THE END OF THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN IS SHAKSPERE'S. 55 Act V. scene vi. (Weber; sc. iv. Littledale). Palamon. Thy brave soul seek Elysium! Theseus. His part is played; and, though it were too short, He did it well. Your day is lengthened, and Oh, cousin! Your kinsman hath confessed, the right o' the lady Even then proclaimed your fancy. He restord | her To send him hence forgiven! The gods my justice The executioners. Lead your lady off: And call your lovers from the stage of death, The funeral of Arcite; in whose end, (Exeunt omnes.) You have now before you an outline of the subject of this highly poetical drama, with specimens which may convey some notion of the manner in which the plan is executed. But detached extracts Shakspere. [page 57] Shakspere. II FL DJ VIZZES ET TWO AUTHORS. cance form nams ir a just decision as to the part which Shaksgence may have nie erving the scenes from which de quations we get addressed myself to one previously ameymuned vas am I should be compelled to request an more study of being and Such a perusal would conce de mist strooi mind the ove authors were concerned ne vr vould be peered that certain scenes are disusted by red prominent dates, while others present Sfere mi éssmir jas Evere to assume that Fletcher vorce parts of the piry, we most aim that many parts of it were vrina by mice jesin ni we have only to inquire who that Wimbolt recoming to any external presumptions whaten I dink there's angt as a £f the parts which are endency at Teters = 4propriate them to the great poet vise nime 1 is sure, madoka has associated with his. In in the passigs vich have been here selected, you cannot but bure maced Shisspeare's hand tegently and unequivocally. The zmadaniy views rich I stay suggested to your recollection, my he furnished some rules of podgment, and cleared away some obsadies to the path; and where I have filled in bringing out Scacy the red pots of dierence, your own acute judgment and debere taste must have enabled you to draw instinctively A Sass which I have attempted to reach by systematic In much a question of this sort is infinitely more easy of decison where Fletcher is the author against whose claims Shakspeare's are to be balanced then it could be if the poet's supposed assistant were any other ancient English dramatist. If a drama were presemad a ex here, as in some of Shakspeare's received works, he Aad saken up the ruler sketch of an older poet, and exerted his skin alleeing and enlarging it, it would be very difficult indeed to dermine beween the orginal and his additions. He has often, epericly in his earlier works and in his histories more particularly, mach of that extration of ideas, and that strained and labouring Arve of epresin which marked the Hercules-like infancy of the Fyld Theme The stateliness with which Marlowe paces the QUALITIES OF SHAKSPERE CONTRASTED WITH THOSE OF FLETCHER. 57 nificence like Shakspere some times. kind. tragic stage, and the magnificence of the train of solemn shews Marlowe's magwhich attend him like the captives in a Roman procession of triumph, bear no distant likeness to the shape which Shakspeare's genius assumes in its most lofty moods. And with those also who followed the latter, or trode side by side with him, he has many points of resemblance or identity. Jonson has his seriousness of views, his Jonson. singleness of purpose, his weight of style, and his "fulness and frequency of sentence;" Massinger has his comprehension of thought, Massinger. giving birth to an involved and parenthetical mode of construction; and Middleton, if he possesses few of his other qualities, has much Middleton. of his precision and straightforward earnestness of expression.1 In examining isolated passages with the view of ascertaining whether they were written by Shakspeare or by any of those other 2poets, we [2 page 59] should frequently have no ground of decision but the insecure and narrow one of comparative excellence. When Fletcher is Shak- Fletcher and Shakspere speare's only competitor, we are very seldom driven to adopt so contrasted. doubtful a footing; we are not compelled to reason from difference They differ in in degree, because we are sensible of a striking dissimilarity in kind. We observe ease and elegance of expression opposed to energy and Fletcher. quaintness; brevity is met by dilation, and the obscurity which re- Shakspere. sults from hurry of conception has to be compared with the vagueness proceeding from indistinctness of ideas; lowness, narrowness, Fletcher. and poverty of thought, are contrasted with elevation, richness, and Shakspere. comprehension: on the one hand is an intellect barely active enough Fletcher. to seek the true elements of the poetical, and on the other a mind which, seeing those finer relations at a glance, darts off in the wan- Shakspere. tonness of its luxuriant strength to discover qualities with which poetry is but ill fitted to deal; in the one poet we behold that com- Fletcher. parative feebleness of fancy which willingly stoops to the correction of taste, and in the other, that warmth, splendour, and quickness of Shakspere. imagination, which flows on like the burning rivers from a volcano, quenching all paler lights in its spreading radiance, and destroying every barrier which would impede or direct its devouring course. You will remark that certain passages or scenes in this play are attributed to Shakspeare, not because they are superior to Fletcher's 1 Beaumont's style is unluckily not characterized.