Biographical Essays | Page 4

Addison was

profoundly ignorant of Chaucer and of Spenser. Milton only,--and why?
simply because he was a brilliant scholar, and stands like a bridge
between the Christian literature and the Pagan,--Addison had read and
esteemed. There was also in the very constitution of Milton's mind, in
the majestic regularity and planetary solemnity of its epic movements,
something which he could understand and appreciate. As to the
meteoric and incalculable eccentricities of the dramatic mind, as it
displayed itself in the heroic age of our drama, amongst the Titans of
1590-1630, they confounded and overwhelmed him.
In particular, with regard to Shakspeare, we shall now proclaim a
discovery which we made some twenty years ago. We, like others,
from seeing frequent references to Shakspeare in the Spectator, had
acquiesced in the common belief, that although Addison was no doubt
profoundly unlearned in Shakspeare's language, and thoroughly unable
to do him justice, (and this we might well assume, since his great rival
Pope, who had expressly studied Shakspeare, was, after all, so
memorably deficient in the appropriate knowledge,)--yet, that of course
he had a vague popular knowledge of the mighty poet's cardinal dramas.
Accident only led us into a discovery of our mistake. Twice or thrice
we had observed, that if Shakspeare were quoted, that paper turned out
not to be Addison's; and at length, by express examination, we
ascertained the curious fact, that Addison has never in one instance
quoted or made any reference to Shakspeare. But was this, as Steevens
most disingenuously pretends, to be taken as an exponent of the public
feeling towards Shakspeare? Was Addison's neglect representative of a
general neglect? If so, whence came Rowe's edition, Pope's, Theobald's,
Sir Thomas Hanmer's, Bishop Warburton's, all upon the heels of one
another? With such facts staring him in the face, how shameless must
be that critic who could, in support of such a thesis, refer to " the
author of the Tatler" contemporary with all these editors. The truth is,
Addison was well aware of Shakspeare's hold on the popular mind; too
well aware of it. The feeble constitution of the poetic faculty, as
existing in himself, forbade his sympathizing with Shakspeare; the
proportions were too colossal for his delicate vision; and yet, as one
who sought popularity himself, he durst not shock what perhaps he
viewed as a national prejudice. Those who have happened, like

ourselves, to see the effect of passionate music and "deep-inwoven
harmonics" upon the feeling of an idiot, we may conceive what we
mean. Such music does not utterly revolt the idiot; on the contrary, it
has a strange but a horrid fascination for him; it alarms, irritates,
disturbs, makes him profoundly unhappy; and chiefly by unlocking
imperfect glimpses of thoughts and slumbering instincts, which it is for
his peace to have entirely obscured, because for him they can be
revealed only partially, and with the sad effect of throwing a baleful
gleam upon his blighted condition. Do we mean, then, to compare
Addison with an idiot? Not generally, by any means. Nobody can more
sincerely admire him where he was a man of real genius, viz., in his
delineations of character and manners, or in the exquisite delicacies of
his humor. But assuredly Addison, as a poet, was amongst the sons of
the feeble; and between the authors of Cato and of King Lear there was
a gulf never to be bridged over. [Endnote: 4]
But Dryden, we are told, pronounced Shakspeare already in his day "a
little obsolete." Here now we have wilful, deliberate falsehood.
Obsolete, in Dryden's meaning, does not imply that he was so with
regard to his popularity, (the question then at issue,) but with regard to
his diction and choice of words. To cite Dryden as a witness for any
purpose against Shakspeare,--Dryden, who of all men had the most
ransacked wit and exhausted language in celebrating the supremacy of
Shakspeare's genius, does indeed require as much shamelessness in
feeling as mendacity in principle.
But then Lord Shaftesbury, who may be taken as half way between
Dryden and Pope, (Dryden died in 1700, Pope was then twelve years
old, and Lord S. wrote chiefly, we believe, between 1700 and 1710,)
"complains," it seems, "of his rude unpolished style, and his antiquated
phrase and wit." What if he does? Let the whole truth be told, and then
we shall see how much stress is to be laid upon such a judgment. The
second Lord Shaftesbury, the author of the Characteristics, was the
grandson of that famous political agitator, the Chancellor Shaftesbury,
who passed his whole life in storms of his own creation. The second
Lord Shaftesbury was a man of crazy constitution, querulous from ill
health, and had received an eccentric education from his eccentric

grandfather. He was practised daily in talking