When God was pleased, the world unwilling yet,
Elias James to nature paid his debt,
And here reposeth; as he lived he died;
The saying in him strongly verified,—
Such life, such death: then, the known truth to tell,
He lived a godly life and died as well.
WM. SHAKSPEARE.

commit, Francis Gastrell departed from Stratford, ing epitaph, attributed, certainly not on its interna hooted out of the town, and pursued by the execra- evidence, to our Poet. Its subject was, probably tions of its inhabitants. The fate of New Place the member of a family with the surname of James has been rather remarkable. After the demolition which once existed in Stratford. of the house by Gastrell, the ground, which it had occupied, was thrown into the contiguous garden, and was sold by the widow of the clerical barbarian. Having remained during a certain period, as a portion of a garden, a house was again erected on it; and, in consequence also of some d'spute about the parish assessments, that house, like its predecessor, was pulled down; and its site was finally abandoned to Nature, for the production of her fruits and her flowers and thither may we inagine the little Elves and Fairies frequently to resort, to trace the footsteps of their beloved poet, now obliterated from the vision of man; to throw a finer perfume on the violet; to unfold the first rose of the year, and to tinge its cheek with a richer blush; and, in their dances beneath the full-orbed moon, to chant their harmonies, too subtle for the gross ear of mortality, to the fondly cherished memory of their darling, THE SWEET SWAN OF Avon.

Among the monuments in Tonge Church, in the county of Salop, is one raised to the memory of Sir Thomas Stanley, Knt., who is thought by Malone to have died about the year 1600. With the prose inscription on this tomb, transcribed by Sir W. Dugdale, are the verses which I am about to copy, said by Dugdale to have been made by William Shakspeare, the late famous tragedian.

ON THE EAST END OF THE TOMB.

Ask who lies here, but do not weep:
He is not dead, he doth but sleep.
This stony register is for his bones:
His fame is more perpetual than these stones:
And his own goodness with himself being gone,
Shall live when earthly monument is none

ON THE WEST END.

Not monumental stone preserves our fame:
Nor sky-aspiring pyramids our name.
The memory of him for whom this stands,
Shall outlive marble and defacer's hands.
When all to time's consumption shall be given,
Stanley, for whom this stands, shall stand in heaven.

Of the personal history of William Shakspeare, as far as it can be drawn, even in shadowy existence, from the obscurity which invests it, and of whatever stands in immediate connection with it, we have now exhibited all that we can collect; and we are not conscious of having omitted a single circumstance of any moment, or worthy of the attention of our readers. We might, indeed, with old Fuller, speak of our Poet's wit-combats, as Fuller calls them, at the Mermaid, with Ben Jonson: but then we have not one anecdote on record of either of these intellectual gladiators to produce, for not a sparkle of our Shakspeare's convivial wit has travelled down to our eyes; and it would be neither instructive nor pleasant to see him represented as a As the great works of Shakspeare have engaged light skiff, skirmishing with a huge galleon, and the attention of an active and a learned century either evading or pressing attack as prudence sug- since they were edited by Rowe, little that is new gested, or the alertness of his movements embold-on the subject of them can be expected from a pen ened him to attempt. The lover of heraldry may, perhaps, censure us for neglecting to give the blazon of Shakspeare's arms, for which, as it appears, two patents were issued from the herald's office, one in 1569 or 1570, and one in 1599; and by him, who will insist on the transcription of every word which has been imputed on any authority to the pen of Shakspeare, we may be blamed for passing over in silence two very indifferent epitaphs, which have been charged on him. We will now, therefore, give the arms which were accorded to him; and we will, also, copy the two epitaphs in question. We may then, without any further impediment, proceed to the more agreeable portion of our labours,-the

notice of our author's works.

The armorial bearings of the Shakspeare family are, or rather were,-Or, on a bend sable, a tilting spear of the first, point upwards, headed argent. Crest, A falcon displayed, argent, supporting a spear in pule, or.

of the present day. It is necessary, however, that we should notice them, lest our readers should be compelled to seek in another page than ours for the common information which they might conceive themselves to be entitled to expect from us.

