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The conteft about the original benevolence or malignity of man had not yet commenced. Speculation had not yet attempted to analyfe the mind, to trace the paffions to their fources, to unfold the feminal principles of vice and virtue, or found the depths of the heart for the motives of action. All thofe enquiries, which from that time that human nature became the fashionable ftudy, have been made fometimes with nice difcernment, but often with idle fubtilty, were yet unattempted. The tales, with which the infancy of learning was fatisfied, exhibited only the fuperficial appearances of action, related the events, but omitted the caufes, and were formed for fuch as delighted in wonders rather than in truth. Mankind was not then to be ftudied in the clofet; he that would know the world, was under the neceffity of gleaning his own remarks, by mingling as he could in its bufinefs and amufements.

Boyle congratulated himself upon his high birth, because it favoured his curiofity, by facilitating his accefs. Shakespeare had no fuch advantage; he came to London a needy adventurer, and lived for a time by very mean employments. Many works of genius and learning have been performed in ftates of life that appear very little favourable to thought or to enquiry; fo many, that he who confiders them is inclined to think that he fees enterprize and perfeverance predominating over all external agency, and bidding help and hindrance vanifh before them. The genius of Shakespeare was not to be depreffed by the weight of poverty, nor limited by the narrow converfation to which men in want are inevitably con

demned;

demned; the incumbrances of his fortune were fhaken from his mind, as dew-drops from a lion's

mane.

Though he had fo many difficulties to encounter, and fo little affistance to furmount them, he has been able to obtain an exact knowledge of many modes of life, and many cafts of native difpofitions; to vary them with great multiplicity; to mark them by nice diftinctions; and to fhew them in full view by proper combinations. In this part of his performances he had none to imitate, but has been himself imitated by all fucceeding writers; and it may be doubted, whether from all his fucceffors more maxims of theoretical knowledge, or more rules of practical prudence, can be collected, than he alone has given to his country.

Nor was his attention confined to the actions of men; he was an exact furveyor of the inanimate world; his defcriptions have always fome peculiarities, gathered by contemplating things as they really exist. It may be observed, that the oldest poets of many nations preferve their reputation, and that the following generations of wit, after a fhort celebrity, fink into oblivion. The first, whoever they be, muft take their fentiments and descriptions immediately from knowledge; the refemblance is therefore juft, their defcriptions are verified by every eye, and their fentiments acknowledged by every breaft. Those whom their fame invites to the fame ftudies, copy partly them, and partly nature, till the books of one age gain fuch authority, as to ftand in

[C3]

the

the place of nature to another, and imitation, always deviating a little, becomes at laft capricious and cafual. Shakespeare, whether life or nature be his fubject, fhews plainly, that he has feen with his own eyes; he gives the image which he receives, not weakened or distorted by the intervention of any other mind; the ignotant feel his reprefentations to be juft, and the learned fee that they are complete.

Perhaps it would not be eafy to find any author, except Homer, who invented to much as Shakespeare, who fo much advanced the ftudies which he cultivated, or effufed fo much novelty upon his age or country. The form, the characters, the language, and the fhows of the English drama are his. He feems, fays Dennis, to have been the very original of our English tragical harmony, that is, the harmony of blank verfe, diverfified often by diffyllable and triffyllable terminations. For the diverfity diftinguifkes it from heroick harmony, and by bringing it nearer to common use makes it more proper to gain attention, and more fit for action and dialogue. Such verfe we make when we are writing profe; we make fuch verfe in common converfation.

I know not whether this praife is rigorously juft. The diffyilable termination, which the critick rightly appropriates to the drama, is to be found, though, I think, not in Gorboduc, which is confeffedly before our auther; yet in Hieronymo, of which the date is not certain, but which there is reafon to believe at Icaft as old as his earliest plays. This however is cer

It appears from the induction of Ben Jonfon's Bartholomew Fair to have been acted before the year 1590.

STEEVENS,

tain, that he is the firft who taught either tragedy or comedy to please, there being no theatrical piece of any older writer, of which the name is known, except to antiquaries and collectors of books, which are fought because they are fcarce, and would not have been scarce, had they been much efteemed.

To him we muft afcribe the praife, unless Spenfer may divide it with him, of having firft discovered to how much finoothnefs and harmony the English language could be foftened. He has fpeeches, perhaps fometimes fcenes, which have all the delicacy of Rowe, without his effeminacy. He endeavours indeed commonly to ftrike by the force and vigour of his dialogue, but he never executes his purpose better, than when he tries to footh by foftnefs,

Yet it must be at laft confeffed, that as we owe every thing to him, he owes fomething to us; that, if much of his praise is paid by perception and judgment, much is likewife given by cuftom and veneration. We fix our eyes upon his graces, and turn them from his deformities, and endure in him what we should in another loath or defpife. If we endured without praifing, refpect for the father of our drama. might excufe us; but I have feen, in the book of fome modern critick, a collection of anomalies, which fhew that he has corrupted language by every mode of depravation, but which his admirer has accumulated as a monument of honour.

He has scenes of undoubted and perpetual excellence, but perhaps not one play, which, if it were [C 4]

now

now exhibited as the work of a contemporary writer, would be heard to the conclufion. I am indeed far from thinking, that his works were wrought to his own ideas of perfection; when they were fuch as would fatisfy the audience, they fatisfied the writer, It is feldom that authors, though more ftudious of fame than Shakespeare, rife much above the ftandard of their own age; to add a little to what is beft will always be fufficient for prefent praife, and those who find themselves exalted into fame, are willing to credit their encomiafts, and to fpare the labour of contending with themselves.

It does not appear, that Shakespeare thought his works worthy of pofterity, that he levied any ideal tribute upon future times, or had any further profpect, than of prefent popularity and prefent profit, When his plays had been acted, his hope was at an end; he folicited no addition of honour from the reader. He therefore made no fcruple to repeat the fame jefts in many dialogues, or to entangle different plots by the fame knot of perplexity, which may be at leaft forgiven him, by thofe who recollect, that of Congreve's four comedies, two are concluded by a marriage in a mafk, by a deception, which perhaps never happened, and which, whether likely or not, he did not invent.

So careless was this great poet of future fame, that, though he retired to eafe and plenty, while he was yet little declined into the vale of years, before he could be difgufted with fatigue, or difabled by infirmity, he made no collection of his works, nor defired to

refcus

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