lay down more than their arms, and encamp in a very disorderly and unmilitary form, under no better covering than a large crab-tree, and there they rested till morning. " * This tree is yet standing by the side of the road. If, as it has been observed by the late Mr. T. Wharton,the meanest hovel to which Shakespeare has an allusion interests curiosity and acquires an importance, surely the tree which has spread its shade over him, and sheltered him from the dews of the night, has a claim to our attention. " ' In the morning, when the company awakened our bard,' the story says, ' they entreated him to return to Bidford and renew the charge, but this he declined, and looking round upon the adjoining villages, exclaimed, " No ! I have had enough, I have drunk with Piping Pebworth, Dancing Marston, Haunted Hillbro', Hungry Grafton, Dudging Exhall, Papist Wicfesford, Beggarly Broom, and Drunken Bidford.'' " ' Of the truth of this story I have very little doubt. It is certain that the crab-tree is known all round the country by the name of Shakespeare's crab, and that the villages to which the allusion is made all bear the epithets here given them : the people of Pebworth are still famed for their skill on the pipe and tabor : Hillborough is now called Haunted Hillborough, and Grafton is notorious for the poverty of its soil.' " The above relation, if it be true, presents us with a most unfavourable picture of the manners and morals prevalent among the youth of War- wickshire in the early years of Shakespeare, and it fills us with regret to find our immortal poet, with faculties so exalted, competing the bad pre-eminence in such abominable contests. It is some relief to know that, though he erred in uniting himself with such gross associations, he was the first to retreat from them in disgust. 2 Knight's "Shakespeare," Appleton and Co.'s American edition, p. 1 44 ; E. Grant White, p. 145. 3 Knight, vol. i. p. 158. io Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. 1000^ a year, and died, at the age of fifty-two, from the effect of too much drink at dinner. 4 Sir Francis Bacon, on the other hand, was all his life a clamorous office-seeker, a time-server, and a corrupt judge. He was condemned to the Tower, when Lord Chancellor, for having sold his judicial opinions for money, and, worse still, confessed the crime in order to mitigate his sentence. On a review of his whole character, Pope, the poet, stingingly characterized him as " The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind." So, between William Shakespeare and Sir Francis Bacon, in a moral point of view, there was no great gulf. Indeed, if there were any disparagement of degradation, it was against Sir Francis. Most of the Shakespearian biographers and critics make it a matter of regret that so little being known of the history of the great poet, it is exceedingly difficult to form a true estimate of his personal character; but the difficulty which I find in that respect is, that these biographers and commentators nearly all start from the one point, of endeavouring to conceal, or at least to palliate, those follies and defects which might impair Shakespeare's influence or credit with the people. They set out, consequently, with the desire to describe Shakespeare as they would like to have him. His robbing of a gentleman's park, a very high crime at any time in England, is patronized gently as a youthful escapade, and the premature appearance of the first child of his marriage has been justified by the presumed privileges of a Warwickshire betrothal. There has been some dispute among Shakespeare's biographers about his religious faith, a few having presented evidences tend- ing to show that he was a Roman Catholic; but the great majority, being of Protestant politics, discourage that idea. Bacon we know to have been a Protestant of an extreme type, and from this difference springs an interesting point of our inquiry. The question presents itself at once as to which religious faith is most manifested in the plays. If they were the production of a Roman Catholic, Bacon could not have been their author. 4 Richard Grant White, pp. 46, 55. Shakespeare s Early Life. 1 1 What we have first upon our hands, however, is the singular anomaly presented by the spectacle of a genius of the life-giving' order, who was born in comparative humbleness, never betray- ing one emotion for, or exhibiting a single sympathy with the down-trodden classes, whose degradations and miseries must have constantly intruded upon his subtle comprehension. But the mist lifts before the light of facts. We have abundant evidence that Shakespeare was, in his personal way of life, though of a cheerful, amiable disposition, a calculating, money-making, money-saving man, and the conclusion from the circumstances of his business in London and at Stratford must be, that he suppressed his natural sentiments to a convenience of association and a sense of interest. His first patron, when he was a theatrical manager, was the Earl of Southampton, a prodigal young nobleman of enormous wealth, who, together with the Earls of Essex arid of Rutland, were constant visitors at his theatre. 5 So thoroughly had Shakespeare established himself under the patronage of Southampton, that he dedicated to him his "Venus and Adonis," and in the following year also his "Lucrece." By way of showing, moreover, the extent to which the dramatist had advanced himself into his lordship's favour, Richard Grant White states (p. 97), that Shakespeare took this liberty in the matter of " Venus and Adonis " without, " as the dedication shows/' asking his lordship's permission ; a very unusual responsi- bility, says the same commentator, to assume with the name of any man, much less a nobleman, unless he had felt himself secure in his lordship's good graces. Southampton was at this time under twenty years of age, and Essex (subsequently the favourite of Queen Elizabeth) was but four years older. In speaking of these young noblemen and their associates, who it maybe as well to state jyere Catholics, Judge Holmes in his essay in favour of the Baconian theory says, that Southampton, Rutland, and the rest of "Essex's jovial crew " pass their time in London in merely going jfco_ plays every day." It was about this time, says Rowe, that " my lord Southampton at one time gave Shakespeare 1000/. to enable him to go through a purchase he had a mind to." This princely gift is, of course, ascribed to Southampton's estimation of the muse of Shakespeare, 5 The " Authorship of Shakespeare," Nathaniel Holmes, p. 95. 12 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. but inasmuch as Southampton never exhibited any appreciation of literature beyond having the run of Shakespeare's theatre, we are justified in attributing the earl's attachment to the manager to considerations which frequently operate with young men of means and fashion down to the present day. It is true that, in Shakespeare's time, there were no actresses attached to theatrical companies, the female parts being performed by boys, but it was the custom of ladies of quality to sit upon the stage during theatrical entertainments, and there are several anecdotes of intrigues having taken place between them and young gallants, under such circumstances. 6 And this theory of personal familiarity between Shakespeare and a coroneted gallant of nine- teen is all the more likely, than the one which ascribes South- ampton's liberality to his patronage of literature, since that nobleman lived till he was fifty-four without having given any other evidence of a love of letters, or, indeed, without having made any mark beyond getting himself into the Tower for taking part in Essex's foolish Irish- Jesuit expedition, which cost the latter unhappy nobleman his life. Considerations such as the foregoing would as satisfactorily account for the ajj^prir^^n^Shakespjffi^ f Jjberal jjejxtinients, as the natural tendencies of Bacon's rank would account for the latter's aristocratic coldness of heart. Let not the rapt worshippers of Avon's bard, whose sacred ecstasy is thus rudely broken in upon, suppose I take pleasure in these hard statistics. Nothing can reduce Shakespeare from the supreme elevation which he holds in the United States as the poet of the English-speaking race ; but we in America take no interest in him as a politician, nor yet as a moralist; and, surely it is wiser for us, who are not involved in any tangles of allegiance, to disenchant ourselves of the spells fumed up by loyalty and doctrine, and treat this mighty morlaLjaa^a^man. Perhaps the most curious and interesting problem which ~~caiT" thus be brought to our comprehension is what amount of dirt may mix with, and be instrumental in, the production of a flaming gem. And Bacon is as subject to this criticism as Shakespeare. 6 Queen Elizabeth used sometimes to sit behind the scenes, and on one occasion crossed the stage in view of the audience while Shakespeare himself was performing a character. Lord Bacon. 13 CHAPTER III. LOUD BACON. " They say, best men are moulded out of faults." Measure for Measure, Act. V. Scene 1. THE theory that Lord Verulam (familiarly known as Lord Bacon) was the author of the plays attributed to Shakespeare, first became a matter of general discussion, as I have already stated, in consequence of an article by Delia Bacon, in the January number of Putnam's Magazine for 1856, published in America three hundred and fifteen years after Bacon was born, and two hundred and fifty-nine years after "William Shakespeare had been buried. The claim set up for Bacon, therefore, is barely nineteen years old, as against the nearly three hundred years of general acceptance, by history, of Shakespeare's rights. Shortly after the appearance of Miss Bacon's essay in the American magazine, she published it, somewhat enlarged, in pamphlet form, with an introduction by Nathaniel Hawthorne, in which shape it crossed the Atlantic, and had its ideas adopted by an English writer named William H. Smith, who supported and extended her views in an ingenious treatise published by him in London in 1857. Eight years afterwards, the November number of Eraser's Magazine for 1865 showed that Lord Palmerston had become a convert to the Baconian theory, and in the following year Nathaniel Holmes, Professor of Law in Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass., issued an elaborate volume of 600 pages supporting Miss Bacon's view. Here we have the whole scope of the Baconian pretension, comprising at the most a period of twenty years, with a meagre following of conspicuous advocates ; while, on the other hand, stand grouped in silent protest a crowd of Baconian biographers, stretching through well-nigh three 14 Shakespeare^ from an American Point of Vieiv. centuries, who, with the greatest desire to aggrandize the object of their worship, never dropped a hint of the idea that Bacon could possibly have been the author of the plays of Shakespeare. Nay, more, one of the latest, W. Hepworth Dixon, writing as late as 1861, 7 alludes to Shakespeare as a separate person from the subject of his work. Having thus marshalled the forces of the two parties to the controversy (for the silence of Bacon's biographers practically arrays them on the side of Shakespeare), it now suggests itself that we should inquire briefly into the separate histories of Bacon and Shakespeare, and ascertain what connexion each had with the literature of their age ; and what, if any, were their relations to one another. They are consigned to us by the history of the times in which they lived, as two characters ; one as the unapproachable Master of Philosophy and Law, and the other as the most transcendent genius of Poetry and Imagination. 8 SIR FRANCIS BACON, Lord Verularn, Viscount St. Albans, and Lord High Chancellor of England, was born Jan. 22, 1560. He matriculated at Trinity College, Cambridge, at the age of thirteen, and soon afterward passed two years in travel on the European continent. In 1584? he first sat in the House of Commons as member for Melcombe, and from this time (though he was by courtesy the Queen's Lord Keeper at the age of ten), may be dated the commencement of his public official career. In the parliamentary sessions of 1586-7-8 young Bacon played a most influential part. " These three sessions/' says Dixon, " had to save the liberties of England and the faith of nearly half of Europe. They crushed the Jesuits and broke and punished the Romanist conspiracies." This fixes Bacon's faith, like that of his mother, the pious Lady Ann (whom he speaks of as " a saint of God "), to be of the Protestant persuasion, though we find a more decisive proof of Bacon's doctrine in the fact, ' Dixon's "Personal History of Lord Bacon," Boston, 1861. 8 " Those two incomparable men, the Prince of Poets and the Prince of Philosophers, who made the Elizabethan age a more glorious and important era in the history of the human mind than the age of Pericles, of Augustus, or of Leo." Lord Macaulay, " Essay on Burleigh and his Times," vol. v. p. 611, ed. Trevelyan. Lord Bacon. 1 5 that he was one of a committee which, in 1587, waited upon Queen Elizabeth to demand the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots. To use the words of Dixon in describing the scene : "The Queen (Elizabeth) holds out. A grand committee, of which Bacon is a member, goes into the presence, and, kneeling together at her feet, demand that the national will* shall be done that the Protestant faith shall be saved." & About the year 1589, we find Bacon, who was then between twenty-nine and thirty years of age, the associate of Essex, who was twenty-three, of Southampton, who was nineteen, Montgomery, Pembroke, Rutland, "and the rest of Essex's jovial crew, which passed their time in going to Shakespeare's theatre every day." At this time Shakespeare himself, though already famous, was but twenty-five. This brings the above nobleman so in communication with Shakespeare, that nothing is more probable than that some of his unplayed manuscripts were read to " Essex, Southampton, and the rest," perhaps in Bacon's presence a common custom with authorship and patronage in the Elizabethan age. On the other hand, it is not impossible that Shakespeare, who doubtless was a great reader, touched now and then upon some of Bacon's theories, and thus we may readily account for any supposed plagiarism of one upon the other. I do not wish to be understood, however, as admitting, at this point, that either of these wondrous men was ever indebted to the other for an idea ; though the most exacting devotee of Bacon might readily admit the occasional obligation of the latter to the poet, without brushing a single grain of the golden powder from his idol's wing. The likelihood, indeed, is far greater that Bacon insen- sibly fell into the habit, during the midsummer of Shakespeare's current popularity, of drawing from him as from a common well of language. This has been the custom of the world since he appeared, and even such a man #s Bacon could hardly have resisted the temptation. The spinal column of the Baconian claim is, that Sir Francis Bacon considered the reputation of a playwright to be so de- rogatory to his social and literary pretensions, as well as to his high political aspirations, that he concealed his taste for dra- 9 Dixon's " Personal History of Lord Bacon," p. 29. 1 6 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. matic writing" under the convenient mask of the good-natured and popular manager of the Blackfriars Theatre ; or, to use the language of the article in Fraser, that he (Bacon) " passed the plays off under the name of an actor for fear of compromising his professional prospects and philosophic gravity." But the main difficulty in the way of this theory is, that successful dramatic composition was recognized by very high honours in the times of Elizabeth and James I., Shakespeare himself having reached the high compliment of an introduction to Court for his successes in that way. In addition to this, the dramatists of that day were most of them men of scholarship ; several being of a social position quite worthy of ranking with that of Sir Francis Bacon. For instance, Massinger, " second to none but him who never had an equal/' received his education at Oxford, and lived to an old age, " solaced by the applauses of the virtuous.-" l Beaumont and Fletcher (the latter of whom was buried in the same grave with Massinger) were lawyers in all ages the profession of gentlemen. Marlowe, the tragic poet, matriculated at Cam- bridge ; Shirley studied at Oxford ; Ben Jonson " had the singular happiness of receiving his education under the illus- trious Camden." His studies were interrupted by his change of circumstances, through his mother's death, but they were finally completed at Cambridge ; Quarles was educated at Cambridge ; Lyly went first to Oxford and finished at Cambridge ; and grouped with these come Thomas Sackville, subsequently Lord Treasurer, Lord Buckhurst, and we may add, Sir Philip Sidney, the equal of princes, who " wrote one dramatic piece, ' The Lady of the May/ a masque, acted before Elizabeth in the gardens of Wanstead, in Essex/'' Sidney was Elizabeth's " ambassador to the German powers, but when the fame of his valour and genius became so general that he was put in nomination for the king- dom of Poland, she refused to sanction his advancement lest she should lose the brightest jewel in her court." ' Surely this illustrious example of honour and advancement might have justified Bacon, after the mighty merits of such productions as "Lear," "Hamlet/' and "Othello" had been recognized by the best critics of the time, to accept the credit of their composition to himself provided always that he was their author. Besides, 1 Knight's octavo, published by Guy and Baine, London, p. 37. 2 Knight's octavo, p. 43. Lord Bacon. 1 7 Bacon openly wrote dramatic compositions under the form of masques and mysteries; first, for the gentlemen at Gray's Inn during the Christmas Revels of 1587, and subsequently, in 1594, for the entertainment of the court. 3 Bacon married Alice Barnham at the age of forty-six; at fifty- two he was made Attorney-General, and became Lord Chancellor at the age of fifty-seven. In the fourth year of this great office he was detected in taking bribes for his decisions, and, having confessed his crime in order to propitiate the mercy of his judges, was sent to the Tower on May 3, 1621. After re- maining a prisoner for ten months, the fine inflicted on him was remitted and he was released in March, 1622. He never resumed public life, but died three years afterwards in 1625. Bacon was a thorough specimen of the politician of that time, being a per- sistent applicant for office, and always selfish, sordid, and unfaithful. He was exceedingly greedy of money, and though his revenues most of the time were liberal, he was constantly the victim of the usurers. Some of his biographers describe him as pure in his morals and temperate in his habits, which certainly does not represent the case of William Shakespeare. Dixon speaks of Bacon as " a man born to high rank who seeks incessantly for place/' while according to Pope and Lord Campbell, Cecil and Coke, he is " in turn abject, venal, proud, profuse ungrateful for the gifts of Essex, mercenary in his love for Alice Barnham, servile to the House of Commons, and corrupt on the judicial bench." ' The most noteworthy feature of the work of Dixon is, that its author does not make even the slightest allusion to the Bacon- Shakespeare theory, though that theory had then been projected full five years. And, perhaps, at this point, it is worthy of mention that Bacon, on the other hand, never, in all his voluminous writings, made the most distant allusion to Shakespeare. Such was Bacon, for whom the Baconians claim, that he possessed more of the education, wit, emotional elevation, and moral fitness for the production of such intellectual light as beams through the plays before us, than the man to whom these plays have always been ascribed, and who indisputably wrote " Venus and Adonis.-" 3 Holmes, p. 90. 4 Dixon's " Personal History of Lord Bacon," Boston, 1861, p. 4. 1 8 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. CHAPTER IV. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. " IT is quite a fallacy/'' says Halliwell, one of the most pains- taking and reliable of the biographers of Shakespeare, f< to complain how little we are acquainted with William Shake- speare's career and worldly character. On the contrary, we should be thankful we know more of him than we do of Spenser, or of many others, the history of whose lives would be so interesting and so valuable/'' * " We know more of William Shakespeare before he was forty years old," says Richard Grant White, taking up this cue from Halliwell, " than we do of Oliver Cromwell at the same age ; than the Greeks knew of 2Eschylus, the father of their tragedy ; or of Aristophanes, the father of their comedy, two centuries after they died ; or than the French do of Moliere, not a page of whose manuscripts is known to be in existence/'' " The same truth," adds this writer, " is illustrated in the biography of Washington, whose own nephew, to whom were open all family papers and records, was unable to discover the date of his marriage, although his wife, Mrs. Custis, was one of the richliest dowered widows in all Virginia." ; The truth is, as I have said before, there were abundant details of the personal life of William Shakespeare open to the hands /6f the early, and even the later English biographers, if they had only thought it politic to state frankly and without subterfuge, all they knew about him. Some of the reasons for their reticence I have already given. In dealing with Shakespeare's history for the purposes of this inquiry I shall endeavour to be very brief. 1 Halliwell's " Shakespeare," p. 2. 2 Pilchard Grant White, p. 182, 4, 5. William Shakespeare. 19 William Shakespeare was born at Stratford-upon-Avon, on the 23rd April, 1564. His father, John Shakespeare, was, according- to Rowe, a considerable dealer in wool, and had been first alderman and then high bailiff of the body corporate of Stratford. He had also been chamberlain, and possessed lands and tenements which were said to have been the reward of his grandfather's faithful services to King Henry VII. It has also been said that John Shjtkfispeare at one time followed the occupation of a butcher, but this report doubtless grew out of his occasionally adding to his trade in wool, the sale of furs ; and, when opportunity invited, according to the custom of country stores, the sale of butcher's meat. At the birth of our poet, who was a first son, John Shakespeare was in a thriving condition, and this prosperity continued for some years afterward. William, as soon as he had arrived at a proper age, was placed at a free grammar school of the town of Stratford, where Latin and other liberal acquirements were taught ; but at the age of fourteen he was rather suddenly withdrawn, in consequence of the decline in his father's circumstances, either to assist him in his business, or to lend a hand in gaining his own livelihood. Some of the commentators think, that from school he went into the office of a country attorney, or was placed with the seneschal of some manor court, " where/' says one writer, " it is highly probable he picked up those law phrases that so frequently occur in his plays, and which could not have been in common use, unless among professional men. 3 This view, in addition to being in it- self very plausible, derives its main support from an attack made upon Shakespeare by one of his London dramatic cotemporaries, Robert Greene, who, jealous of our poet's rapid rise over all his rivals in popular estimation, sneered at him for presuming to be t{ the only Shake-scene in a countrey." Nash, a parasite of Greene's, and of the same coarse, envious character, next attacks and practically advises our poet to return to his original " trade 3 Duyckinck's " Life of Shakespeare," in Porter and Coate's edition, Phila- delphia, 1874, p. 3. 4 " Trust them not (?'. e.^the players), for there is an upstart crow, beauti- fied with our feathers, that with his tiger's heart wrapt in a player's hide, supposes he is as well able to bombast out a blank verse as the best of you ; and being an absolute Johannes factotum, is, in his own conceit, the only Shak-scene in a countrey." Greene's " Groat's Worth of Wit." 2O Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. of noverint" 5 which indicates the calling 1 of an attorney's clerk. 