Fourteen of his plays were published separately, in quarto copies, during our Poet's life; and, seven years after his death, a complete edition of them was given to the public in folio by his theatric fellows, Heminge and Condell. Of those productions of his, which were circulated by the press while he author seems to have been as utterly regardless as was yet living, and were all surreptitious, our great he necessarily was of those which appeared when he was mouldering in his grave.* We have already

* In his essay on the chronological order of Shak the title-page of the earliest edition of Hamlet, which he speare's plays, Malone concludes very properly from believed then to be extant, that this edition (published in 1604) had been preceded by another of a less correct and In a MS. volume of poems, by William Herrick less perfect character. A copy of the elder edition, in and others, preserved in the Bodleian, is the follow-question, has lately been discovered; and is, indeed, far more remote from perfection than its sucessor, which was collated by Malone. It obviously appears to have been printed from the rude draught of the drama, as it was sketched by the Poet from the first suggestions of his mind. But how this rude and imperfect draught could fall into the hands of its publisher, is a question not easily to be answered. Such, however, is the authority to be attached to all the early quartos. They were obtained by every indirect mean; and the first incorrect MS., blotted again and again by the pens of ignorant transcribers, and multiplied by the press, was suffered, by the apathy of its illustrious author, to be circulated, without check, among the multitude. Hence the grossest anomalies of grammar have been considered, by his far-famed restorers, as belonging to the dialect of Shakspeare; and the most egregious infractions variations of the copy of Hamlet immediately before us, which was published in 1603, from the perfect drama, as it subsequently issued from the press, are far too nu merous to be noticed in this place, if indeed this place could properly be assigned to such a purpose. I may, however, just mention that Corambis and Montano are

equally hallowed with that of which we have been speaking, for Nature has not yet produced a second Shakspeare; but of genius, which had conversed with the immortal Muses, which had once been the delight of the good and the terror of the bad. I allude to the violation of Pope's charming retreat, on the banks of the Thames, by a capricious and tasteless woman, who has endeavoured to blot out every memorial of the great and moral poet from that spot, which his occupation had made classic, and dear to the heart of his country. In the mutability of all human things, and the inevitable shiftings of property, "From you to me, from me to Peter Walter," these lamentable desecrations, which mortify our pride and wound our sensibilities, will of necessity sometimes occur. The site of the Tusculan of Cicero may become the haunt of banditti, or be dis-of rhythm, as the tones of his honey-tongued muse. The graced with the walls of a monastery. The residences of a Shakspeare and a Pope may be devastated and de5led by a Parson Gastrell and a Baroness Howe. We can only sigh over the ruin when its deforraity strikes upon our eyes, and execrate the hands by which it has boen savagely accomplished.

