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CHAPTER VI.

FACTS CONNECTED WITH THE PUBLICATION OF THE POEMS, WHICH PROVE THAT THEIR AUTHOR WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE WROTE THE DRAMAS.

"Thus then Shakspeare appears, from his Venus and Adonis and Rape of Lucrece alone, apart from all his great works, to have possessed all the conditions of the true poet."-S. T. COLERIDGE.

OUR principal object in launching this small venture upon the wide ocean of literature, is not merely to show the Baconian theory to be both a wicked libel upon the memory of Shakespeare in particular, and a grievous insult to the English nation at large, but to establish, upon the clearest and most intelligible grounds, the identity of William Shakespeare, and to prove by the testimony of his contemporaries, and the evidence of historical documents, that he, and he alone, was the author of those dramas that have long been received as his productions. Upon the internal evidence to be derived from the institution of a careful and rigid comparison between the poems and the dramas, we are not inclined to lay much stress; yet this, as we have before shown, is altogether in favour of our view of the question. We purpose at once proceeding to proofs more palpable; the solemn. testimony of which cannot, we humbly imagine, be impugned.

Let us deal with these in the order in which they present themselves to our notice. We pass, with a brief notice, the petition of "the shareholders in the Blackfriars playhouse," dated November, 1589, pleading against the intolerant spirit which sought to deprive them of

their means of subsistence; on which list of sixteen shareholders, the name of William Shakespeare stands twelfth; we cannot now pause to determine whether Edmund Spenser, the author of the "Fairy Queen,” could by any possibility have alluded to any other poet but William Shakespeare in the verses we are about to quote, although we believe the affirmative might be very easily established. The stanzas occur in a small volume entitled, "Complaints, containing Sundrie small Poemes of the World's Vanitie," by Edmund Spenser, published in 1591. The book contains several divisions; and in one of these, called "The Teares of the Muses," Thalia bewails the decline of comedy, and, as we believe, the temporary retirement of Shakespeare. These lines have been frequently quoted by commentators, but they are not even now sufficiently known, perhaps because not easily accessible to the generality of readers.

"Where be the sweete delights of learnings treasure,
That wont with Comick sock to beautefie
The painted Theaters, and fill with pleasure
The listners' eyes, and eares with melodie;
In which I late was wont to raine as Queene,
And maske in mirth with Graces well beseene ?

O all is gone, and all that goodly glee,
Which wont to be the glorie of gay wits,
Is layd abed, and no where now to see;
And in her roome unseemly Sorrow sits,
With hollow browes and greisly countenaunce,
Marring my joyous gentle dalliaunce.

And him beside sits ugly Barbarisme,
And brutish Ignorance, ycrept of late
Out of dredd darknes of the deep Abysme,

Where being bredd, he light and heaven does hate :
They in the mindes of men now tyrannize,

And the faire Scene with rudenes foule disguize.

All places they with follie have possest,
And with vaine toyes the vulgare entertaine;
But me have banished, with all the rest
That whilome wont to wait upon my traine,

Fine Counterfesaunce,* and unhurtfull Sport,
Delight and Laughter deckt in seemly sort.

All these, and all that els the Comick Stage
With seasoned wit and goodly pleasance graced;
By which man's life in his likest imáge

Was limned forth, are wholly now defaced;

And these sweete wits which wont the like to frame,
Are now despizd, and made a laughing game.

And he the man, whom Nature selfe had made
To mock her selfe, and Truth to imitate,
With kindly counter,+ under Mimick shade,
Our pleasant Willy, ah is dead of late:
With whom all ioy and iolly meriment
Is also deaded, and in dolour drent.‡

In stead thereof scoffing Scurrilitie,
And scornfull Follie with Contempt is crept,
Rolling in rymes of shameles ribaudrie §
Without regard, or due Decorum kept,
Each idle wit at will presumes to make,
And doth the Learneds taske upon him take.

But that same gentle Spirit, from whose pen
Large streames of honnie and sweete Nectar flowe,
Scorning the boldnes of such base-borne men,
Which dare their follies forth so rashlie throwe;
Doth rather choose to sit in idle Cell,

Than so himselfe to mockerie to sell."

These notices would be sufficient to satisfy ordinary inquirers that by the year 1593 William Shakespeare had, by some means or other, attained a certain degree of celebrity, and that many of his earlier dramas then enjoyed high popularity. The most incredulous cannot deny that the "Venus and Adonis," the first acknowledged work of this great poet's that has come down to us, made its appearance in this eventful year. It was

* I. e. counterfeiting.-AIKIN.

I. e. trial of skill.-AIKIN.

I. e. drenched, drowned.-AIKIN.

§ I. e. ribaldry.-AIKIN.

F

published in quarto, on the 18th of April, and a few weeks before Christopher Marlowe, by some regarded as the founder of the English drama, lost his life in a duel. A terrible plague had broken out in London during the preceding autumn, and all the theatres were closed by authority. Shakespeare, availing himself of an interval of repose and leisure, prepared his poem for the press. It appeared with the following dedication :

"To the Right Honorable Henrie Wriothesly, Earle of Southampton, and Baron of Titchfield.

"RIGHT HONOURABLE,—I know not how I shall offend, in dedicating my unpolisht lines to your Lordship, nor how the world will censure me for choosing so strong a proppe to support so weake a burthen; onely if your Honour seeme but pleased, I account my selfe highlie praysed, and vow to take advantage of all idle houres, till I have honoured you with some graver labour. But if the first heyre of my invention prove deformed, I shall be sory it had so noble a godfather: and never after eare * so barren a land, for feare it yeeld me still so bad a harvest. I leave it to your honourable survey, and your Honor to your heart's content, which I wish may alwayes answere your owne wish, and the world's hopefull expectation. Your Honor's in all dutie "WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE."

The use of the expression "first heyre of my invention has induced certain critics to argue that Shakespeare had not, up to this date, written anything for the stage. Such a conclusion is altogether untenable. In the first place, the "Venus and Adonis" might have been the first-fruits of his youthful fancy, and yet have been composed some time before it was given to the

* I. e. to plough.

world. Few authors are fortunate enough to get their earlier poems printed so quickly as they might desire. In the second place, Shakespeare may have regarded this as his first offering at the shrine of the Muses, although he had, previous to its publication, written some dramas. We know, moreover, that the earlier editions of his plays were not sent forth under his sanction; and the "Venus and Adonis " was consequently the first work in the publication of which he took an interest and was concerned. The early copies of the dramas were, as we learn from the folio of 1623, "diverse stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed and deformed by the frauds and stealthes of injurious impostors that exposed them." Thus, in every respect, the "Venus and Adonis was entitled to be regarded as the first heir of the poet's invention; and we can readily imagine that Shakespeare, finding his occupation gone, or at any rate temporarily interrupted, on account of the plague, brought his early poem forth from its concealment, revised it, and gave it to the world as the freshest offering of his fervent genius-the first-fruits of his youthful labours, his first work.

This is the view of the question taken, though not on precisely the same grounds, by two of the most intelligent of the Shakesperian critics of this age,-J. Payne Collier and Charles Knight. Their opinion may be considered as conclusive. Mr. Collier remarks (Life of Shakespeare, p. cxiv.) :

"With regard to productions unconnected with the stage, there are several pieces among his scattered poems, and some of his sonnets, that indisputably belong to an early part of his life. A young man, so gifted, would not, and could not, wait until he was five or six and twenty before he made considerable and most successful attempts at poetical composition; and we feel morally certain that 'Venus and Adonis' was in being anterior to Shakespeare's quitting Stratford. It bears all the