6 The age of fourteen, therefore, which sees Shakespeare retire from the Stratford school, is the true commencement of his public life. It now becomes a matter of great importance to our inquiry to ascertain with what religious sentiments or leanings William Shakespeare embarked upon the world ; (for, after all, it matters not how men may drop the observance of religious forms, as the constant pressure of expanding worldly knowledge chips that reverence away) the early teachings of a religious mother always represent a large dormant influence, which awakens at every opportunity, to give direction to the general flow of judgment. And it is entirely well settled that Mary Arden, the mother of William Shakespeare, daughter and heiress of Robert Arden, of Wellingcote, styled ' { a gentleman of worship," was a Roman Catholic. We have already seen that the mother of Francis Bacon was a Protestant. By following this line of inquiry, and gauging it carefully, as we go along, by the in- variable religious sentiment of the Shakespeare plays, we must finally reach a point decisive. For, though Essex and South- ampton, Shakespeare's great patrons were Catholics, and though Shakespeare may be supposed to have been influenced by their political predilections, from any expression savouring of democracy in his writings, it is not to be credited for an instant that a man of such early training could have been domineered by them from the natural flow of his religious sentiments. On the contrary, there is much reason to believe that, in this particular, he and they were in full accord. Let me add at this point that it is certainly known that Sir Thomas Lucy, whose deer were stolen by Shakespeare soon after 5 Noverint universi per presentes is the Latin for "know all men by these presents," hence attorneys were often called noverints from their frequent use of that term. The nickname could apply to no other class. 6 " It is a common practice now-a-days, among a sort of shiftless com- panions that run through every ait and thrive by none, to leave the trade of noverint, whereto they were born, and busy themselves with the endeavours of art, though they could scarcely latinize their neck-verse if they should have need; yet English Seneca, read by candle-light, yields many good sen- tencesand if you entreat him fair in a frosty morning, he will afford you whole Hamlets, I should say, handfuls of tragical speeches." Nashe's Intro- duction to " Greene's Menaphon," 1589, and Knight, vol. i. p. 102. William Shakespeare. 21 \ he left school, and under whose persecutions it seems the future poet was finally driven out of Stratford was, of that strict shade of the reformed faith known as Puritan, and as such, was one of a commission appointed by the government to report against heretics and nonconformists. 7 As such commissioner, Sir Thomas Lucy, with the rest of the board, reported against John Shakespeare, the father, and about fourteen other persons, for not having, during several weeks, made their appearance at church. Eight of these derelicts, among whom we again find John Shakespeare, were likewise impugned with the further motive of desiring by such non-attendance to evade the service of process for debt. This latter imputation is rather eagerly adopted by the Protestant biographers of Shakespeare in pre- 7 Harness, in describing the incident between Sir Thomas Lucy and young William Shakespeare, which had such a decisive influence upon the poet's life, says, " One of the favourite amusements of tbe wild companions with whom Shakespeare in bis youthful days allied bimself, was the stealing of deer and corries. In tbese bazardous exploits Sbakespeare was not backward in accom- panying bis comrades. Tbe person in wbose neigbbourbood, perhaps on wbose property, these encroachments were made, was of all others the indi- vidual from wbose bands they were least likely to escape witb impunity in case of detection. Sir Tbomas Lucy was a Puritan ; and tbe severity of manners whicb bas always characterized tbis sect, would teacb him to extend very little indulgence to the excesses of Sbakespeare and bis wilful companions. He was, besides, a game preserver : in bis place as a member of Parliament be bad been an active instrument in the formation of the game laws, and the trespasses of our poet, wbetber committed on tbe demesne of bimself or others, were as offensive to his predilections as to bis principles. Shakespeare and bis compeers were discovered, and fell under the rigid lasb of Sir Tbomas Lucy's authority and resentment. Tbe knigbt attacked tbe poet witb tbe penalties of tbe law, and the poet revenged bimself by sticking some satirical verses on the gate of the knight's park. Tbe following are the first and last: Verses on Sir Thomas Lucy. " A. parliement member, a justice of peace, At home a poore scarecrowe, in London an asse ; If Lucy is Lousie, as some volke misscall it, Sygee Lousie Lucy whatever befall it. ****** " If a iuvenile frolick he cannot forgive, We'll synge Lousie Lucy as long as we live ; And Lucy the Lousie a libel may call it, We'll synge Lousie Lucy whatever befall it." 3 22 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. ference to the first, because, perhaps, they are thus enabled to escape the inference that the Shakespeare family was of the Roman Catholic faith. Before proceeding farther as to Shakespeare's religious faith, I will return to the historical narration, in order that the decisive questions of our poet's social, political, and religious sentiments may follow in regular order, and lead up to the door of the text, with as little further interruption as possible. In this, as I have already said, the objects of our inquiry only permit me to be brief. We have seen that Shakespeare, owing to his father's straitened circumstances, left school at the age of fourteen; but we are justified in the conclusion that he acquired a sufficient knowledge of the classics, during the last two or three years of his studies, to qualify him for all the use which is exhibited of such learning in the plays, and this, from the fact (says Malone) "that other Stratford men, educated at the same school, were familiarly conversant with Latin, and even corresponded in that language."" ! Upon this point Mr. Lofft asserts, in his introduction to the "Aphorisms/' that Shakespeare "had what would now be considered a very reasonable proportion of Latin; he was not wholly ignorant of Greek ; he had a knowledge of French so as to read it with ease, and, I believe, not less of the Italian. If it had been true that he had no Greek, as some contend from Ben Jonson's famous line, that he had ' little Latin and less Greek/ it would have been as easy for the verse as for the sentiment to have said 'no Greek/' It is hard to defeat this reasoning; Aubrey and Dr. Drake agree with it, and Harness, in subscribing to it, remarks, " That Shakespeare should appear unlearned in the judgment of Jonson, who perhaps measured him by the scale of his own enormous erudition, is no imputation upon his classical attainments." I think it may be properly suggested at this point, that nothing is more likely than that Shakespeare keenly pursued his studies after he left school; and if, as there seems to be but little doubt, he wont into an attorney's office, he had ample leisure for such application. The experience of every man who has ever had a taste for study will tell him how natural such a course would bej nay, how strange it would have been if 8 Malone's " Shakespeare," Boswell's Edition, vol. ii. p. 182. 9 " Aphorisms from Shakespeare," pp. 12, 13, 14. William Shakespeare. 23 the eager mind of Shakespeare had not followed it. The extent of proficiency acquiredhby a mind like his, after such a good start as it had received, cannot be captiously limited. It is fair, therefore, to terminate the analysis of this first period of our poet's life with the conclusion that William Shakespeare, though not so great a scholar as Lord Bacon, possessed all the reading and classical accomplishment ^re^uisj|ejfcojtJie^roductiD^of the Shakespeare plays; and though he never became a lawyer in any true senslfofthat term, he had, in some lesser way, acquired all the " conveyancer's jargon/' and phrases_of attorneyship which are to be found sprinkled through his dramatic works. The period for this educational improvement, in the semi- solitude of a little country town like Stratford ran, in Shakespeare's case from fourteen till the age of twenty-two, at which latter date he went up to London. I may here be met by the remark, in objection to the probability of Shakespeare's studious habits, that he began by leading a wild, dissipated life, and married at the age of eighteen. But every married man's experience will tell him that the conjugal condition rather promotes serious reflection than otherwise; while Shakespeare's drunken bouts, his matches at intoxication, and his infractions of the game-laws under the form of deer-stealing, may be regarded as the neces- sary vents and excesses of an intensely active nature, which could not be "cribb'd, cabin'd and confined" of its natural instincts by the sleepy decorum of a place like Stratford. Yielding to these wilful impulses in yet another way, he made his precocious and imprudent marriage. The object of his choice was Ann Hathaway, the daughter of a substantial yeoman of Shottery, a little village about three miles from Stratford. She was eight years older than Shakespeare, which circumstance doubtless had its effect in producing the long separations that took place between them in the form of extended stays in London during his after-life. This marriage took place in December, 1582, and their first child subsequent to it was Susanna, born May 23, 1583, a period of little more than five months. Shakespeare showed his superior affection for this child, however, by leaving her the bulk of his property. It would seem, therefore, that he could not have doubted her paternity, whatever scandals may have got into circulation on the subject. It does not appear, indeed, that there ever was any 24 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. positive disagreement between himself and wife ; though it is worthy of observation, that in the first copy of his will he made no mention of her name, and only inserted it afterward to the extent of leaving her " his second-best bed." He probably was influenced to the slightness of this bequest, by the fact that she was sufficiently provided for out of his real estate by the usual common-law right of dower. Nearly all of Shakespeare's biographers show a disposition to shield him and Ann Hathaway from the inferential reproach of the premature debut of Susanna, by assuming that the period of betrothal in that age, in some portions of England, imparted all the liberties of wedlock. Perhaps we have Shakespeare's own opinion on the subject in the following lines of Claudio's in "Much Ado about Nothing/' where he replies to Leonato's reproaches for slandering the honour of his daughter Hero, whom Claudio stood engaged to marry : CL AUDIO. I know what you would say; if I have known her, You'll say she did embrace me as a husband And so extenuate the " forehand sin." Much Ado, Act IV. Scene 1. And, again, in the Duke's advice to Mariana, in " Measure for Measure :" DUKE (disguised as a priest}. Nor, gentle daughter, fear you not at all. He is your husband on a pre-contract : To bring you thus together, 'tis no sin, Sith that the justice of your title to him Doth flourish the deceit. Measure for Measure, Act IV. Scene 1. On the subject of his wife's superior age, we find Shakespeare again testifying in " Twelfth Night " as follows : DUKE. Let still the woman take An elder than herself; so wears she to him, So sways she level in her husband's heart. Ticelfth Nig Jit, Act II. Scene 4. And still again, in the same piece, to Viola, who is disguised as a young man : DUKE. Then let thy love be younger than thyself, Or thy affection cannot hold the bent : For women are as roses, whose fair flower, Being once displayed, doth fall that very hour. Twelfth Night, Act II. Scene 4. William Shakespeare. 25 Further on in the same play, the poet puts his own case with still more distinctness. Olivia, the heroine of the piece, having mistaken Sebastian for Viola, whom she has seen only as a page, and with whom she is madly in love, invites him with expressions of the utmost fondness to her apartments. Sebastian, who has never seen Olivia before, follows her wonderingly, and they pass some hours together. After the interval of a scene with other characters, Sebastian reappears in Olivia's garden, musing and alone, and hardly able to contain himself with his good fortune. After gazing with rapture on a pearl Olivia has given him, he says, I am mad, Or else the lady's mad ; But here my lady comes. Enter OLIVIA and a Priest. OLIVIA (to Sebastian). Blame not this haste of mine ; if you mean well, Now go with me, and with this holy man, Into the chantry by ; there, hefore him, And underneath that consecrated roof Plight me the full assurance of your faith ; That my most jealous and too doubtful soul May live at peace ; he shall conceal it, Whiles you are willing it shall come to note, What time we will our celebration keep, According to my birth. What do you say ? SEBASTIAN. I'll follow this good man, and go with you, And having sworn truth, ever will be true. OLIVIA. Then lead the way, good father ; and heavens so shine That they may fairly note this act of mine. Act IV. Scene 3. There are two further passages in the plays bearing upon this subject of troth-plight and premature birth which may as well be noticed at this point. The first of these we find in "The Winter's Tale/' LEONTES. My wife's a hobby-horse ; deserves a name As rank as any flax-wench, that puts to Before her troth-plight. Act I. Scene 2. The other occurs in " King John/' in the scene between the King, Robert, and the Bastard. 26 Shakespeare^ from an American Point of View. KOBEBT FAULCONBRIDGE (alluding to the Bastard). And this my mother's son was none of his ; And, if he were, he came into the world Full fourteen weeks before the course of time. Act I. Scene 1. These fourteen weeks, which Sir Robert thus refers to, represent just about the precocity of Susanna Shakespeare, and it will be seen that the poet, in neither case, made the defi- ciency the subject of a reproach or penalty. Whether this frequent recurrence to an important incident in Shakespeare's life was most natural to Shakespeare or to Bacon, the reader can readily settle for himself. In this connexion our attention becomes directed to the frequency with which the author of the plays indulges in a word which, though common enough in Shakespeare's time, I must be excused for quoting. I allude to the word cuckold. It is surprising to note the extent to which he revels in this term. It is profusely sprinkled through all his comedies and his historical plays. His tragedies also plentifully bear the soil of the idea ; and, indeed, there are very few of the plays which are free from this strange fantasy. The word, and even its equivalents, seem to operate upon him like a spell. Their merest mention provokes in his mind the most un- bounded merriment. Like the introduction of a syringe to a French audience, the fancy never tires. Indeed, it appears to deprive our poet of all self-control, and he rolls before the reader, and hold his sides like one who is on the brink of a fit, from excess of the ludicrous. 1 The question which presents itself in connexion with this observation is, whether such a development of comic ecstasy would be more likely to Sir Francis Bacon, who was not married until he was forty-six, or to William Shakespeare, who, at the age of eighteen, married a matured 1 In looking over the " Dramatic Miscellanies " of Thomas Davies, pub- lished in London in 1784, I find the following allusion to Congreve's frequent use of the same word in his plays : " The audience in Congreve's time," says Davies, " were particularly fond of having a city-cuckold dressed up for their entertainment, and Fondle-wife in Congreve's " Old Bachelor " is served up with very poignant sauce, for the several incidents in the scene are very diverting." Davies' " Miscellanies," vol. iii. p. 316. Congreve was doubtless governed in this matter by the taste which Shake- speare had so industriously inculcated. William Shakespeare. 27 woman, and was rewarded with a child in little more than five months afterwards ? Within eighteen months after the birth of Susanna, Shake- speare's wife bore him twins, a son and a daughter, who were baptized by the names of Hamnet and Judith ; " and thus, when little more than twenty, Shakespeare had already a wife and three children dependent on his exertions for support/" He remained at home in Stratford until 1586, when, as we have already seen, he went to London to seek new fortunes, in that larger sphere. Whether he had written anything beyond son- nets previous to that time does not appear. It seems that he went at once to the neighbourhood of the theatres, and it is reported that he began by holding gentlemen's horses at the doors. Having probably thus become acquainted with the management, he readily worked his way inside the temple of the drama, and was soon promoted to the position of call-boy on the stage. 28 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. CHAPTER V. SHAKESPEARE'S progress from this point appears to have been very rapid. He soon was permitted to play minor parts, and in three or four years acquired an interest in the management of the Globe, and also in the summer theatre, which was known as the playhouse at Blackfriars. At what precise time he began to write his plays is not definitely known, as they all found their way into print without any effort on his part, and the dates of their production was consequently, to a large extent, confounded with the order of their publication ; but, taking Furnival's table for our guide, it may safely be concluded that he began to write them as early as 1588-9. It is a singular fact that he appeared to take no interest in the vast renown they were building up for him ; for it was not until seven years after his death that the first collection of them was printed together, in what has been universally known as "the folio of 1623." Of his poems and sonnets he seemed to be a great deal more considerate, having published most of them over his own name and supervision, and dedicating the " Venus and Adonis," and the " Rape of Lucrece " in 1593 and 1594 respectively to the young Earl of Southampton. In his dedication of the former poem to the Earl, he charac- terizes it as " the first heir of his invention," but it is known that he wrote plays previous to its appearance, so it is not im- probable that the " Venus " had been written much earlier, and had perhaps been begun previous to his leaving Stratford. He followed the profession of an actor for upwards of seventeen years, and the production of his plays, which began probably when he was twenty-four, covered a period of twenty- six years. During this period he produced thirty-seven plays. Shakespeare s Personal Characteristics. 29 ) N^sJ^ " The latter part of his life," says Howe, " was spent in ease, retirement,, and the conversation of his friends/' and he died on his birthday, April 23rd, 1616, at the age of 52, in the full maturity of his powers, and leaving a large property behind him. The immediate cause of his death is reported by Ward, the vicar of Stratford, to have been a merry meeting which he had with Drayton and Ben Jonson ; at which, says the vicar, " it seems he drank too hard, for Shakespeare died of a fever there con- tracted." Knight is unwilling to give absolute confidence to this tradition, because the vicar wrote forty years after the event, " but," he remarks, " if it were absolutely true our reverence for Shakespeare would not be diminished by the fact that he accelerated his end in the exercise of hospitality, according 'to the manner of his age, towards two of the most illustrious of his friends." Knight's objection, that Ward wrote forty years after the event, has but little force when we learn that the good vicar's work, in which the above fact is stated was his diary, published naturally at the close of his career. In person Shakespeare is represented as having been of full size, comely and prepossessing ; of agreeable manners, but not marked either by bearing or in features with that dignity of presence which we naturally associate with our ideas of his genius. He was chiefly remarkable as a good-natured, amiable, easy-going man, with more heart than conscience, of a convivial inclination, with full conversational powers, supported by a readiness of wit which made him a desirable companion for men of any amount of acquirement or rank. "^Every contemporary who has spoken of him," says one writer, " has been lavish in the praise of his temper and disposition. f Tfofi gp.nl2a Sfrajfce.fippfl^ ' seemsto have been his distinguishing appellation." " No slighFjportiQiL of our enthusiasm for his writings," says anoiner, " may be traced to the fair picture which they present of our author's character; we love the tenderness of heart, the candour and openness and singleness of mind, the largeness of sentiment, the liberality of opinion, which the whole tenor of his works prove him to have possessed ; his faults seem to have been the transient aberrations of a thoughtless moment, which reflection never failed to correct." All affroft f.hnf Sha,kggj)eare'sjDresence was very attractive, while many incidents are given by his contem- poraries to show that with women lie was very fascinating. The 3O Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. general disposition evinced by his biographers, most of whom approach him only in awe and almost upon their knees, is to dis- believe the broadest of these anecdotes, as if it were discreditable to his intellect for him to have been so much a man. But the character of Bacon has already revealed to us that morals are not indispensable to intellectual force, and that the divine afflatus of the poet may find its way to the most sublime developments through the muddiest of niters. T am disposed, therefore, to accept most of the stories about Shakespeare's conviviality and gallantry, and think them less to his discredit, even when they stretch to the extremity of deer-stealing, than were the low con- trivances by which Bacon sought and retained office, or the sale of his judicial opinions from the bench. One of these stories about Shakespeare is recorded by Oldys in his MSS., and it is supported by such additional authority that we cannot help giving it full credence. It seems that it was the habit of our poet, in his trips between Stratford and London, to bait his horses at the Crown Inn or Tavern, in Oxford, which was kept by Mr. John Davenant, " a grave, melancholy man," never known to laugh, who was subsequently Mayor of Oxford, and whose son William became afterward a poet under the title of Sir William Davenant. But Mrs. Davenant, the hostess, was by no means a grave and melancholy woman. On the con- trary, tradition says she was " very mettlesome/' and withal quite pretty. During the several years through which these London and Stratford trips and Oxford stoppages continued, scandal was very free about the terms existing between the buxom hostess and the London manager. " One day/' and we have this story on the authority of Pope, the poet, " an old towns- man, observing the boy running homeward, almost out of breath, asked him whither he was posting in that heat and hurry. He answered, to see his ^od-father Shakespeare. ' There's a good boy/ said the other, ' but have a care that you don't take God's name in vain.' ' ; This story, Pope told at the Earl of Oxford's table, upon the occasion of some discourse which arose about Shakespeare's monument, then newly erected in Westminster Abbey; and he quoted Mr. Betterton, the player, for his authority/' ! The tale is also mentioned by Anthony Wood ; 1 Reed's " Shakespeare," vol. i. pp. 124, 125. Shakespeare's Personal Characteristics. 