IN MEMO&IAM.
. Grant San lei I
SHAKSPEAKE'S DELINEATIONS
INSANITY, IMBECILITY, AND SUICIDE.
A. O. KELLOGG, M. 1).,
ASSISTANT PHYSICIAN STATE LUNATIC ASYLUM, UTI^V. JT. T.
NEW YORK:
PUBLISHED BY KURD AND HOUGHTOtf,
459 BROOME STREET.
1866.
Ki
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by
KURD AND HOUGHTON,
in the Clerk's Office of the District Court for the Southern District of
New York.
RIVERSIDE, CAMBRIDGE:
STEREOTYPED AND PRINTED BY
H. 0. HOUOHTON AND COMPANY.
TO
THOMAS P. BARTON, ESQ.,
OF MONTGOMERY PLACB, ON THE HUDSON,
IN REMEMBRANCE OF THE KIND INTEREST EXTENDED TO THE
AUTHOR, WHEN A STRANGER, AND OF THE PLEASURE
DERIVED FROM HIS SUBSEQUENT
FRIENDSHIP.
STATE ASYLUM, UTICA, Jan. 1866.
NOTICE.
THESE Essays were published in the " American
Journal of Insanity," at various intervals between
1859 and 1864.
A better acquaintance with the delicate shades of
mental disease as seen in the wards of a large Hos-
pital for the Insane, has tended to modify the earlier
views of the writer respecting some of Shakspeare's
insane characters, and enabled him better to appre-
ciate the fidelity of the great dramatist's delineations.
No other excuse, therefore, is deemed necessary for
the alterations that have been made in the original
essays. A. o. K.
State Lunatic Asylum, Utica, April, 1866.
CONTENTS.
PART I.
INSANE.
PAOH
LEAR. MACBETH. LADY MAOBETH . . . . . 1
HAMLET * 29
OPHELIA . 68
JAQUES 87
CORDELIA. : 103
PART H.
IMBECILES.
BOTTOM. DOGBERRY. ELBOW. SHALLOW . . . 115
MALVOLIO. BARDOLPH. NYM. PISTOL .... 135
LAUNCE 153
CALIBAN 168
PART III.
SUICIDES.
OTHELLO 181
PART I.
SHAKSPEARE'S
DELINEATIONS OF INSANITY.
LEAR. MACBETH.
THE extent and accuracy of the medical, physi-
ological, and psychological knowledge dis-
played in the dramas of William Shakspeare, like
the knowledge there manifested on all matters
upon which the rays of his mighty genius fell, has
excited the wonder and astonishment of all men
who, since his time, have brought their minds to
the investigation of these subjects, upon which so
much light has been thrown by the researches of
modern science.
Shakspeare's knowledge extended far beyond
the range of ordinary observation, and compre-
hended subjects such, as in our day, and we may
suppose in his, were regarded as strictly profes-
sional and special. This fact has led some intelli-
gent investigators and critics to believe that these
immortal works were not the offspring of one in-
dividual mind, and that, from the very nature of
things, the man who wrote " Lear" and "Hamlet"
could not have written, unassisted, the " Merchant
l
5 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
of Venice." This argument has been maintained
with much apparent plausibility. Its fallacy, how-
ever, is rendered sufficiently apparent by the fact,
that the knowledge displayed was very far in ad-
vance of the age in which he lived, and, as we shall
have occasion to show, was not possessed by any
one in his time, however eminent in any special de-
partment of science to which he might be devoting
himself; and many facts not known or recognized
by men of his age appear to have been grasped
by the inspired mind of the poet, to whose acute
mental vision, it would seem from his writings,
they were as clear and certain as they have been
rendered by the positive deductions of modern ex-
perimental science. This power of entering into
the deep and hidden mysteries of nature and the
universe of lifting the veil, and drawing thence
facts not yet manifested to the world, and perhaps
not to be made manifest until after centuries of
patient scientific investigation and deduction is
a characteristic of what has been termed poetic in-
spiration ; a power, we maintain, withoulTlfear~of
contradiction, more evident in the poet we have
under consideration, than in any other who has
ever written in the English language, and perhaps
it would not be unsafe to add, in any other, an-
cient or modern. This power consists, without
doubt, first, of an extraordinary faculty for close
observation, and an acute perception of the nature
and relations of all things which come up before
the eye and mind ; and in the second place, of a
LEAR. MACBETH. 3
wonderful faculty, only possessed by a few such
persons in varied degrees, of calling up at will
from the recesses of the memory with great dis-
tinctness, every perception there recorded, and of
making such use of it as may seem fit.
Upon no subjects, perhaps, has this extraordinary
faculty of the great dramatist been more curiously
manifested than those we propose to consider in
this connection, viz., physiology and psychology.
In fact we believe a very complete physiological
and psychological system could be educed from
the writings of Shakspeare, a system in com-
plete accordance, in almost every essential particu-
lar, with that which we now possess as the result
of the scientific research and experience of the
last two centuries.
In the time of Shakspeare these sciences, like
all others, were very imperfectly understood by
men who devoted their lives to the investigation
of them. Even the great discovery by Harvey
of the circulation of the blood, which may be
taken as the basis of all our present physiological
knowledge, had not been given to the world ; for
Shakspeare died in 1616, and the discoveries of
Harvey were first published in 1628. Yet many
passages from his dramas seem to indicate a pre-
existent knowledge, on the part of the writer, of
this great physiological fact. Falstaff, speaking
of the influence of a good " sherris-sack " upon
the blood, says :
" The second property of your excellent sherris is, the
4 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
warming of the blood ; which before cold and settled, left the
liver white and pale, which is the badge of pusillanimity and
cowardice : but the sherris warms it, and makes it course from
the inwards to the parts extreme"
Let us pursue further the physiological views
of the fat knight, as set forth in the same famous
encomium upon his favorite beverage, sack, in
order to observe how strictly they accord with the
universally recognized truths of modern physiology.
Speaking of Prince John, and contrasting him
with his jovial friend Prince Henry, he says :
" This same sober-blooded boy doth not love me ; nor a man
cannot make him laugh ; but that 's no marvel, lie drinks no
wine. There is never any of these demure boys come to any
proof; for thin drink doth so overcool their blood, and making
many fish-meals, that they fall into a kind of male green-sick-
ness ; . . . they are generally fools and cowards, which some
of us would be too but for inflammation. A good sherris-sack
has a twofold operation : it ascends me into the brain, dries up
all the foolish, and dull, and crudy vapors which environ it ;
makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery,
and delectable shapes ; which delivered o'er to the voice (the
tongue) which is the birth, becomes excellent wit."
We would not wish to be held responsible for
the morality of all the views held by the worthy
knight on his favorite subject of eating and drink-
ing, but if this " tun of man " could again " re-
visit the glimpses of the moon," like the ghost of
murdered Denmark, and once more roll his huge
bulk from tavern to tavern in London, and in his
nocturnal perambulations, guided by the light of
Bardolph's red nose, should, by ^iny accident,
LEAR. MACBETH. 5
i
"roll" into a modern Exeter- Hall temperance-
meeting, he would undoubtedly be as much puzzled
to know what constituted it, as he was in the days
of his earthly pilgrimage, to " remember what the
inside of a church was made of" ; and if a modern
Gough occupied the platform, he would probably
be held up as a most pitiful example of one who
had pushed his physiological views to the very
extreme of physical endurance. We confess,
however, that we would cheerfully give a very
respectable admission-fee to hear the worthy knight
argue the point at issue with the modern reformer,
on pure physiological grounds, and give his reasons
why, if "he had a thousand sons, the first earthly
principle he would teach them would be to for-
swear thin potations, and addict themselves to
sack." We assert, at the risk of being considered
anti-progressionist, or anti-teetotal, that much of the
physiology set forth above by the worthy knight,
is* in strict accordance with the teachings of modern
science ; and though from its frequent abuse, as
in his case, it may be looked upon as a dangerous
admission, its truthfulness cannot be denied.
In " As You Like It," Shakspeare makes the old
man Adam say
" Though I am old yet am I strong and lusty ;
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors to my blood."
By "hot and rebellious liquors" are doubtless
meant such drinks as whiskey and bad brandy,
used to such a fearful extent in our day ; not
6 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
the "excellent sherris" which he puts into the
mouth of Falstaff, which was a light Spanish
wine. Shakspeare was too good a physiologist
and moderate temperance man to teach that such
" hot and rebellious liquors " are good for the blood
of any healthy man. His works, as well as the
imperfect history of his life, show that he was one
of those moderate men whose physiological views
were not pushed to extremes in any direction.
Shakspeare contended for truth, not for the estab-
lishment of a moral theory ; and modern science
has demonstrated, moreover, that he has not gone
very far astray in this matter.
Let us take a cursory view of some of the con-
flicting physiological doctrines maintained by
eminent physicians, not only in Shakspeare's time,
but long after, even down to the present century,
when they were overthrown by modern scientific
research, and replaced by a system which admits
of positive proof, in order to observe whether the
physiology of our own times, or that of the sixteenth
century, best coincides with the expressed views
of the poet. From the physiology of his own
times it is quite evident that Shakspeare could
have derived no assistance whatever. There was
nothing which can now be regarded as approximat-
ing a correct scientific system. All that related
to physiology or medicine was a confused, chaotic
jumble of conflicting dogmas and doctrines, main-
tained by the rival sects of medical philosophers
who flourished at that time. One sect, the
LEAR. MACBETH. 7
Solidists, referred all diseases to alterations in the
solid parts of the body, and maintained that these
alone were endowed with vital properties, and
were alone capable of receiving impressions from
external agencies. Even the vitality of the blood
was denied, and this doctrine has been main-
tained and was prevalent until quite recently.
The Galenical physicians, the Humoralists, assert-
ed, on the contrary, that all diseases arose from
a depraved state of the humors of the organized
body, the blood, chyle, lymph, &c. It is scarcely
necessary to observe, in this place, that modern
investigators have shown clearly that vitality is
incident to both solids and fluids, that the blood
is particularly concerned in all vital processes;
that all alimentary substances, fluid and solid, are
restorative or nutritious by virtue of the supply,
after digestion, of certain principles necessary to
the healthy vital condition of the blood ; and that
most medicinal substances act on the system after
finding their way into the blood by absorption.
Shakspeare appears to have been well aware of
this great physiological fact.
Take the following for example, from King John,
Act V., Scene VII. Prince Henry, in speaking
of the poisoning of his father, says :
" It is too late ; the life of all his blood
Is touched corruptibly ; and his pure brain,
Which some suppose the soul's frail dwelling-house,
Doth, by the idle comments that it makes,
Foretell the ending of mortality."
8 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
The peculiar action of certain poisons upon the
blood, and their influence on the organ of the
mind, through the, medium of the blood, are here
distinctly pointed out.
Again, the Ghost, speaking to Hamlet of the
manner of his death from poison, says :
" Thy uncle stole
With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches of my ears did pour
The leprous distiUment ; whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That, swift as quicksilver, it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body,
And, with a sudden vigor, it doth posset
And curd, like aigre-droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood : so did it mine ;
And a most instant tetter bak'd about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body."
The fact now demonstrated, that certain medic-
inal substances and poisons induce, primarily, a
change in the condition of the blood itself, and, in
the second place, a leprous condition of the skin,
is here pointed out clearly by the poet. The
syphilitic poison furnishes a good illustration of
this fact.
Again, Romeo asks the beggarly apothecary for
" A dram of poison ; such soon-spreading gear
As will disperse itself through all the veins."
It is unnecessary to multiply quotations in illus-
tration of the extraordinary amount of physiolog-
ical knowledge possessed by Shakspeare. We
LEAR. MACBETH. 9
have brought forward enough to show that on this
subject he anticipated the scientific discoveries
and deductions of nearly two centuries. We now
pass to the consideration of Shakspeare as a psy-
chologist.
In relation to psychology, the wonderful pre-
vision of the poet is still more astonishing to
modern investigators. It was a remark of a late
eminent physician to the insane, Dr. Brigham, that
Shakspeare was, himself, as great a psychological
curiosity as any case of insanity he had ever met ;
and he declared that in the Asylum at Utica he
had seen all of Shakspeare's insane characters.
To suppose that Shakspeare obtained his knowl-
edge of insanity and medical psychology from his
contemporaries, or from works on these subjects
extant in his day, is simply absurd, for there were
none in existence worthy of mention, and all the
ideas of his contemporaries were vague and un-
digested. Yet, notwithstanding all this, after near
two centuries and a half, we have little to add to
what Shakspeare appears to have known of these
intricate subjects. For his profound understand-
ing of these and all other matters to which he
alludes, and there is scarcely a department of
scientific knowledge that he has not enriched,
we can only account by supposing that he looked
into the volume of nature with a glance, deeper
-and more comprehensive than that of any other
mortal not divinely inspired ; seeming almost to
possess the " gift of prophecy," and to " under-
10 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
stand all mysteries and all knowledge," which he
uttered " as with the tongues of men and of
angels."
To illustrate Shakspeare's extraordinary psycho-
logical knowledge, let us glance for a moment at
the ideas entertained of that intricate disease, in-
sanity, by his contemporaries, in order to contrast
them with his own, as set forth in his works. In-
sanity was uniformly regarded by the contem-
poraries of the poet as an infliction of the Devil.
All the unfortunate sufferers from this dreadful
malady were supposed to be " possessed " by Satan.
This was not alone the vulgar opinion, but the
opinion of some of the most distinguished medical
writers. St. Vitus was sometimes invoked ; spells
were resorted to, and amulets worn. Even such
profound philosophers as Lord Bacon believed in
these. Sir Theodore Mayence, who was physician
to three English sovereigns, and is supposed to
have been Shakspeare's Dr. Caius, believed in
supernatural agency in the cure of this and other
diseases. One of the most common of remedial
means in the time of Shakspeare was whipping.
He seems to have been aware of this, as of most
other things, for, in " As You Like It," (Act III.,
Scene II.) he makes Rosalind say to Orlando :
" Love is a mere madness ; and, I tell you, deserves as well
a dark house and a whip as madmen do : and the reason why
they are not so punished and cured is, that the lunacy is so
ordinary that the whippers are in love too."
In opposition to these views of insanity so uni-
LEAR. MACBETH. 11
versally entertained by his contemporaries, Shak-
speare, as his works conclusively show, believed,
with enlightened modern physicians, that insanity
was a disease of the brain, and could be cured by
medical means, aided by judicious care and man-
agement : all which he points out as clearly as it
could be done by a modern expert.
Falstaff, when outwitted by the Merry Wives,
says :
" Have I laid my brain in the sun, and dried it, that it lacks
matter to prevent such gross o'erreaching as this ? "
And again, when he had been induced by these
same women, in order that he might be safely con-
veyed from the house when in danger of a broken
head, to conceal himself in a basket of foul linen,
under pretence of being carried to the laundress, he
is, by their direction, taken and thrown into the
Thames, he thus soliloquizes :
" Have I lived to be carried in a basket, like a barrow of
butcher's offal, and to be thrown into the Thames ? Well, if I
be served another such trick, I will have my brains taken out,
and buttered and given to a dog for a new-year's gift."
Laertes, on seeing Ophelia deranged, exclaims :
" O heat, dry up my brains ! "
Othello, when racked by jealousy, and goaded
by the insinuations of lago, was supposed to be
insane. Hence Lodovico asks : " Are his wits safe ;
is he ^ nptjjght ,of ..ferain ? "
Jacques, in As You Like It," (Act II., Scene
VII.) speaks of the brain of a fool, as being " dry
as the remainder-biscuit after a voyage."
12 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
/
In Macbeth, Shakspeare has given us in the
dagger scene (Act II.) one of the most admirable
fJU 1 illustrations of hallucination to be found. Previous
to the incident described in this scene, the mind of
Macbeth had been wrought up to the highest pitch
of excitement, short of actual mania, by the im-
portunities of Lady Macbeth, and the contempla-
tion of the bloody deed he was about to undertake,
and its consequences. Finally, after goading him
to the verge of distraction, and having, as she says,
" screwed up his courage to the sticking point," he
exclaims :
" I am settled, and bend up
Each corporeal agent to this terrible feat ! "
Although his purpose was determined, his mind
was evidently far from being " settled." He had
dwelt so long on the act, and the means by which
it was to be accomplished, that his thoughts were
taking a material shape, and the creations of his
excited imagination had become to him embodied
realities, and stood out before his eyes as clearly
and palpably defined as real bodily existences.
This condition of the mind, to which much
attention has been given by modern psychologists,
is most admirably set forth and illustrated in the
famous dagger scene. On first perceiving the
image of the dagger, his reason, yet intact, leaves
him to doubt the evidence of his eyes, and he seeks
to confirm the vi^uaMaipression by the more ac-
curate and trustworthy sense of touch ; and what
follows is most profoundly interesting and truthful
LEAR. MACBETH. 13
in a psychological point of view, and illustrates the
true theory of apparitions now, after two centuries,
just beginning to be understood by scientific men.
" Is this a dagger which I see before me,
The handle towards my hand ?
Come, let me clutch thee :
I have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight ? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from a heat-oppressed brain ? "
Looking again intently at the vision, and striving
to comprehend it by the help of reason, now be-
ginning to stagger from prolonged and excessive
mental excitement, he exclaims :
" I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses,
Or else worth all the rest."
Finally, after a struggle, reason succeeds in cor-
recting the evidence of the visual sense, and he
exclaims :
" There 's no such thing.
It is the bloody business which informs
Thus to mine eyes ! "
After the accomplishment of the bloody deed,
Lady Macbeth seems to have a presentiment of
the consequences to her own mind and that of her
husband, tfrom the prolonged excitement, and from
dwelling upon the awful circumstances their guilt
has brought upon them. And here follows that
/ 14 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
beautiful apostrophe to sleep, the great preventive
and restorative remedy in mental disease. She
says to Macbeth :
" Consider it not so deeply.
These deeds must not be thought
After these ways ; so, it will make us mad."
Macbeth, in reply, alludes to another hallucina-
tion, that of the sense of hearing, and says :
s/
" Me thought I heard a voice cry, ' Sleep no more !
Macbeth doth murder sleep ; the innocent sleep ;
Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast.'
Still it cried, ' Sleep no more ! to all the house.
Glamis hath murdered sleep : and therefore Cawdor
Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more ! ' '
So great was Shakspeare's intuitive psychologi-
cal knowledge, that everything in his characters is
in perfect keeping. If he wishes to draw insane
characters, he first exhibits them as surrounded by
the predisposing and exciting causes of the .disease,
and insanity follows as the natural result pf what
has preceded it. b\
Neither Macbeth nor Lady Macbeth appear to
have had the predisposition to insanity as strongly
marked as we observe it in Lear or Hamlet, and
though the exciting' causes were brought to operate
powerfully upon both, still they were not sufficient
to bring it about completely.
/
i
LEAR. MACBETH. 15
Neither could be called at any time insane,
though Macbeth suffered hallucinations of sight
and hearing, and Lady Macbeth was a somnam-
bulist, and talked in her sleep of the murder, and
strove to cleanse her hands of the imaginary blood-
stains ; yet she was rational enough when awake.
Each, however, feared the occurrence of the disease
in the other.
In Act V., Scene III., Macbeth appears to think
Lady Macbeth deranged, and in reply to the phy-
sician's remark that she is
" Troubled with thick coming fancies,
That keep her from her rest/*
says
" Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased ;
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow ;
Raze out the written troubles of the brain ? "
Nothing could be more true to nature than the
mental disquietude and remorse of conscience in-
cident to guilt, depicted by the dramatist in Act
V., Scene L, where Lady Macbeth is first intro-
duced to us as a somnambulist.
In this state of imperfect sleep, she gives vent to
the thoughts which agitate her mind so powerfully
during her waking moments : thoughts she would
fain conceal in the deepest recesses of her spirit.
She walks about with lighted taper, her eyes
open, but they convey to her mind no impression
of external things ; but to the -mward sense, the
" mind's eye," the scenes and circumstances con-
nected with the murder are painfully vivid. With
16 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
this inward sense she sees the bloody mark upon
her hand, and crying, " Out, damned spot ! " strives
in vain to wash it away. With this inward sense
she smells the blood, and in her anguish exclaims :
" All the perfumes of Arabia will not sweeten this
little hand. Oh ! oh ! oh !
This scene closes all that relates to Lady Mac-
beth, and she is not again introduced. The dram-
atist knew when, and where, and how to with-
draw his characters from the scene, and also, that
the prolonged exhibition of such mental anguish
as is shadowed forth in the somnambulism of
Lady Macbeth would be unfavorable to dramatic
effect.
In none of Shakspeare's plays, if we except
Hamlet, is the psychological knowledge of the
dramatist more admirably exhibited than in Lear.
" The case of Lear," says a late distinguished psy-
chologist, " is a genuine case of insanity from
beginning to end, such as we often see in aged
persons."
The very first act o^Jeaip) exhibited by the dram-
atist, evinces that well-known imbecility incident
to old age,^and which frequently results in con-
firmed, ^EQ&e* insanity. Incapable alike of per-
ceiving the hollow pretensions of affection on the
part of Goneril and Regan, the truthfulness of Cor-
delia, or the disinterestedness of Kent, he makes
over his kingdom to the former with all its revenues,
retaining only " the name, and all the additions
to a king," and making such stipulations only as
LEAR. MACBETH. 17
are in perfect keeping with his mental stated/and
that madness first glanced, at by Kent, which was
hanging over him.
With great psychological exactness Shakspeare
has from the first endowed Lear with those mental
peculiarities and eccentricities which experienced
medical psychologists recognize at once as the fore-
runners of confirmed mental disease, but which are
usually overlooked by ordinary observers, or not
regarded as pathological phenomena, but merely
the ebullitions of a temper and disposition nat- /
urally fiery and irritable perhaps, and now rendered
unbearable through the infirmities incident to age.
This seems to have been the view of Lear enter-
tained by his daughters, as also by those modern
critics who, far more ignorant of psychology than
the poet who wrote two hundred years before them,
have regarded the insanity of Lear as caused solely
by the ingratitude and unkindness of his daughters.
In answer to a remark of Goneril, respecting the
changeableness of their father's disposition, Regan
says: " 'T is the infirmity of his age, yet he has
ever but slenderly known himself."
" The best and soundest of his time has been
but rash," says Goneril. Regan replies : " Such
inconstant starts are we like to have from him as
this of Kent's banishment."
However this may have been looked upon by
them, and many of Shakspeare's commentators of
the last century, considered in the light of modern
psychological science, it must be regarded as a
18 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
premonition of the disease which followed, and was
undoubtedly so intended by the poet.
Time and the change in Lear's outward circum-
stances bring about no change for the better in his
disposition or mental state, and the next thing we
hear of him is, that in a paroxysm of rage, he has
\resorted to open violence, " broken the peace," and
beaten one of GoneriPs gentlemen for chiding his
fool.
Her remarks upon the transaction show how
rapidly the disease is advancing, before he has
received any marked unkindness from her or her
sister :
" By day and by night he wrongs me, every hour
He flashes into one gross crime or other,
That sets us all at odds."
All through Scene IV., Act L, we trace a gradual
increase of the mental excitement of Lear, rendered
worse by the injudicious treatment he receives ; and
towards the conclusion, after the interview with
Goneril, where he is reproached by her for the
riotous conduct of his train, and requested to
diminish it, which request is accompanied by a
; threat in case of non-compliance, he becomes quite
T frantic with rage.
This barefaced outrage upon the kingly dignity
he has reserved to himself puts him in a towering
passion :
" Darkness and devils !
Saddle my horses call my train together.
Degenerate bastard ! I '11 not trouble thee :
Yet have I left a daughter."
LEAR. MACBETH. 19
Striking his head with rage, and pouring out
such epithets as " Detested kite ! " upon her, he
gives vent to his insane rage in that blasting curse,
that withering imprecation, which reminds one so
strongly of what is frequently heard from the
mouths of highly excited patients in the wards of
a lunatic asylum. With an ingenuity and a re-
finement of malice worthy of an insane man, he
seizes upon the weakest and most vulnerable point
in her female nature, and to that point he directs
his attack. After pouring out the vials of his wrath
upon her without stint, his rage finds vent in tears,
and he says :
" I am ashamed
that them hast power to shake my manhood thus."
The first intimation Lear himself gives of his
own apprehensions of insanity {we have at the con-
elusion of Scene V. After amusing himself for a
time with the Fool he becomes more calm, and
apparently more capable of taking a survey of his
mental condition.
In reply to the Fool, who reminds him that he
should not have been old before he was wise, he
says, apparently abstracted :
" Oh let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven !
Keep me in temper ; I would not be mad ! "
It is one of the most common things in the world
to find a man decidedly insane, and yet conscious
of his infirmity. A premonition of the impending
malady, a certain consciousness that it is approach-
20 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
ing, frequently seizes the doomed subject, as is
apparent above in the case of Lear.
Thus far the whole character is psychologically
consistent, and the wonderful skill and sagacity
manifested by the great dramatist in seizing upon
these premonitory signs, which are usually over-
looked by all, even the patient's most intimate
friends, and the members of his family, and weaving
them into the character of his hero|as a necessary
element, without which it would be incomplete,
like those of inferior artists, is a matter of wonder
to all modern psychologists.
We next find Lear before the Castle of Gloster,
where, instead of meeting with that kind reception
and welcome which he expected from his other
daughter and her husband, his mind and feelings
are destined to receive another sad shock.
Here he finds his messenger and faithful attend-
ant, Kent, in the stocks, placed in this degrading
position by the orders of his son-in-law and daugh-
ter. He is so much astounded by the outrage and
disrespect heaped upon him by their treatment
of his messenger, that he can scarcely believe the
palpable evidence of the insult before him, and
declares that they could not, dare not, and would
not do it ; and when the circumstances attendant
upon the act are clearly laid before him by Kent,
and his mind grasps the full extent of his degrada-
tion, and he finds himself spurned, insulted, and
forsaken by those upon whom he has heaped such
great benefits, at the expense of his own dignity,
LEAR. MACBETH. 21 f
crown, and kingdom, his outraged feelings are ad-
mirably set forth in what follows :
" O, how this mother swells up towards my heart !
Hysterica passio I down, thou climbing sorrow,
Thy element 's below ! Where is this daughter ? "
At every step through this wonderful play we
find evidence, like the above, of Shakspeare's great
medico-psychological knowledge, a knowledge
scarcely possessed by any even in our day, except
those few who devote themselves to this special
department of medical science.
The influence also of bodily disturbances upon
the mental faculties is very truthfully set forth by V ^
Lear in the following : j\
" We are not ourselves
When nature, being oppressed, commands the mind
To suffer with the body"
If a modern psychological writer, with all the
knowledge of our own times at his command, was
laboring to convey to the minds of his readers the
manner in which insanity is induced in those pre-
disposed by nature to the disease, in order that
such persons and their friends might guard against
the malady, he could not do better than point out
the conduct of Goneril and Regan towards .Lear,
as set forth in Act II., Scene IV., of the play. All
the feelings of his generous nature are outraged
and trampled upon. The waywardness manifested
as the result of impending disease, meets with
none of that forbearance we are accustomed to
22 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
expect from the native gentleness of woman and
the affection of daughters, but selfishness and in-
gratitude reign supreme in their hearts. Would
that this were only an isolated or imaginary case !
Sensible of his great wrongs, and apparently con-
scious of what was being wrought by them in his
own generous and confiding mind, already stag-
gering under the stroke of disease, he exclaims :
"I pr'ythee, daughter, do not make me mad!"
Before quitting their presence, to encounter the
storm without, he again alludes to the state of his
mind :
" I have full cause of weeping ; but this heart
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,
Or ere I '11 weep. O fool, I shall go mad ! "
We next meet Lear on the heath, in the midst
of the storm. Nothing in the whole range of
dramatic literature can excel this, either in sub-
limity of conception, grandeur of description, or
psychological interest. In fact, we conceive it is
the psychological element infused into the scene
which gives it its peculiar intensity the howling
and raging winds, the " spouting cataracts," the
" oak-cleaving thunderbolts," and thought-execut-
ing fires : in short, that external commotion of
the physical elements seems merely thrown in as
a background to that terrible picture of mental
commotion which reigns within the mind of the
old man. These elements are but
u servile ministers,
That have with two pernicious daughters joined."
LEAR. MACBETH. 23 ./
These he taxes not with unkindness; he never
gave them kingdom, or " called them children."
They " owe him no subscription," therefore they
can " let fall their horrible pleasure," and join
" Their high-engendered battles 'gainst a head
So old and white as this."
The one absorbing thought, the ingratitude of
his daughters, shuts out, as far as he is personally
concerned, all idea of physical suffering. It is a j
well-known fact, that, when the mind is swayed by\ I
intense emotions, the sensibility even to intense \|
bodily pain is often completely suspended. The K
physical endurance manifested by the insane under
certain circumstances is truly astonishing, even
delicate females have been known to undergo with /
impunity what might be supposed sufficient to
destroy the most vigorous physical constitution.
This fact is most beautifully and concisely set
forth by Lear in allusion to the suffering of his
companions in the storm upon the heath, when
they urge him to take shelter in the hovel.
" Thou think'st 't is much, that this contentious storm
Invades us to the skin : so 't is to thee ;
But when the greater malady is fixed,
The lesser is scarce felt.
When the mind 'sfree,
The body 's delicate ; the tempest in my mind
Doth from my senses take all feeling else,
Save what beats there."
This brings round again the ever-recurring
thought of filial ingratitude, and after casting a
24 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
few words of bitter reproach upon Goneril and
Regan, he suddenly checks himself, conscious ap-
parently of the dreadful consequences to his already
shattered mind, which would result from dwelling
upon it, with the exclamation :
" O, that way madness lies ; let me shun that ;
No more of that."
The tempest which pours its fury upon his " old
white head " is of little moment when compared
with that which reigns within. In fact, he appears
to regard the former as a blessing, because it
" Will not give me leave to ponder
On things would hurt me more."
But perhaps the most ingeniously constructed
scene in the whole play is that in which the poet
brings together Lear, now an undoubted madman,
Edgar, who assumes madness for purposes of dis-
guise and deception, and the Fool. What results
are to be anticipated from the operation of the
extraordinary psychological machinery, now set in
motion by and under the direction of the great
artist, none but the master-workman himself can
foresee. Here, however, all things work together
harmoniously. Everything is consistent. The
appearance of Edgar, ragged, forlorn, a miserable
picture of wretchedness and woe, serves only, like
the elements in the former scene, to arouse the
predominant idea in the mind of the madman ;
and filial ingratitude, nothing else, could have
brought him to this state, and recognizing in him
LEAE. MACBETH. 25
a counterpart of himself, his first question is,
" Hast thou given all to thy two daughters ? "
The warm, sympathetic nature of Lear is
strongly aroused by the pitiful object before him,
whom he regards as a fellow- sufferer from like
causes, and though not a king, like himself, he is
nevertheless a "philosopher and most learned
Theban " ; and respectfully craving the " noble
philosopher's" company, and essaying to enter
into scientific discourse, asks him his studies, and
gravely inquires "the cause of thunder." How
beautifully true all this is to nature, those who are
at all acquainted with insanity can furnish ample
testimony; as, also, how admirably the genuine
disease contrasts with the counterfeit, with which
it is here brought in contact.
