Preface to the Works of Shakespeare (1734) | Page 5

the World after a Family-manner, he thought fit, Mr.
Rowe acquaints us, to marry while he was yet very young. It is certain,
he did so: for by the Monument, in Stratford Church, erected to the
Memory of his Daughter Susanna, the Wife of John Hall, Gentleman, it
appears, that she died on the 2d Day of July in the Year 1649, aged 66.
So that She was born in 1583, when her Father could not be full 19
Years old; who was himself born in the Year 1564. Nor was She his
eldest Child, for he had another Daughter, Judith, who was born before
her, and who was married to one Mr. Thomas Quiney. So that
Shakespeare must have entred into Wedlock, by that Time he was
turn'd of seventeen Years.
Whether the Force of Inclination merely, or some concurring
Circumstances of Convenience in the Match, prompted him to marry so
early, is not easy to be determin'd at this Distance: but 'tis probable, a
View of Interest might partly sway his Conduct in this Point: for he
married the Daughter of one Hathaway, a substantial Yeoman in his
Neighbourhood, and She had the Start of him in Age no less than 8
Years. She surviv'd him, notwithstanding, seven Seasons, and dy'd that
very Year in which the Players publish'd the first Edition of his Works
in Folio, Anno Dom. 1623, at the Age of 67 Years, as we likewise learn
from her Monument in _Stratford_-Church.
How long he continued in this kind of Settlement, upon his own Native
Spot, is not more easily to be determin'd. But if the Tradition be true, of
that Extravagance which forc'd him both to quit his Country and way of
Living; to wit, his being engag'd, with a Knot of young Deer-stealers,
to rob the Park of Sir Thomas Lucy of Cherlecot near _Stratford_: the
Enterprize favours so much of Youth and Levity, we may reasonably
suppose it was before he could write full Many. Besides, considering
he has left us six and thirty Plays, which are avow'd to be genuine; (to
throw out of the Question those Seven, in which his Title is disputed:
tho' I can, beyond all Controversy, prove some Touches in every one of
them to come from his Pen:) and considering too, that he had retir'd
from the Stage, to spend the latter Part of his Days at his own Native

_Stratford_; the Interval of Time, necessarily required for the finishing
so many Dramatic Pieces, obliges us to suppose he threw himself very
early upon the Play-house. And as he could, probably, contract no
Acquaintance with the Drama, while he was driving on the Affair of
Wool at home; some Time must be lost, even after he had commenc'd
Player, before he could attain Knowledge enough in the Science to
qualify himself for turning Author.
It has been observ'd by Mr. Rowe, that, amongst other Extravagancies
which our Author has given to his Sir John Falstaffe, in the Merry
Wives of Windsor, he has made him a Deer-stealer; and that he might at
the same time remember his Warwickshire Prosecutor, under the Name
of Justice Shallow, he has given him very near the same Coat of Arms,
which Dugdale, in his Antiquities of that County, describes for a
Family there. There are two Coats, I observe, in Dugdale, where three
Silver Fishes are borne in the Name of _Lucy_; and another Coat, to
the Monument of Thomas Lucy, Son of Sir William Lucy, in which are
quarter'd in four several Divisions, twelve little Fishes, three in each
Division, probably Luces. This very Coat, indeed, seems alluded to in
_Shallow_'s giving the dozen White Luces, and in Slender saying, he
may quarter. When I consider the exceeding Candour and Good-nature
of our Author, (which inclin'd all the gentler Part of the World to love
him; as the Power of his Wit obliged the Men of the most delicate
Knowledge and polite Learning to admire him;) and that he should
throw this humorous Piece of Satire at his Prosecutor, at least twenty
Years after the Provocation given; I am confidently persuaded it must
be owing to an unforgiving Rancour on the Prosecutor's Side: and if
This was the Case, it were Pity but the Disgrace of such an Inveteracy
should remain as a lasting Reproach, and Shallow stand as a Mark of
Ridicule to stigmatize his Malice.
It is said, our Author spent some Years before his Death, in Ease,
Retirement, and the Conversation of his Friends, at his Native Stratford.
I could never pick up any certain Intelligence, when He relinquish'd the
Stage. I know, it has been mistakenly thought by some, that
_Spenser_'s Thalia, in his Tears of his Muses, where she laments the
Loss of her Willy