The sun., 1916-04-16

simple and tense and the ordinary trap
pings Of rhetoric drop Off
II We may venture, then. to~speak nf
Shakcspeare's personal judgments, they
seem to he of two kinds. Of society in
classes and of men and women as individ-
uas. The former kind are not always
broad and sympathetic. being limited by
his conception of the State as feudal
organism; the latter kind are almost a.
ways just and sound and humane. 1t is
these which are universally approved.
Their applicability is immensely elastic.
They are vital and eternal. They serve
and Will probably always serve. to enlarge
narrow experience. to cure sentimentality
TO tighten morbid gloom. His sense of
manhood values is very broad and liberal.
Santler and more l.eroic conceptions OF
human life have been formed by religious
leaders and by epic poets Odysseus Pro-
metheus. Beatrice. Mil,on's Satan. even
AUarow-'s Faustus ami Tamburiane are
beyond Shakespeare's range being
either better or worse than mortals. He
never attempted anything in this order
But we must remember that these heroic
or religious figures are not real, but derive
a large part Of their impress!veness from
the fact that they are symbolical. Shake
spcarc perhaps never, and certainly never
in a wao;c hearted way, attempted to
create symbolic types.
Shakespeare's genial power is nowhere
more copiousiy eXerted than in his history
plays. nor more freely and joyously; yet
50 just is their portrayal of the essentials
Of history that for thousands OF readers
they have taken the place of authentic
history and fixed the popular conception
of Engisn politics and social life between
1877 and 1855; that is. from the accession
of Richard H. to the death OF Richard III
He was really interpreting the fifteenth
century according to the standards Of tire
sixteenth. but We do not always stop to
think Of that. In Richard H." he gives
US an incompetent king. in Henry VI" a
fanatical king. in "Richard H." a diaboli-
cal king. in Henry "" an ovcrpolitic
king, in Henry "" heroic king.
A nation is always governed. or tending
TO he governed. in the interest Of the class
which already holds the most power. In
France before the Revolution. for example.
many important exemptions from taxation
were made in favor of royalty. the nobility
and the clergy. In Germany ever since
the war of 1870 il has been and is the
officer class, the military caste. More than
ten years ago Conservative member Of
the Reichstag, defying the Liberals and
Socialists, boastea that the Kaiser could
order lieutenant and ten soldiers to dis
perse that body. And the laws accordingly
discriminate in favor of the officer class.
which is composed very largely OF rich
mobiles, The imperial franchise Is on a
three class basis, first class vote being
worth three third class votes.
In the United States the most powerful
class is composed not of military men,
nor OF the clergy, nor of titled land owners.
but of men who possess or manipulate free
capital. From the beginning of our ma
tional history this has been the class most
favored by legislation.
In Shakespeare's time there stlll lin
gercd the traditions of an earlier day, when
neither the military man as SUCH nor the
land owner as such, nor the capitalist as
such was the greatest power in England
There still fingered the spirit of feudalism
And in his great historical series, begin
ming with "Richard H." he was reaching
back in imagination to an age two hun
drcd years earlier than his own. when
feudalism really prevailed. in full security
and splendor. The balance of power in
the social organism. though tending to
shift had not wholly shifted, even in
Shakespeare's lifetime. and tn" interests
of his own day prepared him to deal vitally
with the interests of that older time.
Shakespeare's political horizon embraced
fcudal world, not Yet autocratic nor the
ocratic nor plutocrat.c nor democratic The
sovereign was not aAoOlute but power wae