In the scene in the farm-house the ideas of
Lear appear still more fantastic, yet the dominant
thought, the ingratitude of his daughters, is ever
present. Edgar, his companion in misery, is now
no longer a "noble philosopher," a "learned The-
ban," but a learned " justicer," and the thought of
arraigning his daughters before a tribunal made up
by him, the Fool his " yokefellow in equity"
and Kent, is presented to his wayward fancy. Lear
himself appears as a witness for the prosecution.
Goneril is first arraigned in his imagination,
before this extraordinary tribunal, and then follows
'the testimony of Lear :
" I here take my oath before this honorable assembly, she
kicked the poor king her father. She cannot deny it."
26 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
After a momentary excitement caused by the
imaginary escape of one of the culprits, he seems
to suppose sentence to have been passed, and ex-
claims :
" Then let them anatomize Regan,
See what breeds about her heart."
Scenes quite as ludicrous as the one set forth
above are of daily occurrence in the wards of all
extensive establishments for the insane, and those
familiar with them can scarcely divest themselves
of the idea that the poet has given in this an exact
transcription of nature, without assistance from his
imagination.
The next information we have of Lear comes
to us through Cordelia and the Physician, (Act
IV., Scene IV.) he is represented as
" Mad as the vexed sea ; singing aloud ;
Crowned with rank fumiter, and furrow weeds."
Cordelia immediately takes occasion to ask the
Physician
" What can man's wisdom
In the restoring of his bereaved sense ? "
The reply of the Physician is significant, and
worthy of careful attention, as embracing a brief
summary of almost the only true principles recog-
nized by modern science, and now carried out by
the most eminent physicians in the treatment of
the insane.
We find here no allusion to the scourgings, the
charms, the invocation of saints, &c., employed by
LEAR. MACBETH. 27
the most eminent physicians of the time of Shak- /
speare, neither have we any allusion to the rotary
chairs, the vomitings, the purgings by hellebore,
the showerings, the bleedings, scalp-shavings, and
blisterings, which, even down to our own times,
have been inflicted upon these unfortunates by
u science falsely so-called," and which stand re-
corded as imperishable monuments of medical
folly ; but in place of all this, Shakspeare, speaking
through the mouth of the Physician, gives us the
following principle, simple, truthful, and universally
applicable :
" There is means, madam.
Our foster-nurse of nature is repose,
The which he lacks ; that to provoke in him,
Are many simples operative, whose power
Will close the eye of anguish."
The " means " set forth by the Physician, we
learn at the conclusion of Act IV., were used suc-
cessfully in the restoration of Lear. He is thrown
into a deep sleep, and from this he awakes con-
valescen^/
Here follows Another most important consid-
eration, which is not overlooked^by othis wonderful
medical psychologist. y 9^\/ s
He leaves nothing incomplete, therefore the dan-
ger ,of relapse jnu^t-be taken into consideration,
and 'the means to prevent it are pointed out with
his usual truthfulness and accuracy. This we have
in the advice given by the Physician to Cordelia.
He says :
28 SHAKSPEAKE'S INSANE.
" Be comforted, good madam. The great rage,
You see is killed in him ; [and yet J t is danger
To make him even o'er the time he has lost.]
Desire him to go in ; trouble him no more,
Till further settling."
The late distinguished physician to the insane,
Dr. Brigham, remarking on the above, says : " Now
we confess, almost with shame, that although near
two centuries and a half have passed since Shak-
speare wrote thus, we have very little to add to his
method of treating the insane as thus pointed out.
To produce sleep, to quiet the mind by medical
and moral treatment, to avoid all unkindness, and
when the patients begin to convalesce to guard, as
he directs, against everything likely to disturb their
minds and cause a relapse, is now considered the
best, and nearly the only essential treatment."
HAMLET.
IF Lear and Macbeth have served to impress us
, deeply with the extraordinary intuitive psycho-
logical knowledge of Shakspeare, yet even these,
wonderful as they are and so infinitely above
everything else in ancient or modern dramatic
literature, cannot be taken as a gauge by which
we are to measure the powers of that intellect from
whence they emanated ; for the exhibition of the
complete plentitude of these powers seems to have
been reserved for the tragedy of Hamlet, that won-
derful play, which of all he has left, gives us the
most exalted notions of, and the most profound
reverence for, the genius of the man. Nothing he
has left us fethibits so completely the wonderful
versatility of his powers, and the universality of
their range, as this play. All the deepest subjects,
those which individually have engaged the most
profound powers of the human mind in all ages,
are here grappled with, and in each the poet has
shown himself preeminent. Wit the most spark-
ling, humor the most genuine, pathos the most
touching, metaphysics the most subtle, philosophy
the most profound, are here brought together in
complete and harmonious union. Well may such
30 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
an one be called the " myriad-minded." As might
be expected, no other of his plays has given rise to
so much speculation, regarding the purposes of the
dramatist, and the true character of the personages
he has represented. Some of the most profound
critics* of the last century, and down to the present
time, have here found an enigma which they have
by no means been able to solve, and which has
been to them a stumbling-block and perpetual rock
of offence. Schlegel, one of the most profound of
German critics, who devoted some of the best
years of his literary life to the study of Shakspeare,
and who has poured upon the pages of our great
dramatist the light of a most profound and phil-
osophical criticism, and done more perhaps than
any other man to give us a true conception of his
.powers, has not been able to analyze the character
of Hamlet with anything approaching to psycho-
logical accuracy. In fact, the idea of Hamlet as a
genuine madman, seems never to have entered his
mind, and hence his perplexity, and labored and
unsuccessful efforts to unravel the mysteries and
apparent contradictions he meets at every step, and
the extraordinary manifestations of character which
he finds in his hero.
" This enigmatical work," says Schlegel, " resembles those
irrational equations in which a fraction of unknown magnitude
always remains, that will in no way admit of solution. He acts
the part of a madman with unrivalled powers, convincing the
persons sent to examine into his supposed loss of reason, merely
by telling them unwelcome truths, and rallying them with the
HAMLET. 31
most caustic wit. But, in the resolutions he so often embraces
and always leaves unexecuted, his weakness is too apparent ;
he does himself only justice when he implies that there is no
greater dissimilarity than between him and Hercules. He is
not only impelled by necessity to artifice and dissimulation, but
he has a natural inclination for crooked ways. He is a hypocrite
towards himself; his far-fetched scruples are often mere pre-
texts to cover his want of determination, thoughts, as he says
on a different occasion, which have ' but one part wisdom, and
ever three parts coward/
" He has been chiefly condemned both for his harshness^ in
repulsing the love of Qphplj^ which he himself had cherished,
and for his i'npe,n.s,]foillY at, frp.r Hp.a.fr. He is too much over-
whelmed with his own sorrows to have any compassion to spare
for others ; besides, his outward indifference gives us by no
means the measure of his internal perturbation. On the other
hand, we evidently perceive in him a malicious joy, when he
has succeeded in getting rid of his enemies, more through neces-
sity and accident, which alone are able to impel him to quick
and decisive measures, than by the merit of his own courage, as
he himself confesses after the murder of Polonius.
" Hamlet has no firm belief either in himself or in any-
thing else. From expressions of religious confidence he passes
over to sceptical doubts he believes in the ghost of his father
as long as he sees it, but as soon as it has disappeared, it ap-
pears to him almost in the light of a deception. He has even
gone so far as to say there is nothing either good or bad, but
thinking makes it so. With him the poet loses himself here in
labyrinths of thought in which neither end nor beginning is
discoverable. (?)
" A voice from another world, commissioned it would appear
by Heaven, demands vengeance for a monstrous enormity, and
the demand remains without effect. The criminals are at last
punished, but as it were by an accidental blow, and not in the
solemn way requisite to convey to the world a warning example
of justice. Irresolute foresight, cunning, treachery and impetu-
ous rage, hurry on to a common destruction : the less guilty and
32 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
the innocent are equally involved in the common ruin. The
destiny of humanity is there exhibited as a gigantic sphinx,
which threatens to precipitate into the abyss of scepticism all
who are unable to solve her dreadful enigmas."
We have brought forward this extract from one
of Shakspeare's most able critics, to illustrate how
vain are all efforts to solve the " enigma " which
the poet has furnished us, and to unlock the pro-
found mystery with which he has surrounded the
character of his hero, without the true key, which
is at once furnished by the supposition of the real
madness of Hamlet, which, to the experienced med-
ical psychologist is quite as evident, notwithstand-
ing what he himself says about " putting on an
antic disposition," as that of Ophelia or Lear. To
the unprofessional critic, this is the " fraction of
unknown magnitude," which, so long as it remains,
will not allow him to solve his "equation," and,
until this is known and recognized, we quite agree
with him, that " no thinking head who anew ex-
presses himself upon it, will entirely coincide with
his predecessors." Admit the real madness of
Hamlet, and it is readily perceived why this " Prince
of royal manners," this man of highly cultivated
and deeply philosophical mind, this man naturally
endowed with the finest sense of propriety, " the
glass of fashion and the mould of form," so sus-
ceptible of all that is noble in human nature, be-
comes, in the language of the critic, a " hypocrite
towards himself," and possessed by a " natural
inclination for crooked ways." t With the supposi-
HAMLET. 33
tion of real madness, and only with this supposition,
can we account to ourselves for the harshness, the
insensibility, the heartless cruelty of one who loved
with more than the love of " forty thousand broth-
ers," towards the gentle being who was the cherished
idol of his heart.
But, until after taking a view of the peculiar
form and character of Hamlet's madness, we for-
bear farther comment upon the criticism of the
learned and philosophical Schlegel, and pass to
that of another German still greater than he.
Who is more worthy to be heard than Goethe,
the poet and philosopher, the father of " the higher
literature of Germany," " which," says Carlyle most
truthfully, " is the higher literature of Europe ? "
Yet even he, with all his profound and philosophical
insight, is almost as far as Schlegel from forming a
true estimate of the psychological character and
mental condition of Hamlet, and the strange bear-
ing and conduct which results from it, as the fol-
lowing eloquent criticism which we translate from
his " Wilhelm Meister" abundantly proves. Both
fail in their estimate of the character of Hamlet,
from one and the same cause, as we shall endeavor
to show : namely, a want of that medico-psycho-
logical knowledge, which none but a Shakspeare
is supposed to possess intuitively.
" Imagine to yourself a prince whose father dies unexpectedly.
The desire of honor and love of power are not the passions
which animate him ; it is sufficient for him that he was the son
of a king, but now is he under the necessity of observing care-
34 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
fully from a distance, the difference between the king and the
subject. The right to the crown was not hereditary, yet a
longer life of his father might have made the claim of his only
son stronger, and the hope of the crown more secure. Now,
on the contrary, he must attain it through his uncle, and, not-
withstanding the apparent promise, perhaps he is forever shut
out from it. He now feels himself poor in graces and goods, a
stranger in that which, from his youth up, he was accustomed
to regard as his own by right. Here his spirit receives the first
heavy stroke. He feels that he is no more than, indeed not so
much as, any nobleman. He regards himself as a servant of
all. He is not courteous, not condescending ; no, rather bowed
down and abject. Upon his former circumstances he now
looks as upon a vanished dream. In vain does his uncle en-
courage him, and endeavor to show him his situation from
another point of view ; the perception of his nothingness never
leaves him.
" The second stroke he receives wounds him yet more, bows
him yet deeper. It is the marriage of his mother. To him,
a true and tender son, there remains after his father's death
a mother, and he hopes in company with his noble mother left
behind, to do honor to the heroic form of the great one departed.
But he also loses his mother, and in a manner far worse than
though death had torn her from him. The perfect_ideal-which
a jyell-bred child so readily forms of his parents* vanishes ; from
the dead there is no help, and from the living no support. She
is also a woman, and from the common frailties incident to her
sex she is not exempt. Now for the first time he feels himself
truly bowed down, and no fortune in the world can again re-
store unto him that which he has lost. Not melancholy, not
naturally reflective, melancholy and reflection become to him
heavy burdens. Imagine vividly to yourself this young man,
this princely son ; figure to yourself his circumstances, and then
observe him when he perceives the appearance of his father's
form. Stand by him on that terrible night when the venerable
spirit himself walks before him. Huge terror and amazement
seize upon him. He speaks to the wonderful figure, sees it
HAMLET. 35 I
beckoning, follows, and hears. The terrible complaint resounds
in his ears, calling for vengeance, and the pressing and oft-re-
peated entreaty, 4 Remember me. v And when the spirit has
- vanished, what do we see standing before us ? A young hero
that pants for vengeance ? a born prince that deems himself
fortunate in wreaking vengeance upon the usurper of his
crown ? No ; astonishment and sadness fall upon the lone one.
He becomes bitter against the smiling villain, and swears not
to forget the departed, and concludes with the significant ex-
pression, ' The times are out of joint, woe unto me that I was
born to set them right ! ' In these words lies the key to the
wEble conduct of Hamlet, and to me it is clear that Shakspeare
" would have pictured a great deed imposed as a duty upon a
spirit that was not equal to that deed. This idea seems worked
out in the entire plot. Here is an oak planted in a delicate
vessel that should only have contained flowers ; the roots strike
out, and the vessel is destroyed.
" A beautiful, high, noble, pure, moral being, without the
mental strength which makes the hero, travels under a burden
which crushes him to the earth, one which he can neither
bear nor cast entirely from him. Ev$ry duty is sacred to him,
but this is too heavy. ThejnipossiblQ was demanded of him ;
not that which was injtself^ impossible, but that which was im-
. possible Jfluhim. JHow he writhes and turns, filled with anguish,
strides backwards and forwards, ever being reminded, ever re-
minding himself, and at last losing sight of his purpose without
ever having been made happy."
Here. evidently~are - causes sufficient to induce
insanity in minds far less^jaisnftptiblft to the in-
vasion^of the malady than that _o Hamlet ; and
simply because early iriTtheprogress of the disease,
he speaks of " putting on an antic disposition,"
we are not to suppose, in face of all the evidence
which follows, that we have to deal with a case of
feigned insanity, and that the poet has, in produc-
36 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
ing the counterfeit, done more than he intended,
and made the stamp so perfect, that he has been
able to " deceive the very elect " themselves. Upon
other occasions, where the evidence of the poet's
intention was quite palpable to all, and where he
most certainly intended to produce a counterfeit,
he has succeeded, as in everything he undertakes,
and we have truly a counterfeit^ such as needs no
" expert " to detect.
Shakspeare, in the plentitude of his knowledge,
a knowledge derived not from books and the
accumulated experience of others, but from the
closest observation of what he must have seen in
actual life, recognized what none of his critics
not conversant with medical psychology in its
present advanced state, seem to have any concep-
tion of ; namely, that there are cases of melancholic
madness, of a delicate shade, in which thejaso-
ing faculties, the intellect proper, so far from being
overcome or even disordered, m^ op the other
hand, be rendered more active and yigoxojig, while
the wUl^jthe^ moral feelings JL Jbhe_jejijirja3ents and
affections, are the faculties which seem^alone to
suffer from the stroke of disease. Such a case he
has given us in the character of Hamlet, with
a fidelity to nature which continues more and
more to excite our wonder and astonishment, as
our knowledge of this intricate subject advances.
Within the last few years our knowledge of the
various shades of insanity has been so much ad-
vanced, that what we conceived to be the true
HAMLET. 37
view of the character of Hamlet appears now to
be well established, and whether Shakspeare him-
self was conscious of what he was producing,
matters little ; the delineation is so true to nature
that those who are at all acquainted with this in-
tricate disease are fully convinced that Hamlet
represents faithfully a phase of genuine melan-
cholic madness.* Whatever may have been the
intention of Shakspeare, one thing is evident, he
has succeeded in exhibiting in the character of
Hamlet a complete revolution of all the facul-
ties of the soul, by the overwhelming influence of
the intense emotions excited in it ; and whether
the resulting condition of the mind be one of
health or disease, sanity or insanity, (and the line
of demarkation is by no means accurately defined,)
the phenomena exhibited are, psychologically con-
* The late Dr. Brigham, who had seen and treated more than four
thousand cases of insanity, declared that he had more than once seen
. the counterpart of Hamlet, as well as of all Shakspeare's insane char- '
acters, and he describes with his usual clearness and brevity the peculiar
characteristics of e^tch. Dr. Jsaac Bay, the accomplished superintendent
of the Butler Hospital, in a most able, elegant, and classical essay on
"Shakspeare's Delineations of Insanity" ( SQ&Journal of Insanity , Yol .
III.) a a paper which we could hold up with no small amount of national
pride to our professional brethren of other countries, as an example of
American medical literature, also takes this view of the character of
Hamlet, and in our estimation has set forever at rest the vexed question
of his real or assumed madness, and solved satisfactorily that enigma
to which Schlegel refers, and which has so long vexed and discomfited
all Shakspeare's non-medical critics. The distinguished Dr. Connolly,
in his little book entitled " A Study of Hamlet," lately'^yublis'lied',
also maintains this view, and to the" pychologist lias left nothing to be
desired having, as we think, fully established the position of Ham-
let's real madness.
38 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
sidered, of the most profound interest. We are
convinced that the change wrought is so great,
that the resulting condition of mind must, in the
present state of our medico-psychological knowl-
edge, be regarded as of a ps^h
and that Hamlet, with Lear and Ophelia, must be
admitted into the ranks of that " noble army of
martyrs " to a mind diseased, too many of whom,
alas ! are found in the walks of every-day life.
But we must by no means forget that the term
" mind diseased " does not necessarily imply a
mind destroyed, or even a mind deranged in all
its faculties, but one changed in its normal ppera-
tions; a change which aometimps consists in a
Jl[gJ!g^^ n r p.YftftaRJvP flptipify of
some~o~its nobler facuitiesy while others are more
or less^garaljzed. Such a change Shakspeare has
exhibited in a masterly manner in the character
and conduct of Hamlet, as shown throughout
this most extraordinary play, which change we .
shall now proceed to trace, and attempt to analyze
the mental and moral phenomena exhibited in the
course of it.
Upon our first introduction to Hamlet, (Act I. r
Scene II.,) the idea we form of his character is
quite at variance with the view which Schlegel
has maintained, viz. that the hero is a hypocrite
towards himself, and naturally inclined to crooked
ways, and more in accordance with that enter-
tained by Goethe, who, as we have seen, re-
gards him as a prince of most noble, pure, affec-
HAMLET. 39
tionate and highly moral nature. His keen pene-
tration pierces the mask of hypocrisy and lying
deceit assumed by the king, his " uncle-father,"
and the first expression we have from his lips
evinces his utter contempt and detestation of it.
When he first addresses him with mock tenderness
as " cousin " and " son," he turns aside and gives
utterance to the caustic sarcasm,
" A little more than kin, and less than kind."
He also perceives with keen anguish of spirit,
the heartlessness of his " aunt-mother," and when
she reminds him that death is " common,"
" That all that live must die,
Passing through nature to eternity,"
he replies significantly : " Yes, madam, 't is com-
mon," and when she presses him to know why
it " seems " so particular to him, he hints directly
at his own real woe, as contrasted with those out-
ward, hypocritical expressions of sorrow which
surround him, in what follows :
" Seems, madam ! nay it is ; I know not seems.
'T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black,
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
Nor the dejected 'havior of the visage,
Together with all forms, moods, shows of grief,
That can denote me truly. These, indeed, seem,
For they are actions that a man might play :
But I have that within which passeth show ;
These but the trappings and the suits of woe."
40 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
This is certainly not the language of one who
is a " hypocrite towards himself/' or one who has
a natural inclination to, or love for hypocrisy and
crooked ways, or delights to recognize those traits
of character in others ; whatever we may observe
in Mm afterwards, as the result of disease.
/The keen arrow of affliction first pierces his soul
wn\n death suddenly and unexpectedly takes away
his kingly father. Time, however, would have
healed this wound, but it is torn open and made
to bleed afresh by the sudden and too precipitate
marriage of his mother with his uncle.) His keen
moral nature cannot but regard this union as in-
cestuous, and the disgrace reflected upon himself
buries the arrow yet deeper, and its rankling is
perceptible in the language he utters immediately
after the interview with the king and queen, glanced
at above. The disgrace of this hasty and incestu-
ous union, reflected, as we have said, upon himself,
seems to cause Jum to_despise evenjiis own flesh
ajad^blpod, and engenders in him the wish to be
free from its encumbrance :
" O that this too, too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew ! "
Dark thoughts of se]^detfiiui!li"01i enter his mind,
yethis high m^raljiatureJas yet untainted by dis-
ease, [appejar^jt^ re^ against
GocTand Nature, and in the deep anguish of his
soul, he continues,
" Or that the Everlasting had not fixed
His canon 'gainst self-slaughter."
HAMLET. 41
Theji^Yery^ naturallyj^e_^eeks_JQ__sMiL_the sore
burdejQL.of _his afflictions overj^the^eneral account
of the world and_humanity :
" O God ! O God !
How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world !
Fye on 't ! O fye ! 't is an un weeded garden
That grows to seed, things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely."
Let us now follow him, bearing his sore burden
of affliction, into the scene which follows between
him, his friend Horatio, and the officers of the
watch. A new excitement is here prepared to stir
up his already overburdened mind, and the extraor-
dinary revelations made by them respecting the
apparition they had seen, excite in him the most
painful curiosity, and his mind appears to become
giddy with the intense excitement^jwithout at all >
losing its balance. *^j After interrogating them keenly
and closely in the exciting dialogue as to the ap-
pearance and manner of what they had seen, he
says, evidently under the most intense excitement
of mind :
" If it assume my noble father's person,
I '11 speak to it, though hell itself should gape,
And bid me hold my peace
My father's spirit in arms ! All is not well ;
I doubt some foul play : 'would the night were come !
Till then sit still, my soul."
Let us now stand by and observe him in the
struggles of that terrible night he here longs for,
and then endeavor to estimate the effect upon his
42 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
mind and feelings, of the startling disclosures made
by the ghost of his father, and which constitute
apparently the crowning excitement under which
a will, hitherto intact, and a strength of character
which has hitherto sustained him in all his severe
trials, the highest and strongest manifestations
of which we here perceive, appear to give way
under the burden now imposed upon them, render-
ing all his subsequent struggles impotent and vain.
As this extraordinary seen e_apgg.ars^ ix? constitute
the turning point in his mental and moral career,
and serves more than any other to mould the sub-
sequent character of his mind and feelings, we
deem no excuse necessary for dwelling at some
length upon it, and bringing forward what appears
necessary to illustrate our position.
The scene opens by furnishing us another illus-
tration of that native, high-toned moral feeling,
which is so characteristic of him, and so much at
variance with that by which he is, and ever has
been surrounded. His reply to the interrogatory
of Horatio, who inquires the meaning of the noise
which celebrates the bacchanalian revels of the
court, asking if it is a " custom," is peculiarly
graceful and characteristic of the man :
" Ay, marry is 't ;
And to my mind, though I am native here
And to the manner born, it is a custom
More honored in the breach than the observance."
And here follow some pertinent remarks upon
the influence of these things upon individual and
HAMLET. 43
national character, which remarks are interrupted
by the entrance of the ghost. When he first per-
ceives the approach of the wonderful figure, huge
terror and amazement naturally seize upon him,
and after recovering himself, he addresses it in
language, the terrible grandeur of which never has
been equalled.
" Angels and ministers of grace, defend us !
Be thou a spirit of health, or goblin damned,
Bring with thee air? from heaven, or blasts from hell,
Be thine intents wicked, or charitable,
Thou com'st in such a questionable shape,
That I will speak to thee. I '11 call thee, Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane. Oh, answer me.
Let me not burst in ignorance ! but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst these cerements ! Why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurned,
Hath op'd his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again ! What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in complete steel,
B-evisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous ; and we fools of nature,
So horridly to shake our disposition,
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls ?
Say, why is this ? wherefore ? what should we do ? "
He sees the ghost beckoning him to a distance,
and while his companions are quaking with terror,
he seems to know no fear ; expresses his contempt
for life ; declares it cannot hurt his soul, " being a
thing as immortal as itself" ; and feeling
" Each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Nemean lion's nerve,"
44 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
tears himself from his companions, who hold him
back lest he may meet with some terrible fate, or
be driven to madness ; threatens to make ghosts of
them if they do not " unhand " him ; follows and
hears. After a few exclamations of pity, surprise,
and horror at what is announced; after express-
ing his determination to sweep to his revenge on
" Wings swift as meditation, or the thoughts of love,"
he listens with dumb astonishment to the awful
revelation of crime which the ghost pours into his
ears. After the appearance vanishes, the first words
he utters give the clew to his mental and physical
state, and it is quite evident that the cord which
' has been stretched to its utmost tension, here snaps ,
suddenly, and the consequences are immediately
apparent, and are evinced Wfoughout his whole
subsequent career. Here enters the" pathological
element into his mind and disposition, and the
working of the leaven of disease is soon apparent,
for it changes completely and forever his whole
character. Up jo this time we see no weakness,
no vacillation, no want^ of energy^ na infirmity of
purpose. After this, all these characteristics are
irrecoverably lost, and though some faculties of his
great spirit seem comparatively untouched, others,
as we shall see, are completely paralyzed. His first
exclamation, as we have said, seems to foreshadow
this :
^ I " O all you host of heaven ! O earth ! What else ?
And shall I couple hell ? O fie ! Hold, my heart ;
And you, my sinews, grow not instant old,
HAMLET. 45
But bear me stiffly up ! Remember thee ?
Ay, thou poor ghost, while memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe."
Yet immediately after making the discovery
which has so much agitated him, that his mother
is a " most pernicious and perfidious woman," and
his uncle a " villain, smiling, damned villain," he
takes out his tables as though it were necessary
to make a memorandum, lest he forget that, " in
Denmark at least, one may smile, and smile, and
be a villain."
What follows in the scene when he returns to
his friends, evinces strongly the effect upon his
mind of the" volcanic upheaving and commotion it
has experienced in the interview with the ghost,
and savors strongly of disease. Instead of clasping
his old friends to his bosom, and seeking from them
that sympathy, support, and consolation he had a
right to expect from them, and which they, though
animated with the most intense curiosity and ex-
citement, seem ready to give, he tells each to go
about his own especial business, offers them a
parting hand, and as for himself, he says,
" Look you, I '11 go pray."
Well does his friend Horatio exclaim,
" These are but wild and whirling words, my lord."
His jnanner of_seakii^to the ghost, whom he
hears below when he is swearing his friends to
secrecy, so different from the tone of awe and
reverential respect he had previously adopted, is
46 SHAKSPE ARE'S INSANE.
yp.ry significant, p.nd seems to indicate gomething
more than a healthly reaction from intense excite-
jment. "It betrays," says Dr. Ray, "the excitement
of delirium, the wandering of a mind reeling under
the first strokes of disease."
When he first hears the word " swear " pro-
nounced by the ghost from below, he exclaims, in
language which appears to indicate something more
than mock levity :
" Ha, ha, boy ! say'st thou. so ? art thou there, true-penny ?
Come on, you hear this fellow in the cellarage,
Consent to swear."
When he hears the word " swear " pronounced a
second time from below, he says :
" Hie et ubique ! then we '11 shift our ground."
A third time the word is pronounced, and he ex-
claims :
" Well said, old mole ! can'st work i' the ground so fast ?
A worthy pioneer ! "
A fourth time he hears it, and assuming the lan-
guage of command, he exclaims,
" Rest, rest, perturbed spirit ! "
The intimation that he conveys in this scene that
he may think it " meet to put an antic disposition
on," and upon which the theory of feigned mad-
ness is mainly built, is quite natural, and quite as
consistent with the theory of real as feigned mad-
ness, and may, in the commotion of his mind, have
resulted as much from a vague consciousness of
HAMLET. 47
what was impending, as from any intention to act
a part. This is quite clear to the " expert," though
he may not succeed in making it so to those critics
who take an opposite view of it, and who, having
no practical knowledge of the more delicate shades
of mental disease, quite mistake the character of
Hamlet, regarding it, like Schlegel, as a riddle not
easily solved, or like Goethe, as an illustration of
natural imbecility of will and purpose, as we have
seen, or perhaps, what is worse, can only see with
Dr. Johnson in the " pretended madness " of Ham-
let, a cause of much mirth.
The next knowledge we have of Hamlet comes
to us through Ophelia and her father Polonius, and
it is evident that in the interval his already shat-
tered mind and crushed feelings have received
another sad blow. The gentle and lovely being
whom in the ardor of his nature he had loved with
more than the love of " forty thousand brothers,"
prompted by parental duty, and in obedience to
the express will of her father, does violence to her
own deep, cherished feelings, and repels his letters,
and denies him all access to her. The burden of
his former sorrows it would seem was sufficiently
heavy, but this is greater than all, and what results
is just what we might expect, and nothing else\; and
to suppose, with most of Shakspeare's critics, that
this is a piece of consummate acting, a drama
so admirably played as to deceive her who was
accustomed to read the inmost thoughts of his
heart, seems to border upon the absurd. Besides,
48 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
we can perceive no adequate motive for such ex-
traordinary conduct, even were he acting a part,
and not really frantic. Had he wished to break
the connection as incompatible with the heavy duty
imposed upon him, he certainly would not have re-
sorted to such measures in the first instance : such
an act would have been too revolting to his nature,
and his conduct as well as his personal appearance
in her presence, as delineated by herself, is very in-
dicative of the true state of his mind and feelings.
His mind, as we have seen, had been made to
reel and stagger by the contending emotions ex-
cited in the former scene, but it has not been at
any time so jgo m pletely overthrown as to deprive
him, even temporarily 3 _ojL self-control, until it ex-
peri e n^e^Jjie ^ghncj? i m p arte d JQ it by her refusal
to ee him, or, _JPP.P.IVP. hjp letters. This, however,
together withj^hat has preceded^ is more than it
can bear, aiad.he^be_QQnaea^r the time being quite
franti civile rushes unbidden into her presence,
quite regardless of his personal appearance, j
" With his doublet all unbraced ;
No hat upon his head, his stockings fouled,
Ungartered, and down-gyved to his ankle ;
Pale as his shirt ; his knees knocking each other ;
And with a look so piteous in purport,
As if he had been loosed out of hell,
To speak of horrors."
When there, so great are the overwhelming emo-
tions of his soul that the power of utterance is
denied him. Feelings which no words can express
HAMLET. 49
rend his bosom. " Thoughts which are too deep
for tears," rush like a whirlwind through his already
shattered mind, and he can only seize her by the
wrist, look earnestly and wildly into that face
which was wont to beam upon him with the light
of love and the most tender feminine affection, as
though he would there read the mystery of her
conduct, and the change which had come over her,
prompting it. Then heaving a sigh,
" A sigh so piteous and profound, '
That it did seem to shatter all his bulk,
And end his being "
he retreats as unconsciously as he had entered, his
eyes to the last fixed upon that countenance in
which he had striven to read the inmost thoughts
of her soul. Ophelia could not, and as it is quite
evident, did not mistake the import of all this, and
if we are to regard it as a well-acted sham, then
let us forever cease to draw a distinction between
art and nature ; the two are identical, one and the
same.
In Hamlet's first interview with^Pplonius, (Act
II., Scene II.,) though now quite calm and collect-
ed, the evidence of dismse.iajahiin^^
as also the keen penetration and capability of dis-
cerjiing the motives of others, so "characteristic of
cerJ;ajrjLforms of madness. From the contempt he
shows for Polonius and the keen irony he heaps
upon him, and also from the way he alludes to his
daughter, it is quite evident that the old courtier
4
50 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
is, in his estimation, the cause of the altered con-
duct of Ophelia, and her refusal, as formerly, to
countenance his advances. Either instinctively or
by positive information, he seems well aware of
what has taken place between Ophelia and he^Ja-
ther in a former scene. He appears to regard him,
as all lovers, sane or insane, are apt to regard a
fond and perhaps too judicious parent, who stands
between them and their cherished idol, as a med-
dlesome old fool, over anxious as to consequences,
and quite incapable of appreciating their motives
and feelings. In this view of the case, the keen
wit and irony he pours out upon the old courtier
are most amusing. When the old man asks if he
knows him, he replies :
"Ham. Excellent well ; you are a fishmonger.
