SHAKESPEARE NOT AN IMPOSTOR. CHAPTER I. THE NATURE OF THE CHARGE. "Then what do those poor Souls which nothing get? Those Souls, for want of Exercise, must sleep." "ASSUREDLY that criticism of Shakespeare will alone be genial which is reverential. An Englishman, who without reverence-a proud and affectionate reverence-can utter the name of William Shakespeare, stands disqualified for the office of critic." Such are the words of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, one of the most learned and acute of Shakesperian students and commentators; while Shakespeare is a vile impostor," is the cry of the latest luminary of the age. To the eternal disgrace of English literature,-if the effusion to which we refer can be classed amongst its productions, a pamphlet has recently appeared, in every way calculated "to fright the isle from its propriety." It contains charges against the two most illustrious names upon our list of authors, which, if proven, must cover their names with infamy of the deepest dye, and consign their memories to eternal execration. The accusations are made by one William Henry Smith,* with*Throughout this vindication of our immortal bard we have been out, as we shall see in the course of this investigation, one shadow of proof; and for such an offender there can be neither consideration nor respect. On light and unjustifiable grounds, seduced, as it would appear, by the reveries of a disordered fancy, he has brought grave charges against William Shakespeare and Francis Bacon, which he has not attempted to establish by one particle of evidence. The desire of notoriety, not of honourable distinction, has become quite a passion with many of the new lights of the age; and we presume that the aspirant for literary honours, whose wanton onslaught upon the memory of Shakespeare must excite the indignation of all that great man's affectionate admirers, cares little by what means he obtains his end, or gratifies his uneasy ambition. In the rambling sentences in which his accusations are couched, he certainly does hint at proofs; but in any case Mr. William Henry Smith has acted unfairly both towards the mighty dead whom he maligns, and the British public which he would delude. Even if he were in possession of proofs to substantiate his grave charges, these ought most decidedly to have been produced, when the charges were made; and if he can adduce nothing but his own disordered fancies to support his theories, they should never have been given to the world. The fame of the illustrious dead is the most precious memorial of the past; it is not only the source of all our glory, but it is the fountain of future greatness, and acts as an incentive to others, impelling them to the performance of noble and heroic actions. Yet this sacred heirloom is not secure from the attacks of those who, to speak most charitably of their conduct, can have but a feeble notion of its real importance. The author of the present defence of Shakespeare very careful to give this purblind critic's name in full. It is fit that the public should know which member of the large family of the Smiths it is that has stepped out of his legitimate sphere to assail the character of William Shakespeare. if defence can be needed against such a charge-bas waited anxiously for some time, hoping that a champion better qualified to undertake the vindication of the mighty dead, now wantonly and wilfully assailed, would have come to the rescue. None have taken up the gauntlet so deliberately thrown down before us; and he cannot suffer it to be said, that when, in the nineteenth century, dark suspicions were breathed against the character of William Shakespeare, no Englishman could be found to hurl them back at the head of the detractor. The platitudes of M. Ponsard, who drivelled the other day at Paris, about "the divine Williams," as only self-satisfied but incompetent critics can do, were too contemptible to require notice; but Mr. William Henry Smith, though evidently a critic of the same class, cannot be allowed to perpetrate his follies without rebuke. The French critic may be excused for not fully understanding the character or appreciating the genius of Shakespeare; but the Englishman, who, at this advanced stage of Shakespearian investigation, has no adequate idea of either the one or the other, can plead nothing save wilful blindness, or hopeless obtuseness, in extenuation of his extraordinary ignorance. No inducement should lead such a one to set himself up as a teacher; and many people will doubtless assert that an offender of this class and calibre is beneath notice; and that no well-educated man, acquainted either with the dramas of Shakespeare, the writings of Bacon, or the literary history of the Elizabethan period, can possibly be misled by his shallow speculations. This is, to a certain extent, true; but we must not forget that Shakespeare has become a beloved and honoured guest in the cottages and hamlets of the land; that his name is dear to thousands of the humble and the lowly, who have neither the means nor the leisure which will admit of their diving deeply into his history, and to investigate accusations brought against him; and for such persons in particular the author is now induced to take up his pen. Cheap literature has introduced the works of our great dramatist to all classes of his countrymen; it has opened unimagined mines of intellectual wealth to the enraptured gaze of once neglected sections of the community, and it has sunk shafts through the grim haunts of ignorance and crime, letting in the glorious rays of wisdom and intelligence. Wherever Englishmen go, they carry with them their English Bible and their English Shakespeare; and neither of these can suffer to be lightly spoken of or undervalued. The former we defend on account of its divine origin, as the source of all our hopes; the latter, as the most precious of uninspired writings. we Moreover, it is fit and proper that the high priests of literature should be protected from irreverent and wanton assault. Let these, his new admirers in the lower, but not, on that account, less honourable, ranks of life, know that the Shakespeare whose magic power holds them spellbound in amazement and admiration, is not the greatest literary impostor the world ever saw. Nor is it only the humbler class of readers that may be misled by such vagaries. Even the acute and sagacious editor of that deservedly popular periodical, Notes and Queries, falls into the snare, and, apparently without reflecting upon the infamy that must for ever rest upon the names of Bacon and Shakespeare, supposing that Mr. William Henry Smith were able to substantiate his charges, says, with reference to this pamphlet,-"It is a Letter to the Earl of Ellesmere, suggesting whether the plays attributed to Shakespeare were not in reality written by Bacon. The author has overlooked two points: one, the fact that his theory had been anticipated by an American writer; the second, one which certainly tells strongly in favour of his theory, and which has been on several occasions alluded to in these columns, namely, the very remarkable circumstance that nowhere in the writings of Shakspeare is any allusion to Bacon to be met with; nor in the writings of the great philosopher is there the slightest reference to his wonderful and most philosophic contemporary." We are willing to allow Mr. William Henry Smith to make the most of this admission, but how it can possibly prove, either directly or indirectly, that Bacon wrote Shakespeare, or Shakespeare Bacon, we are at a loss to conceive. The former must have gone considerably out of his way to drag the greatest of modern philosophers into his dramas; and, as regards Bacon, he may have felt an influence which he did not choose to acknowledge. Such strange admissions from authorities highly qualified to give an opinion, and in every way entitled to respect, render it expedient that the question should be set at rest without delay, and that it should be clearly shown not only that Mr. William Henry Smith's arguments are untenable—that they are altogether without foundation, but that it is absolutely and utterly impossible, in the teeth of the evidence that we actually possess, that any one but William Shakespeare could have written the dramas that have been for more than two centuries attributed to him. Many years' earnest and affectionate study of the works of Shakespeare have served to increase the author's esteem and admiration for the great and commanding superiority of his genius over that of all other gifted men, and he has no hesitation in asserting, what he is prepared to prove; namely, that Shakespeare merits that general tribute of affection and admiration which he has won. It is a most remarkable fact, that every fresh particular brought to light concerning his career becomes an additional witness in his favour. The more we learn of Shakespeare, the higher does our admiration rise; the nearer we get at the truth, the fairer does the truth appear. Every advance made in our invesi *Notes and Queries, Second Series, No. 42. Notes on Books, p. 320. |