3 1 and certain it is that the traditionary scandal of Oxford has always spoken of Shakespeare as the father of Davenant ; 2 " but it imputes a crime to our author/' says a reverend com- mentator, " of which we may, without much stretch of charity, acquit him. It originated in the wicked vanity of Davenant himself, who, disdaining his honest, but mean descent from the vintner, had the shameless impiety to deny his father, and reproach the memory of his mother by claiming consanguinity with Shakespeare/ 1 ' Before leaving the sketch of Shakespeare at this point, I de- sire to call attention to the fact, as bearing upon the question of the claims set up for Bacon, that his contemporary, Ben Jonson, wrote a laudatory sketch of Shakespeare in his introduction to the plays, and gave the highest stamp of his approbation to the Bard of Avon's genius by the famous, but generally mis- quoted line, " He was not of an age, but for all time." This naturally brings us to the disposal of a common error, on which the Baconians place very great reliance. I allude to the popular tradition that Shakespeare thought with such facility that he never blotted out a line. Ben Jonson, in his " Discoveries/' mentions this preposterous statement as follows : " I remember the players have often mentioned it, as an honour to Shake- speare, that in writing (whatsoever he penned) he never blotted out a line. My answer hath been, ' Would he had blotted out a thousand V which they thought a malevolent speech. I had not told posterity this, but for their ignorance who chose that cir- cumstance to commend their friend by, wherein he most faulted ; and to justify mine own candour, for I loved the man, and do honour his memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any. He was, indeed, honest, and of an open and free nature, had an ex- cellent fancy, brave notions, and gentle expressions ; wherein he flowed with that felicity that sometimes it was necessary he should be stopped; Sufflaminandus erat, as Augustus said to Haterius. His wit was in his own power; would the rule of it had been so too." I have said that this report of the players is perfectly pre- 2 Reed, note ix., pp. 126, 127. 32 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. posterous, because nothing is better known to those who are at all familiar with theatrical affairs that actors rarely or ever see an author's manuscript, the necessities of distribution of the text and of study among the various members of a dramatic company, requiring always the assistance of the copyist's art. But to set this fable at rest, I request attention to the following specimens of Shakespeare's handwriting in the form of signatures on the pages of his will. These, and two other signatures, one in a book and the other to a mortgage deed, are the only five specimens of Shakespeare's " hand " extant, 3 and the bare sight of all of them is sufficient to refute the idea that they represent facility ; or, that when his penmanship had reached this cramped condition, it could have been made serviceable in the way of copying. And it must not be supposed that the above signatures were appended to Shake- speare's will during the feebleness of his last moments, for the document to which they are attached bears date 22nd March, 3 The utter extinction of all the Shakespeare manuscripts is attributed to the great fire of London, and two fires which occurred in Stratford. Shakespeare's Personal Characteristics. 33 1616; whereas he did not die until the 23rd of the next month and then rather unexpectedly, as we have seen. Besides, the two other signatures are precisely similiar. There is still another proof against the copying theory that logically connects itself with this portion of the case. Among the ear-marks which indicate the plays to be the production of one who had been a professional player, are the constantly re- curring evidences in the body of the text of what is known among actors. as " stage business/-' Striking specimens of this professional mystery are to be found in Hamlet's directions to the players, and in Peter Quince's distribution of the copied parts and " properties " to Bottom and his mates, in " Mid- summer Night's Dream." But these proofs of the playwright's technical and professional experience abound throughout the Shakespeare plays to such a degree that it has been said by actors that the very language and disposition of the scenes in the Shakespeare pieces make " stage business " of themselves. This kind of expertry could hardly have been acquired by Bacon ; neither could it have been imparted by a teacher ; nor yet could a copyist of less intellectual capacity than the author have written such matter " in " and made it fit. In fact, this " stage business" in Shakespeare is so blended with, and fashioned to the text, that it could not have been inserted after writing without ruining the structure; nor could it have been removed therefrom without bleeding out a portion of its life. 34 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. CHAPTER VI. THE UELIGION OF THE SHAKESPEARE FAMILY. WE have now brought our observations down to a point, as between Bacon and Shakespeare, where it becomes in order to follow our inquiry into the religious belief of William Shake- speare ; and if it shall appear that our poet was beyond all reasonable doubt a Roman Catholic, we shall be able to account for several things which might otherwise remain disputable. If, finally, we shall show after tracing all the probabilities of circum- stantial proof that the unvarying sentiment and verbal testi- mony of the plays indicate the writer to have been of the religion of the Church of Rome; that they show him to be entirely familiar with its dogmas, tenets, practices, and formula ; that he rarely if ever alludes to a priest without apparently folding his arms across his breast and reverently bowing his head; and, beyond all, that he not only betrays a profound ignorance of the formula of Protestantism, but never alludes to a Protestant preacher, or a Puritan as he prefers to call him, without derision and contempt ; I think it may be considered we have brought the Baconian portion of our inquiry to a close to a close, through what must then become the general verdict, that the plays as- cribed to William Shakespeare could not possibly have been the work of a confirmed and bitter Protestant like Sir Francis Bacon. The ancestors of William Shakespeare, on both sides, seem to have been persons of some note. It is claimed by several writers that the name of Chacksper, or Shackspeare, or Shakespeare, " a martial name however spelt/' says Knight, figured among squires at arms as early as the battle of Hastings, won by the " Conqueror" in 1066. The battle of Bosworth Field, however, The Religion of the Shakespeare Family. 3 5 in which the Earl of Richmond (afterwards Henry VII.) over- threw Richard III. in 1485, makes the first definite historical presentation of both the paternal and maternal Hues of the Shakespeare family. The grant of a coat of arms in 1599 to Shakespeare's own father, recites of " John Shakespeare, now of Stratford-on-Avon," that his " antecessor, for his faithful and ap- proved service to the late most prudent prince, King Henry VII., of famous memory, was advanced and rewarded with lands and tenements, given to him in those parts of Warwickshire where they have continued by some descents in good reputation and credit." The mother of Shakespeare was Mary Arden, the youngest of the seven daughters of Robert Arden, one of whose ancestors had rendered some public service (probably at Bosworth Field) for which he was rewarded with the position of Groom of the Chamber to Henry VII. " He seems/' says Malone, " to have been a favourite ; for he had a valuable lease granted to him by the king, of the manor of Yoxsall, in Staffordshire, and was also made keeper of the royal park of Aldcar." " Mary Arden ! " ex- claims Knight in a sore of rhapsody ; " the name breathes of poetry. It seems the personification of some Dryad, called by that generic name of Arden a forest with many towers. High as was her descent, wealthy and powerful as were the numerous branches of her family, Mary Arden, we doubt not, led a life of usefulness as well as innocence within her native forest hamlet/'' Her father died in December, 1556, and his will, which bears date 24th November of that year, indicates his religious faith by opening as follows : " First, I bequeath my soul to Almighty God, and to our blessed Lady St. Mary, and to all the holy company of heaven/' Mary had the best position in her father's will, and was made one of its executors, along with her sister Alice. Knight, who will not have Shakespeare to have been a Catholic on any show- ing, does not think " that the wording of this will is any proof of Robert Arden's religious opinions ; " but Halliwell, who is equally as stiff as Knight in his Protestantism, says that the testator " was undoubtedly a Catholic, as appears by his allusion to our blessed Lady Saint Mary in his will/' ' And the faith of 1 Halliwell's " Shakespeare," p. 15. 36 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. the father thus solemnly expressed, and made the vehicle of his last fond paternal trust, douhtless remained precious to the daughter. Of the religious faith of John Shakespeare, the father of our poet, who married Mary Arden, Halliwell and the great majority of the biographers express the opinion, or leave it to be inferred, that he was of the reformed religion, and consequently Protes- tant. They support this view withJLbe fact that John Shake- speare had held municipal offices in Stratford, which required him ttr^wcnra'dlicsioii to the principles of Protestantism, and to acknowledge the Queen of England instead of the Pope, as the head of the Church. This is a plausible presentation, certainly ; but when we reflect upon the bitter religious strifes of that tran- sition period between the Romish and the Reformed Church, and observe to what extent the Catholic clergy excused such political oaths, when they might assist them in picketing out adherents to posts of power, the argument loses a great portion of its force. The domestic history of every civil war will show numerous in- stances of malcontents and nonconformists getting into office under government by deceptive protestations. The period of the Cavaliers and the Roundheads was full of such cases, and to be more familiar, I may refer to the fact that during the late con- test in the United States between the North and South there were swarms of Confederates snugly nooked in the Union Custom-houses; while, on the other hand, many a Northern hypocrite was supporting rebellion in the South with the view of stealing cotton, or of profiting by his perfidy in some other way ; all readily swallowing the ironclad oaths of allegiance of either section, without the palliating pressure of either conscience or religion. But we have what may be regarded as direct proofs on the subject of John Shakespeare's religious faith. One of these proofs is the fact that a Protestant commission, which had been appointed by the Government to inquire into the conformity of the people of Warwickshire to the established religion, t{ with a special eye to Jesuits, priests, and recusants" reported many persons " for not coming monthlie to the churche, according to hir Majestie's lawes.-" Among these derelicts was John Shake- speare, but the commissioners specially note him, and eight others, as possibly not coming to church for fear of process for debt. One of these commissioners was Sir Thomas Lucy, aPuri- The Religion of the Shakespeare Family. 3 7 tan, which latter fact, as well as this report against the poet's father, may account for the subsequent invasion by Shakespeare of Sir Thomas Lucy's park, and also for the bitter pasquinade which the poetic youngster launched against Sir Thomas for his prosecution of that trespass. The most direct and absolute proof, however, that John Shake- speare was of the Roman Catholic religion, may be seen in his formal " Confession of Faith/" which was found nearly two hundred years after his death, and the discovery of which is described by Dr. Drake as follows : "About the year 1770 a master bricklayer of the name of Mosely, being employed by .Mr. Thomas Hart, the fifth in descent in a direct line from the poet's sister, Joan Hart, to new tile a house, in which he (Hart) then lived, and which is supposed to be that under whose roof the bard was born, found hidden be- tween the rafters and the tiling of the house a manuscript, con- sisting of six leaves stitched together, in the form of a small book. This manuscript Mosely, who bore the character of an honest and industrious man, gave (without asking or receiving any recompense) to Mr. Peyton, an alderman of Stratford, and this gentleman very kindly sent it to Mr. Malone, through the medium of the Rev. Mr. Davenport, vicar of Stratford." 2 Drake, p. 9 ; Reed, vol. iii. pp. 197, 198. Chalmers, in his " Apology for the Believers in the Shake- speare Papers/' remarks upon this document that, " From the sentiments and the language, this confession appears to be the effusion of a Roman Catholic mind, and was probably drawn up by some Roman Catholic priest. If these premises be granted it will follow, as a fair deduction, that the family of Shakespeare were Roman Catholics a circumstance which is wholly consistent with what Mr. Malone is now studious to inculcate, viz., that this confession could not have been the composition of any of our poet's family. The thoughts, the language, the orthography, all demonstrate the truth of my conjecture, though Mr. Malone did not perceive this truth when he first published this paper in 1790. But it was the performance of a clerkthe undoubted work of the family priest. The conjecture that Shakespeare's family were 2 For extracts from this " Confession of Faith," and remarks thereon by Drake, see Note at the conclusion of this chapter. 4 38 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. Roman Catholics is strengthened by the fact that his father de- clined to attend the Corporation meetings, and was at last removed from the corporate body." " But/' continues Chalmers, " this reasoning is confirmed by the consideration that the reign of Elizabeth was a period of apparent piety, and the reign of James I. an age of religious specu- lation. To own particular modes of faith became extremely fashion- able during both those periods. 'It was probably by this fashion that Lord Bacon, the prince of philosophers, was induced to draw up his Confession of Faith, in order to please a monarch who interested himself in religious theories." : " Every logician would infer," still continues Chalmers, " that if it (John Shakespeare's ' Catholic Confession of Faith ' ) had been the custom of the family, which was followed by the father, it is extremely probable the same custom would be also followed by the son, who at times cannot conceal his faith, even in his dramas." This last surmise of Chalmers suggests the thought that the Great Fire of London, several fires at Stratford, and especially the fire by which the Globe Theatre was destroyed (to which accidents the absence of any scrap of William Shakespeare's handwriting has been attributed), may also be held to account for the non- appearance of any " Confession of Faith " on his part. It appears, by the allusion which Chalmers makes above to Lord Bacon's " Confession of Faith," that such religious documents were common in that age to men of all persuasions. Nevertheless they appear to have had a sort of solemn secrecy attached to them, and from what we gather from Dr. Drake's remark in a subjoined note it is not unlikely that Shakespeare's " Confession of Faith," if he made one, was quietly buried with him. Perhaps this particular fact was reliably known (through the Fulman papers) to the Rev. Richard Davies, who, writing after 1688, flatly says that " Shakespeare died a Papist." 4 3 " Chalmers's Apology," sect, v., pp. 198200. 4 The Eev. William Fulman, who died in 1688, bequeathed his biographical collections to his friend, the Rev. Richard Davies, rector of Sapperton, in Gloucestershire, who made several additions to them. Davies died in 1708, and these manuscripts were presented to the library of Corpus Christ! College, Oxford, where they are still preserved. Under the article " Shake- speare " Fulman made very few notes, and those of little importance ; but The Religion of the Shakespeare Family. 39 "But are not the official situations held by Shakespeare's father in the borough conclusive against the opinion which Mr. Chalmers has grounded upon it?" indignantly exclaims a reverend biographer. Knight, in the same tone, says of the " Oath of Supremacy/' which Shakespeare's father must have taken in order to hold office, that "to refuse this oath was made punishable with forfeiture and imprisonment, with the pains of pramunire and high treason/' To such objections I think I have already opposed cogent reasons why the aspiring John Shake- speare should not have refused to take the oath, and these of themselves suggest why he should have so carefully concealed his "Catholic Confession of Faith." If it is clear that the parents of William Shakespeare were both devout Catholics, it is reasonable to suppose that the poet followed the usual instinct of a child by imbibing the re- ligious sentiment which filled his home, and which was breathed over him into his spiritual lungs, as it were, by his mother while he was lying in his cradle. The first piece of proof we have upon this subject is very posi- tive in its character. It comes from a clergyman who knew Shakespeare, and upon the examination of whose papers another clergyman, the Rev. Richard Davies, declares that the poet, who was born a Papist, died one. Surely it should require something Davies inserted the curious information so important in the consideration of the deer-stealing story. The following is a complete copy of what the MS. contains respecting Shakespeare, distinguishing the addition made by Davies by italics : " William Shakespeare was born at Stratford-upon-Avon, in Warwickshire? about 1563 or '64. Much given to all unluckiness in stealing venison and rabbits, particularly from Sir Lucy, who had him oft whipt and some- times imprisoned, and at last made him fly his native country to his great advancement ; but his revenge was so great that he is his Justice Clodpate, and calls him a great man, and that in allusion to his name bore three louses rampant for his arms. From an actor of plays he became a composer. He died April 23, 1616, setat. 53, probably at Stratford, for there he is buryed, and hath a monument (Dugd., p. 520) on which he lays a heavy curse upon any one who shall remove his bones. He dyed a papist." This testimony has been doubted, because no such character as Clodpate occurs in any of Shakespeare's plays ; but it was a generic term o the time for a foolish person, and that Davies so used it there can, I think, be little doubt. Halliwell, p. 123. 4O Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. more than mere incredulity on the part of Protestant biographers to annihilate this authoritative statement. The positive declaration of the Kev. Dr. Davies, founded as it was upon documentary and other evidence, furnished to him as a legacy by one who may be regarded almost as cotemporary with the poet, must therefore be taken as proof of that fact, not to be affected by any testimony less absolute in its character, and certainly not removed, unless sapped quite away by a steady and resistless flow of circumstantial evidence, breaking constantly as our proofs do, through the current of the poet's life, and con- tinually dropping from him in his writings. Unfortunately for the Protestant side of the argument, the first thing we fall upon in corroboration of the Rev. Dr. Davies' declaration, is the fact that it was made two years previous to the discovery by Mosely of John Shakespeare's " Confession of Faith." The next proof we have of the tendency of circumstances to keep William Shakespeare faithful to the precepts of his infancy is the Puritan persecution, by Sir Thomas Lucy and the other Protes- tant Commissioners of Stratford, of John Shakespeare, the father, and subsequent punishment by Sir Thomas of William the son. In London the young adventurer was immediately met by the same spirit of sectarian intolerance as had harassed his family in Stratford, and which again challenged him, as it were, upon the very threshold of his new efforts to pluck a nving from the world. For we are told by the historians of the Shakespearian period that the contest which the Theatre had to undergo for an existence, about the time Shakespeare went up to London was between the holders of opposite opinions in religion. " The Puritans," says Knight, " made the Theatre the special object of their indigna- tion." So the Protestant crusade, which began against Shake- speare's father, which had been continued against Shakespeare himself, before he arrived at man's estate in Stratford, maintained a ceaseless, unremitting warfare against his chosen avocation in the great metropolis. Thus, having shown the religious conditions under which the poet's mind was formed, the pressure of circumstances operating upon his filial bent and tending to render inexorable the opinions thus initiated, we come logically to the examination of Shake- speare's personal testimony on the subjects of doctrine and religious faith, as exhibited in the spontaneous utterances of his plays. His Knowledge of the Mariner s Art. 41 I confess that T have, from the first, contemplated the discussion 'of this portion of my subject with some misgiving, but the manifest reluctance betrayed by most of the Shake- spearian commentators to touch the question, and the disposition exhibited to follow in the beaten track, makes me less diffi- dent than at the outset. The readiest instance which comes to me to illustrate this tendency of the reviewers to follow the old finger-posts, is 'the common idea that Shakespeare had such a miraculous poetic intuition that he needed no learning to acquire knowledge, as did other men. One of the familiar proofs which is offered of this wondrous faculty of the Bard of Avon is, the felicity and force with which they say he handles the mariner's art, and especially in the power and truth with which he describes the behaviour of a vessel in a gale. " The very management of the ship in the ' Tempest,'" says one of these learned commentators, " may have been the fruit either of casual observation or of what men of letters call 'cram/ rapidly assimilated by his genius/'' And again, this same writer, in expressing his sense of the power of the poet's intuitive comprehension, directs our attention to that fine description in Henry the Eighth of {< the outburst of admiration and loyalty of the multitude at sight of Anne Bullen, as if he (Shakespeare) had spent his life on shipboard." - " Such a noise arose As the shrouds makfe at sea in a stiff tempest ; As loud, and to as many tunes." " And yet," concludes this writer, " of all negative facts in regard to his (Shakespeare's) life, none, perhaps, is surer than that he never was at sea."* Why, who does not know that Shakespeare was an Englishman, and as such may be almost said to have been born at sea? The shores of England lie among roaring waves, and a poet can often find before his eyes as much turbulent, spiteful, howling, and dangerous water by looking from the cliff at Dover, or even from the jetty at Margate, as he would meet with in traversing a thousand miles at sea. Every Londoner who can afford a holiday goes to the seaside in summer, and a man who ventures in a fishing-boat a mile from shore on any portion of the English or Irish coast is as wide at sea ay, and 5 Richard Grant White's " Shakespeare," p. 259. 42 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. sometimes worse at sea than if he were wearily swinging round Cape Horn. The Earl of Salisbury, who probably had never been more at sea than Shakespeare, and who, like all Englishmen who had travelled on the continent only, doubtless got all his know- ledge of the ocean from the twenty-one mile trip between Dover and Calais, in the English Channel, is made to say, in "King John/' " And like a shifted wind unto a sail, It makes the course of thoughts to fetch about; Startles and frights consideration." This shows no more than that Shakespeare had at some time been out on a fishing or boating excursion, or had looked upon the chafing ocean from the land. Mr. White, pursuing the same subject of Shakespeare's wonder- ful intuitiveness, says, " We may be very sure that he made no special study of natural phenomena ; and indeed no condition of his life seems surer than that it afforded him neither time nor opportunity for such studies. Yet, in the following lines from the sixty-fourth sonnet, an important geological fact serves him for illustration : " When I have seen the hungry ocean gain Advantage on the kingdom of the shore, And the firm soil win of the watery main, Increasing store with loss, and loss with store. * * " " Where, and how, and why had Shakespeare/' exclaims Mr. White, " observed a great operation of nature like this, which takes many years to effect changes which are perceptible?" The answer suggests itself Why what New York boy, say we, who has enjoyed holiday afternoons in visits to the beach at Coney Island ; or what Londoner who has made similar trips to por- tions of the English coast, has not seen the shore, one season over-reached and devoured by the flood, receive restitution during the next season by the ocean heaving the plunder back to some adjacent spot ? And pray where did Mr. White get his knowledge of this phenomenon from ? Did he get it from his books ? Again Mr. White, while defending Shake- speare with much warmth, from what he terms " the reproach of Papistry/' states that the Bard nowhere shows a leaning towards any form of church government or towards any theological tenet or dogma. And this, notwithstanding the poet's constant The Religion of the Shakespeare Family. 