certainly very few men accomplish so much at an early age. How long this eulogium might have been written previous to publication, we have no means of judging; but we do know that in 1598 Shakespeare was publicly recognized as the author of COMEDIES. The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Love's Labour's Lost. All's Well that Ends Well. The Midsummer Night's Dream. The Merchant of Venice. HISTORICAL TRAGEDIES. Richard II. Richard III. Henry IV. King John. Titus Andronicus. TRAGEDY. Romeo and Juliet. POEMS. Venus and Adonis. Lucrece. Sonnets. Fifteen such works at the age of thirty-five were indeed sufficient to constitute a glorious reputation, even had their author then relinquished his pen and abandoned the Muses for ever. Nor does Meres wish his readers to suppose that he had enumerated all the works which, at that early period in his career, our great dramatist had produced. The critic merely notices these fifteen as specimens of what Shakespeare had done; we possess positive evidence that others, not referred to in this list, were in existence at that time, and may form some conception of the manner in which he had laboured, and of the extraordinary reputation that he had achieved. Even the fame of his Sonnets, which were not published until eleven years later, had got abroad, and the way in which Meres speaks of them would of itself suffice to prove that all the productions of this master-mind were in his own day sought after and esteemed. We have pointed out the friendship that existed between the Earl of Southampton and Shakespeare, and the honourable mention made by this well-known peer of the manager, actor, and poet, to a third person; we have referred to the publication and the success of poems, and adduced the testimony of a contemporary,— an impartial writer, by whom Shakespeare is recognized as the author of poems, sonnets, and dramas; and we imagine that few will feel inclined to cavil at the conclusions which we draw from these matters; namely, that it is utterly impossible that Bacon could have written the dramas, or that any person but William Shakespeare is to be regarded as their author. No writer enrolled in our literary annals can be more clearly entitled to the proud position he has gained, than this extraordinary the man. Those who have studied these various productions of his superior and commanding mind, in that reverential manner in which everybody ought to approach the consideration of such masterpieces of human genius, will not experience the slightest difficulty in believing them to have emanated from one gifted being. By indisputable evidence, they are assigned to Shakespeare, and are indeed the credentials by which he has won the homage of successive generations. If Mr. William Henry Smith be indeed in search of the wonderful, we can direct his inquiring gaze to a marvel, upon which he seems to have G stumbled quite unawares. His reasoning faculties must be below the average, or he would long since have detected this, lying in his path, and almost inviting observation. The wonder would be, not that William Shakespeare should have produced several works, kindred in beauty and character, but that, after having taken mankind captive by the magnitude of his powers, after having, at a comparatively early age, written poems of the highest order of merit, he should suddenly abandon the cultivation of this particular and glorious gift, and cease to ravish the world by the sweet strains of his melodious lyre. Now this is the marvel that Mr. William Henry Smith has raised up; and it is one inseparable from his theory. It would be harder to believe this, even had we very strong evidence in its support, than that in the "Venus and Adonis," and the "Lucrece," may be recognized the first soarings of that surpassing genius, which reached its fairest development in these beautiful creations of the human mind," Hamlet," "King Lear," "Macbeth," and "Othello." Attempts have been frequently made to depreciate the poems, and to under-rate their merits. The unprejudiced reader will admit that they display much of the same wonderful power that constitutes the excellence of the dramas. They are superior to other poems of the kind, just as the dramas excel all similar compositions. The criticism upon the subject, of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, is not only just, but profound: he felt what he wrote, and had, moreover, a genuine appreciation of Shakespeare. He says: "The subject of the 'Venus and Adonis' is unpleasing; but the poem itself is for that very reason the more illustrative of Shakspeare. There are men who can write passages of deepest pathos, and even sublimity, on circumstances personal to themselves and stimulative of their own passions; but they are not, therefore, on this account poets. Read that magnificent burst of woman's patriotism and exultation, Deborah's song of victory; it is glorious, but nature is the poet there. It is quite another matter to become all things, and yet remain the same,-to make the changeful god be felt in the river, the lion, and the flame; this it is, that is the true imagination. Shakspeare writes in this poem, as if he were of another planet, charming you to gaze on the movements of Venus and Adonis, as you would on the twinkling dances of two vernal butterflies. 66 Finally, in this poem, and the Rape of Lucrece,' Shakspeare gave ample proof of his possession of a most profound, energetic, and philosophical mind, without which he might have pleased, but could not have been a great dramatic poet. Chance, and the necessity of his genius, combined to lead him to the drama, his proper province : in his conquest of which we should consider both the difficulties which opposed him, and the advantages by which he was assisted."* * Notes and Lectures upon Shakspeare and some of the Old Poets and Dramatists, vol. i. p. 57. CHAPTER VII. THE FOLIO EDITION OF 1623, AND THE EVIDENCE IT AFFORDS RESPECTING THE QUESTION OF ITS AUTHORSHIP. "My book hath been so much my Pleasure, and bringeth daily to me more Pleasure, and more, than in respect of it, all other Pleasures in very deed, be but Trifles and Troubles unto me." ROGER ASCHAM. SHOULD the rash, absurd, and disgraceful accusations of Mr. William Henry Smith against the character, and the strictures of other self-satisfied critics and cavillers upon the works, of William Shakespeare have the effect of making the great majority of the English people better acquainted with the facts clearly established concerning the poet's life, and the circumstances under which both his poems and his dramas were given to the world, good will decidedly grow out of evil. The more we know of Shakespeare as a man and an author, the higher does our veneration rise; the better reasons we have for exclaiming, in the words of Dryden, "I love Shakespeare." Assuredly the English people do not yet know what they owe to this incomparable genius, do not actually understand the real extent of their obligations. In seeking to direct attention to the dedicatory epistle, preface, commendatory verses, &c., prefixed to the folio edition of 1623, we feel that we are conferring a boon upon many persons who may not hitherto have been able to meet with this information in a cheap and convenient form. They are found for the most part in voluminous and expensive editions, but have not, so far as the author is aware, been circulated in the cheap standard literature of the day. Familiarity with these interesting documents |