-F. Ine I name but because they are mike It may be true that < xoses tiger excellence than Fletcher could have add be miss merely in excisic cumstance, and it memes 5m led These passages are as Starperros, not from possessing in a higher degree Flemmers met les, but from exhibiting nih te s parmilly or wholly wanting, and which 15 or via malued constitute a style and LT ་གྲགས་པར་ Interea suce Flender is acknowledged to stand immeasurably Soulsspemme, me excelence of some passages might persexx reason for refusing to the inferior poet La i per ama lan nyss of the means by whit me melence s produced places is beyond the necessity of meist mance at least to this general ground of ama bere be ake view, when we have bem unit I assume a poster vach endless to take advantage parts of this play we find those external qualities A wait form Shiasperes ustingushing them nonstics, not separately and sog' present but combined most fly and most intimately; and is conseguenay n disponible that we have, either Shakspeare's S & S and successfil imination of it. It is not est to perceive with perfect demess why it is that imitation of Stagers pecularly dent: but every one is convinced that sir more so the these of any other poet whatever. The nge and apposta of his qualites the ranty and loftiness of the Es varule of these, and sell more, the coincident operation f is nog bænir powers make a next to impossible, even in svert and solized pages to produce an imitation which shall be male it is original composition: but there is not even a pally of sw = Ragt to carry on such an imitation of མ་པ་པོ།གྲོང་ཚིག་པོ།།གང་པོ་རྒྱ་གགཌས་པ་ན Where the external qualities of a work selle ka te question of his authorship can be Become red iz ne other way than by inquiring whether the essential deners and de sunt Nich anmutes the whole, are his also; and #G.Saree for legal argument; it can be answered THE POETIC SENSE. SHAKSPERE'S PART OF THE TWO N. K. 59 By the emotion Shakspere's work be judgd. it creates, must only by reflection on the effect which the work produces on our own minds. The dullest eye can discriminate the free motions of the living frame from the convulsed writhings which art may excite in the senseless corpse; the nightly traveller easily distinguishes between the red and earthy twinkling of the distant cottage-lamp, and the cold white gleam of the star which rises beyond it ;—and with equal quickness and equal certainty the poetical sense can The poetic sense alone can judge. decide whether the living and ethereal principle of poetry is present, or only its corporeal clothing, its dead and inert resemblance. The emotion which poetry necessarily awakens in minds qualified as the subjects of its working, is the only evidence of its presence, and the measure and index of its strength. If we can read with coldness and indifference the drama which we are now examining, we must pronounce it to 'be no more than a skilful imitation of Shakspeare; [1 page 61] but we must acknowledge it as an original if the heart burns and the fancy expands under its influence, if we feel that the poetical and dramatic spirit breathes through all,—and if the mind bows down involuntarily before the powers of whose presence it is secretly but convincingly sensible. I cannot have a doubt that the parts of this work which I have pointed out as Shakspeare's will the more firmly endure this trial, the more closely and seriously they are revolved and studied. The portions of the drama which, on such principles as these, have been set down as Shakspeare's, compose a large part of its bulk, and embrace most of the material circumstances of the story. They are, the First Act wholly,-one scene out of six in the Third, and the whole of the Fifth Act, (a very long one,) except one unimportant scene. These parts are not of equal excellence; but the grounds on which a decision as to their authorship rests, seem to be almost equally strong with regard to each. We have as yet been considering these scenes as so many separate pieces of poetry; and they are valuable even in that light, not less from their intrinsic merit than as being the work of our greatest poet. If it be true merely that Shakspeare has here executed some portions of a plan which another had previously fixed on and sketched, the drama demands our zealous study, and is entitled to a place among And his part of The Two Noble Kinsmen wit nesses for itself. Shakspere's share of The Two Act I. Act III. sc.. Act V, except scene iv. |