43 allusions to holy friars, to shrift, to purging fires and confession ; is about as sensible as to declare him a moral writer, in face of the abominably foul-tongued characters of Parolles, Falstaff, and Doll Tear-Sheet. 6 I find but one point made by Mr. "White in favour of his declaration that Shakespeare was not a Roman Catholic, which appears at first sight to be well taken. " If Shakespeare became a member of the Church of Rome/'' says he, " it must have been after he wrote "Romeo and Juliet/-' in which he speaks of evening mass ; for the' humblest member of that church knows that there is no mass at vespers/'' A mistake which, I admit, that Bacon with his learning could not possibly have made; though Shakespeare might have done so ; as it is doubtful if he ever heard mass performed either at Stratford or in London. Reserving this point to be treated of in the next chapter, I herewith append the full confession of the " Confession of Faith " of John Shakespeare previously referred to. 7 6 In the famous scene between the Ghost and Hamlet there are many strokes of a Eoman Catholic pen. " Shakespeare, apparently through igno- rance," says Warburton, " makes Eoman Catholics of these Pagan Danes " (Steevens' Shak., 1793, vol. xv. pp. 72 75). But this is not so much an example of ignorance as of knowledge, though perhaps not of his prudence, when the poet avows, covertly indeed, his own opinions. In " Othello," Shake- speare makes Emilia say, " I should venture purgatory for't." The readers of Shakespeare will easily remember other expressions of a similar kind, which plainly proceeded from the overflow of Eoman Catholic zeal. He is continually sending his characters to shrift, or confession : " Eiddling con- fession finds but riddling shrift ; " " Bid her devise some means to come to shrift this afternoon." On the other hand he is studious to show his con- tempt for the Puritans. In " Twelfth Night " : " Many, sir, he seems some- times a kind of Puritan." In " The Winter's Tale " : " But one Puritan among them, and he sings psalms to hornpipers." Chalmers's " Apology," p. 200. 7 "JOHN SHAKESPEAEE'S CONFESSION OF FAITH: Section I. " ' In the name of God, the Father, Sonne, and Holy Ghost, the most holy and blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, the holy host of archangels, angels, patriarchs, prophets, evangelists, apostles, saints', martyrs, and all the celestial court and company of heaven : I, John Shakspear, an unworthy member of the holy Catholic religion, being at this, my present writing, in perfect health of body, and sound mind, memory, and understanding, but calling to mind the uncertainty of life and certainty of death, and that I may be possibly cut off in the blossoine of my sins, and called to render an account 44 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. of all my transgressions externally and internally, and that I may be unpre- pared for the dreadful trial either by sacrement, pennance, fasting, or prayer, or any other purgation whatever, do in the holy presence above specified, of my own free and voluntary accord, make and ordaine this, my last spiritual will, testament, confession, protestation, and confession of faith, hopinge hereby to receive pardon for all my sinnes and offences, and thereby to be made partaker of life everlasting, through the only merits of Jesus Christ, my saviour and redeemer, who took upon himself the likeness of man, suffered death, and was crucified upon the crosse, for the redemption of sinners. [Here follow the remaining sections, down to Section XIII. inclusive^] Section XIV., and last. " ' I, John Shakspeare, having made this present writing of protestation, confession, and charter, in presence of the blessed Virgin Mary, my angell guardian, and all the celestial court, as witnesses hereunto : the which my meaning is, that it be of full value now, presently, and for ever, with the force and vertue of testament, codicil, and donation in course of death : con- firming it anew, being in perfect health of soul and body, and signed with mine own hand ; carrying also the same about me, and for the better declara- ration hereof, my will and intention is that it be finally buried with me after my death. " ' Pater noster, Ave Maria, Credo. Jesu, son of David, have mercy on me. Amen.' " " If the intention of the testator, as expressed in the close of this will, were carried into effect, then of course the manuscript which Mosely found must necessarily have been a copy of that which was buried in the grave of John Shakespeare. " Mr. Malone, to whom, in his edition of Shakespeare, printed in 1790, we are indebted for this singular paper, and for the history attached to it observes, that he is unable to ascertain whether it was drawn up by John Shakespeare, the father, or by John, his supposed eldest son : but he says, ' I have taken some pains to ascertain the authenticity of this manuscript, and, after a very careful inquiry, am perfectly satisfied that it is genuine/ In the ' Inquiry,' however, which was published in 1796, relative to the Ireland papers, he has given us, though without assigning any reasons for his change of opinion, a very different result. 'In my conjecture,' he remarks, 'con- cerning the writer of that paper, I certainly was mistaken : for I have since obtained documents that clearly prove it could not have been the composition of any one of our poet's family.' " This conjecture of Mr. Chalmers appears to us in its leading points very plausible ; for that the father of our poet might be a Roman Catholic, is, if we consider the very unsettled state of his times with regard to religion, not only a possible, but a probable supposition, in which case it would undoubtedly have been the office of the spiritual director of the family to have drawn up such a paper as that which we have been perusing. It was the fashion also of the period, as Mr. Chalmers has subsequently observed, to draw up confes- sions of religious faith, a fashion honoured in the observance by the great The Religion of the Shakespeare Family. 45 names of Lord Bacon, Lord Burghley, and Archbishop Parker. That he declined, however, attending the corporation meeting of Stratford from religious motives, and that his removal from that body was the result of non-attendance from such a cause, cannot readily be admitted ; for we have clearly seen that his defection was owing to pecuniary difficulties ; nor is it in the least degree probable that, after having honourably filled -the highest offices in the corporation without scruple, he should at length, and in a reign too popularly Protestant, incur expulsion from an avowed motive of this kind, especially, as we have reason to suppose, from the mode in which this profes- sion was concealed, that the tenets of the person whose faith it declares were cherished in secret. " From an accurate inspection of the handwriting of this will, Mr. Malone infers that it cannot be attributed to an earlier period than the year 1600, whence it follows that if dictated by, or drawn up at the desire of, John Shakespeare, his death soon sealed the confession of his faith ; for, according to the register, he was buried on September 8, 1601." Drake, vol. i. pp. 46 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. CHAPTER VII. EVENING MASS. AT the conclusion of the last chapter we found ourselves con- fronted with the apparent difficulty of Shakespeare's alleged erroneous use of the word evening mass, and in pursuing the inquiry upon this point we have White's view supported by similar observations from H. von Friesen in his "Alt-England und William Shakespeare" (1874), pp. 286-7, and also by Staunton, who, says Dowden, " had previously noticed the same difficulty ." But the word mass, continues Dowden, as used in the passage from " Romeo and Juliet/' is explained by Clarke as meaning generally service, office, prayer. 1 I do not find this explanation satisfactory, however; neither can I assign great importance to the opinion of Harness and others, that it was probably a printer's error, or at any rate not an error of Shakespeare's own, since it is well known that he had never superintended the publication of a single copy of his plays, and that some of the first copies " appeared to have been taken by the ear, during representation, without any assistance from the originals -belonging to the play-houses." Hence, they conclude, that such a mistake might have easily crept in, through the ignorance of a copyist or printer. " Hundreds of spurious lines," says one of these reasoners, " have thus been insinuated in Shakespeare's text ; and it is known that no complete collec- tion of his plays was published until seven years after his death." This is very plausible, but it must be recollected that " Romeo and Juliet " was published during the poet's lifetime, as early as 1597; and I cannot, therefore, bring myself to believe that Shakespeare could have permitted himself to be indifferent to such an error, had he believed it to have been an error. 1 Dowden's " Shakespeare's Mind and Art," 1875, p. 39. Evening Mass. 47 The greatest probability is that he had never heard mass otherwise than secretly, and in the evening; except, indeed, during some transient trip to Paris (if he had ever found ,time during his busy London life to make one) ; and even then it is doubtful if he would have spent any of his precious holiday hours at church. His general knowledge of the doctrines, dogmas, tenets, rites and formula of the Church of Rome might have been obtained from his mother, or from the carefully-hidden Prayer-book of the family ; while his entire comprehension of the ceremony of mass was probably obtained from the hedge priests whom the devoted piety of his mother gave stealthy admission to the Shakespeare homestead, during the Elizabethan period of Catholic persecution. I have found many illustrations from Catholic reviews, and other reliable authorities, of the practices of the hedge priests, as they were called, in times of Catholic persecution, whose business it was to go in the darkness of the evening to the houses of the faithful, to celebrate a nocturnal mass. This was probably the case with Shakespeare's paternal home and family, and " evening mass " was doubtless the only mass our poet ever heard. 2 In regard to mass in general, authoritative Romish works indicate that the main reason why it is fixed as a morning ceremony, is because owing to the extraordinary sanctity which Catholics attach to the consecrated elements (believing them as they do to be transubstantiated into the real body and blood of Christ), the early Popes deemed it irreverent on the part of the clergy and faithful to partake of them after a meal of a material kind. It would also seem, from the works of the most learned Catholic divines, that mass was said during that period of church history called " History of the Catacombs " at night ; and 2 " In the darkest days of the penal code, when learning was proscribed in Ireland, and when it was treason for the Catholic Celt to teach or be taught, to receive or communicate instruction, the hedge schoolmaster braved the terrors of the law, eluded the vigilance of spies, and kept the lamp of know- ledge still burning in darkness, storm, and desolation. If we cherish the memory of the Soggarth Aroon, who often at dead of night fled to the moun- tain cave, the wooded glen, and wild rath to celebrate mass for the faithful and persecuted flock, and, like the Hebrew priests of old, to preserve the sacred fire till the dawn of a happier era, when the sun of freedom would kindle it into a blaze." " Paper on Bishop England," by Professor Mulrenan ; pub- lished in New York in the Manhattan Monthly for March, 1875. 48 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. indeed, in the Apostolic age it was undoubtedly a nocturnal service, since it is in reality only a commemoration of the Last Supper. According to the best authorities, it was Pope St. Telesphorus, A.D. 128, who ordered this service to be said in the morning at tierce, or at nine o'clock. This Pope likewise de- creed that on Christmas eve a mass might be celebrated at twelve o'clock at night in honour of the Nativity, and he added to the missal the noble hymn of praise, Gloria in Excelsis. Still, even after the publication of this decree, masses were said, during periods of persecution, in the vaults and chapels of the catacombs quite late at night. Once the church emerged thence into broad day-light, this practice ceased, and the decree of Pope Telesphorus was obeyed to the letter. During the middle ages even Catholic historians confess that many abuses crept into their Church, and it would seem that there were many gross ones concerning even the solemn rite of mass. The custom of saying mass for the dead was doubtless one of the principal causes of this deplorable state of affairs ; for, as is well known, persons of rank and wealth would often leave in their wills large sums of money to the priests, in order to defray the expenses of a number of masses to be said for the repose of their souls, and of those of their relations and friends. To rid themselves of the obligation of celebrating so many masses, the dissolute and conscienceless amongst the clergy would even run one mass into another, or say as many as three and four in a morning, without leave from their ecclesiastical superiors. 3 They likewise invented a service called the Missa Sicca, which was generally said for the repose of the dead. It consisted of the recitation of the first part of mass, or Introit, and was a " dry mass," since none of the liquids were introduced into it ; for, as already stated, the act of consecration did not take place. It was, however, called a mass, and was celebrated most frequently in the afternoon. The Council of Trent abolished it as a gross abuse, since ifc had occasioned much scandal. It sprang into ex- istence towards the eleventh century, and continued down to the close of the sixteenth. It was an invention doubtless of some unworthy clergymen, in order to free themselves of a portion of the numerous masses they were paid to say for the dead. It 3 See Appleton's " Encyclopaedia," 1875, Father O'Reilly's article on the Mass. Evening Mass. 49 could be said at any time, and as often as they chose, and hence they could naturally rid themselves of their responsibility at a very short notice ; moreover, as they could only solemnize one genuine mass a day, without running the risk of being suspended by their bishops, they could say twenty of these mutilated services, and count them to their purchasers as regular work. It is not improbable, besides, that this Missa Sicca was known to the common people before the Reformation as " evening mass. 1 " For in Ivanhoe, Sir Walter Scott says that Rowena arrived late at the banquet, as she had o'nly just returned from attending " evening mass " at a neighbouring priory. It seems to me that Scott, who was exceedingly well versed in all things con- cerning the history and rites of the Catholic Church, would not have made this statement unless he had good authority for so doing. 4 Shakespeare may have heard of the Missa Sicca as an evening service, and thus alluded to it in this play ; and it may as well here be observed that the monastery to which Friar Laurence belonged was a Franciscan house, which order was, and is still, remarkable to use the Catholic phraseology 5 " for its devotion to the dead and to the souls in purgatory ;" in other words, for its popularity in praying and saying masses for the departed. Another explanation of this much disputed phrase, " evening mass/' may also be gathered from the fact that in Catholic countries, to this day, the fashionable mass is the last ; said often at one, and even at two o'clock in the afternoon. In the sixteenth century, one or two o'clock in the day was already a late hour, for people rose at five, breakfasted at six, dined between ten and eleven, and had supper at seven in the evening ; thus closing the day at an hour when modern " society " is most occupied. Shakespeare may have considered the last, or one o'clock mass, " an evening mass ;" and this is not so im- probable, since the text leads us to understand that Juliet de- signs to wait upon him in his cell alone, which she could not have done under the circumstances of the play, as a young 4 On the other hand, by way of showing the habitual licence of poets, we will direct the attention of the reader to the following lines from the exquisite poem of " Under the Violets," by Oliver Wendell Holmes : " The crickets, sliding through the grass, Shall pipe for her an evening mass." 8 " History of the Franciscans." Albany, Baxter and Co. 5<3 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. girl of her age would certainly not have been allowed out alone at midnight. There is another piece of textual testimony which the Pro- testant biographers of Shakespeare refer to, in order to resist the theory that he was of the Roman Catholic faith. It is put for- ward in its most prominent form by Charles Knight, who, com- batting the inferences of Chalmers and Drake in favour of Shakespeare's Romanism as evinced in his frequent references to " purgatory/' " shrift/' " confession/' &c., in his dramas, says, " Surely the poet might exhibit* this familiarity with the an- cient language of all Christendom without thus speaking from the overflow of Roman Catholic zeal." Was it " Roman Catho- lic zeal " which induced him to write those strong lines in " King John " against the " Italian priest," and against those who " Purchase corrupted pardon of a man "? Was it " Roman Catholic zeal " which made him introduce these words into the famous prophecy of the glory and happiness of the reign of Elizabeth : " God shall be truly known "? The first of the quotations by Knight looks very formidable ; and when I read the above artificial presentation of it I fancied I had run against an insurmountable obstacle to the theory that Shakespeare was a Roman Catholic. But turning to the fountain of the phrase in the body of the text, I found that the quotation had been warped from its true meaning by the critic, and made, by a few accompanying words, to present a proposi- tion which was not the author's. No one could read Knight's pre- sentation of the quotation, along with his unwarranted words, without supposing it was launched not only against the one person addressed, but against all " those who purchased ' cor- rupted ' pardon of a man," or without coming to the conclusion that Shakespeare meant to deride and reject the sanctity of that vital principle of the Roman Catholic faith, the rite of con- fession and the consequent prerogatives of punishment and ab- solution ! And I readily admit that no Roman Catholic writer could ever have permitted himself to do this under any pressure of poetical necessity. But William Shakespeare never did it never in the plays ascribed to him, at least. The line above quoted by Knight against Shakespeare's Catho- Religion of Shakespeare. 5 1 licity is addressed by King John to King Philip Augustus of France, and applies to Pandulph, the Legate of the Pope, who had then recently been despatched from Rome to England, to demand of King John the immediate appointment of Stephen Langton, the Pope's nominee, to the archbishopric of Canterbury on pain of excommunication ; and also to interrogate him (King John) why he had thus far been contumacious to the supreme orders of his Holiness in this respect. Pandulph, in pursuance of this insolent commission, finds John in France, at the head of an English army of invasion, confronting a like array of the French legions under the command of Philip. Seizing the opportunity thus afforded him of making his insolence the more conspicuous, Pandulph, in the presence of the two kings, sur- rounded by their respective nobles, delivers his arrogant message. The English king is naturally roused to anger and resistance by this insult, whereupon Shakespeare, through the mouth of John, treats the prelate in the political attitude he had assumed, and makes John speak with the spirit and dignity which became an English king. The practice of " fitting " his characters, is in- variable with our poet, and is also in full accordance with dramatic rules and common sense. It is in agreement, likewise, with the practice of other Roman Catholic writers, as may be seen in the treatment given by Dumas to the Cardinals Mazarin and Richelieu. When the churchman sinks his profession in the character of an ambassador, he is dealt with as a politician ; and when a king (whom, as a king, Shakespeare always worships upon bended knees) abandons himself to crime and despotism, he is always, as in the case of Richard III. and of John also, treated as a tyrant and a murderer. In these crimes the assassin sinks the king ; as the primate, by his ambition, veils the priest. It was the only method by which the poet could protect his faith from the necessities of history, and consequently the epithets he uses through the mouths of his incensed characters, as " false priest " and " meddling priest/' are only such as are irresistible to anger under any and all circumstances. Shakespeare was too well versed in human nature not to know that an inflamed mind will always assail its enemy where he is most false, and consequently where he is most weak always preferring an accusation of hypocrisy to any other. But here I prefer to let the text speak to the reader for itself : 52 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. KING JOHN, Act III. Scene 1. France tlie French King's tent. Present King John, King Philip, Archduke of Austria, Faulconlridge, Lewis, the French Dauphin, Salis- bury, Arthur, Constance, Blanche, Elinor, and attendants. Enter PANDULPH. K. PHI. Here comes the holy legate of the pope. PAND. Hail, you anointed deputies of Heaven ! To thee, king John, my holy errand is, I Pandulph, of fair Milan cardinal, And from pope Innocent the legate here, Do, in his name, religiously demand, Why thou against the church, our holy mother, So wilfully dost spurn ; and, force perforce, Keep Stephen Langton, chosen archbishop Of Canterbury, from that holy see ? This, in our 'foresaid holy father's name, Pope Innocent, I do demand of thee. K. JOHN. What earthly name to interrogatories Can task the free breath of a sacred king ? Thou canst not, cardinal, devise a name So slight, unworthy, and ridiculous, To charge me to an answer, as the pope. Tell him this tale; and from the mouth of England Add thus much more, That no Italian priest Shall tithe or toll in our dominions ; But as we under heaven are supreme head, So, under Him, that great supremacy Where we do reign, we will alone uphold Without the assistance of a mortal hand ; So tell the pope ; all reverence set apart, To him, and his usurp'd authority. K. PHI. Brother of England, you blaspheme in this. K. JOHN. Though you, and all the kings of Christendom, Are led so grossly by this meddling priest, Dreading the curse that money may buy out ; And by the merit of vile gold, dross, dust, Purchase corrupted pardon of a man, Who, in that sale, sells pardon from himself; Though you, and all the rest, so grossly led, This juggling witchcraft with revenue cherish ; Yet I, alone, alone do me oppose Against the Pope, and count his friends my foes. PAND. Then by the lawful power that I have, Thou shalt stand cursed, and excommunicate : And blessed shall he be that doth revolt From his allegiance to an heretic : Religion of Shakespeare. 