The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1900-02-04
DIR. HUME'S LECTURE.
A Packed House Heard the Distin
guished Shahespearean Scholar.

A lecture by DIR. Hume ON Shakes
peare is one of hfe'S wholly unalloyet
pleasures, as everybody in this Statt
who knows anything knows-and so !;
house packed to the doors heard him a
the Baptist Woman's college yesterday
evening ON Shakespeare Ideals of Con
duct and Life" The master of styk
that is the despair of every man whit
wishes to write well and speak well, ant
knowing Shakespeare as few men have
known him, DIR. Hunle's lecture could ..
appreciated only when given without the
omission of a word.
The distinguished lecturer salu in part
'sTIhey combined theory and practice i'll
the age of Shakespeare, the spaciou
times of great Elizabeth. Lney though
and they fought. They dreamed dreams
and discovered new lands. Lo Raleig.
estopped from voyages wrote the histor,
of the world, prisoner in a room ten fee
square. Lo, virtue and beauty in Sid
ney's life and death, 10 the Fairie Queen
of Spender and his political secretary
ship in ireland. I1o, Bacon, parliamenta-
rian, judge. essayist, philosopher, dyins
in a scientific experiment. Then thu
correlation of thinking and doing. TIL
author of 1.-The tragedy of Thought" was
spacious in the possession of dirt,
Shakespeare grew rich on malt and tax
farming. This was the age of the litera-
ture, the new romantic drama, which em
bodied the best practical morals, not tn
morality of school or cloister, but of ELI
zabeth Knight, of makers of the King
James Bible The book that has made
the English people, the Divine Book to
every human, was now taking its peerless
form and Shakespeare shows the inn
press of it's thought and diction. Note
his allusion to it as the Book Of Life,
the word, Holy Writ, his direct quota
tions from Proverbs and the sermon ON
the Mount, to Scripture personages from
Adam to PLATE, Mr.. Quickly confound>
Father Abraham, and King Arthur. TIL,
essentials of Biblical theology are il
our dramatist. (Here the speaker proved
the point by elaborate and interesting
Selections), atonement, the future state,
recognition in heaven, eternal penalty
the inward hell of conscience, the recon
Citation of justice and mercy, the psyche
logy of sims progress, the relations
conscience to the mystery of sleep, are
all here.
1.-THE tenetS of conservative English
professionalism are definitely presented in
his plays. Every phase of human
thought, railroads.&c., superstitious, ortho-
dox, is given with the dramatist's faculty
of entering into adj experience. But you
do not therefore conclude that at one
time Shakespeare is infidel and at an
other Roman Catholic and again Protes-
tant in his personal convictions. In Lear
he raises your spirit, thrills and purifes
your soul, and with enlarged grasp you
settle the problem for yourself. A poem,
a play is not treatise on morals more
than the Bible is text book of science.
''Thus Shakespeare avoids didactic form
and teaches you by stimulating and
guiding imagination. His morality is con-
sistent with true instinct and born nature
Folly and lust unfold in action their
suicidal unreasonableness. Falstaff
loses at last his power to fall ON his feet
in disaster and goes down in inextinguish-
able laughter after having confused your
fancy and feeling by his brilliant viva
city and humour. This concrete ina
ginative representation of life is worth
more than whole volumes Of philosophic
disquisition. There is tonic quality in
his best work. Life seems worth living.
Love and purity triumph in the death OF
Desdemona. There are in his writin prs
sudden conversions and gradual trans
formations as there are in life as
Juliet and Henry V. prove. His histor-
ical dramas are an enlivening healthy
presentment of the best ethics in action.
Selfish mobiles, weak kings, true heroes.
live and move before MS and God is seen
to be at work in his world"