observed on the extraordinary,—nay wonderful in- | view cured and perfect of their limbs; and all the difference of this illustrious man toward the offspring rest absolute in their numbers as he conceived of his fancy; and we make it again the subject of them." But notwithstanding these professions, our remark solely for the purpose of illustrating the and their honest resentment against impostors and cause of those numerous and pernicious errors surreptitious copies, the labours of these sole poswhich deform all the early editions of his plays. sessors of Shakspeare's MSS. did not obtain the He must have known that many of these, his intel- credit which they arrogated; and they are charged lectual children, were walking through the commu- with printing from those very quartos, on which nity in a state of gross disease, with their limbs they had heaped so much well-merited abuse. They spotted, as it were, with the leprosy or the plague. printed, as there cannot be a doubt, from their But he looked on them without one parental feeling, prompter's book, (for by what temptation could they and stretched not out his hand for their relief. They be enticed beyond it?) but then, from the same had broken from the confinement of the players, to book, were transcribed many, perhaps, of the surwhose keeping he had consigned them; and it was reptitious quartos; and it is not wonderful that their business and not his to reclaim them. As for transcripts of the same page should be precisely the rest of his intellectual progeny, they were where alike. These editors, however, of the first folio, he had placed them; and he was utterly uncon- have incurred the heavy displeasure of some of our cerned about their future fate. How fraught and modern critics, who are zealous on all occasions to glowing with the principle of life must have been depreciate their work. Wherever they differ from their nature to enable them to subsist, and to force the first quartos, which, for the reason that I have themselves into immortality under so many circum- assigned, they must in general very closely resemstances of evil! ble, Malone is ready to decide against them, and The copies of the plays, published antecedently to defer to the earlier edition. But it is against the to his death, were transcribed either by memory editor of the second folio, published in 1632, that from their recitation on the stage; or from the sepa- he points the full storm of his indignation. He rate parts, written out for the study of the particu- charges this luckless wight, whoever he may be, lar actors, and to be pieced together by the skill of with utter ignorance of the language of Shakspeare's the editor; or, lastly, if stolen or bribed access time, and of the fabric of Shakspeare's verse; and could be obtained to it, from the prompter's book he considers him and Pope as the grand corrupters itself. From any of these sources of acquisition of Shakspeare's text. Without reflecting that tc the copy would necessarily be polluted with very be ignorant of the language of Shakspeare's time flagrant errors; and from every edition, through was, in the case of this hapless editor, to be ignowhich it ran, it would naturally contract more pol- rant of his own, for he who published in 1632 could lution and a deeper stain. Such of the first copies hardly speak with a tongue different from his who as were fortunately transcribed from the prompter's died only sixteen years before, Malone indulges in book, would probably be in a state of greater rela- an elaborate display of the unhappy man's ignotive correctness: but they are all, in different de- rance, and of his presumptuous alterations. He grees, deformed with inaccuracies; and not one of (the editor of the second folio) did not know that the them can claim the right to be followed as an au- double negative was the customary and authorized thority. What Steevens and Malone call the re- dialect of the age of Queen Elizabeth; (God help storing of Shakspeare's text, by reducing it to the him, poor man! for if he were forty years old when he reading of these early quartos, is frequently the re-edited Shakspeare, he must have received the first storing of it to error and to nonsense, from which it nad luckily been reclaimed by the felicity of conjectural criticism. One instance immediately occurs to me, to support what I have affirmed; and it may be adduced instead of a score, which might be easily found, of these vaunted restorations.

In that fine scene between John and Hubert, where the monarch endeavours to work up his agent to the royal purposes of murder, the former says,

-If thou couldst

Hear me without thine ears, and make reply
Without a tongue, using conceit alone, &c. &c.

Then in despite of brooded, watchful day,

I would into thy bosom pour my thoughts, &c. &c.

The passage thus stood in one of these old copies of authority: but Pope, not able to discover any meaning in the epithet, brooded, most happily substituted "broad-eyed" in its stead. As the compound was poetic and Shakspearian (for Shakspeare has dull-eyed and fire-eyed,) and was also most peculiarly suited to the place which it was to fill, the substitution for a while was permitted to remain; till Steevens, discovering the reading of the old copy, restored brooded to the station whence it had been felicitously expelled, and abandoned the line once more to the nonsense of the first editor.

In 1623, the first complete edition of our author's dramatic works was published in folio by his comrades of the theatre, Heminge and Condell; and in this we might expect a text tolerably incorrupt, if not perfectly pure. The editors denounced the copies which had preceded their edition as "stolen and surreptitious copies, maimed and deformed by the frauds and stealths of injurious impostors, that exposed them; even those are now offered to your the names given in this copy to the Polonius and Reynaldo of the more perfect editions; and the young lord, Ostick, is called in it only a braggart gentleman.

rudiments of his education in the reign of the maiden queen ;) and thus egregiously ignorant (ignorant, by the bye, where Shakspeare himself was ignorant, for his Twelfth Night, the clown says, "If your four negatives make your two affirmatives -why then the worse for my friends and the better for my foes," &c.) but thus egregiously ignorant, instead of

"Nor to her bed no homage do I owe." this editor has stupidly printed,

"Nor to her bed a homage do I owe." further," this blockhead of an editor has substituted Again, in "As you Like It," for "I cannot go no Nothing," for "I can go no further." In "Much Ado about

"There will she hide her
To listen our purpose."

this corrupting editor has presumed to relieve the halting metre by printing,

"There will she hide her
To listen to our purpose."