53 And meritorious shall that hand le call'd, Canonized, and worshipped as a saint, That takes aivay by any secret course Thy hateful life. ****** Philip of France, on peril of a curse, Let go the hand of that arch-heretic ; And raise the power of France upon his head, Unless he do submit himself to Eome. ****** K. PHI. My reverend father, let it not be so : Out of your grace, devise, ordain, impose Some gentle order ; and then we shall be bless'd To do your pleasure, and continue friends. PAND. All form is formless, order orderless, Save what is opposite to England's love. Therefore, to arms, be champion of our church ! Or let the church, our mother, breathe her curse, A mother's curse, on her revolting son. France, thou may'st hold a serpent by the tongue, A chafed lion by the mortal paw, A fasting tiger safer by the tooth, Than keep, in peace, that hand which thou dost hold. ****** LEW. I muse, your majesty doth seem so cold, When such profound respects do pull you on. PAND. I will denounce a curse upon his head. K. PHI. Thou shalt not need : England, I'll fall from thee. K. JOHN. France, thou shalt rue this hour within this hour. In the light of these quotations it becomes obvious that Knight's presentation of the first italicized line, with its in- ferential words, had the object of making it appear that Shakespeare was deriding and mocking at the sanctity of the rite of confession ; and this plain perversion of the author's meaning was, consequently, not only an abuse of the truth, but an insult, by Mr. Knight, to the understanding of his readers. \ The whole scene represents no independent sentiment of Shakespeare as a writer, any more than does the language of John, when he orders Hubert to commit murder upon Arthur, represent Shakespeare's sentiments ; or than the words of Richard III. represent the poet's principles, when Richard directs the assassination of the Princes in the Tower. Bat we can perceive by the course of the play of King John, where the poet does step in and takes sides ; and, when he does make his individual inclinations thus seen, he decides most 5 54 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. signally in favour of the Prelate and the Church. He shows that John, on the contrary, with all his resolution and surround- ings, cannot withstand its power, but surrenders to it, humbles himself abjectly before the Legate, and is finally consigned to an ignominious death. In the scene immediately following the above, we find King John, while still in the height of his resentment, giving an order to his creature, Faulconbridge, to hasten to England, and ransack and plunder the monasteries : KING JOHN (to the Bastard], Cousin, away to England ; haste before ; And, ere our coming, see thou shake the bags Of hoarding abbots ; imprisoned angels Set at liberty : the fat ribs of peace Must by the hungry now be fed upon : Use our commission in his utmost force ! BASTARD. Bell, book, and candle shall not drive me back, "When gold and silver becks me 'to come on. At the opening of Act V. we find that King John, unable to contend any longer, even in his own dominions, against the power of the Pope, makes absolute submission and resigns his crown, in order that he may undergo the utter humiliation of receiving it back from his haughty hands and of holding it subject to his breath : Act'V. A Room in the Palace. Enter KING JOHN, PANDULPH with the crown, and attendants. K. JOHN. Thus have I yielded up into you hand The circle of my glory. PAND. Take again [Giving JOHN the crown. From this my hand, as holding of the pope, Your sovereign greatness and authority. K. JOHN. Now keep your holy word : go meet the French : And from his holiness use all your power To stop their marches, 'fore we are inflamed. Our discontented counties do revolt ; Our people quarrel with obedience Swearing allegiance, and the love of soul, To stranger blood, to foreign royalty. This inundation of mistemper'd humour Rests by you only to be qualified. Then pause not ; for the present time's so sick, That present medicine must be minister 'd, Or overthrow incurable ensues. Religion of Shakespeare. 55 PAND. It was my breath that blew this tempest up, Upon your stubborn usage of the pope : But, since you are a gentle convertite, My tongue shall hush again this storm of war, And make fair weather in your blustering land. On this Ascension-day, remember well, Upon your oath of service to the pope, Go I to make the French lay down their arms. Here the Pope's Leg-ate finishes with John. Now let us see what luck the poet assigns to Pandulph, in his assumptions of Papal supremacy over the King- of France. Carrying out his con- tract with King John, Pandulph next appears before the French forces, which, under the charge of Lewis the Dauphin, have in- vaded England, and are lying in camp near St. Edmunds- Bury : Act V. Scene 2. "Present LEWIS, the DAUPHIN, SALISBURY, MELUN, PEMBROKE, BIGOT, and Soldiers. Enter PANDULPH, attended. LEW. And even there, methinks, an angel spake ; Look, where the holy legate comes apace, To give us warrant from the hand of heaven ; And on our actions set the name of right, " With holy breath. PAND. Hail, noble prince of France ; The next is this King John hath reconcil'd Himself to Rome : his spirit is come in, That so stood out against the holy church, The great metropolis and see of Rome ; Therefore, thy threat 'ning colours now wind up, And tame the savage spirit of wild war ; That, like a lion foster 'd up at hand, It may lie gently at the foot of peace, And be no further harmful than in show. LEW. Your grace shall pardon me, I will not back ; I am too high-born to be propertied, To be a secondary at control, Or useful serving-man, and instrument, To any sovereign state throughout the world. Your breath first kindled the dead coal of wars Between this chastised kingdom and myself, And brought in matter that should feed this fire ; And now 'tis far too huge to be blown out With that same weak wind which enkindled it. 56 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. You taught me how to know the face of right, Acquainted me with interest to this land, Yea, thrust this enterprise into my heart ; And come you now to tell me, John hath made His peace with Kome ? What is that peace to me ? I, hy the honour of my marriage-bed, After young Arthur, claim this land for mine ; And, now it is half conquer'd, must I back, Because that John hath made his peace with Rome ? Am I Rome's slave ? What penny hath Rome borne, What men provided, what munition sent, To underprop this action ? is't not I, That undergo this charge ? Who else but I, And such as to my claim are liable, Sweat in this business, and maintain this war ? Have I not heard these islanders shout out, Vive le roy I as I have bank'd their towns ? Have I not here the best cards for the game, To win this easy match play'd for a crown ? And shall I now give o'er the yielded set ? No, on my soul, it never shall be said. PAND. You look but on the outside of this work. LEW. Outside, or inside, I will not return Till my attempt so much be glorified -- As to my ample hope was promised Before I drew this gallant head of war, And cull'd these fiery spirits from the world, To outlook conquest, and to win renown Even in the jaws of danger and of death. The Legate then curses the other side, whereupon the fight takes place, and the French, as becomes them, under the effects of Pandulph's new anathema, get the worst of it; but King John is led from the field sick during the middle of the melee, and retires to Swinstead Abbey in the neighbourhood. In the following scene his approaching death is thus described, and the lines I have italicized are those which the Protestant biographers stoutly rely upon to show that Shakespeare could not have been a Roman Catholic : HUBERT. The king, I fear, is poisoned l>y a monlc : I left him almost speechless, and broke out To acquaint you with this evil, that you might The better arm you to the sudden time, Than if you had at leisure known of this. BASTARD. How did he take it ? Who did taste to him ? Religion of Shakespeare. 57 HUBEET. A monk, I tell you; a resolved villain, Whose bowels suddenly burst out: the king Yet speaks, and peradventure may recover. The monk who did this deed had evidently prepared himself to carry out Pandulph's curse of excommunication, and also to revenge John's sacrilegious plunder of the monasteries. In those days of the absence of newspapers, this monk doubtless had not been informed of the very recent pardon of John by Pandulph, and therefore, instead of being regarded as " a resolved villain/' as Hubert, King John's minion, naturally terms him, he would be esteemed by the faithful, for this brave devotion of himself, as being worthy rather of " canonization " (which, indeed, was promised by Pandulph) and a high place " among the glorious company of the apostles " than of harsh terms, or any form of condemnation whatsoever. That the monk had long been " resolved " in his purpose of poisoning the King and to that extent was " a resolved villain, is evident from the fact that it must have cost him much time and considerable court influence to become " taster " to his Majesty, as a preliminary to the glorious canonization which he expected, for carrying out the orders of the Legate, at the expense of his own life. As to Knight's second exception to Shakespeare's Catholicity, I deem it hardly worthy of an argument. The prophecy made in the play of " Henry VIII.," that under the reign of the infant Elizabeth " God shall he truly known," is the expression of Cranmer, a Protestant prelate, and it is put into his mouth by the author during the reign of Protestant James I., through whose graciousness he still got his living as one of " her Majesty's players." Besides, the expression as to the worship of God the Father is as correct, in a Christian sense, in the mouth of a Koman Catholic as in that of a Protestant. Moreover, the speech of Cranmer, containing the above line, is almost universally attributed to Ben Jonson, who wrote it in compliment to King James. This seems to meet the Protestant arguments based upon the text of " King John." We come next to the evidence offered on the same side from " King Henry VI.," Parts I. and II. Two of the principal characters in both these plays are 58 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. Humphrey Duke of Gloster, brother of the deceased Henry V., and the Duke of Beaufort, who is Bishop of Winchester, and subsequently Cardinal Beaufort. Gloster, who was brother to the deceased Henry V., is Lord Protector of the infant Henry VI., and, being beloved by the people, is popularly known throughout the country by the name of the Good Duke Humphrey. In fact, the original title of the latter of these plays was " The Second Part of King Henry the Sixth, with the Death of the Good Duke Humphrey.-" The Bishop of Winchester, on the other hand, is shown by all the histories of the time to have been a lewd, unprincipled, treacherous, conspiring, and bloody-minded villain, as bad in every respect as lago, Angelo, or Edmund. The part which he performs is entirely political, and his principal aim is to supplant the Lord Protector, whom he finally succeeds in having basely murdered. These two characters come in con- flict at the very outset of the dramatic history of " Henry VI." The first scene of their contention takes place before the Tower, into which the Lord Protector, though entitled to arbitrary access to all public places in the realm, finds himself and his retainers refused admittance by the servants and followers of the Bishop of Winchester, who are in possession. While Gloster is clamouring at the gates, and threatening, by virtue of his supreme authority, to burst them open, the following scene occurs in Act I. Scene 3 : Enter WINCHESTEB, attended by a train of Servants in tawny coats. WIN. How now, ambitious Humphrey ? what means this ? GLO. Piel'd priest, dost thou command me to be shut out ? WIN. I do, thou most usurping proditor, And not protector of the king or realm. GLO. Stand back, thou manifest conspirator ; Thou, that contriv'dst to murder our dead lord ; Thou, that giv'st bawds 6 indulgences to sin : I'll canvas thee in thy broad cardinal's hat, If thou proceed in this thy insolence. 6 I have changed this word, for the purpose of these pages, out of regard for modern ears. The curious reader may consult the text. The line, and the reproach which it conveys, will be better understood when it is known that " the public stews in Southwark were under the jurisdiction of the Bishop of Winchester. In the office-book of the court all fees were entered that were paid by the keepers of these brothels the church reaping the advantages of these pests to society." Religion of Shakespeare. 59 WIN. Nay, stand thou back, I will not "budge a foot : This be Damascus, be thou cursed Cain, To slay thy brother Abel, if thou wilt. GLO. I will not slay thee, but I'll drive thee back : Thy scarlet robes, as a child's bearing cloth I'll use, to carry thee out of this place. WIN. Do what thou dar'st : I beard thee to thy face. GLO. What? am I dar'd, and bearded to my face ? Draw, men, for all this privileged place ; Blue coats to tawny coats. Priest, beware your beard ; [GLOSTER and his men attack the Bishop. I mean to tug it, and to cuff you soundly : Under my feet I stamp thy cardinal's hat ; In spite of pope, or dignities of church, Here by the cheeks I'll drag thee up and down. WIN. Gloster, thou'lt answer this before the pope. The two parties are here about falling- upon one another when the Mayor of London enters with his officers, and commands the peace, whereupon Gloster, out of respect for the law, at once calls off his men, and says, GLO. Cardinal, 7 I'll be no breaker of the law : But we shall meet, and break our minds at large. WIN. Gloster, we'll meet ; to thy dear cost be sure : Thy heart-blood I will have, for this day's work. MAYOR. I'll call for clubs, if you will not away : This cardinal is more haughty than the devil. GLO. Mayor, farewell : thou dost but what thou may'st. WIN. Abominable Gloster ! guard thy head ; For I intend to have it, ere long. [Exeunt. In a subsequent scene Gloster says to Winchester : Thou art reverent Touching thy spiritual function, not thy life. Thus showing that he is neither a questioner of Winchester's religion, nor a heretic himself. Again, after Winchester has been created cardinal, he chal- lenges Gloster to a duel, which is finally settled by King Henry. In Act III. Scene 1, Queen Margaret and Suffolk, her paramour, plot with York and Beaufort Gloster's assassination, and thus the Cardinal : 7 The use of the word Cardinal in this place shows that Shakespeare was not always precise in his expressions. Beaufort at this time was only Bishop of Winchester. 60 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. But I would lay him dead, my lord of Suffolk, Ere you can take due orders for a priest : Say, you consent, and censure well the deed, And I'll provide bis executioner. The assassination is performed in pursuance of this conspiracy, and the following- is the scene of the conscience-stricken mur- derer's death-bed : Cardinal Beaufort's Bedchamber. Enter KING HENEY, SALTSBUEY, WARWICK, and others. The CARDINAL in bed ; Attendants with him. K. HEN. How fares my lord? speak, Beaufort, to thy sovereign. CAE. If thou be'st death, I'll give thee England's treasure, Enough to purchase such another island, So thou wilt let me live, and feel no pain. Jv. HEN. Ah, what a sign it is of evil life, When death's approach is seen so terrible ! WAE. Beaufort, it is thy sovereign speaks to thee. CAE. Bring me unto my trial when you will. Died he not in his bed ? where should he die ? Can I make men live, whe'r they will or no? O ! torture me no more, I will confess. Alive again ? then show me where he is : I'll give a thousand pound to look upon him. He hath no eyes, the dust hath blinded them. Comb down his hair ; look ! look ! it stands upright, Like lime-twigs set to catch my winged soul ! Give me some drink ; and bid the apothecary Bring the strong poison that I bought of him. K. HEN. O thou eternal Mover of the heavens, Look with a gentle eye upon this wretch ! O, beat away the busy meddling fiend, That lays strong siege unto this wretch's soul, And from his bosom purge this black despair ! WAE. See how the pangs of death do make him grin. SAL. Disturb him not, let him pass peaceably. K. HEN. Peace to his soul, if God's good pleasure be ! Lord cardinal, if thou think'st on heaven's bliss, Hold up thy hand, make signal of thy hope. He dies, and makes no sign ; God forgive him ! WAR. So bad a death argues a monstrous life. IL HEN. Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all. Close up his eyes, and draw the curtains close ; And let us all to meditation. [Exeunt. At this point I desire to call attention to the king's use of the Religion of Shakespeare. 6 1 word "meditation," which is a form of Catholic worship, or pious practice, prescribed by the Romish Church for certain hours. King Henry, as a Catholic, had doubtless observed this devotion, and, of course, referred to it; but William Shake- speare could hardly have made this doctrinal reference to it unless he had been a Catholic himself. By the foregoing extracts from the text, it will be seen that the parties were all Catholics together ; and the assumption that the author, because he makes one of them berate another, and reproach him with misrepresenting his clerical pretensions, is, therefore, not a Catholic, seems to me to be without much force. Against this theory we find Gloster distinctly recognizing Beaufort's faith, though he reprehends the sinfulness of the man ; while King Henry himself, the leading feature of whose character is devoted piety, consigns the accursed Cardinal to hell. Had Shakespeare been writing under the suspicion that the sin- cerity of his own faith might at some day be questioned for the freedom with which he makes Duke Humphrey curse the Car- dinal, he could not have provided a more complete justification of his unswerving Romanism, or devised a more perfect excuse for his maledictions of the Cardinal, than is made by the pious king, when, looking in vain to see the dying wretch hold up his hand for mercy from his God, he sadly exclaims, " He dies, and makes no sign." Henry, in this exclamation, means of course no sign of repentance, without which, according to Catholic doctrine, no sinner can be allowed to enter heaven. 62 Shakespeare^ from an American Point of CHAPTER VIII. SHAKESPEARE'S CONTEMPT FOR PROTESTANTS. THE determination of the English biographers of William Shakespeare to resist the theory that he was a Papist, is actuated by entirely different motives from those which govern our present inquiry. Their object is to defend to the Protestant persuasion, the prestige of a writer who, in his influence over the minds of the English people, is next in authority to God, and who has devoted the highest efforts of his genius to the constant inculca- tion of the most submissive loyalty to the aristocratic classes and the Crown. The question of the religious faith of the author of the Shakespeare plays was of very trivial importance to the govern- ing classes of Great Britain at the time when Shakespeare wrote, and, indeed, for some time afterward. At the date of his career, the country had barely emerged from universal Romanism ; and the old faith received its first wound under Henry VIII., who died only seventeen years before Shakespeare was born. The blow which Henry struck at the Church, moreover, was known to be one of politics rather than of faith. Besides, that faith, still suppressed during the short reign of Edward VI., was revived throughout the land by his daughter, Bloody Mary, in seven years after his decease, (1553), which pious princess enforced its re-establishment, 'after trie earnest manner of her estimable father, by a persuasive multiplicity of burnings and boilings in oil of all stubborn Nonconformists. Protestantism was again restored by Elizabeth and James, whose reigns covered Shakespeare's period. But no influence which he or any writer for the stage then possessed, was of the least importance to the Government. Churchmen at that time were either politicians or wore coats of mail, and conformity was secured for the established faith by sheriffs' officers or files of Shakespeare's Contempt for Protestants. 63 troops. These were tendencies which even the Muse of Shake- speare was bound to respect, and, instead of looking through his plays for distinct evidences of adherence to a doctrine which would not only have stripped him of his friends at court, but lost him the favour of both the last-named sovereigns, the wonder should rather be that, under such great temptations to be politic, he never was induced to allude to a Protestant without contempt. Indeed, the only Lutheran he ever permitted to escape from the point of his pen without a stab was Cranmer, who baptized Queen Elizabeth. The evidences of this contempt by Shake- speare for the Protestant persuasion may be found in his por- traiture of Sir Hugh Evans, the Welsh parson, in " The Merry Wives of Windsor,''' described as a vain, profane, pragmatic, obscene creature, who frequents taverns, engages in a duel, and enters readily into a plot to pervert a marriage ;* also of Nathaniel and of Holo femes, 2 respectively a country curate and a Protestant pedagogue, in " Love's Labours Lost/' and likewise of Sir Oliver Martext 3 in " As You Like It." All of these three are mere 1 See " The Merry Wives of Windsor," Act III. Scene 1. 2 " Love's Labours Lost," Act IV. Scene 2 :- Scene SIB NATHANIEL, the CUBAT.S, and HOLOFEBNES. NATH. Sir, I praise the Lord for you ; and so may my parishioners ; for their sons are well tutor'd. by you, and their daughters profit very greatly under you : you are a good member of the commonwealth. HOL. Mehercle> if their sons be ingenious, they shall want no instruction : if their daughters be capable, I will put it to them: but,w> sapit, qui pauca loquitur : a soul feminine saluteth us. 3 " As You Like it," Act III. Scene 2 : Scene TOUCHSTONE, AUDEEY, and JAQUES. TOUCH. But be it as it may be, I will marry thee, and to that end, I have been with Sir Oliver Martext, the vicar of the next village ; who hath pro- mised to meet me in this place of the forest, and to couple us. Enter SIB OLIVEB MAETEXT. Here comes Sir Oliver : Sir Oliver Martext, you are well met. Will you despatch us here under this tree, or shall we go with you to your chapel ? SIB OLIV. Is there none here to give the woman ? TOUCH. I will not take her on the gift of any man. JAQ. And will you, being a man of your breeding, be married under a bush, like a beggar ? Get you to church, and have a good priest that can what marriage is : this fellow will but join you together as they 64 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. buffoons, while the " Twelfth Night " is made to contribute its quota of derisive presentation of Protestant character by an illusory drunken parson called Sir Topas; 4 though the Roman join ivainscot : then one of you will prove a shrunk pannel, and, like green timber, warp, warp. TOUCH. I am not in the mind, but I were better to be married of him than of another ; for he is not like to marry me well ; and not being well married, it will be a good excuse for me hereafter to leave my wife. [Aside. JAQ. Go thou with me, and let me counsel thee. TOUCH. Come, sweet Audrey, We must be married, or we must live in bawdry. Farewell, good master Oliver ! [Exeunt JAQUES, TOUCHSTONE, and AUDREY. SIB OLIV. 'Tis no matter; ne'er a fantastical knave of them all shall flout me out of my calling. [Exit. 4 " Twelfth Night," Act II. Scene 3 : Scene SIE TOBY BELCH, MARIA, and SIR ANDBEW. SIB To. Possess us, possess us ; tell us something of him. MAR. Marry, sir, sometimes he is a kind of Puritan. SIB AND. if I thought that, I'd beat him like a dog. SIB To. What, for being a Puritan ? Thy exquisite reason, dear knight ? SIB AND. I have no exquisite reason for't, but I have reason good enough. MAB. The devil a Puritan that he is, or anything constantly but a time- pleaser ; an affection'd ass. Act IV. Scene 2. SIB TOBY BELCH, MARIA, and CLOWN as SIE TOPAS, the Parson. SIE TOBY. Jove bless thee, master parson. CLOWN (to Sir Toby). Bonos dies, Sir Toby ; for, as the old hermit of Prague, that never saw pen and ink, very wittily said to a niece of King Gorboduc, That, that is, is; so I, being master parson, am master parson. For what is that, but that ? and is, but is ? SIB To. To him, Sir Topas. MOCK SIE T. What, hoa, I say peace in this prison. SIB To. The knave counterfeits well : a good knave. MAL. (in an inner chamler}. Who calls there? CLOWN. Sir Topas, the curate, who comes to visit Malvolio, the lunatic. MAL. Sir Topas, Sir Topas, good Sir Topas, go to my lady. CLOWN. Out, hyperbolical fiend! how vexest thou this man? Talkest thou nothing but of ladies ? SIB To. Well said, master parson. MAL. Sir Topas, never was man thus wronged ; good Sir Topas, do not think I am mad ; they have laid me here in hideous darkness. CLOWN. Fye, thou dishonest Sathan ! I call thee by the most modest Political Utilization of Shakespeare. 