phetic spirit, which saw with equal clearness through the darkness of futurity as through the mist of the past, Shakspeare sat down to write his instructive satire on the Homeric hero-life. It was no wish of his to bring down the high, or to make the great little, and still less to attack the poetic dignity of Homer, or of heroic poetry. His object was to warn men against that exclusive and unqualified admiration which they are so likely to fall into, and which, whenever it loses sight of that perfect morality which, as shadowed forth in Christianity, is the godlike, eternal end of humanity, becomes nothing less than sinful, while at the same time he laboured to illustrate the universal truth, that whatever is merely human, however illustrious a poetic halo of ideality and a mythic antiquity may render it, is really but very insignificant and little, when examined by the bird's-eye view of true moral ideality. We may, then, venture to assert, that the "Troilus and Cressida," independently of its satirical tendency, has for its fundamental idea the conviction that all human grandeur and greatnesswhatever is most commonly admired and ennobled-is but little and worthless, when contemplated from the lofty position of that true moral perfection which Christianity archetypically sets before Thus regarded, the piece no longer appears singular; its import becomes as clear as it is profound. man. In conclusion, I cannot refrain from advancing the conjecture, that Shakspeare probably had also an ulterior object in its composition, not unconnected with his own profession and pursuits. We know that Ben Jonson-as a man the friend, but as a poet the decided adversary of Shakspeare-had made it the express objects of his critical and poetical labours to revive the observance of Aristotle's ill-understood rules, and to reform the English drama by the model of classical antiquity. Shakspeare, although often and warmly attacked, had never entered openly and directly into the controversy; he no doubt despised it, from a conviction that in so purely theoretical a domain no decision could ever be come to by vague abstract reasoning. He may, however, have thought that the point of his adversaries' argument might be blunted if it could be shewn in a striking manner that the whole spirit and character-the morals and customs of antiquity-were irrecon cileable with the views and feelings of Christianity. In such a case it would appear an absurd attempt to seek to apply to christian art the foreign and inconsistent principles of ancient poetry. And what more convincing or more pertinent method of adducing such a proof, than to embody it in a poem, and so to present it to the general eye? We must not, however, expect to find any express or palpable intimation in the poem itself of such an ulterior and secondary purpose. Such a hint would ruin the character of his work as a piece of art, and Shakspeare had too high a sense of the dignity of his art to degrade it to such personal offices. The whole dispute he felt to be at best but temporary, and one which, in his judgment, was not worth the wasting on it of a noble work of art. There is nevertheless one passage in which the intelligent eye alone may detect a very distant allusion of the kind. It is the passage in Act II., Scene 4, where Hector objects to Paris and Troilus that they have glozed but superficially on the question whether Helen ought or not to be delivered up, "Not much Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought The words in themselves have no value but for their comic effect. And yet this useless, impertinent, but most flagrant anachronism, may perhaps have been boldly hazarded in order to give a sideblow to his senseless opponents, who on all occasions absurdly brought in the name of Aristotle, and thought they had cleared. all before them if they had only adduced a word or passage, however inapplicable, from the works of their great authority. If this conjecture be correct, it will serve also to throw some light on the external history of the piece. It was printed in the quarto of 1609, with the accompanying remark in the Preface, that it was never acted at the Globe. On the other hand, we find an entry of it at Stationers' Hall as early as the 7th of February, 1602-3, and an allusion to it in Dekker's "Satiromastix," which (according to Collier) appeared in 1602, which proves that "Troilus and Cressida" must have been acted in 1601, and, as appears by a note in the Stationers' Registry, by the Lord Chamberlain's company. Now, this was the very time when Ben Jonson brought forward his "Poetaster," and generally attacked the popular theatre, while he advocated the Aristotelian rules and the ancient model. While, therefore, Dekker was employed on his "Satiromastix," Shakspeare replied to Jonson more or less promptly with his "Troilus and Cressida ;" but in all probability with a hasty sketch of the whole at first. In this form it may have been acted once or twice at the small winter theatre at Blackfriars, or, as Tieck supposes, before the Court only, and subsequently withdrawn from the stage, when Jonson was beaten, as we have seen, for a time, and the public interest in the dispute had evaporated. But about 1608, the party of Ben Jonson sprung up more active and more powerful than ever. Thereupon Shakspeare entirely remodelled the piece as it appears in the quarto; and in its present shape I refer it to 1608 or 9. The "Merry Wives of Windsor," on the other hand, must have been written as early as 1599 or 1600. For it is entered in the Stationers' Registry the 18th of January, 1601, and that it was not composed much earlier is proved by its language and general character. The arguments which Chalmers adduces for placing it before "Henry the Fourth," and as early as 1596, are satisfactorily refuted by Drake, who, however, with Malone, places it as much too late, in 1601, for we may safely assume that no play was ever printed, before it had been acted at least once. A comparison of the two old' quartos with the folio of 1623, furnishes another proof of the unceasing care with which Shakspeare retouched his compositions. When Shakspeare made this revision is uncertain; Malone says in 1603, but Tieck several years later. I cannot see any valid ground for either opinion. From what sources Shakspeare borrowed the materials of these two pieces is, to my mind, a question of indifference. The invention in both is obviously of secondary importance; the chief interest in one lies in the character of Falstaff, and the view of classical antiquity of the other. For the "Merry Wives of Windsor" he may have made use of translations of some tales 341 of Giovanni Fiorentino and Straparola (see Stevens' Note; Simrock, &c. i. 201 f.; iii. 221, &c.) As to "Troilus and Cressida," the work of Eschenberg will afford every information. Whether in the structure of it he followed an older piece of the same title by Dekker and Chettle, and mentioned in Henslowe's Diary, the 7th and 16th of April, 1599 (Reed's Shakspeare, iii. 391), admits not of determination, but is, no doubt, highly probable. 342 SHAKSPEARE'S HISTORICAL DRAMAS. IN an examination of the thirteen dramas which we have classed together under this head, the preliminary question is, to ascertain Shakspeare's notion of an historical drama. In the first, then, it is evident that to deserve this name for his composition the poet must not dispose absolutely of his historical matter, nor employ it simply as materials which he is at liberty to mould and fashion at will; but that his primary duty is to give, as Shakspeare invariably does, a true, accurate, and faithful likeness of the actual history. In this procedure poesy evidently renounces its own independence, and becomes, what in a high sense it ought to be, the handmaid of history. For poems of this kind can have no other end in view than to exhibit in clear artistic transparency the profound and inmost meaning of historical events, and consequently the true essence of history itself. And thus the historical drama appears to coincide in its end and design with the idea of dramatic art in general. The former, however, cannot attain to this end in the same way that the latter secures it. For this is at liberty to choose its own subjectmatter, and to give it a form in accordance with the poetic end it had in view in selecting it. It is therefore able to weave the historical idea so intimately into the characters of the dramatic personages, and into the particular motives of the action, as to allow the epic and lyric elements to coalesce, and to reflect in the subjectivity of the actors the whole objectivity of the art in its full significance. In actual history, on the contrary, the progress of development is governed by certain general laws and principles, which in their extent greatly transcend the life and influence of the individual agents. Into this progress the subjective enters, it is true, with a free self-determination either to promote or to obstruct it; the activity of individuals influences and regulates in measure even the history of the world. But still this some |