THE COMPLETE WORKS OF WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. WITH A LIFE OF THE POET, EXPLANATORY FOOT-NOTES, CRITICAL 120 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, by HENRY N. HUDSON, in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. GINN & HEATH: J. S. CUSHING, PRINTER, 16 HAWLEY STREET, BOSTON. KING JOHN. IRST printed in the folio of 1623, but included in the list FIRS of Shakespeare's plays given by Francis Meres in his Palladis Tamia, in 1598. This is the only external evidence we have as to the date of the writing. Various attempts have been made to argue that date from allusions to contemporary matters; but I cannot see that those attempts really amount to any thing at all. On the other hand, some of the German critics are altogether out, when, arguing from the internal evidences of style, structure of the verse, and tone of thought, they refer the piece to the same period of the author's life with The Tempest, The Winter's Tale, and Cymbeline. In these respects, it strikes me as having an intermediate cast between The Two Gentlemen of Verona and The Merchant of Venice. From the characteristics of style alone, I am quite persuaded that the play was written some considerable time before King Henry the Fourth. It thus synchronizes, I should say, very nearly with King Richard the Second. The matter is well stated by Schlegel: In King John the political and warlike events are dressed out with solemn pomp, for the very reason that they have little of true grandeur. The falsehood and selfishness of the monarch speak in the style of a manifesto. Conventional dignity is most indispensable where personal dignity is wanting. Falconbridge is the witty interpreter of this language; he ridicules the secret springs of politics, without disapproving of them; for he owns that he is endeavouring to make his fortune by similar means, and would rather be of the deceivers than the deceived; there being in his view of the world no other choice." Schlegel thus regards the peculiarities in question as growing naturally out of the subject; whereas I have no scruple of referring them to the undergraduate state of the Poet's genius; for in truth they are much the same as in several other plays where no such cause has been alleged. These |