65 Catholic priest of the same play is most respectfully alluded to. In this reverent tone Shakespeare treats all his Romish clergy- men ; so if he were really a Protestant, as the English bio- graphers stubbornly insist, it is most extraordinary that, with a Protestant court to write to, and a Protestant people to cater for, his mind was never tempted by the high motive of religion into a single invocation of the faith that filled his soul ! It was not foreseen in Shakespeare's time that his intellectual supremacy over all the intellects of his own nation would acquire for him an amount of moral power which a sagacious govern- ment, whether in its legal, religious, or its merely political departments, could not afford to leave unutilized. In degree, as coats of mail were laid aside, the consent of the governed became an increasing element in the control of the State; and then it was found that scholarship and genius were worthy of being officially patted on the back, as, for instance, through the appointment of poets-laureate ; or of writers cleverly subsidized in cozy government nooks, with comfortable sinecures. Of all the representatives of the new forces of civilization, Shakespeare, since his hour, has uninterruptedly remained the chief. His progress for a time was tardy, but like the thin column of vapour which slowly curled from the magician's lamp, his genius kept rising and spreading itself before the wondering English people, until it covered the whole heaven of their comprehension, terms ; for I am one of those gentle ones that will use the devil himself with courtesy. Say'st thou that .house is dark ? MIL. As hell, Sir Topas.' The Same. Scene 3. SEBASTIAN, OLIVIA, and a Priest. OLIV. Blame not this haste of mine : If you mean well, Now go with me, and with this holy man, Into the chantry by : there, before him, And underneath that consecrated roof, Plight me the full assurance of your faith ; That my most jealous and too doubtful soul May live at peace : he shall conceal it, Whiles you are willing it shall come to note ; What time we will our celebration keep According to my birth. What do you say ? SEB. I'll follow this good man, and go with you ; And, having sworn truth, ever will be true. Then lead the way, good father ; And heavens so shine, That they may fairly note this act of mine ! [Exeunt. 66 Shakespeare^from an American Point of View. and they bowed amazed ly before it, utterly enraptured by its glory. Nay, such is the service which, with all his faults, our poet has rendered to mankind, it is not too much to say, that were the two separate questions put, to every man of the English-speaking race who can read and write, as to what was the greatest benefaction God ever made to man? and to whom each of them was indebted for the greatest amount of intellectual pleasure he had enjoyed on earth ? the unstudied and immediate answer would be Shakespeare ! To the question of who next ? the reply of the present generation most likely would be, Dickens true to his class, true to morality, and the Apostle of the Poor ! It is difficult for Americans who have never been in England to conceive to what an extent religion enters into the machinery of the British government. In fact, the Episcopal Church of England has not only one-third of the actual government in the hands of its representatives in the House of Lords, but it has gradually organized itself into a regular "industry," which covers the land with swarms of its dependents, represents accu- mulated salaries and annual incomes to the extent of millions upon millions of money, and is, in every respect, as much of an organized business, in the sense of an industry, as the industries of making boots and shoes, of the raising of beeves or of the growing of corn. So potent is this Industry of Religion in the machinery of the British realm, that it claims one day out of every seven, or nearly one-seventh part of the entire year, as a concession to its importance ; and this, too, to the subordination of every interest else. It is not to be wondered at, therefore, that this great Episcopal power will permit no traffic but its own, on what it terms the Lord's Day ; that it will suffer no doors to be opened in English cities for the transaction of business of any sort, during the hours of service, but church doors, and tolerate no sounds at that time but the sound of church bells. In every other portion of the civilized world (except in the United States, which still retains its tendency for English opinion), and under every form of religion but that of the English Episcopal Church, Sunday is free, and The People enjoy their usual pastimes, even to the extent of going to the races or to the theatres, accompanied often, as I have seen in Rome, France, Italy, Spain, and in other Catholic countries of North and South America, by their religious guides and teachers. The strange feature of this annihilation of Religion of Shakespeare. 67 the liberty of the Lord's Day is the servile following which the English political Sunday has in the United States; and that, too, under a National Constitution which prohibits all connexion between Church and State, and likewise under State Con- stitutions every one of which declares that " no laws shall be made affecting religious belief/' This may seem to be a divergence from the purposes of this chapter. But its aim is to exhibit the immense interest which the English Government, and particularly that portion of it con- fided to the English Church (covering as it does the great domain of English scholarship) , has, in concentrating every par- ticle of influence which can contribute toward popular control, within their own hands, for the security of their privileges and the quiet management of the State. This is the reason why the English churchmen and nobility cannot afford to relin- quish the tremendous advantages of Shakespeare's inculcations of loyal subserviency upon millions of his worshippers, and why the dignitaries of the Established Church cannot permit that in- fluence to be impaired, by admitting for a moment, that he was a Roman Catholic. This is the key to the denial by the English commentators, that he was an adherent of the latter doctrine, while my whole purpose, in tracing the evidences of Shakespeare's attachment to the Catholic faith, is to show that the Shakespeare plays, which so teem with Romish reverence, and which so abound with evidences of the writer's contempt for Protestantism, could not have been the production of the Puritan Lord Bacon. Indeed, to settle this question more certainly, it is only necessary to contrast the decisive illustrations which I have attached to this chapter, in the way of Shakespearian extracts, with the undisputed facts that Bacon wrote metrical versions of the Psalms of David, and dedicated them to his Protestant friend, George Herbert, as " the best judge of divinity and poesy met;" 5 and that he also, while a member of Parliament for Liverpool, wrote a paper on " Church Controversies," to assist a discourse of Secretary Walsingham on the conduct of the Queen's government towards Papists and Dissenters. 6 Every influence, however, has its period, and Shakespeare's prestige, which was nothing to Government in the arbitrary age 5 Holmes on " The Authorship of Shakespeare," p. 185. c Holmes, p. 84. 68 Snakespeare, from an American Point of View. in which he lived, became colossal as his genius developed itself to the expanding- intelligence and growing literary tastes of his countrymen. Though now threatened with a decline from its political zenith, his poetic supremacy will not be impaired, even if its political effectiveness be reduced to a quantity of ordinary power. Indeed, should it be proven he was a Catholic, it is not impossible that the nobility of England, which for two hundred years and more have been claiming for him a divine preeminence over the poets of all other countries, or that the English Church, which has been backing these extreme pretensions, may ere long abandon him to the defences of his own genius, and turn to other agencies for the protection of their political ascendancy. It is. hardly necessary that I should add anything more, at this stage of my inquiry, as to the respective religious beliefs of Lord Bacon and of William Shakespeare ; but before taking leave of Henry VIII., which is an ample field of reference upon this sub- ject, I will direct attention to the fact that' the poet makes Queen Catharine, who is his beau ideal of Catholic purity and elevation, declare that " All hoods make not monks/' and further on, when she addresses the Cardinals Wolsey and Campeius, he allows her to evince the comprehension that politics soon drives religion from the soul, by the sarcasm : " If ye be anything but churchmen's habits." 7 I make this reference because it seems to me to take the steel out of Knight's point on the passage in " King John," commencing with " The king, I fear, is poisoned by a monk A monk, I tell you ; a resolved villain." I am reminded by a note from a Protestant friend (and, it may be as well to state here that I am of the same persuasion), that I shall probably find some difficulty in accounting for * See "Henry VIII." Act III. Scene l. X Also the following remarks by Dr. Samuel Johnson on the same : " The play of * Henry VIII.,' " says Johnson, " is one of those which still keeps possession of the stage by the splendour of its pageantry. The coronation scene, about forty years ago, drew the people together in multitudes for the great part of the winter. Yet pomp is not the only merit of this play. The meek sorrows and virtuous distress of Katharine have furnished some scenes which may be justly num- bered among the greatest efforts of tragedy. But the genius of Shakespeare comes in and goes out with Katharine. Every other part may be easily con- ceived and easily written." Religion of Shakespeare. 69 Shakespeare's great familiarity with the Bible, inasmuch as Catholics were not allowed to read the sacred volume ; but I find no difficulty in this fact at all. John Shakespeare, the poet's father, had been High Bailiff and first Alderman of Stratford, and as such had taken the oath of conformity ; so the absence of a Protestant Bible from his house might have led to the loss of his office, and possibly to the arrest of his family. The Bible, no doubt, was always lying conspiciously " around " in the Stratford homestead, and the youthful Shakespeare, with his rage for reading, must have eagerly devoured its splendid imagery at any rate, whenever he had nothing else at hand. But he was equally, nay, much better informed upon Catholic rites and peculiarities of belief than of Protestantisms, as has been shown by his frequent allusions to their terms and tenets, and especially to purgatory in proof of which I refer to the following exquisite lines in Richard III. : QUEEN ELIZABETH. Ah, my poor princes ! Ah, my tender hahes ! My unblown flowers, new-appearing sweets I If yet your gentle souls fly in the air, And be not fix 'd in doom perpetual, Hover about me with your airy wings, And hear your mother's lamentations. " Eichard in.," Act IV. Scene 4 And again by Buckingham in his invocation, on the way to execution, to the souls of those whom Richard (by his own help) had murdered : All that have miscarried By underhand, corrupted foul injustice! If that your moody discontented souls Do through the clouds behold this present hour, Even for revenge, mock my destruction ! The most remarkable evidence, to my mind, that Shakespeare could not have been a Protestant, is the restraint which he im- posed upon himself during Elizabeth's reign, against writing even a line reflecting upon the manifold atrocities of Bloody Mary, though she at one time even meditated sending his patroness, Elizabeth, to the block. Of the same character are his slavish praises to that unparalleled miscreant, Henry VIII., who stifled Smithfield with the smoke of human sacrifices, for opinion's sake. Nevertheless, Shakespeare has falsely handed 6 70 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. down this monster to the English people, gilded by the halo of his genius ; nay, has consigned him to their forgiveness, and even to their affections, as Bluff King Hal. There was some reason, perhaps, why the poet should pass him gently by, as the father of Elizabeth (though the play of " Henry VIII." was not written until long after her decease), but I have no doubt that Shake- speare's main reason was because Henry, notwithstanding his per- secutions of the Church, died a good Catholic. The same reason may be held to account for the poet's extreme devotion to Queen Catharine, who was conspicious for nothing, except for the pro- found depth of her Catholic bigotry; which, instead of having been softened by English influences, seems to have deepened from the hour of her leaving Spain. Before closing this chapter I may add that I find another personal proof of Shakespeare's Romanism in the bitter hatred which he repeatedly exhibits to the Jews. This prejudice does not exist largely among Protestants ; at any rate, not among the Protestants of the United States. On the contrary, the Jews mingle here with Christians without any social disadvantage; and, for my own part, I have never heard of any historical, ethno- logical, or moral reason why they should suffer the least discount in any equitable estimation. They certainly are the purest race known to the world ; and this purity could not have been pre- served without great traits of character and great sacrifices. They are notoriously brave, for the proofs of their courage are stamped upon every age, from the battle-field to the prize-ring. Their women are proverbially virtuous and beautiful ; an intense interior pride keeps them from ever billeting their poor upon the public charities; and the wonder is that, under the prejudice which the society of all Christian countries has unremittingly exercised against them, they remain such useful, inoffensive, law- abiding citizens. The world is not at all indebted to William Shakespeare for what he has done to contribute toward this narrow, grovelling, and contemptible reflection upon the Jews; and, least of all, should he be respected for it in America. Less, than at any time, to-day. Prejudice is the very meanest form of slavery ; for it is the slavery of the mind. One black, shrivelling blot, slavery, has recently been exuded from the national con- science. Surely there can be no excuse for allowing even a shadow of this other to remain* Legal A cquirements of Shakespeare. 7 1 CHAPTER IX. LEGAL ACQUIREMENTS OF SHAKESPEARE. HAVING now disposed, in a general way, of the inquiry as to the respective religious beliefs of Sir Francis Bacon and of William Shakespeare, we are now prepared to pass onto the reading of the plays for further evidence in support of the Roman Catholic theory. And also for evidence to test the truth of the declarations in our opening chapter, that the author of the Shakespeare plays was never betrayed into one generous aspiration in favour of popular liberty, and never alluded to detestation or contempt. Further, that he could not have been a statesman or a lawyer ; both of which, beyond all doubt, Lord Bacon was. In dealing with this latter point I am aware that I shall have to undertake the hazard of disagreeing, to some extent, with so powerful an authority as Lord Chief Justice Campbell of England, and also with distinguished lawyers in this country; while, in denying to Shakespeare a single political emotion in favour of liberty for the masses, I am also conscious of the apparent contradiction which presents itself to this assump- tion, in the one solitary play of " Julius Caesar," through the character of Brutus. Upon this latter point, however, I shall only stop at this stage of the inquiry to say that Brutus, though a patriot, in the sense of an abounding love of country, was at same time an intense aristocrat, who struck Csesar purely in defence of an oligarchical form of government and the privileges of his own patrician class, and whose conspiracy never contem- plated for a moment the liberation of the People from their fixed condition of bondsmen and of slaves. . His invocations to Liberty, therefore, were merely in the interest of the associated nobles, as contrasted with the invidious despotism of a king, and did not comprehend reducing the degrading distance between the Patri- 72 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. cians, who were the masters of the State, and the Plebeians, who were the dirt under their feet. This was the form of the Roman Republic in the defence of which Brutus, Cassius, " and the rest," struck down the ambitious Caesar. They were patriots in their own estimation, of course, but they were patriots in the same sense as the Earls of Warwick and of Salisbury were patriots ; and their love of country was of precisely the same brand as that of King John and of Henry V. But of this more in the proper place. The assumption that the author of the Shakespeare plays must have been a lawyer, from the evidences of legal erudition which are strewed throughout his text, has been a very favourite one with the majority of the commentators and biographers of William Shakespeare ; and when the Baconian theory was broached a few years ago, these evidences were eagerly seized upon by the persons who claimed the credit of those wonderful productions for the great Lord Chancellor. At the outset of this discussion of Shake- l speare's legal lore, Bacon was not thought of in connexion with 1 the puzzle ; and the commentators, therefore, were forced, pretty ) generally, to come to the conclusion that during the six or seven wears between Shakespeare's leaving school and going up to Lon- Vlon he had either been articled to an attorney or been a clerk and /scrivener in some notary's office. Some critics, whose brows were more rainbowed than the rest, suggested that any extent of scholastic accomplishment might fairly be attributed to the vivid, lambent, quick-breeding conception of such a miracle of genius as was the poet of our race ; but this exceptional theory made but little headway with more sober reasoners, mainly for the want of precedents that any man was ever known to have learned his letters, or attained to the art of making boots or watches by mere intuition. The fact is, that the true difficulty with this portion of the inquiry has been, that too much erudition and legal comprehension has been attributed to Shake- speare for what his law phrases indicate ; or, in plainer words, they have been paraded at a great deal more than they are really worth. Let me say here for myself, however, that without attributing too much to the exceptional superiority of Shakespeare's quickness of conception and intellectual grasp, all the knowledge which he shows of legal verbiage and of certain general principles of law, Legal A cquirements of Shakespeare. 73 so far as he refers to them in his plays, might, it seems to me, have been obtained first, by reading certain elementary works of law falling in his way ; next, by attendance at the courts of record, held twice a month at Stratford, and courts-leet and view of frankpledge, held in the same town twice a year. Next, through his own subsequent experience as an owner of real estate ; which latter position necessarily familiarized him with all the forms of " purchase," of leases, of mortgages, and sale. Besides, he might reasonably be credited with much additional law know- ledge gained by legal borrowing and lending, and through law- suits which we know he instituted for the recovery of debt. I think it would be difficult for Lord Campbell to show that the law phrases which Shakespeare uses go beyond the wide scope of this opportunity of acquisition to a bright-minded man ; while, if we are to take into consideration the subsequent advantages our poet derived in London, from familiar discussion of the great / law cases of the day at " The Maiden" J and other popular taverns v _^ he frequented near the Inns of Court, where such men as Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher, Seldon, Cotton, Carew, Donne, Martin, Sir Walter Raleigh, and sometimes even Bacon himself, found conversational relaxation in absence of newspapers, we should have to come to the conclusion that Shakespeare must have been a very dull man if he had not acquired at least as much legal knowledge as his dramas show. 2 1 Beaumont, in a friendly letter to Ben Jonson from the country, says,- " What things have we seen Done at the Mermaid ! heard words that have been So nimble, and so full of subtle flame, As if that every one from whom they came Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest." 2 Lord Campbell says, "At Stratford there was, by royal charter, a court of record, with jurisdiction over all personal action to the amount of 30, equal, at the latter end of the reign of Elizabeth, to more than 1001. in the reign of Victoria. This court, the records of which are extant, was regulated by the course of practice and pleading which prevailed in the superior courts of law at "Westminster, and employed the same barbarous dialect, composed of Latin, English, and Norman French. It sat every fort- night, and there belonged to it, besides the town clerk, six attorneys, some of whom must have practised in the Queen's Bench in Chancery, and have had extensive business in conveyancing. An attorney, steward of the Earl of Warwick, lord of the manor of Stratford, twice a year held a court-leet and 74 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. Chalmers was the first to present the theory that Shakespeare must, for a considerable portion of his unrecorded youthful life, have been an attorney's clerk at Stratford. Malone and others adopted this view from the very necessity of accounting for the oft-recurring 1 law phrases in the Shakespeare text ; while Lord Chief Justice Campbell has been carried to such an extent of enthusiasm by these professional terms as to attribute to Shake- speare quite an extensive knowledge of the law. His expression is : " Great as is the knowledge of the law which Shakespeare's writings display, and familiar as he appears to have been with all its forms and proceedings, the whole of this would easily be accounted for, if for some years he had occupied a desk in the office of a country attorney in good business ; attending sessions and assizes, keeping leet days and law days, and, perhaps, being sent up to the metropolis in term time to conduct suits before the Lord Chancellor.-" 3 My objection to this is, with all due deference to so great a lawyer as a Lord Chief Justice, that the author of the Shake- speare plays did not possess any great knowledge of the law ; or, if he did, his dramatic writings do not show it. He exhibits, without doubt, a familiarity in law expressions, and applies them with a precision and a happiness of application in all cases which apparently carries the idea that he may have served in an attorney's office ; but not one of them, nor do all of them together, mark anything higher than mere general principles and forms of practice, or such surface clack and knowledge as were within the mental reach of any clever scrivener or convey- ancer's clerk. On the contrary, whenever Shakespeare steps beyond the surface comprehension of the solicitor's phraseology, and attempts to deal with the spirit and philosophy of law, he makes a lamentable failure. " The Merchant of Venice," "Comedy of Errors/' "Winter's Tale," and "Measure for Measure," contain conspicuous proofs of this deficiency, while the statesmanship of the Duke in the "Two Gentlemen of Verona," who, in his joy at recovering his daughter from a view of frank-pledge there, to which a jury was summoned, and at which constables were appointed and various presentments were made." Campbell, p. 22. 3 " Shakespeare's Legal Attainments," by Lord John Campbell. Apple- ton's edition, 1869, p. 24 Legal A cquirements of Shakespeare. 