The San Francisco call., 1899-10-16

to despise ourselves for our laughing con-
donation of his vices. when Prince Hal.
now king indeed touches him as with
the spear of Ithuriel and causes him to
appear in his true aspect C'2 Hen. w."
V, V, 51-74.
8. Shakespeare has the greatest respect
for the civic virtues for those which hold
together the framework Of society. 1t fol-
lows that he brands with his adherence
all treachery, disloyalty and ingratitude,
all ruthless and insolent tyranny, and all
deliberate failure to cooperate in the ad-
vancement of the common veal. Almost
every one of the more serious plays and
even some of the comedies. will furnish
instances in proof. In king Lear" he
stigmatiZes filial ingratitude; in Mac
beth" regicide and oppression; in 1.-The
Tempest treason; and these are but
specimens. Now and again the whole
tempest of his eloquence is poured out in
a flood on the unsocial vices, on lawless-
ness, anarchy and riot.
4. While it is thus true that Shake
speare has for his characters a scale of
values and recognizes a pantheon of vir-
tues, it must be said. on the other hand,
that there is an excellence for which he
has but scant and conventional appre-
citation. ] refer to the virtue which has
primary reference to God. as those all
ready mentioned have to man or the state
Though he can at times manifest tender
ness and reverence in his illusions to
sacred things Gas e. g.. Il Hen. w." l.,
l., 1927; Hamlet" l., l.. 15S-1s4; "All's
Well" H., l.. 139-14D. yet for reverence,
for worship, for holiness of life, he in
general has but slight regard. The ami
able friar in Romeo and Juliet" by no
means inspires unqualified reverence; the
ambitious Gloucester. not yet become
King Richard Ill, is willingly supported
in his young hypocrisy by two bishops,
and the sanity seeming Angelo in Meas
use for Measure has but stolen the livery
of the court of heaven to serve the devil
in. Shakespeare came between the earlier
ages of faith. with their exaltation of re-
ligion, and the puritanism of the seven
teenth century. He finds the Middle Ages
picturesque and despises the purtans; he
himself in child of the Renaissance, and
his kingdom is a kingdom of this world.
5. While Shakespeare's prime interest
is in humanity, he yet has an open eve
for the terror, the majesty and the beauty
of the physical universe and for the
aspect Of all things visible. Take but two
illustrations-the one of the sun ("Richard
IL" Ill, H., 41-2, when
From under the terrestrial ball
He fires the proud tops of the eastern pines:
the other of the winds Ct2 Hen w." III.
l., 22-4):
Who take the ruff1an pillows by the tops
Curling their monstrous heads and hanging
them
With deafening clamor in the slippery clouds;
or, if you wish another add the picture of
a navy afloat ("Henry W" I'LL, prol.
7-16). But in any case note how he per-
sonfies-how he makes nature alive with
man.
6. Shakespeare has definite views con-
corning poetry, its nature and processes.
Thus he proclaims the office of poetry to
soften and refine c'Two Gentlemen of
Verona" Ill, H., 72 ff)
Much is the force of heaven-bred poesy
For Orpheus' lutte strung with poets
sinews
Whose golden touch could soften steel and
stones,
Make tigers tame and huge leviathans
Forsake unsounded deeps TO dance sands.
Again, he tells US what is the poets
master faculty ('Midsummer Nights
Dream ", l., 12-1O:
The poets eye. in fine frenzy rolling.
Doth glance from heaven to earth. from earth
to heaven;
And as Imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown the poets pen
Turns them to shapes and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name