Pol. Not I, my lord.
Ham. I would you were so honest a man To be
honest, as the world goes, is to be one man picked out of ten
thousand.
Pol. That 's very true, my lord.
Ham. For if the sun breed maggots in a dead dog, being a
god, kissing carrion, Have you a daughter ? *
Pol. I have, my lord.
Ham. Let her not walk i' the sun. Conception is a blessing ;
but not as your daughter may conceive friend, look to 't."
He seems to take a morbid delighJLJlL annoying
the.. ald^iuaB-JPolonius. Nothing^js^^niore natural
than for thejjnsa^jojkji^.n^some one individual,
fronij$5&Q& they, have, re-
ceived some slight j^rjnjury, and endeavor to tease
them by every means their insane^ ingenuity can
HAMLET. 51
device. After pouring out his satirical spite upon
old men in general, and Polonius in particular, he
thanks him for leaving his presence, telling him
that he could take away nothing that would please
him better, " except my life, my life."
He meets his old friends Rosencrantz and Guil-
deristern cordially, and a lively dialogue ensues,
brought about apparently by old associations ; yet
in a moment this becomes tinctured with the pre-
vailing melancholy of his mind, and the hue of his
misanthropic feelings. He scouts the idea that the
world is getting honest, calls Denmark a prison,
and when they hint that it is a prison to him, be-
cause too narrow for his ambitious views, he utters
a remark quite significant of what is hanging over
his mind :
" O God ! I could be bounded in a nutshell, and count my-
self a king of infinite space; were it notthat I have had bad
dreams."_
jsleep, and_dreaming are
stages of most
forms ofjnental disease, and this remark forms
anothejLjij^ respecting
the real jstate ^ of '...hisjmnd- He interrupts the short
metaphysical disquisition on ambition which fol-
lows, with a remark-whieh shewh4tettH*e-feels that
his mindjs not JO a fit ..state. .An reason on certain
thingSj^and can only act as it is directed by the
disturbed current of his feelings. "By my fay,
I cannot^ reason," says he ; yet in the direction these
lead, see how he can discourse :
52 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
" I have of late (but, wherefore, I know not,) lost all my
mirth, foregone all custom of exercises : and, indeed, it goes so
heavily with my disposition, that this goodly frame, the earth,
seems to me a sterile promontory ; this most excellent canopy,
the air, look you, this brave overhanging firmament, this
majestic roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other
thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapors."
Then follows his famous and well-known apos-
trophe to man, and many no doubt will think
these are hardly the thoughts to emanate from
a mind at all tinctured with insanity; but such
have yet to learn that the ^peculiar form of mad-
ness^delineated by Shakspeare^in the character of
Hamlet, is quite ^compatible with- ^occasional out-
bursts_o_grjy34_4H^J^ Such will no
doubt persist in believing him when he says, " I
am but mad north-northwest; when the wind
is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw."
Those, however, who are familiar with the halls
of an asylum for the insane, and have repeatedly
heard patients scout the idea of their insanity in
language almost identical with the above, will
persist in holding a contrary opinion.
At the conclusion of Act II. he furnishes us
with the clearest evidence yet given of th^t par-
^lyzedwill, the first signs of which we began to
perceive shortly after his interview with the ghost.*
* A young lady, aged twenty years, of great talent for piano-forte
playing, which had been assiduously and successfully cultivated, was
quite recently a patient of the writer with melancholia, to which she has
inherited a strong natural tendency.
In a late letter to me, speaking of her health, she says : " I am sorry
to say that I have not felt well, bodily, for some time, I feel tired and
HAMLET. 53
Here we find him deploring his weakness r -quite
conscious of his utter inability to sweep to that
revenge he had so solemnly sworn: ttr~execute.
As keenly conscious as ever of the great wrong
done him by his uncle, the only power left is the
power to rail against him, " to fall a-cursing like
a very drab, a scullion," and this he does with a
hearty good will, a " science," so to speak, thor-
oughly understood, it has often seemed to us, only
by the insane themselves. Hear him rail at him-
self for his infirmity of will and purpose :
" Am I a coward ?
Who calls me villain ? breaks my pate across ?
Plucks off my beard and blows it in my face ?
Tweaks me by the nose ? gives me the lie i' the throat ?
As deep as to the lungs ? Who does me this ?
Ha!
Why, I should take it; for it cannot be,
But I am pigeon-livered, and lack gall
To make transgression bitter ; or, ere this,
I should have fatted all the region kites
With this slave's offal. Bloody, bawdy villain !
Remorseless, treacherous, lecherous, kindless villain !
O, vengeance !
Fye upon* t ! foh ! About, my brain I "
How different is all this from the language used
in the scene with the ghost, and from that lion-
languid, as if I could not exert myself. I am busy, and try to overcome
these feelings, but my will, once strong, seems to have nothing to do with it.
I shall not give up again, come what may. I am determined to succeed
in what I have undertaken." This determination to be occupied, and
thus to divert her mind from the morbid state of her feelings, will no
doubt go far in warding off her malady ; and we shall watch with much
interest the struggles of the diseased will in this gifted girl.
54 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
heartedness with which he breaks from his friends
and follows it. And what a change does it in-
dicate, wrought by disease in the character of the
, man. He then, as a mere pretext and excuse for
his want of energy, pretends to doubt if even the
ghost was an honest-ghost ; suggests that it might
hay_e_fee^a^th.xej:y .de_Yil. himself .seeking to assail
hi m thro ugltJli^iweak n ess ? ? and "melancholy," in
orderjo damn him ; and in the true spirit of his dis-
ease devises a scheme to test the matter by means
of the play. The successive steps in the progress
of his disease now become more and more marked,
and we next perceive an upheaving and overthrow
of those deep moral feelings and affections, so pe-
*culiar to his character before the invasion of the
disease. And here let those who maintain the
theory of feigned madness be careful to observe,
that the very feelings and faculties of his soul
which have been most intensely exercised, are the
very ones which first give way and become most
completely upset by the diseased reaction which
follows. This they may regard, if they choose,
as a mere coincidence ; it will, however, be some-
what difficult for them to show that it was more
easy, natural, and convenient for Hamlet to assume
this form of madness than a form more readily
calculated to deceive others, one more easily
feigned to carry out his purpose of deception. To
us it appears that Shakspeare has, as usual, " held
the mirror up to nature," in making his faculties
become diseased in the very direction in which
HAMLET. 55
they have been most intensely exercised ; whether
that direction be, as he says, " north-northwest,"
or towards some other point of the intellectual
compass.
His will, courage, and energy of purpose had
been put to the utmost test in the interview with
the ghost, and the result we have seen. Let us
now see what has been the consequence of exces-
sive exercise of the moral feelings and affections
of his ardent nature. In illustration of this, let us
glance for a moment at his remarkable interview
with Ophelia, in Act III., Scene L, of the play.
From what we have observed in former scenes, it
is abundantly evident that Hamlet had loved the
gentle Ophelia with all the intensity his ardent
and affectionate nature was capable of, and which
love, it is also evident, had been abundantly re-
ciprocated. The first blow to this comes through
her, prompted by her father, and it falls upon him
when his mind is sadly unprepared to receive it.
Writhing as he was under his other sorrows and
their diseased reaction, as we shall see in this scene,
the blow rebounds upon her with a weight so
crushing, that all our sympathies are enlisted for
the gentle being, and these are made more lively
by the remembrance that she has not called down
all this upon herself by her fickleness and feminine
caprice, but that it has been instigated by parental
duty. In the midst of that grand soliloquy, in
which, prompted by the melancholy of his mind
and the dark misanthropy of his feelings, he places
56 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
so insignificant an estimate upon human life when
weighed in the balance against the cares, perplex-
ities, and sorrows incident to it, and where, quite
forgetting the axiom he has previously advanced,
that " there is nothing good or bad but thinking
makes it," he spurns it, and casts a fearful glance
towards the mysteries of the grave and eternity,
also tinged with the dark hue of his thoughts, and
in which he thinks " perchance " there may be
" dreams " more terrible than the sad realities
which now surround him, he is interrupted by
the entrance of Ophelia. The first sight of her
appears to awaken in him all those tender emo-
tions he was accustomed in health to indulge to-
wards her :
" Soft you, now !
The fair Ophelia : Nymph, in thy orisons,
Be all my sins remembered."
To her first greeting he replies thankfully and re-
spectfully, and if not affectionately and cordially,
in a manner suited to the state of mind in which
she has found him. She then takes occasion to
restore him the gifts he has made her, intimating
that he had ceased to love her. In an instant the
demon of disease slumbering in his rnind is roused
up and let loose upon her, to lacerate most unmer-
cifully her already crushed and bleeding heart,
and- he 4**** hiB work-jwith JJIgj'' refined cruelty
^ of. She at-
tempts to reason with the monster, and as was
to be expected from its true nature, it only becomes
HAMLET. 57
more and more cruel, and ceases not to rend her
till its mad rage is expended, and she stands before
us trembling in every limb, her heart bleeding from
many deep and sore wounds, and " like Niobe, all
tears," an object of the deepest commiseration.
Surely they must be blind to dramatic propriety
who can perceive in all this nothing more than
a well-acted sham, in which the actor does violence
to his own best feelings, and wounds and lacerates
fearfully those of her whom he had loved so ten-
derly, when the deception which he is thereby sup-
posed to attempt is attainable at so much less
cost. Ophelia, certainly no incompetent judge
under the circumstances, seems as before to have
placed the proper estimate upon his conduct. The
lynx-eyed vigilance of woman's love could not be
deceived, and she has read correctly the riddle
which has so perplexed all Shakspeare's critics
down to the present time. When he leaves her
presence after this harrowing scene, with the cut-
ting words, " Get thee to a nunnery " upon his lips,
she says :
" O what a noble mind is here o'erthrown !
The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's, eye, tongue, sword :
The expectancy and rose of the fair state,
The glass of fashion, and the mold of form,
The observed of all observers, quite, quite down !
And I of ladies most deject and wretched,
That sucked the honey of his music vows,
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,
Like sweet bells jangled out of tune and harsh ;
That unmatched form and feature of blown youth,
58 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
Blasted with ecstacy : O, woe is me !
To have seen what I have seen, see what I see !
In the first part of Scene II. (Act III.) in giving
his instructions to the players, and also his ideas
as to what should be the true character of theatrical
performances, he is quite calm and collected, his
mind and feelings apparently undisturbed, and to
have met him now no one would have supposed
him either insane or feigning. Thi& is-quite natu-
ral, and consistent with the form of madness under
which he suffers; " a . f ornv" says Dr. Brigham,
" undei^-JHdrich the mind only occasionally suffers,
while the^feelings are greatly disordered by disease."
Strangers to insanity, on passing for the first time
through the halls of an asylum which are devoted
to the better classes of patients, are frequently
much surprised at the rational conversation, apt
remarks, and gentlemanly bearing and conduct
of some, and can scarcely believe them insane, and
often, as we have frequently seen, manifest much
curiosity in questioning the medical officers in
charge as to how the disease which they are unable
to perceive, manifests itself. Farther on in the
scene, when the court enters to witness the play,
he is quite calm, as though he had braced up his
mind and curbed his feelings to observe carefully
its effect upon the king and queen. Yet even here,
there is aJdod-of-ayidlsiiiiess, a juvenility of mind
manifestedj which is quite unlike the real Hamlet
of Act I. or the insane Hamlet of Act II. The
demon within is now slumbering, and towards the
HAMLET. 59
gentle being he so lately lacerated is now quite
changed, throws himself down at her feet, and like
a little child asks to be permitted to lay his head
in her lap. Throughout this entire scene, even
after the developments brought about by the effect
of the play upon the king, there is a peculiar levity
in his manner and conduct which savors strongly
of mental and moral unsoundness, and we are
quite ready to believe him when he says to Guil-
denstern : " I cannot make you a wholesome an-
swer, my wit's diseased." Such are the varied
phases of madness, and how wonderful is that
power of observation in our great dramatist, which
has enabled him to draw them so minutely and
accurately. His knowledge of the human heart
and mind, under all circumstances and in all forms,
whether of health or disease, is so accurate that
he never makes a mistake, and when he appears
to do so, we should strongly suspect that we do
not understand him, and wait humbly and labor
patiently for a more accurate knowledge of his
purposes and intentions.
The next appearance of Hamlet, of importance
in illustration of our position, is at the conclusion
of Scene III., where he finds the king alone and
at his attempted devotions. Here was an excellent
opportunity for him to wreak his vengeance upon
him, and he saw it. " Now might I do it pat,"
says he ; but he does not, for the impulse under
which alone he can act efficiently is not upon him,
and his diseased will and infirmity of purpose are
60 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
not sufficient for it ; and framing a flimsy excuse,
such as the fear that if he sent him into eternity
while praying he would not be damned, and his
r revenge would be incomplete, he allows the oppor-
tunity to slip from him. ^T He can make great re-
solves, but he can only execute by a diseased im-
pulse, and this never serves him at the right time.
That speedy vengeance which was the sworn
pose of his life is here prevented by his infirmity,
and a mad impulse in a subsequent scene causes
him to plunge his sword into the heart of poor old
Polonius, instead of the heart of the real culprit,
his uncle.
We now come to the extraordinary interview
between Hamlet and his mother. (Act III., Scene
IV.) Perhaps no scene furnishes to the non-pro-
fessional reader such strong evidence as this in
favor of the theory of feigning. To us, however,
he appears like one who, being really and truly
insane, has summoned all his powers for the ac-
complishment of his purposes, one of which is to
convince others that he is not mad. / He can feign
either sanity qr insanity, as best suited his purposes
at the time. \Here, in the true spirit which ani-
mates him, he'asserts in plain words that he is not
mad, only in " craft," and in spite of aU internal
evidence to the contrary, most of his readers and
critics are ready to believe him.
" It is not madness I have uttered ; bring me to
the test." Unfortunately the test he relies upon,
though once considered infallible, is not now re-
HAMLET. 61
garded as positive ; indeed, as applicable to his
case it is quite worthless. It strikes us as rather
strange too, that one who is really feigning for a
purpose, should take so much .pains to make others
believe he is not doing so. (He speaks rationally,
yet sometimes wildly and obscurely, and the un-
merciful manner in which he harrows up the feel-
ings of his mother, blameworthy as she was, and
so deserving of his severe censure, is in perfect
keeping with his conduct towards Ophelia in a
former scene. ) The reappearance f t.hp.-gbjastj now
visible only to himself, shows the deep agitation of
his rnind, and with all his self-possession he is hot
able to suppress the emotions caused by this men-
tal apparition.
In Scenes II. and III. of Act IV., we see another
phase of his malady. That peculiar levity of con-
duct evinced by the insane in view of the dreadful
circumstances which they have brought upon them-
selves by their insane acts, circumstances which
would cause the guilty sane to quake with fear,
is here admirably shown, as also that waywardness
and perversity peculiar to certain forms of insanity.
He appears -to 4iave concealed-the body of Polo-
nius, whom he has slain in an^irigaSeT ijnpulse^
perversity, and not from "any
fear as to,. the.. consequences to himself from the
deed. In answer to the question of Rosencrantz,
" What have you done, my lord, with the dead
body ? " he says, quite significantly, " Compounded
it with the dust, whereto 't is kin."
62 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
In the next scene, when the king asks him where
is Polonius, he answers : " 'At supper. . . . Not
where he eats, but where he is eaten ; a certain
convocation of politic worms are e'en at him.
Your worm is your only emperor for diet ; " and he
continues to rally the king with the most caustic
sarcasm, showing him the ultimate identity between
a fat king and a lean beggar.
Again, when the king puts the question, " Where
is Polonius ? " he evades in a most provoking man-
ner : " In heaven ; send thither to see : if your mes-
senger find him not there, seek him i' the other
place yourself."
We next find him bewailing his own imbecility
of purpose in view of the expedition of young For-
tinbras, quite conscious apparently of his infirmity,
yet wholly under its influence and totally unable to
overcome it.
We now come to Scene V. Act IV., in which we
find another and very different form of insanity in
the case of Ophelia. Ophelia, of all the creations
of Shakspeare's genius, is certainly one of the most
charming and exquisite. The gentle being, occa-
sional glimpses of whom we have caught in former
scenes, gliding before us for a moment and disap-
pearing like a vision of loveliness and purity, weep-
ing in the heaviness of her heart over the misfor-
tunes which have befallen her lover, and bewailing
the change which his sad disease had wrought in
his feelings and conduct towards her, is now
doomed to fall a victim to another, and if possible
HAMLET. 63
more painful form of the same malady. With true
feminine fortitude she has borne meekly and pa-
tiently all that the mental disease of her lover has
inflicted upon herself, and in childlike obedience to
the will of the politic old courtier, Polonius, her
father, whom, notwithstanding all his follies, she
appears to have loved with the tenderness of a
daughter, faithful and true, she has tried to smother,
if she could not entirely quench, the pure flame
which glowed in her bosom towards Hamlet. This,
no doubt, cost her a sad struggle, yet in obedience
to duty she could make the attempt. But when
under an impulse of disease this lover plunges his
sword into the heart of her beloved parent, the
measure of her sorrow is full and running over.
Her gentle heart, which had been so often and so
sorely wounded, is now crushed forever, and her
pure and delicate mind at once becomes a wreck.
Its native delicacy, though sadly shattered by dis-
ease, is not wholly lost, and though a maniac she is
not wild, but the same gentle, loving, kind-hearted,
affectionate Ophelia. Sad is the picture which the
poet has here given us, yet the records of womanly
experience teach us that it is only too true. After
the mournful exhibition she furnishes us of crushed , /
feelings and a mind in fragments, we are quite pre-
pared, indeed we feel a kind of relief, when death
interposes to take her away from the sorrows and
perplexities of her short and melancholy career.
We next meet Hamlet in the churchyard, with
that same levity of character and conduct which
64 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
we have before glanced at as one of the character-
istics of his disease. He jests with clowns, and
moralizes over dry^ bones. Here, with all his own
* sorrowful experiences of human life fresh in his
\f v memory, and surrounded with the solemn evidences
of the vanity of all earthly things, in the true spirit
of madness he makes him^lf^ merry jwith things
mosjL^rav-e_-aftd--ealemn. A skull " grins with a
ghastly smile " upon him, and he in return smiles
upon it, supposes it to have been the skull of a
lawyer, and asks what has become of its " tenures "
and its " tricks," and wonders why it does not bring
an action for battery against the clown for knock-
ing it about with a dirty shovel. Here he utters
that terrible sarcasm against " men made of
money " :
" Ham. Is not parchment made of sheep-skins ?
Hor. Ay, my lord, and of calves-skins too.
Ham. They are sheep and calves which seek out assurance
in that."
This scene with the grave-diggers is not merely
rich in wit, humor, philosophy, and morality, but it
possesses a profound psychological interest, and it is
evident that Hamlet acted very unnaturally under
theL_circumstarice, supposing him to be sane or
feigning ; or supposing him to be insane, acted in
the true spirit of his disease, very naturally. The
latter supposition is the more reasonable.
In the midst of this singular scene in the grave-
yard, the funeral procession, bearing the remains
HAMLET. 65 J
of Ophelia, enters. And here we are furnished with
the poet's views respecting the obsequies paid by
the church to the bodies of those unfortunates, who,
in a paroxysm of the most dreadful of human mala-
dies, commit suicide. He is evidently at issue with
the priestly prejudicies of his times, remnants of
which have descended to, and are even now occa-
sionally manifest in the midst of the enlightenment
of our own. The poet seems to have felt instinc-
tively that the bodies of those, who, urged by a par-fc
oxysm of disease beyond the power of self-control,
have perished by their own hands, should have the
same sad rites as those who have perished from any
other cause, and that withholding them could do
no possible good, and inflict much unnecessary in-
jury upon the feelings of friends :
" Laer. Must there no more be done ?
Priest No more be done !
We should profane the service of the dead,
To sing sage requiem, and such rest to her,
As to peace-parted souls.
Laer. Lay her i' the earth ;
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh,
May violets spring ! I tell thee, churlish priest,
A ministering angel shall my sister be,
When thou liest howling."
The wild manifestations of sorrow on the part
of Laertes at the grave of his sister, which Hamlet
has observed at a distance, very naturally excite in
him a paroxysm of his malady, and his conduct
here establishes beyond all question the existence
of genuine madness. At^times he ^Quld_control
66 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
himself completely, and act and talk rationally, yet
ever since the interyiesKJsdih the ghost, even during
these intervals, we can detect the genuine mani-
festations of tha^jdisease, which is ready to burst
out in marked paroxysms upon occasions of unusual
excitement like this. He here xushes_jbrward, leaps
into the grave, grapples with Laertes, and disputes
with him the position of chief-mourner; and his
language as well as his conduct leads us to coincide
with the queen when she says,
" This is mere madness :
And thus awhile the fit will work on him ;
Anon, as patient as the female dove
When that her golden couplets are disclos'd,
His silence will sit drooping."
Alternately calm and excited, we find him, in the
next scene, relating with great circumspection the
means he adopted to circumvent his transporta-
tion to England, and to devote his treacherous
companions to the same fate they had, in concert
with the king, intended for him. He also expresses
his regret that the " towering passion " into which
the grief of Laertes had put him, should have made
him forget himself at the grave of Ophelia.
The wild confusion of the last scene furnishes
us a fitting denouement of what has preceded.
It was not to be expected that a drama in which
the principal actor is an undoubted madman,
should end as one in which other materials are em-
ployed. The mental malady of Hamlet was of
such a character as to influence deeply the whole
HAMLET. 67
plot, and in the end we see the irresolution, feeble- v
ness of will, and want of foresight resulting from it, ^ tu
bringing about just what was to be expected, a com- /
plete chaos. Each dies as it were by accident, and
by the means intended for the destruction of an-
other. These means seem like the " times " " out
of joint," and hobble on to the accomplishment of
purposes, vague, indistinct, and uncertain. Ven-
geance indeed falls upon the head of the chief cul-
prit, not however in the solemn manner to give it a
character suited to his enormous guilt, but just as
we might expect from the nature of the instrumen-
talities employed; the only way in fact it could
have been brought about, with the perservation of
the complete dramatic consistency of the plot ; the
whole furnishing another evidence of the wonder-
ful sagacity of the poet, and the truthfulness to
nature, and consistency with which he works out
whatever he undertakes.
OPHELIA.
OF Ophelia, we have already said a few words,
in treating of the character of Hamlet, with
whose, mad career her own sad destiny was so inti-
mately interwoven. Of all the poet's characters, we
may say truly that there is not one that so thor-
oughly enlists the best and most profound sym-
pathies of the human heart as Ophelia. There
are others whose circumstances have been quite
as sad, and whose end, to a superficial view, quite
as tragic ; but every one who studies this character
with that carefulness which its exceeding loveliness
demands, feels that there is a certain something
here, not easily defined perhaps, causing it to differ
from all others in the amount and intensity of the
sympathy excited.
Of all Shakspeare's female characters, Ophelia,
is, par excellence, the most feminine ; and in her, it
strikes us, we perceive a closer approximation to
the " divine perfection of a woman," than is to be
found in any other of the poet's delineations. The
daughter of a courtier, bred amid the vices, the
arts, and the intrigues incident to court life, she
escapes all contamination by the innate purity of
her natural character, and to the end maintains
OPHELIA. 69
that jartlgss and childlike simplicity so essentially
characteristic of the true woman. This, how-
ever, is not the simplicity of ignorance, but, as we
have said, of innate purity. /All she knows about
the " primrose path of dalliance " is by hearsay
and rumor ; but she has never trod its deceitful
and treacherous windings, neither has she wandered
there in thought, nor even in dreams. ) The love
she bears towards Hamlet is so pure, so free from
the slightest trace of any base alloy, either of pas-
sion, pride, or selfishness, that it seems in very
truth " not of the earth, earthy," but an effloresence
of that divine nature with which she has been so
highly endowed, a nature in which pride, selfish-
ness, or ambition, had no part or lot whatever^ The
high social position of her royal lover she regards
with fear and trembling, inasmuch as this may
prove an insurmountable barrier to the possession
of that which was the most cherished desire of
her gentle heart. Yet this desire, pure, holy, un-
selfish, as she felt it to be, she is ready to sacrifice
at whatever cost to her own feelings, and yield it
up in childlike obedience to the expressed wishes
of her father. Duty to her parent, with her, was
paramount to all else, and the thought of dis-
obedience seems never to have entered her mind.
Ophelia is so unselfish and pure-minded, that she
is slow to suspect that others can be actuated by
impure or selfish motives. The unaffected sim-
plicity, the naivete, of her replies to her father and
brother in Act I., Scene III., show the exceeding
70 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
beauty of her natural character and disposition
from the very first. She is unwilling to doubt the
affection or motives of her father or brother, and
she is equally unwilling to doubt the honesty and
truthfulness of her lover's protestations ; and, with
conflicting emotions, she is " perplexed in the ex-
treme," like Othello, not knowing what to do, or
think, or believe ; and when her father calls her a
green girl, and asks her if she believes the protes-
tations of Hamlet, her reply is singularly beautiful :
" I do not know, my lord, what I should think."
The advice which her brother bestows upon her
in taking his leave, good and wholesome as it is,
is quite unnecessary, though received in the kindest
manner, and she tells him : " I shall the effect of
your good lesson keep, as watchman to my heart."
Yet all the time we are made to feel that it is far
more important for him to remember the gentle,
modest, and loving admonition of her reply, than
it is for her to remember his advice, which, we are
led to believe, he has framed from his own prac-
tical experience of the world :
" but, good my brother,
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,
Whilst, like a puffed and reckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads,
And recks not his own read."
The scene between Ophelia and her father,
"touching the lord Hamlet," furnishes an admi-
OPHELIA. 71
rable exhibition of obedience to parental authority,
and further serves to set forth the extreme truthful-
ness and loveliness of her natural character and
disposition. When her father tells her, that of late
she has " of her audience been most free and boun-
teous," in conscious innocence she evades nothing,
and in answer to his demand to " give up the
truth " as to what is between them, she answers :
" He hath, my lord, of late, made many tenders
Of his affection to me. . . . .
He hath importuned me with love
In honorable fashion ....
And hath given countenance to his speech, my lord,
With almost all the holy vows of heaven."
Here we feel that the demand is fully answered,
and that we have the truth, and the whole truth ;
and when he tells her that these vows are not
" sterling,"
" But mere implorators of unholy suits,
Breathing life sanctified and pious bonds,
The better to beguile/'
and lays his commands upon her to avoid in future
these frequent interviews with the prince, she does
not presume to argue the matter with her father,
or to defend the motives of her lover, or her own
conduct, but replies simply and beautifully in the
language of a dutiful and affectionate daughter,
" I shall obey, my lord."
It is here that her pure spirit receives the first
heavy blow. How much this resolution of obedi-
72 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
ence cost her, is known only to herself and those
gentle spirits (and their name is legion) who have
been placed in like circumstances. They stagger
under the stunning blow, but they do not fall ; hope
has not fled forever, but still lingers to sustain and
comfort, and a sublime faith in the divine order
of things, known only to themselves and their like,
points to something beyond the dismal present.
They know that they are beloved, and this they feel
like an " everlasting arm " beneath them, and they
cannot sink until it is removed.
Whatever may be the opinion of others, Ophelia
is fully persuaded in her own mind that her lover
is not playing false with her ; and while such im-
passioned words as the following are treasured up
in the depths of her confiding heart, they are all-
sufficient, and come what will, she is happy.
" To the celestial, and my soul's idol, the most beautified Ophelia :
Doubt thou the stars are fire ;
Doubt, that the sun doth move ;
Doubt truth to be a liar ;
But never doubt I love.
" O dear Ophelia, I am ill at these numbers ; I have not art
to reckon my groans ; but that I love thee best, O most best,
believe it. Adieu.
" Thine evermore, most dear lady, whilst this
machine is to him, Hamlet."
We next meet Ophelia in Act II., Scene I.
From what we gather in the interview between
her and her father in this scene, it is evident that
the heart of the doomed one has received another
OPHELIA. . 73
and still more stunning blow, in the first frightful
meeting with Hamlet, after she has, by her father's
express commands, repelled his letters and denied
him all access to her presence. In the interval,
since their forced separation, her lover has become
a frightful maniac, not a feigning imposter as some
believe, but a real confirmed melancholic madman,
froQL .causes we have heretofore discussed. It is
evident from the anxious inquiries of her father,
and from her replies, that she has been greatly
shocked and frightened by this interview, which
Hamlet, following the instinct of his love, and the
promptings of his disease, so rudely and informally
forced upon her as she was sewing in her closet.
The thought, too, that she has been the innocent
cause of this mental overthrow, makes her
" Of ladies most deject and wretched ; "
though, as she says to her father, she has given
him no " hard words," a thing impossible to her
nature, but has simply obeyed, as in duty bound,
the strict injunctions of her parent.
With all her gentleness^ Ophelia was a woman
of strong character, and to crush her entirely, as she
is doomed to be, required^blows both heavy and
repeated. / She has been greatly agitated and
frightened by the strange conduct of Hamlet, who,
though he utters not a word, has, by his insane
bearing and appearance, harrowed up her inmost
soul, not so much with fear as with pity and regret,
74 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
pity, that, perhaps, " a noble mind is here o'er-
thrown," and regret most poignant that she may
have been the innocent instrument in the hands
of others in accomplishing it.
The air of truthfulness, the calm dignity and
precision of her description of this silent interview
with her lover, exhibit the native strength of her
mind and character, and show clearly that she was
by no means the " green girl " her father calls her ;
he indeed seems to have been convinced of his
own weakness and mistake, and admits that he
is sorry for what he has done, and in his agitation
invites her to go with him at once to the king, and
lay the whole matter before him.
" Pol. I am sorry that, with better heed and judgment, I had
not quoted him."
Notwithstanding the strangeness of this silent
interview, which has so greatly frightened her, and
in spite of the hasty suggestions of Polonius as
to the mental condition of Hamlet, Ophelia seems
not yet to be fully persuaded of the insanity of
her lover, which, indeed, is yet in its initiatory
stage. She only fears, and these fears even she
would like to question as long as possible, and in
answer to her father, who asks if he is mad for her
love, she says, with her accustomed modesty :
" My lord, I do not know,
But truly I do fear it."