7 5 gang of cut- throats in a forest, endeavours to reform them by appointing them to high posts under Government, is a sort of policy which Lord Bacon was never accused of, while he was a member of the Privy Council. Lord Campbell's essay on " The Legal Acquirements of Shake- speare" was drawn forth by an inquiry addressed to his Lordship on that subject, by Mr. Payne Collier (one of the most learned and thorough of the Shakespearian commentators), whether his Lordship was of the opinion that Shakespeare " was a clerk in an attorney's office in Stratford, before he joined the players in London " ? This led to an answer by his Lordship, under date of September 15, 1858, which shows a discovery of legal phrases and allusions in twenty-three of the thirty-seven Shakespeare plays ; and it is this amount of evidence which (though it does not bring the learned replicant to an absolute conclusion) elicits from him the expression which I have already given. His Lordship sets out in his response to Mr. Collier with " I am obliged to say that, to the question you propound, no positive answer can very safely be given " but he adds that, " were an issue tried before me, as Chief Justice, at the Warwick Assizes, whether William Shakespeare was ever clerk in an attorney's office, I should hold that there is evidence to go to the jury in support of the affirmative/' His Lordship, however, does not hesitate to declare, further on, that there is one piece of direct evidence, if not two, that Shakespeare had been so employed in Stratford; and he is brought to this conclusion by libels which Greene and Nash, two jealous play-writing contemporaries, had made upon our poet in the preface to a work of Greene's, edited by Nash, and published in 1589. This preface, which I have already briefly noticed in Chapter IV., characterizes Shakespeare, though his name is not precisely mentioned, as " one of a sort of shifting companions that run through every art and thrive by none, to leave the trade of noverint whereto they were born . . . . , and who busy themselves with whole Hamlets of tragical speeches, &c." The term noverint is recognized by Lord Campbell as indicating the business of an attorney, in Shakespeare's time. Moreover, he believes that the phrase of " whole Hamlets" is a distinct allusion to the great play of our poet, and that the epithet of Shake-scene, applied to him by Greene in a subsequent 76 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. libel, published in 1592, was an undoubted mimicry of Shake- speare's name. In view of this direct evidence, supported by the text, and by the general circumstances of the case, Lord Campbell closes his reply to Mr. Collier by saying, " Therefore, my dear Mr. Payne Collier, in support of your opinion that Shakespeare had been bred to the profession of the law in an attorney's office, I think you will he justified in saying that the fact was asserted publicly in Shakespeare's lifetime by two contemporaries of Shakespeare, who were engaged in the same pursuits with himself, who must have known him well, and who were probably acquainted with the whole of his career. I must likewise admit that this assertion is strongly corroborated by internal evidence to be found in Shakespeare's writings. I have once more perused the whole of his dramas, that I might more satisfactorily answer your question, and render you some assistance in finally coming to a right conclusion/' Lord Campbell then goes on to produce his illustrations from the plays and sonnets attributed to Shakespeare, and I cannot help remarking, that it would be well for his Lordship's admirers if he had exhibited as much good sense and judgment in his presentment of these extracts as he did in his decision of Mr. Collier's general question. Two or three examples will give an idea of his Lordship's mode of reasoning, and of the singular earnestness which, tarantula-like, seems to have bitten all the commentators with a sort of mad desire to prove Shakespeare to have been a miracle, in every specialty ; and this, too often, without either rhyme or reason. His Lordship's first illustration of the depth of Shakespeare's legal lore is from the "Merry Wives of Windsor," and is as follows : FALSTAFF. Of what quality was your love, then ? FOBD. Like a fair house built upon another man's ground ; so that I have lost my edifice by mistaking the 'place where I erected it. Probably not a single well-informed person in England or America, of either sex, does not know as much law as the above indicates nay, does not even know that a nail driven by a tenant into the wall must remain with the realty yet our learned Chief Justice thus discourses on it : Legal Acquirements of Shakespeare. 7 7 " Now tins shows in Shakespeare a knowledge of the law of real property not generally possessed. The unlearned would suppose that if, by mistake, a man builds a fine house on the land of another, when he discovers his error he will be permitted to remove all the materials of the structure, and particularly the marble pillars and carved chimney-pieces with which he has adorned it : but Shakespeare knew better. He was aware that, being fixed to the freehold, the absolute property in them belonged to the owner of the soil" Again, says his Lordship, he remarks as to " Measure for Measure :" . " In Act I. Scene 2, the old lady who had kept a lodging- Jiouse of a disreputable character in the suburbs of Vienna, being thrown into despair by the proclamation that all such houses in the suburbs must be plucked down, the Clown thus comforts her: CLOWN. Come ; fear not you ; good counsellors lack no clients. " This comparison/' says Lord Campbell, " is not very flattering to the bar, but it seems to show a familiarity with both pro- fessions alluded to." My observation upon this would be, that the Clown could not have made use of a more trite and ordinary proverb, in application to the subject, even if he had been a more profound person than a clown. But let us, at the present, go with his Lordship one step further. From ' ' Macbeth" he quotes the lines : " But yet I'll make assurance doubly sure, And take a bond of fate." And this to prove Shakespeare to have been a lawyer! Further on his Lordship takes the following couplet from " Venus and Adonis " to establish the same thing : " But when the heart's attorney once is mute, the client breaks as desperate in the suit." If this is fair evidence, and fair reasoning upon that evidence, to show Shakespeare to have been a lawyer, then, certainly, Hamlet's direction to the players " To hold as 'twere the mirror up to nature," would prove, beyond all doubt, that Shakespeare must have been 78 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. a looking-glass maker, or at least a dealer in that trade ; or that these two lines of Faulconbridge, in " King John/-' which criticize the form of attack proposed by the French and Austrian divisions upon Angiers, " prudent discipline ! from north to south, Austria and France shoot in each other's mouth," would prove Shakespeare to have been a soldier. THE TESTIMONY OF THE PLAYS. " The Tempest^ CHAPTER X. "THE TEMPEST." WE have now arrived at the most important branch of our in- quiry ; namely, at that by means of which Shakespeare may him- self be " interviewed " through the testimony of his text. For this purpose I shall have to make liberal extracts from the 'plays, as on the faith of my opening- declarations I shall not feel at liberty to omit any expression which may seem to bear upon the argument, whether it be for one side or the other, so that the reader may, without regard to my opinion, give judgment for himself. Indeed, if anything deemed pertinent shall chance to be left out, it will be because I have overlooked it ; and I will here avail myself of the opportunity to apologize for the extent of the extracts which I have already made from the old bio- graphers as to Shakespeare's personal history. Doubtless, these will be very trite and tiresome to scholars, to whom they are familiar, but I shall be excused when it is recollected that these extracts seemed necessary to substantiate my statements, while, for the convenience of the reader, it is perhaps better they should be in this book, ready to his hand, than be sought after in the public libraries. For convenience of examination, I shall take the dramas in the order in which they were first published in the original folio of 1623. This publication puts " The Tempest " first; but in- stead of being one of Shakespeare's earliest plays, it was really one of his latest, for it was not produced, according to Malone, till 1612, only four years previous to our poet's death. There is not much in " The Tempest" bearing upon the points that I have offered, though it will serve to strengthen my view concerning the aristocratic class of personages chosen invariably by Shakespeare for his favourite characters, and the wide and con- 82 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. temptuous distance he always places off between these favourites of his muse and the " common " people. With this view, I will give the dramatis persona, along with the first scene, in which most of the characters are introduced : ALONZO, King of Naples. SEBASTIAN, his brother. PEOSPEBO, the rightful Duke of Milan. ANTONIO, his brother, the usurping DuJce of Milan. FEEDINAND, son to the Xing of Naples. GONZALO, an honest old counsellor of Naples. ADEIAN, FBANCISCA, lords. CALIBAN, a savage and deformed slave. TEINCULO, a jester. STEPHANO, a drunken butler. Master of a ship, Boatswain, and Mariners. MIEANDA, daughter to Prospero. AEIEL, an airy spirit. Act I. Scene 1. On a Ship at Sea A Storm, with Thunder and Lightning. Enter a Shipmaster and a Boatswain. MAST. Boatswain BOATS. Here, master ; what cheer ? MAST. Good ; speak to the mariners ; fall to't yarely, or we run ourselves aground ; hestir, bestir. [Exit. Enter Mariners. BOATS. Heigh, my hearts ; cheerly, cheerly, my hearts ; yare, yare ; take in the topsail; tend to the master's whistle. Blow till thou burst thy wind, if room enough ! Enter ALONZO, SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, FEEDINAND, GONZALO, and others. ALON. Good boatswain, have care. Where's the master ? Play the men. BOATS. I pray, now, keep below. ANT. Where is the master, boatswain? BOATS. Do you not hear him ? You mar our labour. Keep your cabins ; you do assist the storm. GON. Nay, good, be patient. BOATS. When the sea is. Hence ! what care these roarers for the name of king ! To cabin ; silence ; trouble us not. GON. Good ; yet remember whom thou hast aboard. BOATS. None that I more love than myself. You are a counsellor ; if you can command these elements to silence, and work the peace of the present, we will not hand a rope more ; use your authority. If you cannot, give thanks you have lived so long, and make yourself ready in your cabin for the mis- chance of the hour, if it so hap. Cheerily, good hearts. Out of our way, I say. {Exit. " The Tempest: 1 83 GON. I have great comfort from this fellow; methinks he hath no drown- ing mark upon him ; his complexion is perfect gallows. Stand fast, good fate, to his hanging ! Make the rope of his destiny our cable, for our own doth little advantage ! If he he not born to be hanged, our case is miserable. [Exeunt. Re-enter Boatswain. BOATS. Down with the topmast ; yare ; lower, lower ; bring her to try with main course. [A cry within.'] A plague upon this howling ! they are louder than the weather, or our office He-enter SEBASTIAN, ANTONIO, and GONZALO. Yet again ? what do you do here ? Shall we give o'er, and drown ! Have you a mind to sink ! ****** ANT. "We are merely cheated of our lives by This wide-chapped rascal. Would thou mightst lie drowning, The washing of ten tides ! GON. He'll be hanged yet ; Though every drop of water swear against it, And gape at wid'st to glut him. [A confused noise within.'] Mercy on us ! We split ! we split ! Farewell my wife and children ! Farewell, brother ! We split, we split, we split ! ANT. Let's all sink with the king. [Exit. After this last touching evidence of loyalty, the storm sub- sides, and the parties distribute themselves about the island, on which they have been stranded, and upon which there are but three other persons Prospero, Miranda, and Caliban. By the above it will be perceived that the boatswain, who labours hard and honestly at his vocation, who speaks nothing 1 but good sense, and who is doing his utmost to save the ship, is denounced as a cur and a rogue by the lords, simply because he ventures to remonstrate hastily with the gentlemen of the scene for interfering with his imperative and vitally important duties. Further on, Shakespeare, in the character of Prospero, and evidently speaking in a tone he would have used for himself, directs Ariel to have the wandering ship's company brought together, in order to be- hold a "masque" of fairies, which he has prepared for the general entertainment. PBOSPEEO (to Ariel). Go bring the rabble, O'er whom I give thee power, here to this place ! The rabble meaning, of course, the ship's company, and all of the dramatis persona who are not gentlemen. S/j. Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. I think that the unvarying inclination which Shakespeare shows, to speak with contempt of the labouring classes sprang from some notion in the poet's mind that he was a gentleman himself. This idea finds support in the fact that he could trace his name, on one side, to the battle of Hastings, and his ancestors, on both sides, to the battle of Bosworth Field ; but more distinctly in the fact of his having laid out a considerable sum of money, after he had become rich by theatrical management, to purchase for his father a coat of arms. This gives a sharp point to the remark of Halliwell upon the death of John Shakespeare, that "it would have pleased us better had we found Shakespeare raising monuments to his parents in the venerable pile which now covers his own remains." The effort to have his father made " a gentleman of worship " supplies the key to the otherwise strange contradiction of his always being so bitterly derisive of " greasy mechanics/'' " woollen slaves," and peasants/' as he terms the masses from whose midst he sprang. New converts, as we know, are usually the most vehement denouncers of rejected associates and principles. "TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA." It is agreed on all sides that the " Two Gentlemen of Verona " was among the earliest of Shakespeare's dramatic compositions, and some commentators think it was his very first play " The Comedy of Errors " being, probably, his second. The l Two Gentlemen " did not reach the dignity of print, however, until the publication of the first general collection, known as the folio of 1683, seven years after Shakespeare's death. The reason why it was not placed first in the catalogue, and the others made to follow, according to the supposed chronological order of their production, was doubtless because it was feared that this plan, by placing the weakest of our poet's productions at the front, would do him injustice with every fresh reader, who, starting with the play as an example, might not be induced to pursue the study further. Therefore, " The Tempest," one of his most highly finished productions, was placed foremost, and the rest followed without order, so far at least as the come- dies were concerned, with the view of giving a rapid exhi- " Two Gentlemen of Verona." 85 bition of the writer's infinite variety. "But/* says Knight, " there must have been years of labour before the genius that produced the 'Two Gentlemen of Verona' could have produced ' The Tempest.' ' : In fact, it is so far below the mark of the latter magnificently-worked-out conception, that many have seriously doubted the authenticity of the "Two Gentle- men" as a Shakespearian production; while several critics of position, among whom are Hanmer, Theobald, and Upton, de- nounce the piece as spurious altogether. There can scarcely be a doubt, however (though Shakespeare can easily be convicted of having adopted the stoiy of the piece from others), that the text was all his own. Upon this question Dr. Johnson very pertinently says, at the close of his dictum in favour of its authenticity as a Shakespeare play, " if it be taken from him, to whom shall it be given ? " The Doctor, in fixing the literary status of this work, continues : - " In this play there is a strange mixture of knowledge and ignorance, of care and negligence The author conveys his heroes by sea from one inland town to another in the same country ; he places the Emperor at Milan, and sends his young men to attend him, but never mentions him more. He makes Proteus, after an interview with Silvia, say he has only seen her picture ; and, if we may credit the old copies, he has, by mis- taking places, left his scenery inextricable. The reason of all this confusion seems to be that he took his story from a novel, which he sometimes followed and sometimes forsook, sometimes remembered and sometimes forgot." "It has been well re- marked that such historical and geographical blunders as these could hardly have been committed by Lord Bacon, even in his earliest youth. In all popular knowledge Shakespeare was a master. He does not err in his illustrations drawn from hunting and hawking and natural phenomena, or in such natural history as is learnt from close observation of the habits of animals. He blunders in things which could only have been derived from book-learning, in which Bacon excelled." ] These remarks lead us directly to the further observation, that the production of the " Two Gentlemen," being generally placed at the date of 1591, when Bacon was thirty-one years of age, 1 Win. H. Smith's "Inquiry," p, 101. London, 1857. 7 86 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. could hardly have received these errors at his hands ; while the supposition that he could have permitted them to live under his eye, unconnected, even after the plays had attained the highest fame and the folio had gone through several editions, is not entitled to a moment's entertainment. If the play was thought worthy, hy Bacon, of being put surreptitiously into Shakespeare's hands, for transcription and performance, it surely must have been thought deserving, after it had become part of a great fame, of being retouched by a few correctional notes. And these could have been as easily handed to Shakespeare as the original MSS., or have been sent to the publishers of the folio, after Shakespeare's death ; for Bacon outlived Shakespeare long enough to know that the poet had already acquired a fame and received an homage from mankind which he, with all of his triumphs in philosophy, could never hope to reach. The idea that Bacon, with his covetous imagination, could have been indifferent to such fame as this, seems to be beyond all the bounds of reason ; while the notion that the mind which originally desired the production of the play would not have corrected its errors, after it had detected them, appears to be utterly absurd. In the first place, the experience of Bacon could not have made these errors ; but admitting that they had escaped him originally, through the haste of writing, he must have detected them afterward, through the very neces- sities of his local, legal, and political career. Indeed, if the " Two Gentlemen" is to be received as one of the Shakespeare plays, it seems to me that the whole Baconian theory falls at once. It is simply beyond the reach of belief (if the play were written by Bacon) that he never corrected it; since we know, through Bacon's biographers, that, for greater accuracy, he frequently revised all his works, and transcribed his "Novum Organum" twelve times. The story of this play is very simple. Valentine and Proteus, who give title to the piece, and who are hardly more than boys, are scions of two wealthy and noble families of Verona. The first act opens with the departure of the former on a travelling tour, by way of increasing his accomplishments, and on taking leave of Proteus (who, being in love, prefers to remain at home) he indulges in some smart reflections on his friend's amorous in- fatuation. Presently the father of Proteus, having heard that Valentine has gone abroad, declares that his son shall improve " Two Gentlemen of Verona." 87 himself in like manner; and consequently, at one day's notice, and without giving him more than a bare opportunity to take a hasty leave of his sweetheart Julia, sends him also to the Em- peror's court. Before Proteus arrives there, however, Valentine has so well improved his time that he has succeeded in making Silvia, the Duke of Milan's daughter, fall in love with him ; the only difficulty, however, being that Silvia stands en- gaged, by the Duke's special permission, to Sir Thurio, a very wealthy nobleman of his court. By-and-by Proteus appears, and he at once, forgetful of his vows to Julia and his duty to his friend, falls in love with Silvia himself. Nay, worse, though told by Valentine, in the sacred confidence of friendship, that he and Silvia are betrothed, indeed, are on the eve of an elopement for the purpose of marriage, Proteus basely betrays this secret to the Duke, and seeks the ruin of his friend, in the hope of gaining ultimate possession of Silvia himself. The traitor justifies this shocking perfidy to Julia on the one hand, and to Valentine on the other, in a soliloquy, in which occur these abominable lines : Unheedful vows may needfully be broken ; And he wants wit that wants resolved will To learn his wit to exchange the bad for better. Act II. Scene 6. The result of this villany by Proteus is the banishment of Valentine, who, falling in with a band of outlaws, is made their captain, while Silvia, rendered desperate by her misfortunes, and spurning the false love of Proteus, escapes from her confinement to a neighbouring forest, under the protection of a gentleman named Sir Eglamour, to whom she appoints a rendezvous to use her own devout language At friar Patrick's cell, Where I intend holy confession. News of her flight, in company with Eglamour, is soon brought to the Duke, and he informs Proteus of it as follows : DUKE. She's fled unto that peasant Valentine ; And Eglamour is in her company. 'Tis true ; for friar Lawrence met them both, As he in penance wandered through the forest : 88 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. Him, he knew well, and guess'd that it was she ; But, being mask'd, he was not sure of it : Besides, she did intend confession At Patrick's cell this even ; and there she was not. Here we find united evidences of that unvarying- Catholic reve- rence which Shakespeare always expresses when speaking of a priest; and likewise of that contempt for humble life which I have pointed out as another of his peculiarities, in the opprobrious use he makes of the word peasant, by applying it as an epithet of contempt to the well-born Valentine. Proteus has previously used the same angry epithet to Launce. But to return to the story. Proteus, having obtained from the Duke, as above described, the direction of Silvia's flight and of his intention to pursue her, takes with him his page, Sebastian, and hastens to the forest, with the view of anticipating the Duke, and of obtaining possession of her for himself, in advance of the Duke's arrival. It appears, however, that, before Proteus gets to the forest with his party, a portion of the outlaws capture Silvia; Sir Eglamour, her escourt, prudently running away. Her deplorable situation then is thus described by Shakespeare : Act V. Scene 3. The Forest. Enter SYLVIA and Outlaws. OUT. Come, come ; Be patient, we must bring you to our captain . SIL. A thousand more mischances than this one Have learn'd me how to brook this patiently. 2 OUT. Come, bring her away. 1 OUT. Where is the gentleman that was with her ? 3 OUT. Being nimble-footed, he hath outrun us, But Moyses, and Valerius, follow him. Go thou with her to the west end of the wood, There is our captain ; we'll follow him that's fled. The thicket is beset, he cannot 'scape. 