Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser., 1856-01-10

ings, by the light that plays upon the
branches Out from such summer spirit,
we have from Shakspere his magnificent
dream of lyric-witchery, 1.-The Midsummer
> Nights Dream s'Romeo and Juliet
came also from the summer of the mind
, The intensity of summer life, of summer
beauty is in their love: the sudden darkness
! of a summer tempest is in their DEATH
There is summer in the laugh of the old
Nurse; there is summer in the wit of the
Young Mercutio. ':Much Ado About No
thing" shows also the summer of the mind ::
it shows it in the buoyant wit of Benedick !;
in the reckless sarcasm Of Beatrice; in the
stupid and happy dignity of Dogberry: in
the diffusion through the whole, of exuber-
ance and audacity. The character of Fal-
staff most especially belongs to the summer
of the mind There is an JUNCTION, an olea-
ginous moisture about Sir John, which give
strong evidence of hot weather: there is a
broad sunlight of mirth about the rascal, a
profigacy Of ideas within him, which clear
Iy proves that when he was engendered in
the brain, it was Joyous with fun and crowd
ed with images Summer departs as sure
ly in the order of the mind as in the order
of the seasons. As in the year we can not
see it pass away without regret, neither can
we in the life Every mind of any thought
becomes reflective at this change. The pass
ing from the prime OF life into its maturity
is a transition at once serious and exciting.
Hitherto we looked only onward, and our
life by hope was in the future henceforth,
we shall look mostly backward, and our life
by memory will be in the Past. At this
point, we stop to pause and muse. We feel
with the young while going out of youth; );
and we claim to mediate with the old with
out realizing age. Passion adds force to
thought: thought gives dignity to Passion.
Passion, thought, fancy, come together, and
are made in Imagination s.all compact. >
This, perhaps, is the time in our nature
when there is most of interest, and even
most of romance: when there are the most
suggestive contrasts and minglings between
the shadows and the lights of our existence.
It is time Of questioning. Problems,
doubts, difficulties beset us, which before
| we kad not experience to estimate, Or calm
ness to ponder, and which after this, we
must solve or lay aside. It is a time Of sa-
tire Much later satire becomes repulsiye.
What in the mature may be merely critical,
seems in a graver age to be misanthropic.
From the old we expect counsel and not ri
dicule; not wit but wisdom. An old satir-
list is almost as odious as all old sensualist.
This transition-time Shakspere has embodi-
ed in such plays as s.Hamlet' and ''As You
Like it, Both are pregnant with the meta
physics and criticism CT life; as keenly in
Touchstone at the lowest extreme, as in the
royal thinker at the highest; while some
qualities Of each are found in the contem-
plative Jacques, who in character as we'll as
in condition occupies middle ground be-
tween them. And 50 we come to autumn
with its II pc fruitage, its painted woods;
with its swollen torrents, its gorgeous and
it's gloomy skies; with its difusive inspira-
ton, which makes it seem as if all nature
were rapt in thinking; with its living still
ness which acts upon the soul like music.
1t was in such season Of the mind that
Shakspere gave us ''Othello' and Mac
beth" Shakspere had no winter of years !;
for he died while his autumn was vet full ::
nor does it appear that he had any winter of
the heart If I find any analogy of winter
in the order Of his genius, it is only in that
which is most pleasing or most grand in
winter. There is an indoor winter; when
the wind rattles in the easements, and the
rain or snow beats against the glass; and
we hear the dirges Of troubled spirits in the
air; then it is that we refresh the fire, and
5 trim the light, come together in the friendly
group, and long wistfuly for song and story
From the quiet seriousness Of Shakspere's
later mind, we have in correspondence with
i these instincts, the wild romance Of s'Cym-
beline," the august tsupernaturalism of ''The
1.-The Winters Tale" But there is also an
outdoor winter: in which we come directly
into contact with its darkness, it's storms, its
terrors, and its powers. This is the winter
! that we meet in the sterner exercise of
5 Shakspere's later genius; in ssCoriolanus'
in ''Timon of Athens" s"-and in Lear" in
!; the desolation of pride; in the rage of scorn;
; in the fury of the will in the collected hur-
, ricane Of all griefs, madness, passion,-on
: ly exhausted in the exhaustion of misery
and of life.
Perhaps it is in most fitting consistency
with the relations of Shakspere's genius to
humanity-that the individual, Shakspere,
{ should not be better known There are GER
tain relations in which the personality of a
man enters essentially into his work; in
which character is part of his power. 1t
is so with the orator. We want the man,
, the man himself, in his word; and if we
, find he1s not in it. his word is hollow. We
: look for personal belief, for personal convic-
I ton, and without them, the finest effusion
is but windy rhetoric. We seek for the
!; proof in the individual life. Evidence of
1 libertinism would take grandeur even from