In her next interview with Hamlet, Act III.,
OPHELIA. 75
Scene I., these fears are only too fully confirmed
by the unmerciful manner in which he lacerates
her already bleeding heart. The blows which here
fall upon the doomed one are more stunning than
any she has yet received ; but still she does not
sink under them, and the gentle pleadings, ques-
tionings, and remonstrances which she employs,
the plaintive wail which bursts from her heart at
the conclusion of the scene, when she is made to
perceive fully that he is insane, are affecting in the
extreme. The touching character of the scene in
which she seeks to return his gifts would be greatly
modified if we could feel that she acts as she does
from feminine caprice, to annoy her lover, or from
a natural desire to test the sincerity of his protesta-
tios. But we cannot bring ourselves to think that
this is the case, for it is contrary to her character,
and quite opposed to her confiding nature. On the
contrary, we are conscious throughout the whole
scene that she is acting from the promptings of
another, obedience to whom she regards as a para-
mount duty, to which all her own most cherished
feelings must be held in complete and sovereign
subjection. That Ophelia was, at least in the
opinion of Hamlet, acting from an impulse im-
parted by her father, seems evident from the man-
ner in which he alludes to Polonius in this scene,
and where he speaks of shutting him up at home,
that he may "play the fool nowhere but in his own
house." Be this as it may, there is no modification
of the blows he so unmercifully lets fall upon her
76 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
in his paroxysm of insane violence. This scene
is so illustrative of the character and disposition
of Ophelia, that we cannot forbear quoting from
it at length. When Hamlet first perceives her, at
the conclusion of his grand soliloquy, he seems for
a moment to forget the relation in which he now
stands to her, and all his old cherished feelings
seem uppermost in his heart and mind :
" Soft you, now !
The fair Ophelia. Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remembered."
Yet immediately after her kind and respectful
greeting, and inquiry after his welfare, the thought
of their present relation seems to return, and he
replies with a cold, cutting dignity :
" I humbly thank you, well."
Ophelia then proceeds to the discharge of the
heavy and painful duty imposed upon her :
" Oph. My lord, I have remembrances of yours,
That I have longed long to re-deliver ;
I pray you, now receive them.
Ham. No, not I ; I never gave you aught.
Oph. My honored lord, you know right well, you did ;
And with them, words of so sweet breath composed
As made the things more rich. Their perfume lost,
Take these again ; for to the noble mind,
Rich gifts wax poor, when givers prove unkind.
There, my lord.
Ham. Ha ! ha ! Are you honest ?
Oph. My lord ?
Ham. Are you fair ?
Oph. What means your lordship ?
OPHELIA. 77
Ham. That if you be honest and fair, your honesty should
admit no discourse to your beauty.
Oph. Could beauty, my lord, have better commerce than
with honesty ?
Ham. Ay, truly ; for the power of beauty will sooner trans-
form honesty from what it is to a bawd, than the force of
honesty can translate beauty into its likeness; this was some
time a paradox, but now the time gives it proof. I did love
you once.
Oph. Indeed, my lord, you made me believe so.
Ham. You should not have believed me ; for virtue cannot
so inoculate our old stock but we shall relish of it. I loved
you not.
Oph. I was the more deceived."
In this scene, with an ingenuity, and a refined
sarcasm worthy of the form of insanity under
which he is suffering, he pours out his invective
upon her in a manner which those best acquainted
with this disease in all its variable forms, can most
readily appreciate. The first object he selects for
attack is the one which of all others he feels in his
inmost soul to be the most dear to her, namely,
himself; and as though with one blow he would
dash to the earth all the fond hopes he has led her
to cherish, and there trample upon them, he says
to her,
" Get thee to a nunnery ; why wouldst thou be a breeder
of sinners ? "
He then seeks to reveal to her that this idol of
her heart, this Hamlet, is the very " chief of sin-
ners," and so black that " it were better that his
mother had not borne him ; " and, after enumerat-
78 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
ing his many vices, he repeats his harsh demand,
" Go thy way ; get thee to a nunnery." He then
opens his batteries upon the object next dear to
her, namely, her father, and in a few words disposes
of him, as we have already seen, in a manner best
calculated to wound her feelings.
u Oh, help him, you sweet heavens !
Heavenly powers, restore him ! "
is the deep prayer of her bruised heart, and all she
can utter in reply.
After disposing of Polonius, his mad rage falls
upon Ophelia herself; the intense bitterness and
cruelty of his words, and the awful 'sarcasm he
launches at the gentle and unresisting creature
before him, are worthy the madman, and call forth
the deepest commiseration for the victim. How
torturing are these words, coming as they do from
one whose love she had cherished so fondly.
" If thou dost marry, I '11 give thee this plague for thy dowry.
Be thou as chaste as ice, as pure as snow, thou shalt not escape
calumny Or, if thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool ;
for wise men know well enough what monsters you make of
them."
As though this were not enough to crush and
humble her, he must torture her with certain dis-
agreeable personal peculiarities, evidently false, and
quite contrary to the simplicity and native dignity
of her character. But madness of the kind here
delineated is never scrupulous in the choice of
means for the accomplishment of its purposes :
OPHELIA. 79
" I have heard of your paintings, too, well enough. God
hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another ;
you jig, you amble, and you lisp, and nickname God's creatures,
and make your wantonness your ignorance. Go to; I'll no
more of it ; it hath made me mad To a nunnery,
go-"
The plaintive wail which bursts from her heart
in view of the awful malady which has called
down all this upon her, is truly most affecting :
" Oh, what a noble mind is here o'erthrown !
The courtier's, soldier's, scholar's eye, tongue, sword ;
The expectancy and rose of the fair state,
The glass of fashion and the mould of form,
The observed of all observers, quite, quite down !
And I, of ladies most deject and wretched,
That sucked the honey of his music vows,
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason,
Like sweet bells jangled, out of time, and harsh ;
That unmatched form and feature of blown youth,
Blasted with ecstacy. Oh, woe is me !
To have seen what I have seen, see what I see ! "
At the play her lover is in a better mood of
mind, in view of the revelations he expects to
bring forth by means of the players, and this ap-
pears to have reacted upon herself, as was quite
natural, so that for a moment she is again happy.
This, however, is but a treacherous lull in the
awful tempest which has hitherto blown her about,
and which is again to burst upon her with in-
creased and destructive violence.
When we next meet Ophelia, Act IV., Scene
V., the last heavy blow has descended upon her ;
80 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
her gentle, confiding heart, which has hitherto with-
stood so many shocks, is now crushed completely,
and her pure mind is in fragments hopelessly
destroyed. That insanity which, under all ordinary
circumstances, is justly regarded as the most dire
of human calamities more fearful even than
the king of terrors here comes like a minister-
ing angel, and even the shadow of its dark wing
hovering over her, is a species of relief to us ; for
it shields her from the consciousness of the terrible
calamities that have befallen her, till, in great
mercy, death bears her beyond the reach of all
earthly sorrows.
This last sad blow which she suffers, is the
violent death of Polonius, her father, by the hand
of Hamlet. The previous calamities, though in
themselves sufficiently heavy to crush a less hope-
ful and confiding spirit, she has borne up under ;
bat this is too much. The bitter cup, which might
not depart from her, has been drained, and she
sinks at once into a form of mild rriania 3 the hope-
less character of which is recognized at once by
all who have any practical acquaintance with
mental disease. To such, the delineation is so
perfect that we feel that in no instance has the
poet " held the mirror up to nature " more carefully.
The language used is almost identical with what
is heard daily in the wards of all asylums. Cohe-
rence and incoherence are here strangely, but most
truthfully, intermingled; yet throughout the whole,
the truthfulness, gentleness, and loving kindness
OPHELIA. 81
of her nature are manifested. We perceive this
in the first words which she utters when in this
state, " Where is the beauteous majesty of Den-
mark?" These words, and those which follow,
fall upon the ear with a sad, melodious sweetness,
than which nothing in the whole range of dramatic
literature is more pathetic ; and were it not that
they manifest utter unconsciousness of her own
great misfortunes, would be altogether too painful
for dramatic effect.
Throughout her incoherence, as is most common
in such cases, there are one or two dominant
thoughts, tortured though these be into all manner
of curious shapes. These thoughts twine fantas-
tically round her dead parent, with once or twice
an obscure allusion to her lover :
" How should I your true love know
From another one ?
By his cockle hat and staff,
And his sandal shoon."
This stanza seems to have been suggested by
some vague thought of her lover, but the dominant
thought is of her dead father, and is expressed in
the stanza which follows. In answer to the queen's
question, " What imports this song ? " she replies,
as if not quite conscious of what is said of her:
" Say you ? nay ; 'pray you, mark. (Sings.)
He is dead and gone, lady,
He is dead and gone ;
At his head a grass-green turf,
At his heels a stone ;
' 6
82 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
White his shroud as the mountain snow,
Larded all with sweet flowers ;
Which bewept to the grave did go,
With true-love showers."
Nothing could be more natural than the com-
plete incoherence of her reply to the greeting of the
king :
" King. How do you, pretty lady ?
I Oph. Well, God 'ield you ! They say the owl was a baker's
I daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not what we
may be. God be at your table ! "
How perfectly natural the above incoherence, to
such as are afflicted with this form of disease,
those best acquainted with insanity can bear am-
ple testimony.* The obscenity of the lines begin-
ning
" Good morrow ; 't is Saint Valentine's day,"
though shocking to the polite ears of modern times,
is also quite natural, even when we remember that
it comes from one whose lips, previous to disease,
have ever been most pure, and her ears quite
unused to such enunciations. These utterances fall
* This day the following words were noted down, verbatim, by the writer,
as they fell from the lips of one whose case has many points of resem
blance to that of Ophelia :
" Phy. Good morning; how do you do ?
Patient. Very well, thank you. My cow has jumped into the Lord's
pasture. I am driven about from pillar to post. They mean to kill me ;
wonder how my brains will taste? "
In reply to the salutation of another person, and inquiry as to her wel-
fare, she said, " I 've a pain in my side; some one must have killed a
cat; is n't there one dead in the garret?"
OPHELIA. 83
unconsciously, like most words which escape from
their mouths, and when so regarded, they are
robbed of much of their force. Even persons quite
young, and who have been carefully secluded all \
their lives from such language, are found indulging /
in jrtsfiP.np. -expressions when insane; and parents
are struck dumb with astonishment, and wonder
where they could have been learned. This is only
one of the many curious phenomena attendant
upon mania. All this obscenity is, perhaps, fol-
lowed immediately by the sweetest utterances that
can fall from the lips of innocence. Witness the
following, for example, from Ophelia :
" Oph. I hope all will be well. We must be patient ; but I
cannot choose but weep to think they should lay him i' the cold
ground. My brother shall know of it, and so I thank you for
your good counsel. Come, my coach ! Good night, ladies ;
good night, sweet ladies ; good night, good night." *
* The late distinguished Dr. Brigham, than whom no man in modern
times has observed the insane more carefdlly, asserted that he had seen f
all of Shakspeare's characters in the wards of the Utica Asylum, of
which he was physician-in-chief. " Here, too," says he, " is Ophelia, past
cure, past hope, sitting at the piano and singing the songs of Moore and
other modern poets, as the Ophelia of Shakspeare sang the songs of the
jM>ets of her own times." We think we know to whom he refers, and
have quoted her words in the preceding note. Yes, twenty years since
she was here, and here she is now, " the observed of all observers,
quite, quite down; " and though the snows of some sixty winters have
settled upon her head, she still bears traces of that extraordinary beauty
for which she was once celebrated. The causes, too, of her insanity are
known to have been similar to those of the Ophelia of the poet, namely,
ilomcstic sorrow and blighted affections. At times she is obscene ; though,
like her great prototype, apparently as unconscious of this now as she is
of all her early sorrows. She decks herself fantastically, constructs the
most curious and fantastic things, and will sit at the piano, and, with
84 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
When we next meet Ophelia, she is fantastically
dressed with straws and flowers, and though still
more maniacal, if possible, than before, the domi-*
nant thought the death of her father is still
uppermost in her mind, and she sings :
** They bore him barefaced on the bier ;
Hey no nonny, nonny hey nonny ;
And in his grave rained many a tear ;
Fare you well, my dove !
" You must sing, Down-a-down, an' you call him a-down-a. Oh,
how the wheel becomes it ; it is the false steward, that stole his
master's daughter There 's rosemary, that 's for re-
membrance ; 'pray you, love, remember ; and there is pansies,
that 's for thoughts There 's fennel for you, and
columbines ; there 's rue for you, and here 's some for me ;
we may call it herb o' grace of Sundays ; you may wear your
rue with a difference. There 's a daisy ; I would give you
some violets ; but they withered all when my father died. They
say he made a good end,
For bonny sweet Robin is all my joy." [Sings. 22
With great truthfulness,. Laertes adds,
" Thought and affliction, passion, hell itself, she turns to favor
and to prettiness."
The burden of her last song is the same, her
dead parent ; and how plaintive, and what desola-
tion of heart does it exhibit :
much taste, sing the songs of brighter days, together with her own
strange and wild improvisations. And so her life is gliding away, if not
happily, at least without the consciousness of the early sorrows that have
overthrown her.
OPHELIA. 85 f
" And will he not come again ? [Sings.
And will he not come again ?
No, no, he is dead ;
Go to thy death-bed,
He will never come again.
His beard was white as snow,
All flaxen was his poll ;
He is gone, he is gone,
And we cast away moan ;
God a mercy on his soul !
And of all Christian souls ! I pray God. God be wi' you ! "
This is the last utterance of Ophelia which falls
upon our ears ; and all the knowledge we have of
her subsequently, comes through others. The poet
has given us an exhibition of ^ujjigme JpYeliu^ag^
and upon it has called down an intensity of sorrow, y
calculated to enlist the most profound sympathy of
which humanity is capable a sorrow so crushing
that a prolonged exhibition of it would be too
painful. He seems to have been well aware of the
effect he has produced, and, in wisdom, closes the
scene.
The last calamity which can befall the doomed /
one has passed, and death now comes like an angel
of mercy, and the dark pall is made to descend
upon her as gently as was possible, in the nature
of things ; and though this sweet vision of the
poet has passed away, the memory of its loveliness
will linger fresh and green till the very end of all
earthly things. For this and for all that he has
86 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
'given us, humanity is thankful ; and that portion
of humanity, the best, most truthful, most loving,
and most sorrowing, whence he has taken this
character, will, in all coming time, " rise up and
call him blessed."
JAQUES.
rilHOSE who have observed carefully the phe-
- nomena of mind as warped by the more delicate
shades of disease, shades so delicate perhaps as
to be scarcely recognized by the ordinary observer,
must have remarked that in certain cases there
are mental conditions which appear at first sight
almost incompatible and contradictory.
This is most frequently illustrated in those more
mild, but nevertheless marked cases of incipient
melancholia, underlying which may frequently be
found a vein or substratum of genuine humor ; so
that the expression " wrapped in a most humor-
ous sadness " is neither contradictory, nor by any
means paradoxical. How frequently have we
observed even confirmed melancholies, persons so
depressed at times as to be strongly suicidal,
" setting the table in a roar " by the quiet piquancy
of their humor, their countenances at the same time
so expressive of the genuine sadness, the fixed
sorrow that brooded in their hearts, that we hardly
knew whether to weep or smile ; indeed were al-
most ready for both./ Of this class was the poet
Cowper, who, in the midst of profound melan-
cholia, as is well known, could write one of the
88 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
most humorous poems in the English language.
The instance of the comedian who consulted Aber-
nethy for melancholy, and, unknown to the doctor,
was advised to go and hear himself, is a familiar
one. But it is not necessary in this place to mul-
tiply illustrations, as such will occur to the reader,
who will, no doubt, be able to recall examples of
what is here referred to, from the experience of life.
Shakspeare, who observed everything, has fur-
nished us some notable examples, none more 'so,
if we except perhaps Hamlet, than Jaques* the
character we now propose to consider.
In the character of Jaques it is very evident that
Shakspeare intended to represent a certain delicate
shade of incipient melancholia. He is called the
" Melancholy Jaques " by one character in the
play, and another, Rosalind, tells him he is regarded
as a very " melancholy fellow." He speaks of
himself as one who is sometimes " wrapped in a
most humorous sadness," and one who can " suck
melancholy from a song as a weasel sucks eggs."
At the same time he seems to regard his melan-
choly as something quite unique and peculiar to
himself.
When pressed by Rosalind to describe it, he finds
himself unable to say in what it consists, yet of
this he is certain, it is something very delicious,
and a thing he cherishes, and "loves better than
laughing."
" It is not the scholar's melancholy," says he,
" which is emulation ; nor the musician's, which is
JAQUES. 89
fantastical ; nor the courtier's, which is proud ; nor
the soldier's, which is ambitious ; nor the lawyer's,
which is politic ; nor the lady's, which is nice ; nor
the lover's, which is all these," but it is a " melan-
choly of his own," which is " compounded of many
simples, and extracted from many objects," and
one which frequently " wraps him in a most humor-
ous sadness." f N
The melancholy of Jaques is not so much a
fixed condition of disease, as the gradual ingraves-
cence of the melancholic state, that condition so
admirably delineated below by old Burton.
" Generally," says Burton, " thus much we may
conclude of melancholy, that it is most pleasant
at first, blanda ab initio^ a most delightful humour
to be alone, dwell alone, walk alone, meditate
alone lie in bed whole days dreaming awake,
as it were, and frame a thousand fantastical im-
aginations unto themselves ; they are never better
pleased than when they are so doing; they are
in paradise for the time. Tell him what incon-
venience will follow, what "will be the event, all
is one. Canis ad vomitum, 't is so pleasant he cannot
refrain ; so, by little and little, by that shoehorn of
idleness, and voluntary solitariness, melancholy
that feral fiend is drawn on."
When the disease becomes fairly fixed, the
\genuine melancholic is the greatest of egotists.
All his thoughts run in the one turbid stream which
wells up from the dark depths of feeling within
him, when the fountain is stirred by disease and
90 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
morbid impulse. He has no sympathy whatever
with anything external to himself; he cannot force
a genuine smile even at the most ludicrous things,
though perhaps he may be able to induce others
both to smile and weep.
With such, however, Jaques has no part or lot
whatever. And though he is called a "melan-
choly fellow," he is nevertheless a most delightful
dreamer, and the very prince of contemplative
moralizing idlers ; a species of intellectual and
emotional epicurean, if we may use the expression,
whose mental appetite is the most dainty imag-
inable.
Everything in external nature, it matters not
what, which can in any way administer to his intel-
ectual and emotional gratification, he lays hold
upon ; and when once within his grasp, he converts
it into a most delicious, healthful, and life-giving
intellectual aliment; not like the confirmed mel-
ancholic of the more advanced stages, who, by his
morbid imagination, converts it into a poison.
Indeed, after a careful examination of him, we
confess our inability to discover anything more
really morbid in his mental or moral organization,
than what is glancect^t above as belonging to the
initiatory stage of this disease.
His love for lounging and moralizing " under the
greenwood tree, and by the babbling brook," and
his ability to laugh at a fool " an hour by his dial,
sans intermission," or until his lungs do " crow like
chanticleers," is but one of the conditions peculiar
to this initiatory stage of melancholy.
JAQUES. 91
The first introduction which we have to Mons.
Jaques is in the forest of Arden, and the first words
he utters are in commendation of that delightful
little song of Amiens's, which it strikes us is any-
thing but melancholy or suggestive of sadness :
" Under the greenwood tree,
Who loves to lie with me,
And tune his merry note,
To the sweet bird's throat," etc.
Well may Jaques cry " more, more," for the kind
of melancholy he could suck from such a song, was
about as luscious to his feelings and intellectual
appetite, as is the fresh egg to the palate of the
egg-sucking weasel.
Jaques, though at times he appears to assume
the garb of cynicism for the gratification of an in-
tellectual freak, is never egotistical or misanthropic,
but manifests the keenest sympathy with every-
thing. " His sullen fits," as they are called, in
which, according to the Duke, he is so " full of
matter," are not so much the sad introspective
musings of the confirmed melancholic, as the quiet
contemplative musings upon the nature and essence
of surrounding objects. With what keen sympa-
thy can he moralize the spectacle " of a wounded
stag into a thousand similes."
" First, for his weeping into the needless stream ;
* Poor deer/ quoth he, ' thou mak'st a testament
As worldlings do, giving thy sum for more
To that which had too much.' Then, being alone,
Left and abandoned of his velvet friends,
92 SHAKSPEAEE'S INSANE.
* 'T is right/ quoth he, ' thus misery doth part
The flux of company.' Anon, a careless herd,
Full of the pasture, jumps along by him,
And never stays to greet him. l Ay,' quoth Jaques,
* Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens ;
J T is just the fashion. Wherefore do you look
Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there ? ' K
Confirmed melancholies are not given to such
moralizing as this ; they have no sympathy with
humanity, much less with inferior creatures, but
are wholly wrapped up, in themselves and their
own real or fancied ills, and can scarcely be said to
moralize at all ; they theorize much, however, upon
these ills, and speculate continually on their imag-
inary misfortunes. All their ideas centre in them-
selves, and to this focus they seek to concentrate
the thoughts of those who approach them;/ Jaques,
on the contrary, never alludes to himself for the
purposes of enlisting the sympathies of others in
his behalf. When,
" Most invectively he pierces through
The body of country, city, court," etc.,
he does it more as a moralist than as a cynical
misanthrope, or melancholy egotist, " more in
sorrow than in anger,'* and because in the kindness
6f his heart, he has little sympathy with the abuses
which he sees about him in every direction. All
the superficial conventionalities of life not founded
upon genuine feeling, he heartily despises, he
" pierces through " the hollow pretences of cour-
tiers, the false flatteries of the world, with the
JAQUES. 93
keenness and certainty of instinct, and vents his
opinion of them. He feels sympathy for all gen-
uine and refined emotion; for this he experiences,
cultivates, and cherishes ; but to him, " that they
call compliment, is like the encounter of two dog-
apes."
He shuns the company of the Duke, because be /
looks upon him as a man of many words and few
thoughts, a character not at all in accordance
with his ideas and feelings. " The Duke," he says,
" is too disputable for my company ; I think of as *
many things as he, but I give Heaven thanks and
make no boast of them." Jaques has no compan-
ions equal to his own thoughts. When he is told
by Amiens that the Duke " has been all this day to
look you," he replies in a most significant manner,
that he " has been all this day to avoid him."
When, at last, he discovers himself to his friends,
he had been laughing an hour by the fool's dial,
" sans intermission," and the quiet yet significant
irony he pours out upon Lady Fortune, the Duke,
and the miserable world, in his rhapsody over this
motley fool he has met in the forest, is most edify-
ing and characteristic. The fool has made the
profound discovery of " the way the world wags,"
-that as ten o'clock is preceded by nine, and
followed by eleven,
" So, from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale."
94 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
The irony expressed in the lines which follow in
reference to the amusement afforded him by the
fool, is about as rich in its way as anything that
can be found :
When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools should be so deep-contemplative ;
And I did laugh, sans intermission
An hour by his dial. O noble fool !
A worthy fool ! Motley 's the only wear."
To the Duke's question, " What fool is this ? " he
answers that he is a " worthy " fool, and " one that
hath been a courtier," and therefore, as a matter
of course, a genteel, if not a philosophical fool, that
can make the most profound observation ever con-
ceived by a brain " as dry as the remainder biscuit
after a voyage," namely, that,
" If ladies be but young and fair,
They have the gift to know it."
His greatest ambition, he professes, is to be a
fool, that he may utter his sentiments without giv-
ing offence to any one, that he may " rail on Lady
Fortune in good terms, in good set terms," and
utter what he thinks, in a pleasant way, without
being called to account for it.
" Oh, that I were a fool !
I am ambitious for a motley coat
Invest me in my motley ; give me leave
To speak my mind, and I will through and through
JAQUES. 95
Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,
If they will patiently receive my medicine."
But here^let it be observed, he would be a fool only
on certain conditions, which conditions, it strikes
us, are highly creditable to both his head and his
heart. He will be allowed the license of a fool
only, and,
" Provided, that you weed your better judgments
Of all opinion that grows rank in them,
That I am wise. I must have liberty . . .
To blow on whom I please ; for so fools have :
And they that are most galled with my folly,
They most must laugh. And why, sir, must they so ?
The why is plain as way to parish church.
He that a fool doth very wisely hit,
Doth very foolishly, although he smart,
Not to seem senseless of the bob. If not,
The wise man's folly is anatomized
E'en by the squandering glances of the fool."
But he would not like to indulge in personalities,
and " therein tax any private party," or hurt any
one's feelings ; for this he is too gentle, and his
character in this respect contrasts most favorably
with that of the Duke, who indulges in the grossest
personalities towards him, and thereby shows that,
if the one is the nobleman, the other is, in this re-
spect, much more the gentleman :
" Duke. Fie on thee ! I can tell what thou would'st do.
Jaques. What, for a counter, would I do but good ? "
The Duke replies in a tirade of most ungentle-
manly personalities, and the way these are received
96 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
and replied to by Jaques is characteristic of him,
and highly creditable to his temper and disposition.
How charmingly he eschews all personalities, and
a disposition to iniure the feelings of individuals,
in his innocent railings, in what follows :
" Why, who cries out on pride,
That can therein tax any private party ?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the sea,
Till, that the very, very means do ebb ?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I say, the city woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders ?
Who can come in, and say, that I meant her,
When such a one as she, such is her neighbor ? "
Thus does he answer the coarse railings and
gross personalities of the Duke. He does not stoop
to reply in the same strain, and the disposition of
Jaques is nowhere shown to better advantage than
in this scene. The charge of libertinism and sen-
suality, made in such a way, he deems unworthy
of an answer, but he sets forth the animus which
calls out his invectives against the world, and shows
that he deals in generalities. If, in the language
of the Duke, he " disgorges into the general world,"
unlike him, he is never grossly personal or discour-
teous.
" Jaques. Let me see wherein
My tongue hath wronged him ; if it do him right,
Then he hath wronged himself : if he be free,
Why then, my taxing like a wild goose flies,
Unclaimed of any man."
JAQUES. 97
Some one of Shakspeare's critics has made the
remark, that the character of Jaques seems to have
been intended by the poet as a satire upon sat-
irists. If Jaques was intended as a satirist in any
sense, he certainly appears to us the most gentle of
his crew. His railings, though they may be " in
good set terms," are always kindly, and show that
he is sound hearted, and possessed of many gener-
ous feelings and gentle impulses. Neither the sting
of abusive words, nor the attempt of Orlando to
rob him of his meal when famishing in the forest,
call forth any violence of speech or action ; nor does
his conduct here leave upon the mind the impres-
sion of cowardice, but of forbearance and a kindly
consideration for the wants and distresses of others
similarly situated. When suddenly set upon with
a drawn sword, his words are significant, and quite
in accordance with previous manifestations. His
language is not the language of fear, but simply of
quiet concession to the wants of others, perhaps
more pressing than his own :
" An you will not be answered with reason,
I must die. "
JHe cares little for eating or drinking, only that
thereby he can live, and dream, and moralize every-
thing " into a thousand similes." And these phil-
osophical moralizings of his seem to have culmi-
nated in the famous passage in Act II. Scene VII. :
" All the world 'a a stage,
And all the men and women merely players.
7
98 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
They have their exits and their entrances ;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages."
To Jaques, as to Prospero, everything external
was merely a mockery, a show, " an insubstantial
pageant," fading, if not faded, and thought, the
only thing really enduring, and in the end strictly
substantial ; as the sensualist says to himself, " Let
us eat and drink, for to-morrow we die," so, to both
these dreamers, we are really " such stuff as dreams
are made of," and as finally, our " little life " is to
be " rounded with a sleep," therefore, in their phi-
losophy, the true way to pass off even this " little
life" is in moralizing, thinking, and dreaming.
This may not be sound practical philosophy, but
we find in it little trace of anything morbid, mel-
ancholic, or egotistic. There is, perhaps, a certain
delicate shade of sadness, which borders on mel-
ancholy, but as yet there is nothing really morbid.
Everything is strictly within the bounds of physio-
logical soundness.
Jaques, like all of Shakspeare's characters, is
complete in his way, and undoubtedly just what
the poet intended him to be. He does " after his
kind " exactly what he is expected to do, and noth-
ing more nor less.
Viewed as a phase of human character, he is,
as we have said, complete ; but viewed as a model
of humanity, he is, in his mental and moral or-
ganization, most incomplete and inharmonious, but
none the less genuine. One great mainspring in
JAQUES. 99
his mental and moral machinery has either been
broken and destroyed, or left out originally. That
the former was the case, we are led to believe, not
only from his general characteristics, as shown in
his " walk and conversation," but from the words
of the Duke, which we have already referred to.
Like Falstaff, he had no genuine love for the sex.
This was not in the nature of the latter originally,
as shown in the forced attempt in the " Merry
Wives," to represent him in love, and which at-
tempt, we are told, was made by order of the poet's
mistress, Queen Elizabeth, and could not, with
consistency, be shown in any other way than it
was in this play. When the Duke says to Jaques,
" Thou thyself hast been a libertine,
As sensual as the brutish sting itself,"
we are forced, reluctantly, to believe him," not only
from the fact that Jaques does not so much as give
the assertion a simple denial, but from the evidence
furnished by his contemptuous manner of dealing
with the tender passion, whenever and under what-
ever circumstances he comes in contact with it
whether it be in Audrey, Touchstone, Rosalind, (jr
Orlando. To him the clownish love, courtship, and
marriage of Audrey and Touchstone is quite as
interesting and romantic as that of Rosalind and
Orlando. The sharp dialogue between him and
Orlando in Act III. Scene II., shows that he has
far less sympathy with unfortunate swains smitten
by the arrows of Cupid, than for the stag, smitten
100 SIIAKSI'KAKF/S IXSANK.
by the arrow of the hunter in flic forest of Ardcn.
llr r;m lauvh at the one as heartily as lie can
at the other. In the true spirit of the bachelor, he
begs Orlando lo " mar no more trees by writing
love - ison.'js on their barks"; annoys li'nn by Idl-
ing him he docs nol, like flic name of his love,
ami when ( )rlando replies so prettily lo liis <|iie; si ion
about herslalnre, lellin^ him Ihat, sh(i is u jn
high as his hearl," 1m pours ridicule upon him by
asking him if he had nol/ " been acquainted with
goldsmiths' wives, and conned his pretty an^
out of rings." H(^ tells Orlando Ihat his worst fault
is being in love, and ends by hinting that
S( ij'iiior Love is a fool.
In the famous love-scene between Touobstone
and Audrey, in Act III. Scene III., whieh Jaques
witnesses unobserved at a distance, it lias often
struck us that a sight of his countenance, as he
contemplated Ihe amorous farce before him, would
have furnished any one but a confirmed melan-
cholic with material sullieienfly ludicrous to can <
him to laugh an hour by I he dial " sans intermis-
sion"; and .laijues seems t.o have entered into the
Kene with suilie.icnt xest. After the entrance of
ir Oliver Martext to perform the marriage < <rc-
mony, and when the sport is like to be cut short
by the want of some one to give away the bride,
Jaques steps forward and oilers his humble
u Proceed, proceed; I'll give her. . . . Will you
be married, Motley?" It strikes us that the coun-
tenance of Jaques at this precise point wa
JAQI;|',S. 101
of emotion about the opponite of melan-
choly. Jn fact, we think it has been suffi<:i<:nt.Jy
n that Jaques is no confirmed melancholic, in
/ K-.t sense of the term, and as it is now used
by mo'i'rn psychologists; but that this most curi-
/ unique of UK; po<;f ; ' :u:>< < ,- . . .<>,< <>I -<
, or gentle satirist, and that his melancholy
'>i -y , and consists in a profound love for con-
t/:mj>lat.ion and moralizing. This he can do, as he
f.an laugh, by the hour, "gems intermission." What
never tired of him ; but like the
Duke, are glad to "cope him in his sullen fits, 7 '
. i he is so " full of matter ; " and, what is more,
the world will never tire of him. Already, nearly
centuries with their generations have passed
away, and much that these years have produced
han pa<-;:-;<:<l v;ii.h th'-m iuf.o ulU:r for^^tfulncHh " and
mere oblivion/' Much more which now clamors
loudly for earthly immortality will follow ; but that
/ gathering in the forest of Arden will
r be scattered The old man Adam, though
raished when we last saw him, yet lives.