1 OUT. Come, I must bring you to our captain's cave ; Fear not : he bears an honourable mind, And will not use a woman lawlessly. SIL. Valentine, this I endure for thee. {.Exeunt. The scene then shifts, and shows Valentine, alone, in another part of the forest. He is in a sad mood, and utters a long soliloquy, when, being disturbed by the sound of a noisy conflict " Two Gentlemen of Verona" 89 (that turns out to be the rescue of Silvia from the outlaws by Proteus and his party) , he utters these lines : These are my mates, that make their will their law, Have some unhappy passenger in chase ; They love me well ; yet I have much to do, To keep them from uncivil outrages. Withdraw thee, Valentine; who's this comes here ? '[Steps aside. Enter PEOTEUS, SILVIA and JULIA. It must now be mentioned that Julia, the betrothed of Proteus, not having 1 heard from her false lover for a long while, had some time before left Verona disguised as a page, and had succeeded in entering the service of Proteus, under the name of Sebastian, in which character she now accompanies him. With this expla- nation, and with Valentine listening in the thicket, we will return to the text. PEO. (to Silvia). Madam, this service I have done for you (Though you respect not aught your servant doth), To hazard life, and rescue you from him That would have forced your honour and your love. Vouchsafe me, for my meed, but one fair look ; A smaller hoon than this I cannot beg, And less than this, I am sure, you cannot give. VAL. (from his concealment). How like a dream is this I see and hear; Love, lend me patience to forbear a while. SIL. O miserable, unhappy that I am ! PEG. Unhappy were you, madam, ere I came ; But, by my coming, I have made you happy. SIL. By thy approach thou mak'st me most unhappy. JUL. And me, when he approacheth to your presence. [Aside. SIL. Had I been seized by a hungry lion, I would have been a breakfast to the beast, Rather than have false Proteus rescue me. Heaven be Judge, how I love Valentine, Whose life's as tender to me as my soul ; And full as much (for more there cannot be), 1 do detest false perjured Proteus : Therefore, begone ; solicit me no more. * * * * * * . PEO. Nay, if the gentle spirit of moving words Can no way change you to a milder form, I'll woo you like a soldier, at arms' end : And love you 'gainst the nature of love, force you. SIL. O Heaven ! PEO. I'll force thee yield to my desire. go Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. VAL. (discovering himself). Ruffian, let go that rude uncivil touch ; Thou friend of an ill fashion ! PEO. Valentine ; YAL. Thou common friend, that's without faith or love ; (For such is a friend now), treacherous man ! Thou hast beguiled my hopes ; nought but mine eye Could have persuaded me : Now I dare not say, I have one friend alive ; thou would'st disprove me. Who should be trusted now, when one's right hand Is perjured to the bosom ? Proteus, I am sorry I must never trust thee more, But count the world a stranger for thy sake. The private wound is deepest. time, most curst ; 'Mongst all foes, that a friend should be the worst. PEO. My shame and guilt confound me Forgive me, Valentine ; if hearty sorrow Be a sufficient ransom for offence, I tender it here ; I do as truly suffer As e'er I did commit. VAL. Then I am paid : And once again I do receive thee honest ; Who by repentance is not satisfied, Is nor of heaven, nor earth ; for these are pleased ; By penitence the Eternal's wrath 's appeased : And, that my love may appear plain and free, All that was mine in Silvia, I give thee. JUL. me unhappy ! [Faints. PEG. Look to the boy. Julia is then discovered. No wonder that she fainted under the indescribable poltroonery and baseness of Valentine in resigning the devoted and heroic Silvia to the villain Proteus, because the latter, under a sense of policy and fear, expressed sudden contri- tion for his execrable crimes. Proteus, however, does not think it prudent to accept Silvia under such an offer from the chief of a band of outlaws; so he makes a virtue of necessity by renewing his fealty to Julia in about six lines. Whereupon Valentine, finding that Proteus declines to receive Silvia at his hands, makes the original lovers happy by joining them together. PEO. O Heaven ! were man But constant, he were perfect ; that one error Fills him with faults ; makes him run through all sins : Inconstancy falls off, ere it begins : What is in Silvia's face, but I may spy More fresh in Julia's with a constant eye ? " Two Gentlemen of Verona" 91 YAL. Come, come, a hand from either : Let me be blest to make this happy close ; 'Tvvere pity two such friends should be long foes. PEO. Bear witness, Heaven, I have my wish for ever. JUL. And I have mine. Everything being thus amicably settled, it unfortunately hap- pens that those incorrigible fellows, the outlaws, suddenly turn up again in another act of villainy. Enter Outlaws, with the DUKE and THUBIO. OUTLAW. A prize, a prize, a prize I YAL. Forbear, forbear, I say ; it is my lord the Duke, Your grace is welcome to a man disgraced. Thurio, hereupon discovering Silvia, at once lays claim to her, but Valentine, who has suddenly recovered his affection also, threatens him with instant death if he dare " take but possession of her with a touch," concluding his fiery menace with " I dare thee but to breathe upon my love !" Thurio, of course, gives Silvia up ; upon which the Duke, in disgust with his cowardice, denounces him as base and degenerate, and magnanimously hands Silvia over to Sir Valentine. Then follows the climax, in the following sudden conversions to morality, on the part of the brigands, whose miraculous repentance at once receives a reward which elicits our amazement : YAL. I thank your grace : the gift hath made me happy. I now beseech you, for your daughter's sake, To grant one boon that I shall ask of you. DUKE. I grant it for thine own, whate'er it be. YAL. These banish'd men, that I have kept withal, Are men endued with worthy qualities ; Forgive them what they have committed here, And let them be recall'd from their exile. They are reformed, civil, full of good, And jit for great employment, worthy lord. DUKE. Thou hast prevail'd ; I pardon them, and thee : Dispose of them as thou Icnowest their deserts. Come, let us go : we will conclude all jars "With triumphs, mirth, and rare solemnity. Now, as Valentine represents these outlaws (who had given him so much to do to keep them from uncivil outrage) to be men endued with worthy qualities, and declares them to be not only 92 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. " reformed, civil, and good." but " fit for great employment/' the carte blanche which the Duke gives to him to " dispose of them" as he "know'st their deserts/' can hardly mean less than the appointment of them to positions under Government. A fine request, truly, to make for Silvia's sake, who had been rudely captured by these thieves ; and for a father to make, who had himself just escaped from their attempt to rifle and, perhaps, to murder him. And, in order to make sure that these lawless rascals would have not hesitated, because of any qualms of con- science, to have had recourse to the latter extremity, the reader has only to turn to their own description of themselves at the opening of Act IV., when they chose Valentine to be their cap- tain. But it is no portion of my task to show the contradictions and incongruities of Shakespeare, except where they bear upon the points we have in hand ; and I have, therefore, but to say, in excuse for the extent of my extracts from the " Two Gentlemen/ 1 ' that the numerous absurdities they exhibit against our poet, do not seem to be the logical product of the mind of such an exact lawyer, statesman, and philosopher as Bacon. " The Merry Wives of Windsor" 93 CHAPTER XL "THE MERUY WIVES OF WINDSOR." THE events of this play are supposed to take place between the First and Second Parts of " Henry IV." Falstaff is still in favour at court, and the compliment of Ford on his warlike pre- parations must, says Mr. Harness, allude to the service he had done at Shrewsbury. Shallow, Bardolph, Pistol, and Nym are the same as in the former plays, though it is evident that Mrs. Quickly, the servant of Doctor Caius, the French physician, is quite a different person from hostess Quickly, of the Boar's Head, in Eastcheap, who subsequently married Ancient Pistol. The tradition respecting the origin of this comedy is that Queen Elizabeth was so well pleased with the admirable character of FalstafF that she ordered Shakespeare to continue it and show him in love. To this we owe " The Merry Wives of Windsor -" and, says Mr. Dennis, who, in 1702, somewhat rearranged the play under the title of "The Comical Gallant/' "she was so eager to see it acted that she commanded it to be finished in fourteen days."" Tradition further says that she was exceedingly pleased at its representation. All of which, if true, must con- vince the thoughtful reader who has perused the delectable dialogues between Doll Tearsheet and Sir John and the free language of " The Merry Wives of Windsor," that the charm exercised over her Majesty by such very broad allusions proves her to have been a true daughter of Henry VIII. Let me be excused, therefore, if I quote a supporting picture of her Majesty, by Edward Dowden, LL.D., Professor of English Literature in the University of Dublin, and Vice-President of the new Shakespeare Society, from an admirable volume, entitled "A Critical Study of Shakespeare's Mind and Art/' which has just (1875) been issued from the London press: 94 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. " Raleigh rode by the Queen in silver armour ; the Jesuit Drexilius esti- mated the value of the shoes worn by this minion of the English Cleopatra at six thousand six hundred gold pieces." Now, as Professor Dowden is a devout member of the political Anglican Church, a very learned man withal, and knows exactly what he is writing about, I trust this allusion of his to the possible moral status of the virgin Queen will not be deemed disloyal or irreverent. " The Merry Wives of AYindsor " is deserving of especial notice from the fact that it is the only one of Shakespeare's plays the superior action of which is not devoted to kings and queens and princes and nobles, but which confines itself wholly to the ordi- nary characters of homely or middle life. It exhibits its rela- tions to our religious theory mainly in the gross ridicule which it lavishes upon the Welsh parson, Sir Hugh Evans, and the fecundity, not to say feculence, of the tavern wit which flows from Falstaff and his mates with a readiness which does not seem peculiarly Baconian. Sir Hugh, who is hardly a degree above a mere buffoon, declares his sacred calling in the first scene by saying to Shallow, " If Sir John Falstaff have committed disparagements unto you, / am of the Churchy and will be glad to do my benevo- lence, to make my atonements and compromises between you." Further on he is made to profanely say, " The tevil and his tarn ! what phrase is this ? " He is next engaged in a duel with the French doctor, in order that he may be made the butt and laughter of the company, and then makes his appearance in a tavern, with the noisy, vulgar host of which he shows himself to be thoroughly cheek by jowl. Shakespeare never treats a Catholic priest after this irreverent and unseemly fashion. There is not much more to be said of this play from our point of view, save that Falstaff uses the term of peasant in the sense of cur against Ford, whose jealousy is filling his" purse ; or perhaps to notice one further of Lord Chief Justice Campbell's proofs of Shakespeare's legal acquirements, in addition to the one quoted from the same authority in the last chapter. " In writing the second scene of Act IV. of ' The Merry Wives of Windsor/ " says Lord Campbell, " Shakespeare's head was so full of the recondite terms of law that he makes a lady thus pour them out in a confidential tete-a-tete conversation with " Measure for Measure" 95 another lady, while discoursing of the revenge they two should take upon an old gentleman (FalstafF) for having made an un- successful attempt upon their virtue : " MES. PAGE. I'll have the cudgel hallowed, and hung o'er the altar ; it hath done meritorious service. " MES. FOED. What think you ? May we, with the warrant of woman- hood, and the witness of a good conscience, pursue him with any further revenge ? " MRS. PAGE. The spirit of wantonness is, sure, scared out of him ; if the devil have him not in fee-simple, with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the way of waste, attempt us again." " This Merry Wife of Windsor/' remarks his lordship, " is supposed to know that the highest estate which the devil could hold in any of his victims was a fee-simple, strengthened by fine and recovery. Shakespeare himself may probably have become aware of the law upon this subject when it was explained to him in answer to questions he put to the attorney, his master, while engrossing the deeds to be executed upon the purchase of a Warwickshire estate with a doubtful title." * Now, I have no doubt, for my own part, that Shakespeare might have acquired as much legal knowledge as the above indi- cates, through his own purchases of land. Fine and recovery, as an artifice for perfecting title to land, was like, in policy to the legislative stratagem known to modern times as a " motion to reconsider," accompanied by a supplementary motion to " lay on the table," on the part of a majority who have just carried a bill. The effect of this device is, that the bill is thus made reasonably safe from further peril. Every man of fair expe- rience knows that. "MEASURE FOR MEASURE." The date of the production of this fine play is fixed by Mr. F. J. Furnival, 2 in his " Trial Table of the Order of William Shakespeare's Plays," at 1603, when our poet was forty years of age. It was performed, says Gervinius, in 1604, but not pub- 1 Lord Campbell, pp. 40, 41. 2 Mr. Furnival is the Director of the new Shakespeare Society of London. 96 Shakespeare^ from an American Point of View. lished until 1623. Dr. Johnson speaks of its merits with such indifference that it would almost seem as if he had never read it ; while to other equally competent critics it is on a level, so far as the intellectual elevation of its language and imagery are con- cerned, with the very finest productions of Shakespeare's genius. To my judgment its moral management is faulty, and the great principle of retributive justice is sadly sacrificed to a weak fancy for forgiveness; but nothing can excel the exquisite delicacy, combined with the tremendous illustrative force, of the language allotted to Isabella, who is the main figure in the piece. The plot was familiar even before Shakespeare's time, but he undoubtedly adopted it from Whetstone's play of " Promos and Cassandra," published in 1578, which had no success, and which was itself translated from an Italian novel by Geraldi Cinthio. The main story is that of a pure sister pleading to a corrupt judge for a condemned brother's life, which sister is allowed to ransom his existence only by a surrender of her chastity to that functionary. The judge, succeeding in his aim, then orders the execution of the brother (Claudio) to take place, for fear he may seek revenge for " so receiving a dishonoured life." This is the original story; but Shakespeare changes it, so that Isabella, the sister, when her honour is at its crisis, sends a female representa- tive, in the undistinguishing darkness of the night, to perform her expected part with Angelo, the judge, and thus herself escapes all taint. To justify her pure mind to the pursuance of this double course, however, Isabella acts under the direction of a holy friar, who provides, as her nocturnal substitute, a maiden under betrothal to Lord Angelo, the judge. The real duke is the disguised friar who counsels Isabella to this act, and who, when he finds that Angelo, his deputy, still orders the sentence of death to be carried out against Claudio, privately interposes his authority with the prison officials, and sends to Angelo the head of a man who had that day died in his cell, as Claudio's head. The severed head deceives Angelo and Isabella both; where- upon the agonized and desperate girl bursts into threats of personal vengeance upon the villainous deputy, and is about starting off to execute them, when the friar, gently check- ing her rage, informs her that the real duke comes home on the morrow, and advises her to intercept him, along with Mariana, on his public entrance to the city, and then to con- " Measure for Measure" 97 spicuously lay their wrongs before him, in the very presence of Lord Angelo. This advice is followed by Isabella and Mariana, and as the duke comes into the city, surrounded by his nobles, the young ladies cast themselves before him, and, denouncing Angelo, demand justice on him. DUKE. Eelate your wrongs : In what ? By whom ? Be brief: Here is lord Angelo shall give you justice ! Reveal yourself to him. ISAB. 0, worthy duke, You bid me seek redemption of tbe devil : Hear me yourself ; for that which I must speak Must either punish me, not being believed, Or wring redress from you : hear me, O, hear me, here. ANG. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are notfirm : She hath been a suitor to me for her brother, Cut off by course of justice ! ISAB. By course of justice I ANG. And she will speak most bitterly, and strange. ISAB. Most strange, but yet most truly, will I speak : That Angelo's forsworn ; is it not strange ? That Angelo's a murderer ; is it not strange ? That Angelo is an adulterous thief, An hypocrite, a virgin-violator ; Is it not strange, and strange ? DUKE. Nay, ten times strange. The duke affects to disbelieve Isabella, and orders her off to prison. Mariana is then required to tell her story. She there- upon recites her betrothal to Angelo, and his abandonment of her because of the failure of her fortune. Next comes her description of the midnight consummation of her betrothal by keeping Isabella's appointment with the deputy in the dark. Finally, unveiling, Mariana shows her face to Angelo, and claims to be his wife. The duke hereupon demands of Angelo if he knows this woman. ANG. My lord, I must confess, I know this woman ; And, five years since, there was some speech of marriage Betwixt myself and her ; which was broke off, Partly, for that her promised proportions Came short of composition ; but, in chief, For that her reputation ivas disvalued In levity : since which time of five years 98 Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her, Upon my faith and honour. MAST. Noble prince, As there comes light from heaven, and words from breath, As there is sense in truth, and truth in virtue, I am affianced this man's wife, as strongly As words could make up vows : and, my good lord, But Tuesday night last gone, in his garden-house He knew me as a wife : As this is true Let me in safety raise me from my knees ; Or else for ever be confixed here, A marble monument ! ANG. I did but smile till now ; Now, good my lord, give me the scope of justice ; My patience here is touched : I do perceive, These poor informal women are no more But instruments of some more mightier member That sets them on : Let me have way, my lord, To find this practice out. DUKE. Ay, with all my heart ; And punish them unto your height of pleasure. The duke now goes out on some pretence, but really to resume his friar's habit, and to presently return in that disguise. At the same time, from the other side of the stage, but still in the cus- tody of officers, again comes Isabella. Angelo, on the exit of the duke, had at once resumed all his former arrogance, and as soon as he sets eyes upon the returning friar, of whom he has heard so much, and through whose guidance of Isabella and Mariana he had suffered so much trouble, he assumes a lofty tone, and orders him to be arrested. The duke being hustled by the officers, is then discovered under the friar's cowl, and being thus recognized, at once assumes his regal dignity, and waives Angelo from the ducal seat. DUKE (to Angelo). Sir, by your leave : Hast thou or word, or wit, or impudence, That yet can do thee office ? If thou hast, Kely upon it till my tale be heard, And hold no longer out. ANG. O my dread lord, I should be guiltier than my guiltiness, To think I can be undiscernible, When I perceive your grace, like power divine, Hath look'd upon my passes ; then, good prince, " Measure for Measure." 99 No longer session hold upon my shame, But let my trial be my own confession, Immediate sentence then, and sequent death, Is all the grace I beg. DUKE. Come hither, Mariana : Say, wast thou e'er contracted to this woman ? ANG. I was, my lord. DUKE. Go take her hence, and marry her instantly. Do you the office, friar ; which consummate, Eeturn him here again : Go with him, provost. [Exeunt ANGELO, MAEIANA, FEIAE PETER, and Provost. DUKE. Come hither, -Isabel : Your friar is now your prince : As I was then Advertising, and holy to your business, Not changing heart with habit, I am still Attorney 'd at your service. ISAB. O give me pardon, That I, your vassal, have employ 'd and pain'd Your unknown sovereignty. DUKE. You are pardon'd, Isabel, And now, dear maid, be you as free to us. Your brother's death, I know, sits at your heart ; And you may marvel, why I obscured myself, Labouring to save his life ; and would not rather Make rash remonstrance of my hidden power, Than let him so be lost : O most kind maid, It was the swift celerity of his death, Which I did think with slower foot came on. That brain'd my purpose : But, peace be with him ! That life is better life past fearing death, Than that which lives to fear ; make it your comfort, So happy is your brother. Re-enter ANGELO, MAEIANA, FBIAE PETEE, and Provost. ISAB. I do, my lord. DUKE. For this new-married man, approaching here, Whose salt imagination yet hath wrorig'd Your well- defended honour, you must pardon For Mariana's sake ; but as he adjudged your brother, (Being criminal, in double violation Of sacred chastity and of promise breach, Thereon dependent, for your brother's life), The very mercy of the law cries out Most audible, even from his proper tongue, An Angela for Claudio, death for death. Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers leisure ; Like doth quit like, and Measure still for Measure. Then, Angelo, thy fault's thus manifested ; ioo Shakespeare, from an American Point of View. Which, though thou would'st deny, denies thee vantage ; We do condemn thee to the very block Where Claudio stoop'd to death, and with like haste ; Away with him. MAEI. 0, my most gracious lord, I hope you will not mock me with a husband ! DUKE. It is your husband mock'd you with a husband ; Consenting to the safeguard of your honour, I thought your marriage fit ; else imputation For that he knew you, might reproach your life, And choke your good to come ; for his possessions, Although by confiscation they are ours, We do instate and widow you withal, To buy you a better husband. Mariana hereupon sweetly entreats Isabel to help her beg of the duke the life of Angelo ; but the duke checks the movement by the following sublime rebuke : DUKE. Against all sense do you importune her. Should she kneel down in mercy, of this fact, Her brother's ghost his paved bed would break, And take her hence in horror. Mariana, nevertheless, perseveres and succeeds in touching the deepest springs of Isabella's saintly nature, who, falling on her knees before the duke, thus addresses him : ISAB. Most bounteous sir, Look, if it please you, on this man condemn'd, As if my brother lived ; I partly think A due sincerity govern'd his deeds, Till he did look on me ; since it is so, Let him not die : My brother had but justice, In that he did the thing for which he died ; For Angelo, His act did not o'ertake his bad intent ; And must be buried but as an intent That perish'd by the way ; thoughts are no subjects, Intents but merely thoughts. DUKE. Your suit's unprofitable : stand ufc, I say I have bethought me of another fault : Provost, how came it Claudio was beheaded At an unusual hour ? In a few minutes afterward Claudio is brought to life, par- doned, and handed over to Isabella, whereupon the all-forgiving " Measure for Mtfristitfe"'* '>' ' \^ duke thus addresses her, and winds up the situation with one general joy : DUKE. And, for your lovely sake, Give me your hand, and say you will be mine, He is my brother too : But fitter time for that. By this, lord Angelo perceives he's safe ; Methinks, I see a quick'ning in his eye : Well, Angelo, your evil quits you well : Look that you love your wife ; her worth, worth yours. I find an apt remission in myself. It is hardly possible for language to picture a more base, blood- thirsty, and unpitying miscreant than Angelo. To the last mo- ment, even in the presence of the duke, he maintains his villany by misrepresenting Isabella, and by relentlessly defaming the character of Mariana. In fact, he does not cease to lie against them both, until he is actually unmasked beyond all remedy ; and then, like Proteus, he suddenly confesses, and, as every reader must regret, is as readily forgiven. In this respect, the moral of the play is as deplorable as that of the "Two Gentlemen of Verona/' and through its utter defeat of the principle of retri- butive justice, could hardly have been the inspiration of such a stern lawyer as Lord Bacon. With Shakespeare, however, a big- natured, good-tempered man, with a prodigious and sympathetic genius, but scarcely any conscience, this pleasant rounding of the whole story was a natural inclination. By following this course, which, it may be remarked, was usual with our poet in the earlier part of his career (indeed, until he arrived at the period of his deepest tragedies), he evinced an unruffled serenity of character. It may also be observed, that in preferring these happy terminations, Shakespeare evinces one form of the art of theatrical management by sending his audiences home pleased, thus unconsciously testifying to the tender and generous nature of the people. But something, at the same time, let me add, is due to the principle of justice; and there can be no doubt that Coleridge is right when he says " that sincere repentance on the part of An- gelo was impossible/"' and therefore regrets that the unparelleled villain was not executed. But Gervinius finds excuse for the mercy of the duke in the fact that, " apart from poetry/' such a doom would not have been in strict conformity with either law or 8 V skdfotyearv;*fr&jtf