In these instances, I feel convinced that the editor is right, and consequently that the critic is the blockhead who is wrong. In what follows also, I am decidedly of opinion that the scale inclines in favour of the former of these deadly opposites. The double comparative is common in the plays of Shakspeare, says Malone :-true, as I am willing to allow; but always, as I am persuaded, in consequence of the illiteracy or the carelessness of the first transcriber: for why should Shakspeare write more ar sinalous English than Spenser, Daniel, Hooker, and Facon? or why in his plays should he be guilty o barba

* Act v. sc. I

*

the editor's

"And with the brands fire all the traitors' houses."

The next charge, brought against the editor, may be still more easily repelled. In a noted passage of Macbeth

risms with which those poems of his, that were | plement is as beneficial to the sense, as it is ne printed under his own immediate eye, are altoge-cessary to the rhythm. Malone's line is, ther unstained? But, establishing the double com- "And with the brands fire the traitors' houses:" parative as one of the peculiar anomalies of Shakspeare's grammar, Malone proceeds to arraign the unfortunate editor as a criminal, for substituting, in a passage of Coriolanus, more worthy for more worthier; in Othello-for, "opinion, a sovereign mistress, throws a more safer voice on you," "opinion, &c. throws a more safe voice on you;" and, in Hamlet, instead of "Your wisdom should show itself more richer to signify this to the doctor," "Your wisdom should show itself more rich to signify this to the doctor." Need I express my conviction that in these passages the editor has corrected the text into what actually fell from Shakspeare's pen? Can it be doubted also that the editor is accurate in his printing of the following passage in "A Midsummer Night's Dream?" As adopted by Malone it

stands.

"So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord, Ere I will yield my virgin patent up Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke My soul consents not to give sovereignty." .e., says the critic, to give sovereignty to, &c.-To be sure-and, without the insertion, in this instance, of the preposition, the sentence would be nonsense. As it is published by the editor, it is,

"I would while it was smiling in my face
Have pluck'd my nipple from its boneless gums,
And dash'd the brains out, had I so sworn
As you have done to this."

"Not perceiving," says Malone, "that 'sworn' was used as a dissyllable," (the devil it was?) "He (the editor) reads 'had I but so sworn,' much as we think, to the advantage of the senso as well as of the metre; and supplying, as we conceive, the very word which Shakspeare had written, and the carelessness of the transcriber omitted. Charms' our Poet sometimes uses, according to Malone, as a word of two syllables."-No! impossible! Our Poet might, occasionally, be guilty of an imperfect verse, or the omission of his tran scriber might furnish him with one: but never could he use "charms" as a word of two syllables. We feel, therefore, obliged by the editor's supply ing an imperfect line in "The Tempest," with the very personal pronoun which, it is our persuasion, was at first inserted by Shakspeare. In the most modern editions, the line in question stands"Cursed be I that did so! all the charms," &c. but the second folio reads with unquestionable pro Having now sufficiently demonstrated the editor's priety, "Cursed be I that I did so! all the charms, ignorance of Shakspeare's language, let us proceed &c. As 'hour' has the same prolonged sound with his critic to ascertain his ignorance of Shak-with fire, sire, &c. and as it is possible, though, speare's metre and rhythm. In "The Winter's Tale," says Malone, we find,

"So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
Ere I will yield my virgin patent up
Unto his lordship, to whose unwish'd yoke
My soul consents not to give sovereignty."