Touchstone is there ; he too, thank Heaven, will
never take his departure. Celia, Orlando, and Bo-
t there, in all the freshness of immor-
tal youth. Jaquen till lingers in the forest, moral-
izing, laughing, and weeping, and there we leave
him, where the generations of the earth will find
him, in all coming time, "under the greenwood
the babbling brook." We shall not
stop to inquire the precise geographical position of
102 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
the forest of Arden, as this would be a species of
topographical criticism for which we have little
taste or inclination ; but content ourselves with the
thought, that wherever it is, it yet " waves above
them its green leaves," and though " dewy with
Nature's tear-drops," will never be found " weep-
ing" that the shadows of its immortals have
passed forever away.
CORDELIA.
character, though perhaps not presenting
as many points of profound psychological sig-
nificance as some others, is, nevertheless, so inti-
mately interwoven with another about which so
much of this peculiar interest is gathered, and,
besides, is so illustrative of the true spirit which
should guide, govern, and direct all who are
thrown in contact with the insane, in whatever
capacity, that it comes properly within the scope
of our inquiry.
The stern and humane principle, the gentleness,
patience, and forbearance which should character-
ize all intercourse with those afflicted, as was her
father, with the most dire of human calamities,
is nowhere so admirably set forth as it has been
in the delineation of the character of this noble,
queenly woman. Shakspeare has placed the
character of Cordelia in immediate juxtaposition
with two others so diametrically opposite in all
things, that it is made to appear the more striking
by the mere force of contrast ; for the truthfulness,
humanity, and tender love of Cordelia is brought
into immediate contact with the selfishness, dupli-
city, and untruthfulness of her two sisters, Goneril
and Regan.
104 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
The first words she utters give us the key-note
to her whole character.
In the state of extreme senility of her father,
she seems to feel at once that she is no match for
her sisters in the contest for his favor and affec-
tions, and after the hollow-hearted words of Gon-
eril, in which she feigns so much love for Lear,
she asks herself sadly and plaintively,
" What shall Cordelia do ? "
For the answer she looks into the depths of
her truthful heart, and it finds expression in the
short but significant phrase,
" Love, and be silent."
Here spoke the true woman. While others
were to receive wealth, honor, and preferment for
their duplicity, an unrequited love was apparently
the only reward for her truthfulness ; but like one
of old, she had "chosen the good part which
should in no wise be taken from her," as the
sequel abundantly proves. Her love was indeed
" cast upon the waters," but, in strict accordance
with that promise which cannot be broken, it was
to be found again, " after many days."
Yet, though caring little apparently for what
she is to lose in a material point of view, she is,
like all true women, sensitively jealous of her good
name, and shrinks appalled from the thought that
the fact of being utterly disinherited and cast
off by her father may even for a moment lead
an uncharitable world to cast its cruel and unjust
CORDELIA. 105
aspersions upon her honor; and before taking
leave of her weak and misguided parent, she pre-
fers the dignified and plaintive appeal which fol-
lows :
" I yet beseech your majesty,
(If for I want that glib and oily art,
To speak and purpose not ; since what I well intend,
I '11 do 't before I speak,) that you make known
It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,
No unchaste action, or dishonored step
That hath deprived me of your grace and favor ;
But even for want of that, for which I am richer,
A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue
That I am glad I have not, though not to have it
Has lost me in your liking."
To the cruel reply of Lear to this plaintive
appeal for the protection of her character and
innocence,
" Better thou
Hadst not been born, than not to have pleased me better,"
she utters no word of remonstrance, but shrinks
back in silence and sorrow, choosing to bide her
time " to love and be silent."
She is little moved apparently when told by
Burgundy, her betrothed, that the loss of father
and fortune must necessarily entail the loss of
a husband, and replies with characteristic dig-
nity,
" Peace be with Burgundy ;
Since that respects of fortune are his love,
I shall not be his wife."
106 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
The farewell she takes of her sisters is equally
characteristic and dignified. She indulges in no
bitter words of reproach, though in commending
her father to their " professed bosoms," she inti-
mates, with dignity, that their duplicity is not
unperceived :
" Cor. The jewels of our father, with washed eyes,
Cordelia leaves you ; I know you what you are ;
And, like a sister, am most loath to call
Your faults, as they are named. Use well our father ;
To your professed bosoms, I commit him.
But yet, alas ! stood I within his grace,
I would prefer him to a better place.
So, farewell to you both, ....
Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides ;
Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.
Well may you prosper."
We hear no more of Cordelia until in Act IV.,
Scene III., the gentleman in attendance upon her
as queen of France, relates to Kent the impres-
sion made upon her by his letters, detailing the
sufferings of her father ; and the deep, yet digni-
fied and undemonstrative grief evinced is in com-
plete accordance with what we have previously
seen in the character of this noble woman. She
does not multiply words, shows no bitterness of
feeling, nor manifests any undue excitement ; yet
it is abundantly evident, from the short, abrupt
ejaculations which she could not entirely sup-
press, that her heart is surcharged with sorrow.
In answer to Kent's questions as to the impres-
CORDELIA. 107
sion made upon her by his letters, the gentleman
replies :
" Gent. She took them, read them in my presence ;
And now and then an ample tear trilled down
Her delicate cheek. It seemed, she was a queen
Over her passion ; who, most rebel-like,
Sought to be king o'er her.
Kent. Oh, then it moved her.
Gent. Not to a rage ; patience and sorrow strove
Who should express her goodliest. You have seen
Sunshine and rain at once ; her smiles and tears
Were like a better way. Those happy smiles,
That played on her ripe lips, seemed not to know
What guests were in her eyes ; which parted thence
As pearls from diamonds dropped. In brief, sorrow
Would be a rarity most beloved, if all
Could so become it.
Kent. Made she no verbal question ?
Gent. 'Faith, once or twice, she heaved the name of
father
Pantingly forth, as if it pressed her heart.
Kent. Cried, Sisters ! sisters / shame of ladies ! sisters !
Father I sisters ! what i* the storm ? i' the night ?
Let pity not be believed. There she shook
The holy water from her heavenly eyes,
And clamor moistened ; then away she started
To deal with grief alone."
When we meet her again at the opening of
Scene IV. of the same Act, she has evidently re-
ceived more definite information as to the mental
condition of her father, and her words are so de-
scriptive of a condition of mind, which all conver-
sant with the forms of insanity must have observed,
that we cannot refrain from quoting them.
108 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
" Alack, 't is lie ; why, he was met even now
As mad as the vexed sea ; singing aloud ;
Crowned with rank fumiter, and furrow weeds,
With harlocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers,
Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow
In our sustaining corn."
She then inquires earnestly of the physician,
" What can man's wisdom do
In the restoring his bereaved sense ? "
The reply of the physician is so fraught with
wisdom, and so expressive of Shakspeare's views
of the treatment of the insane, that it should be
deeply pondered by all. " Repose," the " foster
nurse of Nature," which the old worn body and
distracted brain so much needed, is the first thing
to be sought after, and, to induce this, the physician
says, most truly, there are " means " and " simples
operative " whose power will " close the eye of
anguish."
With implicit trust in the wisdom manifested by
the physician, Cordelia urges that these " means "
be put to immediate use,
" Lest his ungoverned rage dissolve the life
That wants the means to lead it."
Or, in the professional language of our times,
before he sinks irrecoverably from exhaustive mania.
To prevent this is now the sole object of her
thoughts, and with womanly and characteristic
self-sacrifice, she says,
" He that helps him, take all my outward worth.
. . . . All blessed secrets,
CORDELIA. 109
All you unpublished virtues of the earth,
Spring with my tears ! be aidant, and remediate,
In the good man's distress."
How "many a time and oft" has the same
heart-felt aspiration been breathed into the ear of
the physician to the insane, by the loving and de-
voted wife, or daughter, as, with crushed heart
and streaming eyes, they have committed with a
Cordelia's trust and confidence to his care all
they hold most dear upon earth, in " trembling
hope " that the " bruised reed " will not be utterly
" broken."
When the messenger enters, informing her that
" The British powers are marching hitherward,"
the only interest she manifests in the important in-
telligence is connected with her father, and the re-
dress of his great wrongs, and she replies calmly,
and apparently without a thought as to her own
personal safety and the sad destiny that hung over
her,
" 'T is known before ; our preparation stands
In expectation of them. O dear father,
It is thy business that I go about ;
Therefore great France
My mourning, and important tears, hath pitied.
No blown ambition doth our arms incite,
But love, dear love, and our aged father's right."
Here, though her mind is apparently fully occu-
pied with her father's misfortune, she does not for-
get, in the first instance, to express her heart-felt
gratitude to Kent, for his noble, humane, and self-
sacrificing devotion to him :
110 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
" Cor. O thou good Kent, how shall I live and work,
To match thy goodness ? My life will be too short,
And every measure fail me."
She then turns to make anxious inquiries, of the
physician touching the condition of her father.
And here, let it be observed, that the physician, as
depicted by a few master-strokes of this never fail-
ing pencil, seems to have been one fully deserving
of the confidence bestowed upon him. There is
none of the charlatan about him ; he does not mul-
tiply words, or seek to make a vain display of his
medical lore ; he makes no ostentatious exhibition
of " means and appliances " ; neither do we per-
ceive about him, strange to say, any of the curious
notions and fantastic doctrines and ideas concern-
ing the insane which belonged to the sixteenth
century ; had he lived in the nineteenth, his princi-
ples could not have been more simple, natural, and
scientific. Kind care, nourishment, sleep, and rest,
during the course of the disease, and, more es-
pecially during convalesence ; the avoidance of
everything tending to excite the mind of the patient
by turning it back towards what it had previously
dwelt upon, or the supposed exciting causes, are the
principles inculcated. These principles are now
regarded as universally applicable by the best phy-
sicians of modern times, and, indeed, seem to em-
brace nearly all species of treatment not now ob-
solete.
Cordelia, who was a woman of strong common
sense, perceives instinctively the character of her
CORDELIA. Ill
medical adviser, and casts the care of her father
upon him with implicit confidence. Her conduct
here is a lesson to be well pondered by all who are
so unfortunate as to have friends afflicted as was
Lear. She never manifests the slightest inclina-
tion to run counter to his advice, and, even though
this should lead in a direction quite opposite to
her own feeling, inclinations, or affections, we are
made to perceive, that as a fond child, she would
without questioning submit to all reasonable
" means " for the good of him she so much loved.
Although she never questions the means employed
and the skill, judgment, and humane intentions of
her medical adviser, she wishes, as was eminently
right and proper, to know all about his condition ;
and here again the physician, as was to have been
expected from his high character and keen sense
of duty, gives her all the satisfaction in his power.
" Cor. How does the King ?
Phy. Madam, sleeps still.
Cor. O you kind Gods,
Cure this great breach in his abused nature,
The untuned and jarring senses, oh ! wind up,
Of this child-changed father."
The manner in which this simple piece of infor-
mation, that he sleeps, is conveyed by the physi-
cian without comment, and the reply of Cordelia,
show what curative importance was attached to
this condition.
" Phy. So please your majesty,
That we may wake the King ? he hath slept long."
112 SHAKSPEARE'S INSANE.
This question and the reply are significant.
The question was evidently prompted by courte-
ous respect for her rank and her relations to the
patient, and in full confidence that the good sense
of Cordelia would not in the least embarrass him,
or lead her to set up her own will and inclinations
in opposition to his.
The temptation to have her father awakened
prematurely was great, and to one constituted like
herself, and situated as she then was, almost irre-
sistible. His loved voice she had not heard per-
haps for years, and its last sad accents had fallen
upon her ear in mad chidings and unjust com-
plaints, the last glance of his eye had been cruel-
ly unnatural and scornful. The physician had as-
sured her that he had no doubt when the patient
was awakened he would be calm and " temper-
ate," yet she is in no haste, but calmly leaves
all to him. She has applied to him because he
has more knowledge and experience in the mat-
ter than herself, and she is bound not to interfere
with him, or set up her own queenly will to embar-
rass in any way his proceedings. We commend
her conduct here, and the words which follow, to
the careful consideration of all friends of the in-
sane :
" Cor. Be governed by your knowledge,
And proceed in the way of your will."
When told by the physician that now, when he
had slept so long, it would not be improper to
COKDELIA. 113
arouse him, and that she might be present, and
even accomplish this herself, she is not slow to
take advantage of the liberty allowed her ; and
the manner in which she proceeds is eminently
feminine, and characteristic of the genuine wo-
man.
" Cor. O my dear father ! Restoration, hang
Thy medicine on my lips ; and let this kiss
Repair those violent harms that my two sisters
Have in thy reverence made ! ....
Had you not been their father, these white flakes
Had challenged pity of them. Was this a face
To be exposed against the warring winds ?
[To stand against the deep, dread-bolted thunder ?
In the most terrible and nimble stroke
Of quick, cross lightning ? to watch (poor perdu !)
With this thin helm ?] Mine enemy's dog,
Though he had bit me, should have stood that night
Against my fire ; and was 't thou fain, poor father,
To hovel thee with swine, and rogues forlorn,
In short and musty straw ? Alack, Alack !
'Tis wonder that thy life and wits at once
Had not concluded all."
As soon as Lear is awake, the physician per-
ceives the danger of exciting his enfeebled mind
by having it directed to former scenes of sorrow
and trouble, whether real or imaginary, through
which he has passed ; and tenderly and modestly
he breaks in upon Cordelia, who, with her accus-
tomed good sense, heeds at once the admonition :
'' Phy. Be comforted, good madam. The great rage
You see, is killed in him, (and yet it is danger
To make him even o'er the time he has lost.)
114 SHAKSPEAKE'S INSANE.
Desire him- to go in ; trouble him no more,
Till further settling."
Though her father had, when fairly awake, con-
versed quite rationally, she breaks away at once
from what they have been speaking about, and,
evidently seeking to direct his mind into another
channel, asks him to walk away with her. .
Would that all friends of the unfortunate insane
were alike sensible, tractable, and confiding ; and,
we may add, all physicians equally as judicious as
was Lear's. Many sad relapses and much suffer-
ing would be spared ; and much anxiety, care, and
perhaps, fruitless effort saved, while the work of
restoration would be none the less complete.
PART II.
SHAKSPEARE'S
DELINEATIONS OF IMBECILITY.
BOTTOM. DOGBERRY. ELBOW. SHALLOW.
IN former essays we have attempted to point out
the extraordinary accuracy and facility manifested
by the great dramatist in the delineation of mind as
warped and influenced by disease, and to show that
in drawing the characters of Lear, Macbeth, Lady
Macbeth, Ophelia, and Hamlet, he has exhibited a
knowledge of the operations of mind, thus influ-
enced, far beyond that of his own times, and quite
equal to that of the most accomplished psychol-
ogists of our own. Nothing connected with the
operations of the human intellect in any form,
whether of health or disease, seems to have es-
caped the observation of this "myriad-minded"
man ; nothing has been too high for his sublime
and philosophical contemplation, nothing too low
for his minute and careful observation. He has
traversed the whole realm of human intellect, as a
sovereign prince makes a triumphal tour through
a conquered province ; while philosophers and mor-
ralists, physicians and metaphysicians, statesmen,
116 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
lawgivers, and poets, have fallen humbly at his feet,
to do him homage ; for in the province of each he
has been acknowledged worthy to reign supreme.
In that of the physician and medical psychologist,
we think we have already given sufficient evi-
dence of his deserved supremacy, and what is ap-
plicable to this our peculiar province, we believe
to be applicable to al! 3 and that proof of this would
not be difficult to furnish.
To multiply instances and bring forward illus-
trations would not come within the scope of these
papers. One illustration, however, we are tempted
to adduce in this place, which must suffice. So
great was Shakspeare's knowledge of law-forms
and law-terms, (see Lord Campbell's cum multis
aliis,) that nearly every lawyer who reads Shak-
speare carefully is ready to maintain that the poet
must have been a lawyer, or at least a law student,
at some period of his life, and as one once re-
marked to the writer, was only driven from the
legal profession into poetry and the drama by the
force of his great genius. If the validity of such
evidence is to be admitted in proof of his having
been a lawyer, we see no reason why, on the
strength of the proofs we have already adduced, we
should not be allowed to claim that the great bard
must once have been a physician to the insane ;
for we think we have shown conclusively that he
understood insanity in all its varied forms ; and
perhaps it would not be more difficult to show that
Shakspeare was once physician-in-chief to Bed-
THE UNIVERSALITY OF SHAKSPEARE'S GENIUS. 117
lam Hospital, than to establish many other things
that have been asserted respecting his early career.
Such, for example, as his horse-grooming and deer-
stealing.
But, unlike our brethren of the law, we seek to
set up no special claim to him as one of our num-
ber, but content ourselves with regarding him as
the common property of all thinkers in each and
every department of literary effort and scientific re-
search ; and proceed at once to consider another
phase of this great intellectual luminary of the
sixteenth century, namely, his delineations of the
innumerable shades of mental obtuseness and men-
tal imbecility in the characters of his fools and
clowns.
In the illustration of the varied and innumerable
shades of folly, mental obtuseness, arid mental im-
becility naturally incident to humanity, our poet
is incomparably rich, and every degree and order
of mental manifestation is represented with a truth-
fulness and vigor which has never been equalled,
and perhaps never will be to the end of time. He
has given us a type of everything bearing the shape
of humanity, however remote, and the class of
characters we now have to consider, like all his
others, do not stand up before us as creatures of the
imagination, but as real bodily existences, so that
we cannot divest ourselves of the idea that such
must at some period of time have walked or
" crawled between heaven and earth." Many of
them we have seen; and those that we have not, we
118 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
feel that we might and should have seen " if our
eyes had been opened " like those of the poet.
Of imbeciles and clowns fools as they are gen-
erically termed he has an almost endless variety,
and the very names which he gives them are some-
times so strikingly significant and characteristic,
that the mere mention of them forces a smile.
Let us take a few examples by way of introduc-
tion, and see if we can suppress a smile when the
mere name of some of them is called out from
the presentation role. Bottom the Weaver, Peter
Quince the Carpenter, Snug the Joiner, Snout the
Tinker, Flute the Bellows-mender, Starveling the
Tailor, Christopher Sly the Tinker, Sir Toby Belch,
Sir Andrew Ague-cheek, Froth, Dogberry, Mal-
volio, Launcelot Gobbo, Touchstone, Simple,
Slender, Shallow, Speed, Dull, Costard, Caliban,
Elbow, Lucio, Moth, Mouldy, Shadow, Feeble,
Bull-calf, and Wart ; and lastly, as the curious pro-
cession must end somewhere, comes Launce, lead-
ing his interesting dog Crab.
Here we have presented to us a galaxy of fools
such as is nowhere else to be found, and every
shade of folly, imbecility, and mental obtuseness is
represented ; and the portraiture of each, as deline-
ated by the bard, is well worthy of the cognomen
bestowed.
First in the motley procession we see Bottom
the Weaver, the very embodiment and quintessence
of self-conceit, and of everything, in short, necessary
to constitute a perfect human ass. It was not suf-
BOTTOM AND QUINCE. 119
ficient for him simply to be " writ down an ass " in
the record, like Dogberry, but the diadem which
crowned him prince of all his tribe must be placed
in due form upon his head, and when first led in
by Puck after his coronation, the poet must cer-
tainly have chuckled over his own workmanship,
and said quietly to himself, " O all ye tribes
of human asses, that are, ever have been, or ever
will be, behold your king ! from this time hence-
forth and forever, let no one of you deny my
anointed." And to all posterity he seems yet to say,
" Behold the perfection of conceited blockheads, $
the asinorum asinalissimus^ par excellence ! From
henceforth and forever let no man dispute my work-
manship. Doubt if you will that moonshine can
be personated by a man holding a lantern behind
a thorn-bush ; that a lion can modulate his voice
so sweetly that he shall roar you as 'twere any
nightingale or sucking dove ; that a wall can be
personated by a man plastered over with lime and
rough cast ; but while Bottom, wearing his ass's
head, can, by his conceit which makes all things
possible, believe this, let no one deny that he is the
crowned and anointed king of Donkeys."
And by what a court is this strange potentate
surrounded and worshipped !
First we see Peter Quince the Carpenter and
Playwright. If Bottom is prince of donkeys,
Quince takes the first place of honor in his court
and his title, prince of playwrights, like that of
Bottom, cannot be disputed.
120 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
O all ye tribes of playwrights, wherever ye are,
ye Knowleses, and Shees, and Maturins ; ye Gill-
parzers, Klingemanns, and Kotzebues ; many of you
cunning men in your handicraft, behold your king,
Peter Quince, the anointed of the poet! And
whomsoever he anoints and crowns let none of
you seek to depose.
And you, ye " periwig-pated players," who,
whether ameteur or professional, can " tear a passion
to tatters," to very rags ; ye who are capable of
nothing but inexplicable dumb show, and noise to
" split the ears of the groundlings " ; who " strut
and bellow, having neither the accent of Christians,
nor the gait of Christians, pagans, or men, pro-
ducts of Nature's journeymen," those mechanics
who " imitate Nature so abominably," remember
your great antecessors, those histrionic mechanicals
of the poet, Snug the Joiner, Starvling the Tailor,
Flute the Bellows-mender, and Snout the Tinker.
So extensive, varied, and rich is Shakspeare in
his illustrations of the almost endless forms of
metal imbecility, that it would be impossible to
give each more than a passing glance in this con-
nection. He has taken his subjects for portraiture
from all ranks and grades of life, high and low,
rich and poor ; and almost every trade, profession,
and calling has furnished material aid. With this
mere glance at such as he has selected from his
own calling, the histrionic, we pass on to take a
view of his official imbeciles.
Of this class of mental impotents we hardly
DOGBERRY. 121
know which to select to head the list, whether
Dogberry, Justice Shallow, or some other, as each
seems to claim preeminence. With all due defer-
ence to others, however, we consider we shall not
go far astray in selecting the first.
Dogberry is not so much an imaginary character
as a type of a class of bungling judicial impotents '
to be found in real life, through whose clumsy and
cowardly imbecility many a thief has escaped the
penitentiary, and many a murderer the gallows.
The outskirts of civilization in all new countries
furnish too many such. A justice of this kind,
who had allowed the chief of a trio of murderers to
escape, we once saw in the witness-box at a court
of Assize, held before one of the most learned and
eloquent judges on the bench ; and the answers to
the questions put to him by the judge would have
done ample justice to Dogberry himself. " Is it
possible," said the judge, at the conclusion of his
examination of the witness, "that you are a jus-
tice of the peace ? " " Yes, and I has been for
more as fifteen years, your honor," was the reply.
" God help the country ! " said the learned judge,
as he dismissed him contemptuously from the stand.
Shakspeare, with a few vigorous touches of his
never-failing pencil, has given us a full-length por-
trait of such a character in Dogberry. (See Much
Ado About Nothing, Act III., Scene III., and Act
IV., Scene II.)
The downright stupidity, ignorance, and donkey-
ism shown in Act III., Scene V., and the ludicrous
122 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
misuse and misconception of terms peculiar to
worthies of the Dogberry and Verges stamp, is rich
in the extreme.
" Leonato, What is it, my good friends ?
Dogberry. Goodman Verges, sir, speaks a little of this mat-
ter an old man, sir, and his wits are not so blunt as, God
help, I would desire they were ; but, in faith, honest as the skin
between his brows.
Verges. Yes, I thank God, I am as honest as any man
living, that is an old man and no honester than I.
Dogberry. Comparisons are odorous ; palabras, neighbor
Verges.
Leonato. Neighbors, you are tedious.
" It pleases your worship to say so," says Dogberry, (evidently
not comprehending the term tedious, but mistaking it for a com-
modity of value), " but we are the poor duke's officers ; but,
truly, for mine own part, if I were as tedious as a king, I could
find in my heart to bestow it all on your worship.
Leonato. All thy tediousness on me ! ha !
Dogberry. Yes, and 'twere a thousand times more than
't is ; " etc.
The following, as a sample of drivelling senile
imbecility, can scarce be matched, and is from the
mouth of Dogberry, where he speaks of Verges,
and in which (quite oblivious, of course, as to his
own stupidity) he patronizingly and with great
self-satisfaction bewails the infirmities of his
brother official.
" Dogberry. A good old man, sir ; he will be talking ; as
they say, When the age is in, the wit is out ; God help us ! It
is a world to see ! Well said, i' faith, neighbor Verges : well,
God 's a good man ; an two men ride of a horse, one must ride
behind. An honest soul, i' faith, sir ; by my troth, he is, as ever
DOGBERRY. 123
broke bread ; but God is to be worshipped. All men are not
alke ; alas ! good neighbor ! "
When Leonato reminds him that indeed his
friend comes very far short of himself, what self-
satisfaction and conceit is embodied in his short
reply.
" Gifts," says he, " Gifts that God gives ! " quite
unconscious that his greatest gift is like that con-
ferred, on Bottom, the gift of an ass's head.
But the climax of bungling imbelicity, ignorant
officiousness, and self-conceit, we have in Act IV.,
Scene II., where Dogberry presides at the court of
inquiry held over Conrade and Borachio ; and the
laughable record of proceedings, in which every-
thing is so curiously jumbled together, where
everything which is impertinent is carefully noted
down, and everything incident to the inquiry as
carefully excluded, and where terms the most dis-
similar are confounded, furnishes, in its way, a
model of judicial procedure. The first blunder he
makes is simply the confounding of himself and
his brother official with the culprits to be examined
before him :
" Dogberry. Is our whole dissembly appeared ? . . .
Sexton. Which be the malefactors ?
Dogberry. Marry, that am I and my partner.
Verges. Nay, that 's certain ; we have the exhibition to
examine."
After duly recording the names of his prisoners,
the first question he puts to them is certainly most
pious and pertinent, considering the characters
he is supposed to address :
124 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
" Masters," says he, " do you serve God ? "
" Con. and Bora. Yes, sir, we hope.
Dogberry. Write down that they hope they serve God ;
and write God first ; for God defend but God should go before
such villains ! "
The idea soon strikes the Sexton that the pro-
ceedings are somewhat informal, and that wit-
nesses and proof were necessary.
" Sexton. Master constable, you go not in the way to ex-
amine ; you must call forth the watch that are their accusers."
Dogberry, whose dignity is hard to offend, and
who is totally unsuspicious that any one should
ever presume to question his knowledge and intelli-
gence, seizes at once upon the suggestion, as though
it was something of minor importance, however,
that had escaped him in the most casual way. He
says :
" Dogberry. Yea, marry, that 's the eftest way. Let the
watch come forth. Masters, I charge you, in the prince's
name, accuse these men."
The first witness testifies that one of the prisoners
called Don John a villain. Dogberry immediately
orders Don John to be put down a villain in the
record, and pronounces the calling a man villain
flat perjury. The second witness testifies that the
other prisoner had declared that he received a
thousand ducats from Don John for accusing a
lady wrongfully. " Flat burglary" says Dogberry,
" as ever was committed."
" Verges. Yea, by the mass, that it is. ...
Dogberry. O villain ! thou wilt be condemned into ever-
lasting redemption for this."
DOGBERRY. 125
The Sexton suggests that the prisoners be bound
and removed. Dogberry, acting upon the hint, im-
mediately orders them to be " opinioned," when
one of them, resisting, calls him a coxcomb. This
does not seem greatly to disturb his equanimity.
Perhaps, as usual, he does not fully comprehend
the import of the word coxcomb ; for he calls the
prisoner simply a naughty varlet, and orders the
Sexton to write down the prince's officer a coxcomb
in his extraordinary record of procedure. The
other prisoner is more clear and explicit. The term
he applies to Dogberry is by no means ambiguous.
" You are an ass," says he, emphatically, and re-
peats it, " You are an ass." The import of the
term ass Dogberry has no difficulty in compre-
hending; that is quite clear, and he immediately
throws himself back upon his offended official dig-
nity, and the terms in which he asserts this are
most ludicrously characteristic :
" Dogberry. Dost thou not suspect my place ? Dost thou
not suspect iny years ? Oh, that he were here to write me
down an ass ! -But, masters, remember that I am an ass ;
though it be not written down, yet forget not that I am an ass.
No, thou villain, thou art full of piety, as shall be proved on thee
by good witnesses. I am a wise fellow ; and, which is more,
an officer ; and, which is more, an householder ; and, which is
more, as pretty a piece of flesh as any in Messina ; and one that
knows the law, go to ; and a rich fellow enough, go to ; and a
fellow that hath had leases ; and one that hath two gowns,
and everything handsome about him. Bring him away. Oh,
that I had been writ down an ass ! "
Another official of the Dogberry stamp we have
126 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
in constable Elbow, in " Measure for Measure."
As with Dogberry, much of the humor of this
character rests upon his ridiculous misuse and mis-
conception of the most common terms.
" Elbow. If it please your honor, I am the poor duke's con-
stable, and my name is Elbow. I do lean upon justice, sir, and
do bring in here before your honor two notorious benefactors.
Angela. Benefactors ? Well, what benefactors are they ?
are they not malefactors ? " '
The meek simplicity of the reply, and the don-
key-like unconsciousness with which he contradicts
himself, is worthy of the most accomplished of our
poet's long-eared officials.
" Elbow. If it please your honor, I know not what they
are ; but precise villains they are, that I am sure of; and void
of all profanation in the world, that good Christians ought to
have."
A little farther on he makes other most ludicrous
blunders in the use of the king's English ; /which
blunders, aided by the humor of the clpwn, are
near calling in question the character o his own
wife. When Elbow is asked by Escalus by what
authority he gives the clown and his employer,
Mistress Over-done, such an infamous character,
he replies :
" My wife, sir, whom I detest (protest) before Heaven," &c.
..." I say, sir, I will detest myself, also, as well as she, that
this house, if it be not a bawd's house, it is a pity of her life,
for it is a naughty house." . . .
" First, and it like you, the house is a respected (suspected)
house ; next, this a respected fellow ; and his mistress is a
respected woman.
SHALLOW. 127
Clown. By this hand, sir, his wife is a more respected
person than any of us all.
Elbow. Varlet, thou liest ; thou liest, wicked varlet ; the
time is yet to come, when she was ever respected with man,
woman, or child.
Clown. Sir, she was respected with him, before he married
with her.
Elbow. O thou caitiff! O thou varlet! O thou wicked
Hannibal ! I respected with her before I was married to her !
If ever I was respected with her, or she with me, let not your
worship think me the poor duke's official ; Prove this, thou
wicked Hannibal, or I '11 have my action of battery on thee."
This whole scene in " Measure for Measure," (Act
II., Scene II.,) is exceedingly rich in illustration of
our subject. The amusing circumlocution of the
clown in telling his story in defence from the
charge brought against him by Elbow is also very
characteristic.
The next worthy we select from our list of im-
beciles is Shallow, or, as he designates himself
and is described by his scarcely less interesting
cousin Slender, " Robert Shallow, Esquire, in the
county of Gloster, justice of the peace and cor am
and custalorum^ and ratolorum, a gentleman born,
who writes himself armigero in all warrants, obli-
gations, &c., and has done so any time these three
hundred years, as all his successors gone before
him have done, and all his ancestors that come
after him may do." As with other worthies of his
class in real life, who have "a plentiful lack of
wit," a plentiful supply of titles and cheap honors
is necessary to complete his personality. When
128 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
Nature is niggardly in her gifts, Fortune sometimes
steps in to make in her way ample restitution, and
a " plentiful lack " of brains is compensated by a
plentiful supply of bonds, and the lack of wit and
wisdom by " land and beeves." Among worthies of
this class, Robert Shallow, Esquire, of Gloster, holds
an eminently respectable, if not honorable position ;
and though his antecedents, as given by Falstaff,
are not the most flattering, as we shall see, this mat-
ters little. Like other " respectables," he is only un-
der the necessity of remembering such as are suited
to his present circumstances and condition in life.
