Characters of Shakespeares Plays | Page 8

imagination, possess such truth and consistency, that
even when deformed monsters like Caliban, he extorts the conviction,
that if there should be such beings, they would so conduct themselves.
In a word, as he carries with him the most fruitful and daring fancy into
the kingdom of nature,--on the other hand, he carries nature into the
regions of fancy, lying beyond the confines of reality. We are lost in
astonishment at seeing the extraordinary, the wonderful, and the
unheard of, in such intimate nearness.
'If Shakespeare deserves our admiration for his characters, he is equally
deserving of it for his exhibition of passion, taking this word in its
widest signification, as including every mental condition, every tone
from indifference or familiar mirth to the wildest rage and despair. He

gives us the history of minds; he lays open to us, in a single word, a
whole series of preceding conditions. His passions do not at first stand
displayed to us in all their height, as is the case with so many tragic
poets, who, in the language of Lessing, are thorough masters of the
legal style of love. He paints, in a most inimitable manner, the gradual
progress from the first origin. "He gives", as Lessing says, "a living
picture of all the most minute and secret artifices by which a feeling
steals into our souls; of all the imperceptible advantages which it there
gains; of all the stratagems by which every other passion is made
subservient to it, till it becomes the sole tyrant of our desires and our
aversions." Of all poets, perhaps, he alone has pourtrayed the mental
diseases,--melancholy, delirium, lunacy,-- with such inexpressible, and,
in every respect, definite truth, that the physician may enrich his
observations from them in the same manner as from real cases.
'And yet Johnson has objected to Shakespeare, that his pathos is not
always natural and free from affectation. There are, it is true, passages,
though, comparatively speaking, very few, where his poetry exceeds
the bounds of true dialogue, where a too soaring imagination, a too
luxuriant wit, rendered the complete dramatic forgetfulness of himself
impossible. With this exception, the censure originates only in a
fanciless way of thinking, to which everything appears unnatural that
does not suit its own tame insipidity. Hence, an idea has been formed
of simple and natural pathos, which consists in exclamations destitute
of imagery, and nowise elevated above every-day life. But energetical
passions electrify the whole of the mental powers, and will,
consequently, in highly favoured natures, express themselves in an
ingenious and figurative manner. It has been often remarked, that
indignation gives wit; and, as despair occasionally breaks out into
laughter, it may sometimes also give vent to itself in antithetical
comparisons.
'Besides, the rights of the poetical form have not been duly weighed.
Shakespeare, who was always sure of his object, to move in a
sufficiently powerful manner when he wished to do so, has
occasionally, by indulging in a freer play, purposely moderated the
impressions when too painful, and immediately introduced a musical
alleviation of our sympathy. He had not those rude ideas of his art
which many moderns seem to have, as if the poet, like the clown in the

proverb, must strike twice on the same place. An ancient rhetorician
delivered a caution against dwelling too long on the excitation of pity;
for nothing, he said, dries so soon as tears; and Shakespeare acted
conformably to this ingenious maxim, without knowing it.
"The objection, that Shakespeare wounds our feelings by the open
display of the most disgusting moral odiousness, harrows up the mind
unmercifully, and tortures even our senses by the exhibition of the most
insupportable and hateful spectacles, is one of much greater importance.
He has never, in fact, varnished over wild and blood- thirsty passions
with a pleasing exterior,--never clothed crime and want of principle
with a false show of greatness of soul; and in that respect he is every
way deserving of praise. Twice he has pourtrayed downright villains;
and the masterly way in which he has contrived to elude impressions of
too painful a nature, may be seen in Iago and Richard the Third. The
constant reference to a petty and puny race must cripple the boldness of
the poet. Fortunately for his art, Shakespeare lived in an age extremely
susceptible of noble and tender impressions, but which had still enough
of the firmness inherited from a vigorous olden time not to shrink back
with dismay from every strong and violent picture. We have lived to
see tragedies of which the catastrophe consists in the swoon of an
enamoured princess. If Shakespeare falls occasionally into the opposite
extreme, it is a noble error, originating in the fulness of a gigantic
strength: and yet this tragical Titan, who storms