Arizona republican., 1892-06-01
nrre snondence of TIE REruRmcAN.

InC ptSSluB years 1uIto pottS OA4N have been compared with him-Homer, Dante, Goethe. But what are they, sin gle or combined, to him? Shakespeare stands, and, it should seem, must always stand, alone, unapproached and unap- proachablc, The language in which he wrote-our rich, sinewy, nervous Eng lish-must be immortal, were there no other reasons, from the mere fact of his writing in it. If all the English classics were irretrievably lost, except Shake speare's dramas, these alone would prove English to have been the master tongue. He appears to have ecomprehended human nature completely, and he has expressed his comprehension in words so vivid, picturesque and beautiful that they can never die. His works are an inspired abridgement of the history-mental, moral and spiritual-Of mankind. He has set the weaknesses, the virtues and the passions of the human family to im- perishable music, which will echo, to the last, through the galleries of time.
 Nomarvel that it has been maintained that his writings are the product of many minds. How could one mind create an intellectual world and endow it with typical inhabitants? It is almost impos- sible to answer the question, but to pre- suppose anything else approaches the ab surd. Throughout the plays now cred ited to Shakespeare, with perhaps one or two exceptions, run the same match less expression and quality of thought. There is every reason for believing that they must have come from single mas ter brain, Two brains that could have so sounded the depths of the soul, so interpreted its passions, are not to be discovered even in the Elizabethan era. The conviction of the unity of those mighty dramas is overwhelming and irresistible Unless we accept Shake speare as their sole author, we are landed in chaos; driven to desperation by any number of opposite theories.
 More learned and ingenious nonsense has been written by the critics of and commentators on the poet than would make a good sized library. And it is still written, and will be for future ages, in every civilized land Who would understand him should go direct to his pages.
 Essentially Gothic, original, indi- yidual, rule defying as his genius is, it compels sympathy and admiration from every large, penetrating mind. Being northern and Teutonic, it does not ap- peal to the Latin or Slav races generally, but their intellectual giants are drawn to him instinctively. The French, with their nicety of art, their verbal exact ness, their spick and span phrases, can not as people appreciate him. Voltaire, prodigiously gifted and versatile as he was, called him barbarian He is the contrary of Corueille and Racine, and all the grander for SO being. But lat terly the leading thinkers and scholars of France have grown to his height, while repclled by his lack of form. Taine speaks of his extraordinary char acter of mind, all powerful, excessive, equally master of the sublime and the base; the most creative that has ever en- gagged in the exact copy of the details of actual existence; a nature poetic, i'm moral, inspired, superior to reason by the sudden revelations of his seer's madness.
 Commentators yet continue to dispute whether the poet was learned or un- learned; whether he had more imagina- ton or more observation; whether he was pure genius or a patient laborer.
 As a man he must ever remain mys- tery. For all that is known of him personally, he might have lived thou sands of years ago. His individuality is well nigh fss obscure as that of Homer, who preceded the historic period. There is no authentic record of his birth, but it is probable that both birth and death occurred April 23, in 1864 and l6l6. His parents names have been preserved, and the name of his wife whom he welded from urgency. He left Strat- ford-on-Avon, his native place. went to London; was an indifferent actor; wrote his dramas for the theater with profit; returned to Warwickshire in prosperous circumstances, and in few years died there, as supposed, at the age of fifty two. Beyond these leading facts and a few others, the rest is chiefly conjec- ture. Not line of his manuscript is preserved, except three or four of his signatures. His sole monument is his plays; but they are eternal.
 The poet, with data so limited, with reputation so overshadowing, has natu- rally been idealized, not mentally-that would be superfluOus-but personally, characterally, morally. His SO named portraits are innumcrable and familiar toeverybody, but there is no good reason for believing any one of them authentic. We like to think of him as the author of Hamlet" Macbeth" and "Othello" should look, and so we have him to a degree in the Chandos portrait, which is no portrait at all. Could we see him in the flesh today, he would not answer to our imagining; hence we should incline tO pronounce him an impostcr. Nature seldom incases transcoudent genius in very attractive body-she is not bountc- ous enough for that, He may have been like so many gouiuscs-ycry plain, un- welcome as the pp5tuldie is,
 Of his character we can form no con ceptiOn really, albeit we infer it to have been gentle, generous, lofty and wholly practical, despite his grand idealism. This idealism, as often happens, was in his writing, not in his daily round. He was apparently sad, 70, by tempera- ment and experience; he was intense, passionate, fond of pleasure, especially in his younger days; trying to forget his Droodlng thought Tn excltation of the