Shallow, like a true scion of a genuine English
family of parvenues, has gone through the forms
necessary to a liberal education. He has shown
above that he has some Latin, and when Bar4olph
tells him that the soldier Falstaff is better accom-
dated than with a wife, he adds, after a little cir-
cumlocution : " Accommodated, that comes of ac-
commodo ; very good, a good phrase." What little
Latin he has, he is ready to display upon every con-
venient, and sometimes inconvenient occasion, like
all superficials. Like his cousin William, he may
have been at Oxford to the great " cost" of some
one, bringing home with him, as the natural fruit
of this " cost," a cherished and ever-abiding re-
membrance of his wildness and folly. " I was
once," says he, " at Clement's Inn, where I think
they will talk of mad Shallow yet."
How very natural is the boasting which follows !
It might have come from the mouth of any one
SHALLOW. 129
" of all the kind of the " Shallows, as well as from
Robert Shallow, Esquire, of Gloster :
" By the mass, I was called anything ; and I would have
done anything, indeed, and roundly too. There was I, and
little John Doit, of Staffordshire, and black George Bare, and
Francis Pickbone, and Will Squele, a Cotswold man, you
had not four such swingebucklers in all the inns of court, again ;
and I may say to you, we knew where all the bona-robas were,
and had the best of them all at commandment."
The crouching obsequiousness and lack of dig-
nified self-respect in their intercourse with superi-
ors in rank and station in life, so characteristic of
the whole family of Shallows, wherever found,
(and every one must have met some of them in
the journey of life,) is admirably delineated in the
scene where he bores Falstaff with his vain, offi-
cious, and bustling hospitality, a hospitality based
entirely upon vanity, and a desire to show off his
own importance, and to " have a friend at court."
" Shalloiv. Nay, you shall see mine orchard, where in an
arbor, you will eat a last year's pippin of mine own graffing,
and a dish of carraways, and so forth."
The silly affectation of his reply to the knight's
compliment to his rich dwelling is also quite char-
acteristic, " Barren, barren, barren ; beggars all,
beggars all, Sir John ! "
Notwithstanding this affectation of poverty and
beggary, it is plain to all, and to none more so
than Falstaff, that the Shallows are a thriving fam-
ily. If he is an adept in finesse, Shallow is infi-
nitely his superior in finance and domestic econo-
130 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
my ; shrewdness in these matters is, as a rule, quite
characteristic of the Shallows, wherever they are
found. Indeed, the most worldly thoughts are apt
to creep in and disturb their most solemn musing ;
sometimes it is to be feared, their very devotions.
When Silence reminds Shallow of the uncertainty
of life, he replies :
" Certain, 't is certain, very sure, very sure ; death, as the
Psalmist saith, is certain to all ; all must die. How a good yoke
of bullocks at Stamford fair ? "
Even in the midst of his excitement at the arri-
val of the " man-of-war " and his suite, and his
bustling endeavors to entertain them suitably to
his own dignity, and to their importance as coming
from the court, he can stop to give directions in
matters of business and domestic economy to his
man Davy :
" Marry, sir, thus ; those precepts cannot be served : and,
again, sir, Shall we sow the headland with wheat ?
Shallow. With red wheat, Davy ? . . .
Davy. Yes, sir. Here is now the smith's note for shoe-
ing and plough-irons.
Shallow. Let it be cast, and paid. Sir John, you shall
not be excused.
Davy. Now, sir, a new link to the bucket must needs be
had. And, sir, do you mean to stop any of William's wages,
about the sack he lost the other day at Hinckley fair ?
Shallow. He shall answer it," &c.
How descriptive is all this of a class of charac-
ters to be met with every day ; they are fools, and
acknowledged to be such by the world, yet in
SHALLOW. 131
money transactions and matters of domestic econ-
omy they are " wise as serpents." And yet in
these matters of finance and economy their serpent
wisdom is not always a match, however, for the
hawk-eyed vigilance and shrewd wit of the spend-
thrift, who, taking them in an unguarded moment,
and understanding well their weak points, by a
stroke of policy relieves them at once of the hard
earnings and niggardly savings of years, as Falstaff
relieved Justice Shallow of his thousand pounds.
Who is there that has not met some one or more
of this family of Shallows ? It is a known fact in
psychology that a man may be " stark mad " on
one or two subjects, and to all outward appear-
ances quite sound on others. Upon precisely the
same psychological principles we may suppose
that a man may be wise on some one or two sub-
jects, and in the sense in which the term is applied
to Shallow, a fool on all others. Indeed our ex-
perience and observation of life teach us that it
is so.
Another characteristic of the Shallows is admi-
rably illustrated in Act V., Scene I., namely, their
manner of dealing with domestics and dependents.
Towards the weak, like William, who lost the
sack, they are overbearing and cruel, while, uncon-
sciously to themselves, they are completely ruled
and led captive by those who are cunning and
strong of will and purpose, like Davy, who in real-
ity is the justice in all but name, and on such
familiar terms with his nominal master that he
132 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
presumes to dictate the manner in which he is to
dispense his judical favors.
" Davy. I beseech you, sir, to countenance William Visor of
Wincot, against Clement Perkes of the hill.
Shallow. There are many complaints, Davy, against that
Visor ; that Visor is an arrant knave, on my knowledge.
Davy. I grant your worship that he is a knave, sir ; but
yet, Heaven forbid, sir, but a knave should have some coun-
tenance at his friend's request. An honest man, sir, is able to
speak for himself, when a knave is not. I have served your
worship truly, sir, these eight years ; and if I can not once or
twice in a quarter bear out a knave against an honest man, I
have but a very little credit with your worship. The knave is
mine honest friend, sir ; therefore, I beseech your worship, let
him be countenanced.
Shallow. Go to ; I say, he shall have no wrong," &c.
But for a climax to every description of the
character of Justice Shallow we must resort to
Falstaff. It would be impertinent to look for such
elsewhere. The fat knight, whose brain was by
nature as plethoric of wit and worldly wisdom as
was the rest of his huge body of capons, sack, and
sugars, measures at once the mental calibre of the
lean justice and the depth of his purse, and
shapes his course accordingly. " I do see the bot-
tom of Justice Shallow," says he ; and if he ha<J
never told a greater lie, or made a more unreason-
able boast, he would not have been Jack Falstaff.
But let us come at once to his descriptive climax
of Justice Shallow :
" If I were sawed into quantities, I should make four dozen
such bearded hermit's-staves as Master Shallow. It is a wonder-
SHALLOW. 133
ful thing to see the semblable coherence of his men's spirits and
his ; they, by observing of him, do bear themselves like foolish
justices ; he, by conversing with them, is turned in a justice-
like serving man ; their spirits are so married in conjunction
with the participation of society, that they flock together in
consent, like so many wild geese. If I had a suit to Master
Shallow, I would humor his men, with the imputation of being
near their master ; if to his men, I would curry with Master
Shallow, that no man could better command his servants. It is
certain that either wise bearing or ignorant carriage is caught
as men take diseases, one of another ; therefore, let men take -
heed of their company. I will devise matter out of this Shal-
low, to keep Prince Harry in continual laughter, the wearing
out of six fashions, (which is four terms, or two actions,) and
he shall laugh without intervallums. Oh, it is much, that a lie
with a slight oath, and a jest with a sad brow, will do with a
fellow that never had the ache in his shoulders. . . .
" Lord, lord, how subject we old men are to this vice of
lying. This same starved justice has done nothing but prate
to me of the wildness of his youth, and the feats he hath done
about Turnbull Street ; and every third word a lie, duer paid
to the hearer than the Turk's tribute. I do remember him at
Clement's Inn, like a man made after supper of a cheese-paring ; ^
when he was naked he was for all the world like a forked
radish, with a head fantastically carved on it with a knife ; he
was the very genius of famine, yet lecherous as a monkey. . .
He came ever in the rearward of the fashion, and sung those
tunes to the over-scutched huswives that he heard the carmen
whistle, and sware they were his fancies, or his good-nights.
And now is this Vice's dagger become a squire ; and talks as
familiarly of John of Gaunt as if he had been sworn brother to
him ; and I '11 be sworn he never saw him but once in the Tilt-
yard ; and then he burst his head for crowding among the mar-
shal's men. I saw it, and told John of Gaunt he beat his own
name ; for you might have thrust him and all his apparel into
an eel-skin ; the case of a treble hautboy was a mansion for him,
134 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
a court ; and now hath he lands and beeves. Well, I will be
acquainted with him, if I return; and it shall go hard but I
will make him a philosopher's two stones to me. If the young
dace be a bait for the old pike, I see no reason in nature but I
may snap at him. Let time shape, and then an end."
MALVOLIO. BARDOLPH. NYM. PISTOL.
WE have frequently had occasion to remark
that whatever Shakspeare does is always
complete in its way, and leaves nothing to be de-
sired. The ass and the fool which he depicts are
ever the ass and the fool par excellence, and he has
been no less successful in drawing a fantastic and
a fop ; for if Bottom, as we have seen, is prince
of donkeys, Malvolio is prince of fops, and his
title is also not to be disputed.
Malvolio, of all Shakspeare's impotents, has al-
ways appeared to us the most contemptible and
least interesting, unless to make a man supremely
ridiculous is to cast about him a certain amount
of interest from this very reason. The other fools
we have glanced at, have all some redeeming qual-
ities, and there is not one of them for whom we
should not feel more pity if placed by his folly in
the circumstances in which Malvolio finds himself,
in Act IV., Scene II, " Twelth Night," where he is
confined for supposed lunacy, and " Sir Topas, the
curate, comes to visit Malvolio the lunatic." Dog-
berry, Shallow, Bottom, and his companions are all
imbeciles in their way, but the most we can do is
to pity the fools and smile at their folly ; but for
136 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
Malvolio we feel a sort of contempt, for he is not
simply a fool, he is also a fantastic, the very sub-
lime of coxcombs and affected fops. Dogberry, as
we have seen, is an ass and a fool, but he at least
thinks he is a " wise fellow," and one that " knows
the law." Let others think as they will of him,
he himself believes that he has some brains, and
the same remark is applicable to Shallow. This
sort of conceit, applying as it does to certain in-
tellectual qualities, for which, if not possessed,
it shows at least a respect and a desire, com-
mands our sympathy. Even Bottom the Weaver,
the prince of donkeys, is not contemptible; he
believes that he is the very perfection of histrionics,
for he is told so by Peter Quince, and worshipped
as such by the motley crew that surrounds him, and
we smile at the delusion and pity the deluded, but
feel no contempt for him. Indeed, the very facul-
ties in him which prompt him to covet these high
histrionic honors prevent this. Not so, however,
with Malvolio, the fop par excellence ; for, like all
his tribe, he has not so much as the conceit of any-
thing intellectual. As to whether he has wit or
wisdom whether like Dogberry he is a " wise
fellow " who u knows the law," or like Shallow can
write Esquire or armigero to his name is all a
matter of very small importance to him. Indeed,
as to whether he has an excess or deficiency of
brains, is a question which never troubles him ;
for, like the genuine fop, his external personal qual-
ities are with him all-sufficient, all in all. To Mai-
MALVOLIO. 137
volio, indeed to all the family of Malvolios, what
is the mind of a Newton, a Shakspeare, or a Leib-
nitz, or an intellect rich in all the philosophy of
a Plato, or the learning of an Erasmus ? Has
he not what will more than compensate for the
lack of all these ? Has he not a most magnificent
pair of legs, which, garnished with yellow stockings
and cross- gartered, must be quite irresistible to all
the rich Olivias in the world ? Besides, has he not
a splendid set of teeth, and is not his smile in the
presence of his mistress quite overpowering ?
Like all brainless fops, his smile he regards as the
chief weapon with which he subdues hearts ; that
continuous, affected, unmeaning, half-idiotic smile,
always ready to garnish the face, in season and out
of season, having no soul, spirit, or life behind
which prompts it, and which, to the genuine smile
springing from all these and lighting up an intelli-
gent countenance, is as the dim light of a night
lantern to the Aurora Borealis, or the heat light-
nings of a summer evening. See how he opens
his batteries upon his mistress, in Scene IV.,
Act III:
" Olivia. Where is Malvolio ?
Maria. He 's coming, madam ; but in very strange manner.
He 's sure possessed, madam.
Olivia. Why, what 's the matter ? does he rave ?
Maria. No, madam, he does nothing but smile : . . . Sure,
the man is tainted of his wits.
Olivia. Go, call him hither. . . . How now, Malvolio ?
Malvolio. Sweet lady, ha, ha. [Smiles fantastically.
Olivia. Smilest thou ? I sent for thee upon a sad occasion.
138 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
MaL Sad, lady ? I could be sad ; this does make some
obstruction in the blood, this cross-gartering. But what of that ?
if it please the eye of one, it is with me, as the very true sonnet
hath it, ' please one, please all.'
Olivia. Why, how dost thou, now? What is the matter
with thee ?
Mai. Not black in my mind, though yellow in my legs,"
etc.
Like all Shakspeare's characters, Malvolio is a
being of real life. No one can walk from the Bat-
tery the length of Broadway without meeting more
than one Malvolio, men who scarce have a
thought not derived from their tailor, hatter, boot-
maker, or posture-master, and who, like Malvolio,
think of nothing but their externals, and how these
are to be made to dazzle the eyes of some rich
Olivia, of whom, in their own estimation, none is
so worthy as themselves. The yellow stockings
of Malvolio have indeed disappeared, giving place
to the flashy vest ; and the obstruction of blood by
tight cross-gartering, which pained Malvolio and
made him sad, is now brought about by very tight
boots. As a specimen of their meditations as they
strut along the pavement, stroking their beards,
twirling their canary-colored canes, and looking
both wise and foolish, or like him " practice be-
havior to their own shadows," we take the follow-
ing from the mouth of their great prototype :
" 'Tis but fortune ; all is fortune. Maria once told me she
did affect me ; and I have heard herself come thus near, that,
should she fancy, it should be one of my complexion. Besides,
she uses me with a more exalted respect than any one else that
MALVOLIO. 139
follows her. What should I think on 't ? To be Count Mal-
volio; There's example for't; the lady of the Strachy
married the yeoman of the wardrobe. Having been three
months married to her, sitting in my state, Calling my officers
about me in my branched velvet gown ; . . . And then to have
the humor of state ; and after a demure travel of regard
telling them, I know my place, as I would they should do theirs
to ask for my kinsman Toby : Seven of my people, with
an obedient start, make out for him : I frown the while ; and,
perchance, wind up my watch, or play with some rich jewel.
Toby approaches ; courtesies there to me : I extend my hand
to him thus, quenching my familiar smile with an austere re-
gard of control : Saying, Cousin Toby, my fortunes having
cast me upon your niece, give me this prerogative of speech :
You must amend your drunkenness," &c., &c.
We doubt much if a more complete personifica-
tion of self-love could be drawn than has been by
Shakspeare in the character of Malvolio. This
sentiment is here developed in all its perfection,
and we believe that the closest scrutiny and most
complete analysis of the character could not dis-
cover anything beyond the most consummate ego-
tism in the whole machinery of his mind. This is
the mainspring which sets all in motion. He is
" sick of self-love," and this causes him to taste
everything with a " distempered appetite." Every-
thing which can in any way satisfy his vanity is
devoured greedily, and without questioning the
quality of the aliment, or the source whence it has
been obtained. To this distempered appetite his
folly is chief purveyor. When the forged letter
which intimates to him that his rich mistress is in
love with him is left in his way, he scarcely allows
140 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
himself to question its genuineness. " By my life,"
says he, " this is my lady's hand ; these be her very
C's, her IPs, and her T's." He is so much in love
not with her, but with the vain idea that he will
not allow that there can be any mistake about the
matter. Therefore, says he, " it is evident to any
formal capacity. Daylight and champaign discov-
ers not more." And as he swallows the bait which
has been so cunningly prepared for him, see how
he swells himself and gloats over it :
" I will be proud, I will read politic authors, I will baffle Sir
Toby, I will wash off gross acquaintance, I will be point-device,
the very man. I do not now fool myself, to let imagination jade
me ; for every reason excites to this, that my lady loves me.
She did commend my yellow stockings of late, she did praise
my leg being cross-gartered ; and in this she manifests herself
to my love, and, with a kind of injunction, drives me to these
habits of her liking. I thank my stars I am happy. I will be
strange, stout, in yellow stockings, and cross-gartered, even with
the swiftness of putting on. ... Jove, I thank thee. I will
smile ; I will do everything that thou wilt have me."
Everything, as we have observed, turns upon his
vanity and egotism. The pains he takes to pre-
serve order in the household, disturbed by the
druken revels of Sir Toby Belch and Sir Andrew
Ague-cheek, is more from a desire to show off the
importance of his stewardship in the eyes of his
mistress and others, than for any love he has for
her or the household. Indeed, any other kind of
love than the love of self would be quite inconsis-
tent with his whole character.
With all the desire he has to marry his mistress,
PISTOL. 141
which causes him to make such an ass of himself,
and others to make such a fool of him, we see not
a trace of love for her. No ; it is the idea of her
love for a man of his complexion for Malvolio,
the exquisite in yellow stockings, the fop who can
bow so elegantly, and the fool that can grin so in-
comparably that fills him to overflowing; not his
love for her, to which scarcely an allusion is made.
Need we ask the reader if he has ever seen the
counterparts of Malvolio in real life ? individuals
into whose bosoms the sentiment of love for an-
other could not possibly enter, while their vanity
and self-love are so great as to lead them to be- v/
lieve themselves quite irresistible, and that, for their
mere external, personal qualities every one must
love them at first sight as well as they love them-
selves ?
In Ancient Pistol we have another and very dif-
ferent kind of fool from any we have hitherto con-
sidered ; but he is also a prince in his way, and
his realm is that of bombast and " buncombe." Pis-
tol is the perfection of swaggering, cowardly impo-
tents, or, to use another expressive Americanism,
the prince of " tall talkers," and his title, like the
others, is not to be disputed. Pistol is in his way
a merchant prince, a wholesale dealer in fustian,
and his capital stock in trade is unlimited. His
mother English is quite inadequate to express his
lofty and swelling emotions, and, like others of his
tribe, when this fails him, he lays murderous hands
upon Latin or French.
142 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
" I will cut thy throat," says Nym. " Coupe le
gorge, that 's the word," says Pistol ; and what a
medley of the mock-sublime and vulgar we have
in the following, which appears to be a slight
ebullition of jealousy :
" O hound of Crete ! think'st thou my spouse to get ?
No ; to the spittal go,
And from the powdery tub of infamy
Fetch forth the lazar kite of Cressid's kind,
Doll Tear-sheet she by name, and her espouse.
I have, and I will hold, the quondam Quickly
For the only she : and pauca, there 's enough."
Like others of his kind in real life, Pistol is very
fond of exhibiting his classical lore, both in season
and out of season. When he comes to Falstaff in
the house of Justice Shallow, swelling with the
important news of the death of the old king, and
his high-sounding sentences are interrupted by
Master Silence, who, being maudlin and musical,
sings out,
" And Robin Hood, Scarlet, and John,"
he exclaims in most classical bombast,
" Shall dunghill curs confront the Helicons ?
And shall good news be baffled ?
Then, Pistol, lay thy head in Furies' lap ! "
And again, when he informs Falstaff that his
favorite Mistress Tear-sheet is in "base durance
and contagious prison," he employs another high-
sounding classical allusion :
PISTOL. 143
" Rouse up revenge from Ebon den with fell Alecto's snake,
For DoM is in ; Pistol speaks naught but truth."
When, however, he finds that his master FalstafF
is not " on fortune's cap the very button," and that
all of them, both fools and knaves, are ordered by
the chief-justice to the fleet, his plumes droop at
once, and he exclaims in most demure Latin,
" Sifortuna me tormenta, spero me contenta"
Pistol's force, like that of all swaggerers, spends
itself in high-sounding words. His acts are ever
pusillanimous and mean, and his whole character
cannot be better drawn than it is by the boy in
Act III., Scene II. (" Henry V.")
" For Pistol," says the boy, " he hath a killing
tongue and a quiet sword ; by the means whereof
'a breaks words, and keeps whole weapons." Upon
all occasions, where there is even an approach
towards putting him upon his " metal," he shows
himself a weak-hearted, spiritless craven ; yet when
fully persuaded that there is no personal danger, no
one can swagger like him; as for example, when
he is set upon by Corporal Nym for the payment
of the eight shillings lost in betting. He is not so
much a fool as not to perceive that Nym is as
great a coward as himself, and that his " sword is
an oath " merely, like his own ; and the words in
which he repudiates the debt show that his honor
is quite on a par with his courage : " Base is the
slave that pays."
The manner in which the poet brings together
144 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
Bardolph, Nym, and Pistol, in Act IL, Scene L, is
admirably calculated to show up their individual
parts. The two latter, it would seem, had aspired
to the high honor of the hand of Dame Quickly,
the hostess ; but, as in all contests of the kind, the
quiet fool, being no match for the blustering fool,
is compelled to see the latter carry off the prize ;
and the very quiet way in which Nym acknowl-
edges himself a coward, and in the same breath
hints at the revenge he may take, when occasion
serves, on Pistol's throat, is one of many rich
things of our bard :
" Nym. For my part, I care not. I say little ; but when
time shall serve, there shall be smites. 1 dare not fight ^ but I
will wink and hold out mine iron. It is a simple one, but what
though, it will toast cheese. . . . Faith I will live so long as I
may, that 's the certain of it. . . Men may sleep, and they may
have their throats about them at the same time ; and, some say,
knives have edges."
Nym is in one respect the very opposite of Pistol.
Both are imbeciles and cowards, yet the former is
a quiet fool, using but few words ; but he evidently
attaches quite as much importance to the few and
simple, as Pistol does to the many and boisterous.
Nym's character is also admirably sketched in a
few words by the boy.
" For Nym," says the boy, " he Hath heard that men of few
words are the best men ; and therefore he scorns to say his
prayers lest 'a should be thought a coward. But his few bad
words are matched with as few good deeds ; for 'a never broke
any man's head but his own, and that was against a post when
he was drunk."
PISTOL. 145
No newsboy or printer's devil was ever more
shrewd or quick-witted than this youth, Falstaff's
page. He is the prince of sharp boys, and Falstaff
himself never got off a better piece of wit at the
expense of Bardolph's glowing nose, than he does
when he summons him to his sick master, shaking,
as Mrs. Quickly says, of a quotidian tertian.
" He is very sick," says the boy, " and would to
bed. Good Bardolph, put thy nose between the
sheets, and do the office of a warming-pan"
Pistol, like all swaggering fools, is ready to stand
upon his dignity, whenever he thinks he can do so
without being in danger of a broken head.
When Falstaff desires him to carry the letters to
Mrs. Ford and Mrs. Page, he throws himself back
upon his offended dignity.
" Pist. Shall I, Sir Pandarus of Troy become,
And by my side wear steel ?
Then Lucifer take all."
His objection to the term "steal," shows how
much more importance he attaches to words and
phrases than to things and acts. When Falstaff
dismisses Bardolph from his train because he was
not an adroit thief, his filchings being, like an un-
skilful singer, " out of time " and he had not the
skill to "steal at a minim's rest" Pistol objects
to the term steal. " Convey the wise it call," says
he. " Steal ! foh ! a fico for the phrase." To the
act of stealing per se he makes no objection, but
the term by which it is expressed is evidently in
his view not quite respectable. If he steals he
10
146 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
would not be called a thief, but simply a " convey-
ancer"
These worthies, Nym and Pistol, like others of
their kind in real life, are not destitute at times of
a certain species of vulgar wit and mental astute-
ness. Nym's observations in view of Bardolph's
change of vocation are rich, when we consider the
calibre of the mind from whence they emanate. He
evidently believes in the doctrine of hereditary
transmission, even of the qualities, mental or phys-
ical, which lead to drunkenness in the offspring.*
When Bardolph is about to assume the office of
tapster, which he has so long desired, and in which
he thinks he shall " thrive," Nym says, in allusion
to his enormous imbibing capacities, "He was
gotten in drink his mind is not heroic" &c.
Of the two fools, Nym and Pistol, the latter
" hath the more excellent wit," vulgar and pomp-
ous though it be. When Falstaff gives so graphic
a description of the bearing of Mrs. Ford towards
him, which caused him to " spy entertainment in
her," Pistol's remark is like one of those shrewd
observations which sometimes fall, as if by acci-
dent, from individuals of his mental capacity :
" He hath studied her well," says he, " and trans-
lated her well, out of honesty into English"
And again, when Falstaff speaks of the interest
with which she regards his huge belly, his reply,
though inclining to the vulgar when uttered in
* In this matter of hereditary propensity to drunkenness, we are not
prepared to say that Nym is altogether in the wrong.
PISTOL. 147
modern ears, is nevertheless shrewd, sarcastic, and
to the purpose :
" Then did the sun on dunghill shine ! "
" My honest lass," says the huge-bellied knight,
" I will tell you what I am about "
" Two yards and more" says Pistol. Shakspeare
knew well that a peculiar kind of low wit, flashing
at times even from such acknowledged fools as
Nym and Pistol, is by no means inconsistent or
unnatural.
The war of words between Mistress Tearsheet
and Pistol at the Boar's Head, when the billings-
gate of the bawd on the one hand is matched with
the bombast of the fool on the other, is most ludi-
crously characteristic and natural. The billings-
gate of the bawd we pass by, but a little of the
bombast of the fool will not be out of place in this
connection. Pistol sober, it would seem, was not
sufficient for our poet, who leaves nothing incom-
plete; therefore we must have Pistol "charged"
with a cup of sack, and a little tipsy, as he appears
to be in this scene, to complete the psychological
delineation. The mental characteristics remain
substantially the same, only, as is usual in this
state, a little more strongly marked. His folly
is made somewhat more foolish, his " tall talk "
a little more elevated, the bombast still more ^
bombastic than usual, and the classic allusions
more frequent and far-fetched. When urged by
Bardolph and the boy to go down - stairs, and
148 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
retire from the windy contest with the bawd, he
says :
" I '11 see her damned first ; to Pluto's damned lake, to the
infernal deep, with Erebus and tortures vile also. Hold hook
and line, say I. Down ! down, dogs ! down, faitors ! Have we
not Hiren here ? " . . .
" Shall pack-horses,
And hollow, pampered jades of Asia,
Which cannot go but thirty miles a day,
Compare with Caesars, and with Cannibals,
And Trojan Greeks ? nay, rather damn them with
King Cerberus : and let the welkin roar ! "
He calls for another cup of sack, and goes on
with his classical bombast, " piling Ossa upon
Pelion":
" Fear we broadsides ? no, let the fiend give fire.
Give me some sack ; and, sweetheart, lie thou there."
[Lays down the sword.
When urged to extremes, and, taking up the
sword, he is about to assume the appearance of a
gladiator, he brings in, after a few more "tall"
words, his grand allusion to the three goddesses of
the distaff and thread, who preside over the desti-
nies of men ; and the mock grandeur with which
he resigns himself to the fates is worthy of the
hero :
" Pist. What, shall we have incision ? shall we imbrue ?
Then death rock me asleep, abridge my doleful days J
Why then, let grievous, gaping, ghastly wounds
Untwine the sisters three ! Atropos, I say."
" So dies a Her.o adorable." [Robbers.
PISTOL. 149
Not so, however, dies ancient Pistol, for after
this most valiant and windy contest with the bawd
after a slight prick in the shoulders from Fal-
staff's rapier, he suffers himself to be thrown down
stairs by the quondam soldier, but now tapster,
Bardolph, and whether the journey is made more
speedy by an impulse imparted from the boot of
the latter, we are not told. Neither, however, die
of " grievous, ghastly wounds," the one being re-
served to hang for stealing a Fix, and the other
to plead his cause with his accustomed grandilo-
quence.
These worthies, Nym, Bardolph, and Pistol, turn
up again in " Henry V.," where they are brought
together in the battle-scene. (Act III, Scene II.)
Here Bardolph is the only man that does not play \
the coward, for while he pushes on, Nym declares
that it is " too hot " for a man that has not " a case /
of lives," and Pistol sighs in doleful measure for
safety, and " an alehouse in London ; " and when
driven on by Fluellen to the breach, the terms in
which he begs him to desist, and cries for mercy
are ludicrous in the extreme.
u Pist. Be merciful, great duke, to men of mould. Abate
thy rage," &c.
In view of his cowardly conduct upon this oc-
casion, the impudence with which he presumes to
plead for Bardolph, the only man of the three who
has shown any bravery, and the fire of whose nose
was about to be quenched forever by the halter, for
150 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
this desecration of the church, is amusing, and quite
characteristic of the man ; and also the insolence
shown his captain when his suit is refused. " Die
and be damned ! " says he, " and fico for thy friend-
ship."
Pistol seems never to have forgiven Fluellen,
either for driving him up to the breach and into dan-
ger, or for refusing to interfere in behalf of Bardolph,
but remains vindictive to the end ; for in Act IV.,
Scene III., where he meets the king, whom he takes
for a Welshman, he desires him to tell his country-
man Fluellen, that he will "knock his leek about
his pate on St. David's day." When, however, he
meets his man, in Act V., Scene I., he comes off
second best, like all cowards, and the leek is thrust
down his own throat. Cudgelled and insulted, he
swears revenge, at first loudly, but makes no resist-
ance, offers no personal violence. While Fluellen,
laying on the cudgel, forces him to eat the leek,
telling him insultingly it was " goot for green
wounds " and " broken coxcombs," how meekly,
demurely, and with what a cowardly, craven spirit,
does he beg him to desist :
" Quiet thy cudgel," says he ; " thou dost see 1
eat ! "
As soon, however, as his adversary is away, Pis-
tol " is himself again." Like a cowardly spaniel
who has just escaped with his life from the jaws
of the bull-dog, he can now bristle up his courage,
and, all danger past, bark loud and look threaten-
ing. How different is the tone of what follows
PISTOL. 151
from that we have just quoted above, when he was
under Fluellen's cudgel! How grandly he can
threaten now, when all danger is past ! " All hell
shall stir for this," says he.
This, however, is PistoPs last explosion the
last thunder-tone which escapes from the empty- ''
headed, hollow-hearted, deep-throated Pistol. This./
" roaring devil 'i the old play " has roared out his
last note. He is now desolate. Falstaff, about
whom he hung so long, is dead, his friends Nym
and Bardolph are both hung for stealing, and his
cowardice alone is all that has saved him from a
like fate. His Nell is " dead in spital of malady
of France," and there his " rendezvous is quite cut
off." He is now old, and " from his weary limbs
honor is cudgelled," and he asks sadly, " Does For-
tune play the huswife with me now ? " Reforma-
tion is out of the question. So old a sinner would
make but a sad saint, and, conscious of this, his
resolution is soon taken. Let us not quarrel with
him for taking the only course which seemed open
to him :
"Well, bawd, I'll turn,
And something lean to cut-purse of quick hand, \
To England will I steal, and there I '11 steal ; /
And patches will I get unto these cudgelled scars,
And swear I got them in the Gallia wars."
