NUMEROUS SONNETEERS 217 which was published in 1596, and was probably written in 1595 or 1594. The sonnets, then, were composed before 1596. Clearly, therefore, Shakespeare, was not forty years of age at the time of writing the sonnets, and his statements are not to be taken with literal exactness. Another proof that the sonnets are not to be taken in their literal exactness is found in the fact that Sonnets 72-86 declare that his praises of his friend and patron had become so notorious that others had emulated him, and one of them so successfully as to supplant him in his patron's favour- a statement whose inaccuracy appears from this, that critics have utterly failed to discover any such rival. The sonnets, then, though a lyrical composition, cannot be accepted as an autobiography. But while we are forced to admit that we cannot expect to find in the sonnets accurate autobiographical data, we altogether dissent from the contention of those critics who maintain that the sonnets were written by Shakespeare solely to exhibit his versifying skill. Between the years 1591 and 1599 a vast number of sonnets appeared. Undoubtedly many of these sonnets were written for no better purpose than that of displaying their least scorn of open plagiarism. For these reasons it seems more probable that the line in question was quoted from Shakespeare's Sonnets, already known in 1594 or 1595 among his private friends, than that it was afterwards adopted by Shakespeare from the play. Cf. Simpson, "Philosophy of Shakespeare's Sonnets," 76. author's power in verbal fence, or were composed in a spirit of mere rivalry. This we freely grant. But at the same time we insist that many of the sonnets were inspired by a much higher motive. They treated of serious subjects in a manner suited to the dignity of their theme. No less than 500 sonnets were composed at this period on such grave topics as philosophy and religion.1 The sonnets of Shakespeare, it is true, treat professedly neither of religion nor of philosophy, but of love. Yet this theme, however much it may have been degraded by the treatment of other sonneteers, was discussed from a pure and spiritual standpoint by such sonneteers as Surrey, Sidney, and Spenser. The presumption surely ought to be that Shakespeare would take his stand with such writers as these rather than with Marlowe, Greene, and Donne. But we have something more than presumption. A comparison of Shakespeare's theory on love with that which has found favour with the great Christian writers of every age will show the identity of his views on this subject with those of the leaders of religious thought. The philosophy of love as taught first by Plato, and purified and completed by St. Augustine, Boetius, and St. Thomas, is a definite, comprehensive, and coherent system. In that philosophy the object of love is the good, the act of love is the tendency or the movement towards its 1 S. Lee, "Life of Shakespeare," 441. CHRISTIAN DOCTRINE OF LOVE 219 attainment, and in its secure possession love is perfected, quies in bono, "rest in good," being the essence of beatitude. In intellectual natures the good is apprehended by the intellect as true, and loved by the will as good. God, being infinitely intelligent, necessarily knows His Infinite Perfections in the Word, and from the mutual contemplation of the Father and the Word proceeds the Holy Spirit, their mutual love, the term of union in the Triune God. Thus Dante describes the Divine essence, Luce intellettual pien d'amor. From God's Infinite love of Himself proceeds freely His love of creatures, each of which is called into being to portray some special likeness of the Creator's Beauty, their graduated perfection being determined by their degree of resemblance to the Divine exemplar. Every kind of being by love, natural or supernatural, acquires its perfection. Thus the connatural attractiveness, which by the law of gravity binds the atoms in the stone and the stone in its place, may be called love. The vital principle of growth and increase in the plants, the action of the sensitive faculties in the animal world are respectively the law of self-preservation for each, or the love of their good. Man, as a reasonable being, finds his good in the love and acquisition of truth, and in the possession of absolute truth alone is his perfection attained. Love, then, is the first beginning, the sustaining principle, and the final end of all things. All this is summed up in Dante's vision, in the depth of which he "Saw in one volume, clasped of love, whate'er Of substance and of accident, beheld The whole. And of such bond methinks I saw I do but speak of it my soul dilates Beyond her proper self."-Par. xxiii. 77. So also Boetius had long since said "Hanc rerum seriem ligat Et cœlo imperitans amor." -De Consol. Phil., xi. 8. Now this love philosophy descended through Petrarch and others to the Italian Revivalists of the sixteenth century, and became a prominent subject in their literature. From Italy it passed into England, and was taken up by Surrey and Spenser, and in the Hymns of the latter poet on love and beauty we find the theme treated on the lines of Catholic theology already given. Love, then, according to Spenser, first produced order out of chaos, fixed all things in their different kingdoms, tempered, subordinated, and harmonised their constituent opposing forces, and quickened living things with the desire and power of increase. Man, having an immortal mind, should love immortal beauty, and seek "to SPENSER'S HYMNS 221 enlarge his progeny not for lust's sake but for eternity." Here comes the strife. False love or lust persuades the "earthly-minded with dunghill thoughts" to seek only the gratification of their senses in the enjoyment of corporeal beauty. But the pure, refined mind, by help of Heaven's grace, expels all sordid baseness, and newly fashions the sense image into a higher form, modelled on its divine exemplar, "its God and King, its victor and its guide." The love for this ideal must be sole and sovereign. The fear of its loss is terrible suffering, only to be surpassed by the joy experienced when the loved one is possessed. Such are the leading ideas of the hymns of earthly love and beauty. The hymn of heavenly love tells of the Procession of the Divine Persons and of creatures from the same source, "the blessed well of love." The three great acts of divine love for man are Creation, Redemption, and the Blessed Sacrament. "Him first to love great right and reason is To feed our hungry souls unto us lent." Such love calls for the sacrifice of all else in return. "With all thy heart, with all thy soul and mind |