Adieu, ancient Pistol ! Though your face may
never be seen in the flesh, your spirit, together
with the hundreds raised by the mighty wand
which has now been broken for more than two
152 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
hundred years, like the fabled Hebrew wanderer,
still walks the earth, and will never be suffered to
rest while time shall endure ; though the great ma-
gician himself, who called you up from the " vasty
deep" and sent you forth upon the earth, now
sleeps soundly and sweetly on the banks of the
Avon.
LAUNCE.
A NO THE R shade of mental obtuseness and
-i- imbecility has been exhibited by the poet in
the character of Launce, the clown par excellence^
in " Two Gentlemen of Verona." Launce is
not a character manufactured by a playwright
one of " Nature's journeymen," to serve a particular
purpose, but is a product of Nature's own handi-
work, and if not the most cunning, still none the
less genuine.
The close companionship which exists between
him and his interesting dog Crab is evidently one
based upon a moral and intellectual fitness in the
characters of the two. The clown is such by nat-
ural organization, and no education or change of
circumstances or condition could make him other-
wise. So the dog Crab, even with the " gentle-
man-like dogs " among whom he has thrust him-
self, under the Duke's table, is nevertheless the cur
which Nature made him ; and we can scarcely con-
ceive that even the cultivation of " three genera-
tions," which some high authorities have contended
for as necessary to make a gentleman, would suf-
fice to make either a courtier of the one, or a gen-
tleman-like dog " of the other. Like Justice Shal-
low and his serving men, the spirits of the two are
154 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
so " married in conjunction " by constant inter-
course, that the one has come to conduct himself,
in all companies, as a curlike clown, and the other
as a clownish cur, among all kinds of gentlemanly
and well-bred dogs, whether spaniel, terrier, mastiff,
or poodle.
Next to the human associates whom a man takes
into his confidence, nothing seems to furnish a more
correct index to his character than the species of
the canine race which he selects as his companions.
The grim-looking, fighting bull-dog is found at the
heels of the bully and prize-fighter. The dignified
mastiff and gentlemanly Newfoundland, guard care-
fully the vaults and premises of the stately banker.
The gaunt hound is found in the train of the
active, vigorous, fox-hunting squire. The poodle
or spaniel, who trusts to his good looks and fawn-
ing manners to carry him through, is the combed,
washed, and petted companion of my lady, or the
dandy who " capers nimbly in my lady's chamber,"
but the^cwr, who seems to be a combination of the
evil qualities of all these, your "yallerdog" so
graphically described by the inimitable Autocrat in
" Elsie Venner," is found at the heels of the clown,
and the nature of the relationship is nowhere so
admirably depicted as by the poet in his delinea-
tions of Launce and his dog Crab. The one is as
much the prince of curs as the other is the prince
of clowns, and the inimitable curtain-lecture which
is bestowed by the clown upon the cur in Act IV.,
Scene IV., has shaken the sides of all Christendom
LAUNCE. 155
for the last two centuries, and will' continue to do
so until a sense of the ludicrous ceases to be a
characteristic of mankind.
The clown and his cur are first introduced to us
in Act IT., Scene III., where the former depicts viv-
idly and dramatically the parting scene between
himself and his family, and contrasts his own and
their grief with the stoical indifference of the cur.
He first calls especial attention to that extreme
tender-heartedness which is a marked characteristic
of the Launce family, and measures by the hour
the time it will take to do his weeping.
" Nay, 't will be this hour ere I have done weeping. All the
kind of the Launces have this very fault."
These Launces are all " soft people." In other
words, there is a " soft spot," or a " screw loose,"
somewhere in the minds of all of them ; yet they
are simple, good-hearted, amiable, harmless people,
who cannot suffer to see a dog abused, even for
such undignified behavior as Crab was guilty of
when among the " gentleman-like dogs " under the
Duke's table.
Launce, in his extreme goodness of heart, would
sooner be kicked himself than see a " dumb brute "
suffer, even though guilty. In a humane society
for the prevention of cruelty to animals, all the
Launces would be " burning and shining lights,"
and ever ready to suffer to shield the brute, as
Launce suffered for Crab.
" Kay, I '11 be sworn, I have sat in the stocks for puddings
156 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
he has stolen, otherwise he had been executed ; I have stood on
the pillory for geese he hath killed, otherwise he had suffered
for it." (Act IV., Scene IV.)
The invective which the clown pours out upon
the cur for his ingratitude, and the imperturbable
stoicism in refusing his sympathy and tears in the
parting scene, so touchingly and dramatically
described in Act II., Scene III., is richly humorous.
His old grand-dam, " having no eyes, had wept her-
self blind ; " his mother had gone on " like a wild
woman ; " the maid had howled, and the cat wrung
her hands, yet the surly and imperturbable cur, be-
ing " one not used to the melting mood," sheds not
a tear nor speaks a word. A decent, intelligent,
" gentleman-like dog " might reasonably have been
supposed to show emotion of some kind, for the
scene, as depicted by the clown, must certainly
have been sufficient to " make a horse laugh," if
not to cause a dog to grieve. But perhaps Crab
may have had the sagacity to perceive that after
all, the weeping and wailing were only the mani-
festation of a very superficial sorrow, a grief quite
shallow, like the minds of those affected. At all
events, he must be a " prodigious son " indeed, and
affected with a most prodigious sorrow, who can
employ such figures in giving so minute and
graphic a description of it. When he takes one
old shoe to personate his father, and another with
a " worser sole " to represent his mother, and his
staff, " because it is long and white," to represent
his sister, and his hat to represent Nan the maid,
LAUNCE. 157
and makes use of such grand hyperbolical figures,
such as laying the dust with his tears, filling the
channel of the river with them if it were dry, so
that it would float his boat, the sails of which he
could fill with his sighs, etc.y we have a pretty cor-
rect gauge of the depths of sorrow of which such
an imbecile is capable. Like many in real life of
the same mental proportions, Launce is endowed
with a certain kind of wit and humor, and this, as
a careful and minute examination of Shakspeare's
delineations will show, is ever entirely consistent
with the general mental characteristics of the indi-
vidual, and is made to flow naturally and easily
from its source.
We are ever made to feel that the wit belongs
to the character, as a natural and essential ingredi-
ent, and is not, as is sometimes the case with infe-
rior artists, something merely engrafted upon it, for
effect. The wit of Shakspeare, if we may use the
expression, is always filtered through the mental
alembic of the character he is depicting, and comes
forth unalloyed, something which is recognized at
once by all who have the knowledge necessary to
examine carefully, to be a genuine product, and
yet, though this is an object aimed at by all delinea-
tors of character, none have been so eminently suc-
cessful, in whatever they have attempted, as our
great dramatist. His characters always appear to
think their own thoughts and speak their own
words, without giving us the faintest impression
that these thoughts and words are put into their
158 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
minds and mouths by another. They are their
thoughts and their words by natural, mental evolu-
tion.
Some critics assert, we are aware, that Shaks-
peare sometimes causes his heroes and heroines to
utter sentiments not consistent with their general^
mental/and moral characteristics, making them the
media for the utterance of what has more the ap-
pearance of his own divine inspiration than the
thoughts of his characters. This has more than
once been pointed out as a blemish, or, in the lan-
guage of the critics, one of those " spots " to be
found on the face of the great intellectual luminary.
We think, however, that a more careful study and
examination of his characters will go far to remove
this objection. It is only within the last few years
that several of his higher creations have been at
all understood, from a want of that scientific knowl-
edge absolutely necessary to the proper understand-
ing of them ; and since, it is to be hoped, the reign
of critical ignorance has well-nigh ceased, the nu-
merous " spots " upon the face of the " luminary "
have one by one disappeared ; and this leads us to
think that time and knowledge may cause the
whole to vanish. The history of the critical inves-
tigations into the characters of Lear and Hamlet
alone would furnish some curious illustrations of
this.
-Shakspeare was too good a metaphysician and
psychologist to make any glaring errors of the kind
referred to ; and so great is our confidence in the
LAUNCE. 159
keenness and accuracy of his metaphysical and
psychological perceptions that, at the risk of being
charged by such critics with a blind adoration of
his great genius, we venture to assert that such
psychological inaccuracies are scarcely in the na-
ture of things, and in a large majority of instances
arise more from critical misconception than from
any error or mistake of the artist.
Shakspeare has ever been far in advance of all
his critics, and if, as has been sufficiently shown, it
has taken two centuries for them to discover a
mere fractional part of what he appears to have
known, we may reasonably suppose that it will yet
take some decades at least, if not centuries, of crit-
ical, scientific, and intellectual development to com-
prehend the whole. Experience has amply shown,
that, though humiliating, it is far safer to acknowl-
edge our weakness and the imperfection of our
own vision as compared with his, than to employ
ourselves in seeking to discover and point out the
" spots " upon the face of the great luminary. In
his works, like those of a still higher and more di-
vine order of inspiration, much that is hard to com-
prehend must be reserved for the future to develop,
for now the feeble-eyed critic can scarcely " behold
him face to face," but must contemplate him
through the dim and obscure glass of his own com-
paratively imperfect perceptions.
But to return, after this digression, to the char-
acter we have been examining.
The humorous and bull-headed obstinacy, in
160 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
Scene V., Act II., with which Launce refuses to
give Speed any knowledge of his master's amours,
except the same is wrung from him by a parable,
is exceedingly characteristic of his lubberly nature.
After much circumlocution, and much teasing of his
impertinent and curious questioner, he " caps the
climax" of his mulish obstinacy by referring the
whole matter in question to Crab, his interest-
ing, intelligent, and ever-present canine compan-
ion :
" Speed. But tell me true, will 't be a match ?
Launce. Ask my dog ; if he say, ay, it will ; if he say, no, it
will ; if he shake his tail, and say nothing, it will.
Speed. The conclusion is, then, that it will.
Launce. Thou shalt never get such a secret from me, but by
a parable."
His humorous punning and play upon words is
also quite characteristic, and shows that this fac-
ulty may be possessed in quite an eminent de-
gree by those of very inferior mental calibre, like
Launce. The play upon the word " understand-
ing," in the scene just quoted, though not the most
brilliant, is nevertheless eminently worthy of the
source from whence it proceeds : -
u Speed. What an ass thou art ; I understand thee not.
Launce. What a block thou art, that thou can'st not. My
staff understands me.
Speed. What thou sayest ?
Launce. Ay, and what I do too. Look thee, I '11 but lean
and my staff understands me.
Speed. It stands under thee, indeed.
Launce. Why, stand under and understand is all one."
LAUNCE. 161
But Launce's most choice humor is always spent
upon Crab, his boon companion, and the standing
butt of his ridicule and invective. The dog ap-
pears to have possessed naturally certain very
unamiable qualities, even for a cur, which qualities
the " precise " education of the clown seems to
have been insufficient to correct. " I have taught
him," says the clown, " even as one would say,
precisely thus would I teach a dog." He had dili-
gently sought to have him " one that takes upon
himself to be a dog indeed; to be, as it were, a
dog at all things." But alas, the inherent cur-like
qualities, natural to the brute, are ever prominent,
and always thrust forward to the great annoyance
of his master, upon every occasion when they
should not be.
The unfeeling nature of the brute, and the in-
gratitude he manifests for all the kindness lavished
upon him by Launce, who " saved him from drown-
ing when three or four of his blind brothers and
sisters went to it," is always brought prominently
forward by the clown in a manner so serious as to
render the whole exceedingly comical. The clown's
play upon the word " tide," in reference to the dis-
position of the dog, is about as rich and charac-
teristic as anything :
" Panthino. Away, ass, you '11 lose the tide, if you tarry any
longer.
Launce. It is no matter if the tied were lost, for it is the un-
kindest tied that ever any man tied.
Panthino. What is the unkindest tide ?
Launce. Why, he that is tied here, Crab, my dog."
11
162 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
But the character of Launce would not have
been complete if the poet had neglected to give us
an insight of his amours. This he has taken care
to do in the latter part of Scene L, Act III. If, as
we have already shown, the mental and moral
characteristics of the clown have been most curi-
ously illustrated in the selection of his canine com-
panion, they have been none the less so in the
selection of his mistress, who, if we may judge
from that curious "cat-log" of her qualities pro-
duced by the clown and submitted to the in-
spection of his friend Speed, appears to have
been about as well adapted to Launce as was
Crab himself. The principles which guided him
in making his selection of a mistress, appear to
have been the same as would have actuated him
in the selection of a dog, or a horse, or a piece of
property of any kind. In this respect, we fear the
character of Launce, the clown, is by no means
unique. The same presiding principles have un-
doubtedly actuated marty a " marriage of con-
venience" among those who regard themselves,
and are regarded by the world, as possessing far
greater mental and moral proportions than Launce,
and who indeed would think themselves hardly
dealt by if all the characteristic virtues of genuine
Christians were not attributed to them. Launce
first proceeds to make, most systematically, a com-
parative estimate of the qualities and characteristic
virtues and vices of his mistress, and here he lets
slip a very quiet, yet significant inuendo, in respect
LAUNCE. 163
to the kind of Christians here alluded to. " She
has more qualities," says he, " than a water-span-
iel, which is much in a bare Christian" " Here is
a cat-log," continues he, pulling out a paper, " of
her conditions. Imprimis, she can fetch and carry.
Why, a horse can do no more. Nay, a horse can-
not fetch, only carry, therefore she is better than a
jade." A most generous admission, certainly, as
well as characteristic comparison, for, in the mind
of the clown, a horse, dog, and maid are readily
associated, and it is hard to say which would take
the first place in his affections. Launce appears to
have chosen his mistress as the Vicar of Wakefield
chose his wife, less for the eminence of her intellect-
ual characteristics than for the durability of such
gifts and qualities as were capable of being turned
to some practical account in the conduct of life.
That she had had " gossips," and that her only
title to " maid " was that she could " milk," and
that she was "her master's maid and served for
wages," appears not to have troubled him, as was
to have been supposed. With him this small
" drawback " would not signify, when weighed in
the balance, against her practical qualities. She
could " sew," she could " knit," and she could
" spin," and this last faculty would enable him to
" set the world on wheels," for she could " spin for
a living." She could " wash and scour," and this
was a " special " virtue, for then she " need not be
washed and scoured." And moreover, " blessings
on her heart," she could " brew good ale," which, in
164 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
the eyes of the clown, was her most shining virtue,
and one which he could turn to great practical ac-
count, for his appetite for ale was like to be one of
great permanence, and therefore this most valuable
quality must not be set down with those " name-
less," those " bastard virtues," which have no fath-
ers, but as a most especial offset to all these. And
then as to her " vices, following close on the heels
of her virtues," we will allow him to speak for
himself, to show how his love, such as it was, could
transform all these into most especial virtues :
" Speed. Item. She is not to be kissed fasting, in respect to
her breath.
Launce. Well, that fault may be mended with a breakfast.
Bead on.
Speed. Item. She has a sweet mouth.
Launce. That makes amends for her sour breath.
Speed. Item. She doth talk in her sleep.
Launce. It is no matter for that, so she slip not in her talk.
Speed. Item. She is slow in words.
Launce. O villain ! that set this down among her vices. To
be slow in words is a woman's only virtue. I pray thee out
with it, and place it for her chief virtue.
Speed. Item. She is proud.
Launce. Out with that too; it was Eve's legacy, and cannot
be taken from her. t
Speed. Item. She hath no teeth.
Launce. I care not for that, neither, for I love crusts.
Speed. Item. She is curst.
Launce. Well, the best is, she has no teeth to bite.
Speed. Item. She will often praise her liquor.
Launce. If her liquor be good, she shall ; if she will not, I
will, for good things should be praised.
Speed. Item. She is too liberal.
LAUNCE. 165
Launce. Of her tongue she cannot, for that 's writ down she
is slow of; of her purse, she shall not, for that I'll keep shut.
Now, of another thing she may, and that cannot I help. Well,
proceed.
Speed. Item. She hath more hair than wit, and more faults
than hairs, and more wealth than faults.
Launce. Stop there, I '11 have her ; she was mine and not
mine twice or thrice in that last article. Rehearse that once
more.
Speed. Item. She hath more hair than wit. .
Launce. More hair than wit ; it may be I '11 prove it. The
cover of the salt hides the salt, and therefore it is more than the
salt ; the hair that covers the wit is more than the wit, for the
greater hides the less. . What next ?
Speed. And more faults than hairs.
Launce. That 's monstrous. Oh, that that were out.
Speed. And more wealth than faults.
Launce. Why, that word makes the faults gracious. Well,
I '11 have her ; and if it be a match, as nothing is impossible."
Launce, like many in real life, of far greater
Christian pretentions, and of far greater intellect-
ual, if not moral proportions, appears not to have
been unsusceptible to the influence of money in the
formation and direction of matrimonial alliances.
With him as with others, wealth appears to have
been a cloak whose ample folds were sufficient to
cover a multitude of vices, for though she have
" more faults than hairs," the wealth was all power-
ful to " make the faults gracious."
The last act of Launce's clownish imbecility is
shown in Act IV., Scene IV., where the " foolish
lout," as he is designated by his master, is sent to
deliver the lap-dog to Madam Silvia, his master's
166 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
mistress, and where, after he has suffered the hang-
man's boy to steal the gift from him in the market-
place, the brilliant but dangerous expedient of sub-
stituting his own insufferable cur Crab, and offer-
ing him to the lady in place of the lost poodle, oc-
curs to his mind :
" Launce. Marry, sir, I carried Mistress Silvia the dog you
bade me.
Proteus. And what says she to my little jewel ?
Launce. Marry, she says your dog was a cur, and currish
thanks is good enough for such a present.
Proteus. But she received my dog ?
Launce. No, indeed, did she not ; here have I brought him
back again.
Proteus. What ! did'st thou offer her this cur from me ?
Launce. Ay, sir, the other squirrel was stolen from me by a
hangman's boy in the market-place, and then I offered her my
own, who is a dog as big as ten of yours, and therefore the gift
the greater."
After this Launce disappears forever, amid the
fierce blaze of his master's indignation at his clown-
ish stupidity, but happily not till he has uttered his
famous soliloquy over his dog, at the opening of
Scene IV., Act IV., commencing, " When a man's
servant shall play the cur with him," &c., which,
as a specimen of low clownish humor has never
been approached, and perhaps never will be ; not
indeed, until, in the eloquent words of the late Dr.
Maginn, " The waters of some Avon, here or else-
where, (it is a good Celtic name for rivers in gen-
eral,) shall once more bathe the limbs of the like of
him who was laid for his last earthly sleep under a
LAUNCE. 167
gravestone bearing a disregarded inscription, on the
north side of the chancel in the great church at
Stratford."
The disregard of the inscription upon the humble
tablet reared above the last resting-place of all that
was earthly of the bard is of little moment, when
we remember, that while the dust it was meant to
commemorate was animated by the spirit, there
was reared, as it were unconsciously, a monument
far nobler than the huge piles which mark the rest-
ing-places of Egyptian kings, a monument of en-
during thoughts and immortal words, and one
which shall stand, not only when the " great church
at Stratford" shall have crumbled into dust, but
when all the " cloud-capped towers," the " gor-
geous palaces " and " solemn temples " which now
adorn the proud isle which claims him as her mas-
ter-spirit, shall be numbered among the things that
were, having passed forever away,
" And like an insubstantial pageant, faded,
Left not a rack behind."
CALIBAN.
is a character of the poet which we have
JL always been taught to regard as out of the
range or circle of ordinary humanity, something
infra-human^ a being as much below the common
standard of humanity as Ariel and some others are
above it ; an opinion based upon the same ground
as that which in times passed placed the insane
among the possessed of devils, altogether out of the
pale- of ordinary humanity, and consequently be-
longing to a class of beings not to be governed by
humane laws, but whom, in the language of Pros-
pero, "stripes may move, not kindness," -goril-
las^ perhaps, not gifted with language, but taught
to speak like some of the inferior creatures, and
whose exact position in the scale of being natural-
ists have not yet fully determined. Caliban says
to Prospero,
" You taught me language ; and my profit on 't
Is, I know how to curse."
By the poet he is designated as a " savage and <
deformed slave." His physical deformities, as is
ever the case, render him an object of loathing and
disgust to the unthinking and unfeeling, while his
ignorance and mental imbecility make him the
CALIBAN. 169
sport of all superior intelligences, and the tortured
slave of their cruelty and inhumanity. Like most
degraded and ignorant imbeciles, he is vindictive
and revengeful. He never forgets the wrongs in-
flicted upon him by his torturing enemies, yet for
those who treat him kindly and considerately he
manifests, like the lower creatures, a genuine affec-
tion, and is ever ready to serve and requite them by
every means his instinctive ingenuity can suggest./
While Prospero treated him kindly, he could ap-
preciate it and love him in return.
" Caliban. When thou com'st here first
Thou strok'dst me and made much of me ; would'st give me
Water with berries in't, and teach me how
To name the bigger light, and how the less,
That burn by day and night, and then I loved thee,
And showed thee all the qualities of the isle,
The fresh springs, brine-pits, barren places and fertile."
But upon Prospero, the tyrant, who, not without
some shadow of excuse from the brutal conduct of
the creature, has made him a beast of burden, and
whom Caliban supposes, in his ignorance and
weakness, capable of tormenting him by his black
and mysterious art, he vents fearfully his deepest
curses.
" Caliban. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brushed
With raven feather from unwholesome fen
Drop on you both ! a southwest wind blow on ye,
And blister you all o'er, . . . All the charms
Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you ! . . .
The red plague rid you, for learning me your language."
In the character of Caliban it has sometimes
170 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
struck us that the poet, in his contemplations of the
chain of being, might have intended to shadow
forth one of the gradations through which the hu-
man intellect may have been destined to pass, in
its gradual progress upwards from a state of deg-
radation, characteristic of the intellectual life of in-
ferior orders in the universe. In the progress of
human society we may observe the successive steps
from the rudest and most uncultivated states, up
to the highest refinements of civilization. The
passage from brute to man, and from man to a yet
higher order of intelligences, unseen yet revealed,
is but a gradation of being, and the lessons of hu-
mility taught by the contemplation of our connec-
tion with one extremity of the chain, are accompa-
nied with the glowing aspirations inseparable from
our connection with the other.
The poet has taken upon himself to exhibit not
only the intermediate links, but others, not many
removes from both terminations of this great chain
of beings. If the poet himself, if " Hamlet " and
some of the higher creations of his genius, seem to
exhibit unto us something we feel almost con-
strained to regard as superhuman, and belonging to
a higher order of intelligences, although allied to
our common humanity, revealing unto us, as it
were, the last and uppermost link in the great chain
which binds our humanity to the throne of the
Eternal, Caliban, if not the connecting link in
the lower extremity, is certainly not many removes
from it. His physical deformity is so great that he
CALIBAN. 171
barely approaches the status of humanity. Pros-
pero speaks of him as a Tortoise, and when Trin-
culio first encounters him, he seems to doubt where
to place him in the scale of beings.
" Trinculio. What have we here, a man or a fish ? he smells
like a fish : a very ancient and fish-like smell ; a kind of, not of
the newest, Poor-John. A strange fish ! legged like a man !
and his fins like arms ! I do now let loose my opinion, hold it
no longer ; this is no fish, but an islander that hath lately suf-
fered by a thunder-bolt."
Comparisons between men and beasts, as is
known, havq been made in the earliest times, even
in those of Moses. Socrates, the wise philosopher
of antiquity, says, satirically, " Between the most
uncultivated of men and the brute beast, there is but
a slight difference " ; and further, " Man is a fair
blooming animal with his surroundings poisoned."
Plato, who has penetrated deeply into the intellect-
ual life of animals, says, " Man has the same brut-
ish lusts in his spirit as are possessed by animals " ;
and he speaks of man as a tamed beast, who, under
proper culture, is the most God-like of tame ani-
mals, but who, under bad breeding, becomes the
wildest.
In the character of Caliban we have a painful
exhibition of a combination of beastliness and a
type of human imbecility and degradation, though
not of that low form characteristic of idiocy or cre-
tinism, rendering the individual quite irresponsible
for his conduct.
One of the first of his acts set forth, is his at-
172 SHAKSPEAKE'S IMBECILES.
tempt upon the innocence of Miranda, and the
only regret which he exhibits for this is, that he
was foiled by her father in the accomplishment
of his diabolical purpose. This is apparently the
only act that can be brought forward in justifica-
tion of the harsh and cruel treatment of Prospero,
who is represented to have been so much incensed
by this act of the man-beast, that he brings the full
force of his dark and mysterious art to bear in tor-
menting him, and further punishes him by making
him a beast of burden. The degree of mental and
moral capacity which, as we have said before,
makes him responsible for his acts, renders him also
conscious and appreciative of both kindness and
cruelty. We feel that much more might have been
made of him but for those " poisoned surround-
ings," spoken of by Socrates, which have ever en-
compassed his path, drawfing and warping his
mental, moral, and physical capacities. Prospero
says, in allusion to the condition in which he found
him, when first cast upon the island,
" I pitied thee, took pains to make ihee speak, taught thee
each hour one thing or other when thou did'st not, savage,
know thine own meaning, but would'st gabble like a thing most
brutish. I endowed thy purposes with words, that made them
known. But thy vile race, though thou did'st learn, had that
in 't which good natures could not bide to be with."
If we were allowed to judge Caliban by the light
of modern science, we might perhaps say that, like
many of ignorant, imbecile, and perverted minds,
he appears to have suffered from and been influ-
CALIBAN. 173
enced by his delusions or hallucinations. These
give rise to the language used below, in speaking
of the supposed vexings of Prospero's tormenting
spirits, and which evidently appear to him in the
light of most disagreeable and painful realities.
"Caliban. His spirits hear me
And yet I needs must curse, but they '11 nor pinch,
Fright me with urchin shows, pitch me i' the mire,
Nor lead me, like a fire-brand in the dark,
Out of my way, unless he bid them, but
For every trifle are they set upon me ;
Sometimes like apes that moe and chatter at me,
And after bite me, then like hedgehogs which
Lie tumbling in my barefoot way, and mount
Their pricks at my foot-fall ; sometimes am I
All wound with adders who, with cloven tongues,
Do hiss me into madness."
When he first meets with Stephano and Trincu-
lio, he regards them as the cruel Emissaries of his
master, Prospero, and appears to expect from them
only the same tormenting unkindness he has been
accustomed to receive. His first impulse is that
of craven animal fear, which prompts him to seek
to escape observation. When discovered, he calls
out repeatedly, to these supposed spiritual emissa-
ries of his master, not to be tormented.
" Do not torment me, pr'ythee,
I '11 bring my wood home faster." /
But he is quite mistaken in the characters he
now has to deal with, and the great psychological
remedies, kindness and forbearance, are brought
into requisition in taming him, and their never-fail-
174 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
ing potency is soon apparent in rendering him
quite docile. Stephano, the jolly butler, aside from
his philanthropy, is a far better medical psycholo-
gist than the great Prospero, with all his magic art.
The butler soon recognizes his condition, and his
universal and all-potent remedy, the bottle^ with
other " appliances and means to boot," is brought
to bear successfully in taming and treating the
man-monster.
"Stephano. He is in his fit now, and does not talk after the
wisest ; he shall taste of my bottle ; if he have never drank wine
before, it will go near to remove his fit. If I can recover him
and keep him tame, I will not take too much for him."
The never-failing influence of kindness and hu-
i mane treatment is soon apparent. His fears are
quieted, his confidence, as is apparent in the lan-
guage which follows, is partially, if not wholly, se-
cured, and the wonder and astonishment he mani-
fests at the treatment he receives, so unlike any-
thing he has ever been accustomed to, have been
witnessed in hundreds of instances by the humane
I and philanthropic, in their intercourse with such
degraded beings, whether savage, imbecile, or in-
sane :
" Caliban. Thou dost me yet but little hurt ;
Thou wilt anon, I know it by thy trembling."
Stephano perseveres in the use of his remedies,
both material and psychological, with full confi-
dence in their efficacy :
u Stephano. Come on your ways ; open your mouth ; here is
CALIBAN. 175
that which will give language to you, cat ; open your mouth ;
this will shake your shaking, I can tell you, and that soundly ;
you cannot tell who is your friend ; open your chaps again."
The means work out the desired effects, and their
potency is soon apparent in the change wrought
upon Caliban, who now begins to appreciate them
fully:
" Caliban. These be fine things, and if they be not sprites,
that 's a brave god, and bears celestial liquor. I will kneel to
him. I '11 swear, upon that bottle, to be thy true subject ; for the
liquor is not earthly."
As his blood warms up under the influence of
the kindness and the wine of the benevolent butler,
he comes to regard his benefactor as something
superhuman, y and the manner in which Stephano
humors the delusion of the creature is laughably
characteristic and ludicrous :
" Cal. Hast thou not dropt from heaven ?
Steph. Out of the moon I do assure thee. I was the man
in the moon when time was.
Cal. I have seen thee in her, and I do adore thee. My
mistress showed me thee, and thy dog and bush."
Like all savages when first made acquainted
with the bottle, he takes kindly to it, though the
language used towards Stephano seems as much
prompted by the humane treatment he has received
at his hands as from the liberal potations which the
butler has thrust down his throat. Whatever influ-
ence the drink may have had upon him, it is abun-
dantly evident that, like every creature, however
degraded, he is not unsusceptible to kind and con-
176 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
siderate treatment; and, not unlike many of the
lower animals, when moved by kindness, he takes
every means which his ingenuity can suggest, to
show his gratitude. Mark how the exuberance of
his gratitude is po'ured out in what follows. How
characteristic is the thought and feeling, and the
language used in giving utterance to it !
" Caliban. I '11 show thee every fertile inch of the island,
And kiss thy foot : I pr'ythee be my god. . . .
I '11 show thee the best springs, I '11 pluck thee berries,
I '11 fish for thee, and get thee wood enough.
A plague upon the tyrant that I serve !
I '11 bear him no more sticks, but follow thee,
Thou wondrous man.
I pr'ythee let me bring thee where crabs grow ;
And I, with my long nails, will dig thee pig-nuts,
Show thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how
To snare the nimble marmozet. I '11 bring thee
To clustering filberds, and sometimes I '11 get thee
Young sea-mells from the rock."
Caliban is by no means that monstrous offspring
of the poet's imagination which he is sometimes
supposed, an evolution of the superfecundity of
his genius. Those who, like the writer, have spent
a portion of their lives in the former slave States
of America, will remember to have met more than
once with individuals quite similar to Caliban in
many respects, if not identical with him, among
the lower grades of plantation slaves. The per-
sonal appearance, conduct, mental and moral char-
acter of many of the " contrabands " of Fortress
Monroe and Port Royal, as set forth by the corre-
CALIBAN. 177
spondents of the Northern press, show that Caliban
has many representatives in real life, who were held
in bondage by the " chivalry " of the South ; the
boasted affection for their masters of these modern
Calibans of the actual and the present, and their
readiness to fight for them, as has been abundantly
shown, is about as great as that of the Caliban of
the poet for his tormenting master Prospero./
The parallel between the conduct of some of the
" contrabands " at Beaufort, after their rebellious
masters had fled and left them " a law unto them-
selves," and that of Caliban when he finds himself
free from his master, and seeks to attach himself to
Stephano as they sought to attach themselves to
their liberators, is very marked, and must be appar-
ent to every one. /The savage and uncultivated
nature of both, made desperate by years of degrad-
ing and abusive servitude, shows itself in the out-
rages they are ready to commit, when suffered to
act unrestrained by the superior intelligences that
have enslaved them and made them beasts of bur-
den.
" Col. I am subject to a tyrant, a sorcerer,
That by his cunning has cheated me of this island."
Like Caliban, the lower and more ignorant or-
ders of the blacks of the South have proverbially a
firm belief in magic, sorcery, and the machinations
of a personal devil, who " goes about like a roaring
lion " seeking to devour them, soul and body.
" Caliban. I say, by sorcery he got this isle ;
From me he got it. If thy greatness will
12
178 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
Revenge it on him, thou shalt be lord of it, and I '11 serve
thee. . . .
I '11 yield him thee asleep, when thou mayest knock a nail into
his head. . . .
'T is a custom with him i* the afternoon to sleep : then thou
mayest brain him."
How they love their masters is quite apparent,
we conceive, from the subjoined extracts respecting
the conduct of the slaves after the desertion of
Beaufort, which we are tempted to bring forward
here to complete the parallel.
" We went through spacious houses," says the
correspondent of the " New York Tribune," " where
only a week ago families were living in luxury,
and saw their costly furniture despoiled, books and
papers thrown out upon the floor, mirrors broken,
safes smashed, pianos on the sidewalks, feather-
beds ripped open, and even the filth of the negroes
left lying in parlors and bedchambers. The de-
struction had been wanton ; in many instances no
purposes of plunder could have been served, but
simply a malicious love for mischief gratified.
Entirely of their own accord the negroes perpe-
trated these enormities. We looked through the
rooms so ruthlessly devasted and so sadly changed,
out on the luxuriant gardens, blooming with tropi-
cal plants and redolent with unfamiliar fragrance,
and saw the November sun shining on a landscape
as warm and genial as our Northern fields in June.
The slaves had in many instances been shot at by
their masters for refusing to follow them." " There
can hardly be a doubt," continues this correspond-
CALIBAN. 179
ent, " that the whole slave population, in this vicin-
ity, is ready at least to desert its masters, is not
only ready and determined to do so, but has done
so already by thousands. It is not yet a week
since this battle, one of whose results is so tremen-
dous."
The following from the correspondence of the
" New York Herald," renders the parallel between
these Southern Calibans and the Caliban of our
poet still more striking. Read the language of the
latter after he attaches himself to Stephano, and
witness his joy in the idea of being free from his
tormenting master, and then the following from this
correspondent :
" Contraband slaves still flock into the camp, and
find profitable employment and plenty to eat from
the representatives of the United States. It is
highly amusing to see these poor creatures, after
their day's work, give expression to their exuberant
spirits at the change in their condition from that of
animals to that of human beings. At night, groups
of them gather together ; they sing and dance and
otherwise enjoy themselves, and seem grateful to
our troops for their unexpected delivery from the
hands of their tyrant masters."
" Caliban. I'll fish for thee and get thee wood enough.
A plague upon the tyrant that I serve !
I '11 bear him no more sticks, but follow thee,
Thou wondrous man."
The further consideration of this parallelism be-
tween the savage of the poet's imagination and
180 SHAKSPEARE'S IMBECILES.
the real Calibans of the actual and the present,
would open an interesting chapter in comparative
psychology, a subject which is now beginning to
attract the serious attention of the mental and
moral philosopher, and from the further develop-
ment of which we venture to predict the most in-
teresting and important results. Here also the
poet has pointed out the road and has himself led
the way, leaving his footprints further in the direc-
tion yet to be tro.d than any other who has under-
taken the journey. Our great bard has something
applicable to all conceivable circumstances ; he has
written for all time, past, present and to come.
His was not only " a mind reflecting ages past,"
but it was also one " to outrun hasty time," pene-
trate the mysteries of ages yet to come, and dis-
cover what lies hid in the " deep, dusky dungeons "
of futurity ; and we cannot conceive that the evolu-
tion of the great Platonic year would find him ob-
solete, but still unexhausted and inexhaustible.
PART III.
SHAKSPEARE'S
DELINEATION OF SUICIDE.
OTHELLO.
state of mind, whether healthy and nor-
mal, or unhealthy and abnormal, which leads
an individual to the commission of self-murder, was
one not likely to escape the careful observation and
comment of the great psychologist of the sixteenth
century ; therefore, scattered throughout the whole
extent of his works, we find allusions to this sub-
ject, characterized by that deep, philosophical, and
comprehensive knowledge of the motives and main-
springs of human action, which, as we have taken
occasion frequently to remark, places him preemi-
nently above all others of ancient or modern times.
Some of the greatest minds have contemplated
this subject; many of them, alas! viewing it
through the dark, dismal shadows of their own sad
experience.
One of the greatest minds of modern times has
been brought to bear upon it, and a volume of
great power and all-absorbing interest has been the
result. Yet the " Sorrows of Werther," with its
182 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
deep analysis of feeling and sentiment, is but an
amplification of Hamlet's great soliloquy, " To be,
or not to be." And aside from the light which
modern science has shed upon suicide as a mani-
festation of nervous disease, this soliloquy, uttered
near three hundred years since, is the " end of the
law" upon the subject when viewed in the ab-
stract
Shakspeare evidently regarded suicide as result-
ing not so much from what might be termed a
morbid mental process, in the strict scientific accep-
tation of the term, as from
phy, acting upon miads which had been wrought
to the point of desperation, though not of disease,
and from false views of man in his relations to
time, death, and eternity. Moreover, it was not his
purpose either to furnish us a philosophy of suicide,
or to regard the subject from a scientific point of
view and as the result of a certain diseased mental
process. He certainly was not the man to sit upon
a coroner's inquest, and pronounce upon oath a ver-
dict of " temporary insanity " upon every case of
suicide that came up. This is a psychological
refinement reserved for modern times, and one of
the things " not dreamed of " in his psychology.
Therefore, all his principal suicides, as it will be
observed, perpetrate the crime in their natural, at
least, if not in their sober senses.
Prominent among these stands Othello, a char-
acter which we think could not have been rendered
insane by any combination of moral causes.
OTHELLO. 183
In all the characters that become insane, as we
have already shown, the experienced psychologist
detects at once the peculiar physical, mental, and
moral organization which constitutes the inherent
predisposition. He perceives that the germ of the
disease has been implanted there originally, and
onl^ awaits the influence of adequate exciting
causes, to bring about its complete development.
In Othello this is not present, and though "per-
plexed in the extreme," and wrought up to the
highest pitch of desperation, his mind, up to the
moment he plunges the dagger into his heart, never
loses its balance even temporarily. If in the mind
of Othello there had existed the slighest inherent
tendency to mental disease, the jealousy and ex-
treme perplexity, which have so strong an influence
in calling it forth, would most certainly have ren-
dered him insane, and that they do not may, we
think, naturally be attributed to the entire absence
of any such natural tendency.
No one will pretend to affirm that Othello was
naturally endowed with the highest order of intel-
lect. He has great force of will, and all the quali-
ties calculated to adorn the soldier, open, gener-
ous, brave, faithful, confiding, and to the last de-
gree "jealous of honor ; " in short, possessed natu-
rally of the exact qualities necessary to be acted
upon by the deep cunning and base treachery of
one endowed with a high order of intellect, one
who knew exactly how and when and where to
assail him. Othello has not naturally the keen
184 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
penetration and discernment of character necessary
to shield him from the machinations of the intel-
lectual villain and moral bankrupt who haunts and
pursues him to desperation. His reason and judg-
ment, though never diseased, he allows to become
clouded by the deep passions stirred up within
him by this evil genius. His mind sometimes ap-
pears to reel and stagger so strongly under the in-
fluence of the whirlwind of passion, that once, and
only once, is it suggested that it is upset ; and Lo-
dovico asks, " Are his wits safe ? is he not light of
brain ? " Yet we have no apprehensions of such a
result as is here hinted at, and to whatever extrem-
ities of desperation he is driven we feel certain that
his wits are safe, and that, though he Jnay seem- for
a momeat light of brain, it is but temporary, for he
soon recovers his balance, and in the desperation
of his passion, with a clear head, sweeps on to the
accomplishment of his dark purpose,
" Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive course
Ne'er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
To the Propontic and the Hellespont."
Let us now attempt to trace out and observe the
working of the fearful passions which ultimately
culminate in homicide and self-murder. With
Othello, everything relating to love and matrimo-
nial felicity has gone on well up to act third, scene
third, of the tragedy. At this point the measure of
his happiness seems indeed full and running over.
Care rests lightly upon him, though no duty is neg-
OTHELLO. 185
lected. When aroused, in a former scene, from his
balmy slumbers by the drunken brawl into which
poor Cassio has been drawn by the deep villain who
lies in wait for Othello himself, he disposes of the
matter with the energy and the cool commanding
decision so characteristic of the true soldier, and
says, playfully, to Desdemona,
" 'T is the soldiers' life
To have their balmy slumbers waked with strife."
In scene third, where Othello and lago come in
upon Desdemona, Emilia, and Cassio, as the latter
have been importuning her " in most honorable
fashion " to interpose in restoring him to favor with
his captain, the villain takes occasion to drop the
first drop of poison into his cup of felicity.
" Ha ! I like not that," he utters slyly in the ear
of Othello, as something which had slipped uninten-
tionally from his lips. He here intimates to Othello
most adroitly his suspicion that all is not well.
The time, the opportunity, and all circumstances
are now most fitting, and the result is just what he
intended it should be ; a suspicion is aroused in the
mind of his victim. The first coil of his fatal web
is fastened upon him, to be cautiously woven and
strengthened, as time and circumstances may ad-
mit.
" But the Moor
Is of a constant, loving, noble nature,"
and this suspicion seems to have been nearly dis-
sipated by the mere presence and words of Des-
demona, though the plot has been so cunningly
186 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
arranged that her discourse regarding Cassio was
precisely what was required to confirm it, and on
dismissing her kindly and affectionately from his
presence, he says :
" I will deny thee nothing. . . .
Farewell, my Desdemona, I will come to thee straight."
On her departure, he exclaims in words which
indicate thoroughly the intensity of his affection :
" Excellent wretch ! Perdition catch my soul,
But I do love thee ! and when I love thee not,
Chaos is come again."
The arch intriguer then proceeds to cast another
coil about his victim, and with a profound dissim-
ulation which Othello has not the discernment to
detect, asks shrewdly, and as though the answer
would involve something of terrible importance
touching the happiness of his victim,
" My noble lord,
Did Michael Cassio, when you wooed my lady,
Know of your love ? "
When told that he did, and interrogated as to
why he asked such a question, he replies with dia-
bolical coolness,
" But for the satisfaction of my thought ;
No further harm."
This thought, the import of which lago conceals
so adroitly, until it suits his purpose to reveal it,
becomes at once another drop of bitterness in the
cup of his noble victim, by stirring up still more
OTHELLO. 187
his suspicions that all is not well between Cassio
and his heart's idol.
" Oth. Think, my lord !
By Heaven, he echoes me,
As if there were some monster in his thought
Too hideous to be shown. Thou dost mean something :
I heard thee say but now, Thou lik'dst not that,
When Cassio left my wife. What didst not like ?
And, when I told thee, he was of my counsel
In my whole course of wooing, thou cry'dst, Indeed f
And didst contract and purse thy brow together,
As if thou then hadst shut up in thy brain
Some horrible conceit."
Throughout this entire scene we are made to
feel the weakness of Othello, and his utter inability
to discern and analyze the character and motives
of lago, and the lack of that shrewd penetration
which would enable him to cope with the intellect-
ual villain who besets him, and in whose hand he
seems like a little child, to be led in whatever way
may seem fit to the master mind. In this case it is
painfully interesting to observe the subtle workings
of the strong, acute intellect, and its influence for
evil upon the weaker.
lago proceeds so subtly, and leads on his victim
so cautiously, step by step, that Othello seems
quite incapable of discerning the contradictions in
his conduct and conversation, though striving with
all his force of penetration to determine which of
the two, lago or Desdemona, is false to him.
When lago tells him,
" Oh, beware, my lord, of jealousy ;
188 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
It is the green-eyed monster, which doth make
The meat it feeds on,"
and at the same instant takes every means to add
fuel to the passion, Othello is quite incapable of
perceiving the contradiction. The dissimulation
expressed in the panegyric on good name, is alto-
gether too profound for Othello, and produces just
such an impression as the villain intended it
should.
In the profound duplicity of lago, nothing is bet-
ter or more successfully managed than this pretence
to put Othello on his guard against the very jeal-
ousy he is seeking to bring about ; and among the
observations he drops so carelessly from his lips, in
working out his evil purpose, we find some of deep
psychological significance. With what force, for
example, do the following lines fall upon the ears
of those who have had repeated opportunities in
the course of their professional experience to ob-
serve that unfortunate class of melancholies, who,
while vastly rich, perhaps, in all that pertains to
worldly goods, are, through fear of poverty, " all
their life-time subject to bondage " :
" lago. Poor, and content, is rich, and rich enough ;
But riches fineless, is poor as winter,
To him that ever fears he shall be poor." *
* Numbers of such unfortunates can be pointed out in Lunatic Asy-
lums any day. " I have no home and no friends on earth," said one of
these to the writer, not long since, with an expression of utter desolation,
and the repeated assurance that she had everything that heart could
wish, but mental health, was of no avail. She had not this inestimable
blessing, and consequently, in the strictest acceptation of the term, was
" poor indeed."
OTHELLO. 189
Towards the conclusion of scene third lago has
so far succeeded in worming himself into the con-
fidence of Othello, that he waxes more bold. His
victim, however, is not firmly within his grasp, and
he is yet under the necessity of proceeding some-
what cautiously. When lago suggests that, inas-
much as Desdemona had deceived her father in
marrying him, it may be possible that another
passion, hastily conceived, might lead her to de-
ceive her husband, he seems, by his expression, to
catch at this idea as something new and quite
possible. " And so she did," he exclaims. And
when lago remarks,
" I see this hath a little dashed your spirits,"
the complete abstraction of his reply,
" Not a jot, not a jot,"
shows how fully the thought has taken possession
of his mind. And again, when lago remarks,
" My lord, I see you are moved,"
his reply shows how intensely his mind is fixed
upon the thought which has been suggested :
" No, not much moved ;
I do not think but Desdemona 's honest. . . .
And yet how Nature erring from itself"
When lago takes his leave, Othello asks with
great earnestness,
" Why did I marry ? This honest creature
Sees and knows more, much more, than he unfolds."
Othello seems now to be fully persuaded of
190 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
the honesty of lago, for a little further on he
says :
1 " This fellow J s of exceeding honesty,
And knows all qualities, with a learned spirit
Of human dealing."
And in the interview with Desdemona imme-
diately following, we perceive painfully the in-
fluence wrought upon his mind by the first harsh-
ness manifested towards his wife. This, although
not very marked, is sufficient for her to perceive
that something is wrong.
The passion now deepens, and when lago next
meets Othello he seems to feel sure of his victim.
" lago. The Moor already changes with my poison.
Dangerous conceits are, in their nature, poisons,
Which, at the first, are scarce found to distaste ;
But, with a little act upon the blood,
Burn like the mines of sulphur."
When the approach of Othello reveals to him
the strong working of the poison he speaks of, he
says to himself, with a grim, diabolical satisfac-
tion,
" Not poppy, nor mandragora,
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world,
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep
Which thou ow'dst yesterday."
The following shows how firmly his suspicions
have taken possession of his mind, even at this
early period, and how thoroughly unhappy he has
been made by them, even though they do not
breathe forth that utter desperation which we shall
perceive further on :
OTHELLO. 191
"Oh, now, forever,
Farewell the tranquil mind ! farewell content !
Farewell the plumed troop, and the big wars,
That make ambition virtue ! Oh, farewell !
Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump,
The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife,
The royal banner ; and all quality,
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war !
And, O you mortal engines, whose rude throats
The immortal Jove's dread clamors counterfeit,
Farewell ! Othello's occupation 's gone."
Although we are made to perceive from the
beginning that the doom of Othello has been fixed,
that he is not and could not, from the character
of his intellectual organization, be any match for
the arch intriguer who besets him, it is painful to
witness the vain struggles of the noble victim. He
strides backward and forward as though lashed by
furies ; and at every turn in his rugged pathway
he is met by the incarnate devil who seeks only too
successfully to destroy him, both soul and body.
He struggles manfully with the monster, seizes him
by the throat, in his desperate efforts to discover
whether he is honest or treacherous, and says,
" Be sure of it; give me the ocular proof;
Or, by the worth of mine eternal soul,
Thou hadst been better have been born a dog,
Than answer my waked wrath."
All this passion, however, is weak and worthless,
and when weighed in the balance with the cool,
calm intellectuality which opposes it, becomes
really a " trifle light as air." A few soft words from
192 SHAKSPEAEE'S SUICIDES.
the destroyer, who never loses temper, turn away
his wrath. And now, when the time is come, he
is ready at the strenuous demand, with his " confir-
mations strong as proofs of holy writ.''
He first brings forward his own personal expe-
rience in confirmation of the suspicion he has
aroused, by relating what occurred when he lay
with Cassioj and was troubled with a raging tooth,
that,
" This may help to thicken other proofs,
That do demonstrate thinly."
The plot is now arranged so consummately that
the " other proof," the handkerchief, taken in con-
nection with what precedes, appeals so strongly to
Othello's personal experience, that in the state of
mind in which it finds him, it is overpowering and
quite convincing. When lago tells him,
" Such a hankerchief
Did I to-day
See Cassio wipe his beard with,"
his flaming anger is aroused to a pitch which noth-
ing but blood can quench.
" Oh that the slave had forty thousand lives ;
One is too poor, too weak for my revenge !
Now do I see 't is true. Look here, lago ;
All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven.
'T is gone!-
Arise, black vengeance, from thy hollow cell !
Yield up, O love, thy crown, and hearted throne,
To tyrannous hate ! swell, bosom, with thy fraught ;
For 't is of aspic's tongues !
Oh blood, lago, blood ! "
OTHELLO. 193
When lago promises to revenge him by taking
the life of Cassio, and begs him deceitfully to spare
the life of his wife, he replies :
" Damn her, lewd minx ; . .
. . . I will withdraw
To furnish me with some swift means of death
For the fair devil."
Nothing is more apparent in the character of
Othello, than the great disparity between the
strength of his passions and affections, and the
weakness of his perceptions, his incapability of dis-
cerning clearly the character and motives of others.
When we next meet him, in scene fourth of the
same act, it would seem as though the mere pres-
ence of Desdemona, and the simplicity and truth-
fulness of her language, should disarm him ; and it
does to a certain extent. But the plot has been so
skilfully arranged that even this is made to work
against her, in the plea which, conscious of her
innocence, she makes with so much earnestness
for the restoration of Cassio. Othello does not
seem here to nurse his passion with a morbid satis-
faction, as an insane man will cherish a delusion, but
struggles manfully against it with such intellectual
force as he has been naturally endowed with, and
as though he would fain believe that his wife was
innocent, and he himself deceived, in spite of all
the evidence brought to bear against her by the
demi-devil who plots her destruction. But these
" proofs " are so cunningly devised that, to the
" jealous mind," they are quite conclusive,
13
194 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
" strong as proofs of holy writ," and to every
solicitation he reiterates " the handkerchief," " the
handkerchief," and concludes by dismissing her
abruptly and harshly from his presence.
In act fourth, scene first, the mind of Othello
seems for the first time to stagger with the heavy
burden of passion under which it travels. He here
seems to make an effort to be rid of the convictions
forced upon him, but is met at every turn by some
tormenting suggestion of his cool, cautious, and
cunning adversary, and when he reminds him of
the handkerchief, he replies somewhat abstractedly,
like one waking up from a reverie :
" By Heaven, I would most gladly have forgot it :
Thou said'st, O ! it comes o'er my memory,
As doth the raven o'er the infected house,
Boding to all."
The terrible mental agony which he now suffers
from the broad, pointed insinuations of lago, is
plainly indicated in the broken ejaculations that
follow. These broken reflections and fearful starts,
however, bear little resemblance to the incoherence
of raving madness, and could not be mistaken for
such by the most careless observer. This intense
mental agony is not disease, though it overcomes
completely, for a moment, his strong physical
powers, and he
" Falls in a trance."
" My medicines work ! " says the villain, con-
templating the fearful suffering of his prostrate
victim,
" Thus credulous fools are caught."
OTHELLO. 195
When Cassio enters, lago is not in the least dis-
concerted, but to his question, " What is the mat-
ter ? " replies with diabolical coolness :
" My lord is fallen into an epilepsy ;
This is his second fit ; he had one yesterday."
The intimate connection between epilepsy and
the " savage madness " which follows the fit in
many cases of this dreadful malady, Shakspeare
seems to have understood thoroughly, for when
Cassio proposes to "rub Othello about the tem-
ples," lago replies :
" No, forbear.
The lethargy must have its quiet course ;
If not, he foams at mouth ; and, by and by,
Breaks out to savage madness."
At the first glance it may seem to the psycholo-
gist that lago manifested ignorance of the nature
and course of the epileptic seizure, by intimating
that rubbing the temples would have any influence
whatever upon the fit, or what follows it. But it
will be perceived, on looking closely, that he says
this simply to prevent Cassio from interfering to
arouse him, which, just at this moment, did not
suit his purposes, and he therefore finds a pretext
to dismiss him :
" lago. Look, he stirs.
Do you withdraw yourself a little while,
He will recover straight ; when he is gone,
I would on great occasion speak with you."
From the terrible struggle through which he has
just passed, he emerges with a clear head, and
196 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
nothing now, we are convinced, will be sufficient
to upset his mind, whatsoever range he may suffer
his passions to take. In the scene between Cassio
and lago which follows, and which he witnesses
unperceived, he becomes more and more wrought
up, but manages, though apparently with great
difficulty, to control himself. At times he seems
ready to spring forth upon Cassio with the fierce-
ness of the tiger, more especially when he thinks
that he perceives the fatal handkerchief in his
hands.
When Cassio has taken his leave, he gives vent
to his feelings and passions to lago, who, as usual,
takes occasion to inflame him more and more
against his officer and his wife :
" I would have him nine years a-killing :
A fine woman ! a fair woman ! a sweet woman."
" Ay, let her rot, and perish, and be damned to-night ; for
she shall not live. No, my heart is turned to stone ; I strike it,
and it hurts my hand."
Yet, hard as he declares his heart to be, her
image is there firmly enthroned, and there it will
remain, in spite of all his efforts to cast it down to
destruction, arid in the very next breath he says :
" Oh, the world hath not a sweeter creature ; ... So deli-
cate with her needle ! An admirable musician ! Oh, she will
sing the savageness out of a bear ! Of so high and plenteous
wit and invention ! . . . And then of so gentle a condition !
- . . . O, lago, the pity of it, lago ! "
When lago suggests, with diabolical irony, that
OTHELLO. 197
" If you are so fond over her iniquity, give her patent to
offend ; for, if it touch not you, it comes near nobody, "
his mind returns to the consciousness of his in-
juries, and he exclaims :
" I will chop her into messes ! "
The fearful working of contending passions here
is sufficient, it would seem, to derange any mental
organization not cast in the strongest mould. This
organization, however, maintains strictly its integ-
rity, though, in the scene between Othello, Desde-
mona, .and Lodovico, which follows, he has become
so much changed by what he has passed through,
that the latter seems to tremble for the safety of
his wits, and asks seriously if he is not " light of
brain." But Lodovico, without being fully aware
of what has preceded, has just witnessed the blow
which, during the first temporary loss of self-con-
trol, he has inflicted upon his wife, accompanied
by the epithet " devil," and the harsh command to
be out of his sight. All this conduct follows very
naturally from what has taken place, though un-
perceived, in the immediate presence of Lodovico
at the time.
Lodovico naturally supposes that his mind was
occupied by the packet recalling him from Cyprus ;
but the all-absorbing thought, the inconstancy of
his wife, casts the contents of this entirely into the
background, as is evident from his replies to the inno-
cent remark of Desdemona respecting the " unkind
breach," which she says she " would do much to
198 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
atone for the love I bear to Cassio." In the mental
obtuseness which results from his fierce passion, he
construes this into a direct acknowledgment of her
love for Cassio, and the tormenting thought doubt-
less suggests the exclamation, " fire and brimstone,"
in which he gives vent to his anger.
And when he follows this by striking her in
Lodovico's presence, and calling her " devil," Lo-
dovico is so much surprised by the change that
has come over him, that he declares,
" This would not be believed in Venice,
Though I should swear I saw it."
And further on he asks :
" Is this the noble Moor whom our full senate
Call all-in-all sufficient ? this the noble nature
Whom passion could not shake ? whose solid virtue
The shot of accident, nor dart of chance,
Could neither graze, nor pierce ? "
In the painful scene which follows, between
Othello and his wife, (scene second, act fourth,) we
hardly know which victim excites the more pity,
though it must be confessed our sympathy for
either is not the most profound, particularly as the
simplicity and obtuseness of blind passion has had
much to do in bringing about their calamities.
It is impossible for us to feel towards Othello as
we have been made to feel towards Lear or Ham-
let. The latter struggle in the grasp of a fearful
and inexorable disease, which they cannot in the
nature of things cast off; but the former is led cap-
tive by a blind passion, and the influence brought
OTHELLO. 199
to bear upon him by an intellect superior to his
own. Yet we cannot listen to the eloquent and
gushing sorrow expressed in the lines which follow,
without pitying the noble victim of such profound
treachery and dissimulation :
" Had it pleased Heaven
To try me with affliction ; had he rained
All kinds of sores, and shames, on my bare head ;
Steeped me in poverty to the very lips ;
Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes ;
I should have found in some part of my soul
A drop of patience ; but (alas !) to make me
A fixed figure, for the time of Scorn
To point his slow, unmoving finger at,
O! O!
Yet could I bear that too : well, very well :
But there, where I have garnered up my heart ;
Where either I must live, or bear no life ;
The fountain from the which my current runs,
Or else dries up ; to be discarded thence !
Or keep it as a cistern, for foul toads
To knot and gender in ! turn thy complexion there !
Patience, thou young and rose-lipped cherubim ;
Ay, there look grim as hell ! . . .
O thou weed
Who art so lovely fair, and smell'st so sweet,
That the sense aches at thee. Would thou hadst ne'er
been born ! "
In the whole course of the play we find no more
delicate touch of nature than the utter confusion
of mind which comes over Desdemona, from the
effect of the shock imparted by the conduct and
language of Othello in the scene just quoted :
" Emil. How do you, madam ? How do you, my good lady?
200 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
Des. 'Faith, half asleep.
Emil. Good madam, what 's the matter with my lord ?
Des. With who ?
Emil Why, with my lord, madam ?
Des. Who is thy lord ?
Emil. He that is yours, sweet lady.
Des. I have none. Do not talk to me, Emilia ;
I cannot weep ; nor answer have I none,
But what should go by water. Pr'ythee, to-night
Lay on my bed my wedding-sheets, remember ;
And call thy husband hither."
Let us now pass on to consider briefly the tragic
occurrences of the fearful night above referred to,
in which the wedding-sheets become the winding-
sheets of Desdemona, the innocent and unfortunate
victim of the base treachery and blind passion we
have attempted to trace.
What first strikes us here is the complete self-
control of Othello. The fierce passions manifested
upon former occasions are not now apparent, and
in their place we find the cool, calm determination
of one whose mind is fixed firmly upon the ac-
complishment of his purposes. We perceive no
wavering, as upon former occasions ; no halting
between two opinions. His mind was never more
firm than in this hour of utter desperation, and he
reasons calmly upon what he is about to undertake,
upon the cause and consequences :
" It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul :
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars !
It is the cause
Put out the light, and then put out the light !
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
OTHELLO. 201
I can again thy former light restore,
Should I repent me ; but once put out thine,
Thou cunning'st pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat
That can thy light relume. When I have plucked thy rose,
I cannot give it vital growth again ;
It needs must wither."
After the accomplishment of the bloody deed,
the full consciousness of his great and irreparable
bereavement comes over him with fearful force, and
the feeling of utter desolation finds expression in
the words which follow :
" My wife ! my wife ! What wife ? I have no wife.
Oh, insupportable ! Oh, heavy hour !
Methinks it should be now a huge eclipse
Of sun and moon ; and that the affrighted globe
Should yawn at alteration."
But the most severe trial for the mind and feel-
ings of Othello is yet to come ; it is the remorse
which results from the discovery that he has been
so grossly deceived and led to kill " the sweetest
innocent that e'er did lift up eye."
But even this remorse, it will be observed, is not
sufficient to destroy his mental integrity ; his mind,
even in his utter desperation, is composed, and
there is a degree of sublimity in the stolid calmness
with which he takes a survey of his condition, and
its utter hopelessness either in this world or that
into which he is about to plunge unbidden. He
flies to suicide, not from any hope of relief from
the awful burden of remorse and sorrow under
which he travels, for this burden he expects to bear
202 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
even in that " undiscovered country from whose
bourn no traveller returns." And, moreover, he
seems to regard this, and whatever may be laid
upon him in addition when he arrives there, as the
just punishment of his weakness, his folly, and his
crime.
Even the look of his innocent victim in eternity
is to be his sufficient condemnation.
" When we shall meet at Compt
That look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven,
And fiends will snatch at it.*'
But notwithstanding, he is ready for anything
that can, even for a moment, distract his mind from
the sorrow and remorse which springs from the
sight of Desdemona, " whose breath these hands
have newly stopped ; " and before rushing into her
presence and that of his Judge, he invokes upon
himself the most awful physical torments the im-
agination is capable of conceiving for the lost.
" Whip me, ye devils,
From the possession of this heavenly sight !
Blow me about in winds ! roast me jn sulphur !
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire !
O Desdemona ! Desdemona ! dead ?
Dead? Oh! Oh! Oh!"
Immediately after, when the whole mystery of
his deception is unravelled before him, and in the
presence of lago, he is quite calm, and in view of
his folly and weakness he exclaims,
" Ofool! fool! fool!"
After passing through all the mental suffering he
OTHELLO. 203
has been called upon to endure, the complete in-
tegrity of his mind is nowhere more clearly shown
than in his last words :
" Soft you ; a word or two, before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know it ;
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am ; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice. Then must you speak
Of one, that loved not wisely, but too well ;
Of one, not easily jealous, but being wrought,
Perplexed in the extreme ; of one, whose hand,
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away,
Richer than all his tribe ; of one, whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this ;
And say, besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and a turbaned Turk
Beat a Venetian, and traduced the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog, /
And smote him thus." [Stabs himself.
instill |H W\fic/
The important psychological lesson inculcated
by the poet in the delineation of the character of
Othello, namely, that there are certain mental con-~~7
stitutions which no combination of moral causes
can overthrow, is nowhere more clearly taught
than here. The mind of Othello, as we took oc-
casion to remark before, belonged strictly to this
class ; the inherent germ was not present, and con-
sequently the disease could not be developed.
As we pen these concluding lines, we are re-
204 SHAKSPEARE'S SUICIDES.
minded that upon this very day (April 23d, 1864,)
the whole civilized world is commemorating the
three hundredth anniversary of the birth of WIL-
LIAM SHAKSPEARE, and not only the great, the
noble, and the good of the isle which gave him
birth are gathered reverently around the hallowed
earth in which rests all that was mortal of the
greatest among the sons of song, but the "isles
of the sea " and the " uttermost parts of the earth "
are striving together to do homage to his mem-
ory. Eloquent and loving words are everywhere
being uttered in the noble tongue which, infinitely
above all others, he has done so much to adorn.
This is as it should be, and however humble the
offering, if it be brought reverently and in love, let
it not be utterly despised. - u
THE END.
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