"What wheels, racks, fires; what flaying, boiling In leads and oils!"

with reference to the fine ear of Shakspeare, f think most improbable, that it might sometimes be made to occupy the place of two syllables, I shall pass over the instance from "Richard II." in which Malone triumphs, though without cause, over his adversary; as I shall also pass over that from Not knowing that 'fires' was used as a dissyllable, "All's Well that End's Well," in which a defecthe editor added the word burning, at the end of tive line has been happily supplied by our editor, the line (I wish that he had inserted it before boil-in consequence of his not knowing that 'sire' was ing')employed as a dissyllable. In the first part of "What wheels, racks, fires; what flaying, boiling,lish," is prolonged by the editor with a syllable "Henry VI." "Rescued is Orleans from the Eng

burning."

It is possible that fires may be used by Shakspeare as a dissyllable, though I cannot easily persuade myself that, otherwise than as a monosyllable, it would satisfy an ear, attuned as was his, to the finest harmonies of verse; yet it may be employed as a dissyllable by the rapid and careless bard; and I am ready to allow that the defective verse was not happily supplied, in that place at least, with the word, burning, yet I certainly believe that Shakspeare did not leave the line in question as Malone has adopted it, and that some word has been omitted by the carelessness of the first transcriber. In the next instance, from Julius Cæsar, I feel assured that the editor is right, as his sup

*In his "Venus and Adonis," and his "Rape of Lucrece," printed under his immediate inspection; and in his 154 Sonnets, printed from correct MSS., and no doubt with his knowledge, are not to be found any of these barbarous anomalies. "The Passionate Pilgrim," and "The Lover's Complaint," are, also, free from them. Worser and lesser may sometimes occur in these poems: but the last of these improprieties will occasionally find a place in the page of modern composition. In the "Rape of Lucrece," the only anomaly of the double negative, which I have been able to discover, is the following:

"She touch'd no unknown baits, nor fear'd no hooks." and the same impropriety may be found in three or four instances in the Sonnets. And substituted for nor would restore these few passages to perfect grammar.

† Act iii. sc. ?

which he deemed necessary because he was igno-
rant that the word, English,' was used as a tri-
syllable. According to him the line is-"Rescued
is Orleans from the English wolves." We rejoice
at this result of the editor's ignorance; and we
wish to know who is there who can believe that
'English' was pronounced, by Shakspeare or his
contemporaries, as Engerlish, or even as Engleish,
with three syllables? Again, not knowing that
Charles' was used as a word of two syllables, (and
he was sufficiently near to the time of Shakspeare
to know his pronunciation of such a common word:
but the blockhead could not be taught the most
common things,) this provoking editor instead of
"Orleans the bastard, Charles, Burgundy."
has printed,

"Orleans the bastard, Charles, and Burgundy."
In the next instance, I must confess myself to be
ignorant of Malone's meaning. "Astræa being
used," he says "as a word of three syllables," (I
conclude that he intended to say, as a word of four
syllables, the diphthong being dialytically separated
into its component parts, and the word written and
pronounced Astraea,) for "Divinest creature, As-
træa's daughter," the editor has given "Divinest
creature, bright Astræa's daughter."-Shameless
interpolation! Not aware that sure' is used as
dissyllable, this grand corrupter of Shakspeare's
text has substituted, "Gloster, we'll meet to thy
dear cost, be sure," for "Gloster, we'll meet to thy
cost, be sure."-Once more, and to conclude an
examination which I could extend to a much greate

length in favour of this much-injured editor, but
which I feel to be now becoming tedious, for,

"And so to arms, victorious father,"

as the line is sanctioned by Malone, arms,' being
used, as he asserts, for a dissyllable, (arms a
syllable!) the second folio presents us with-

"And so to arms, victorious, noble father."

21

a few years, another was projected; and that it might be more adequate to the claims of Shakspeare Pope showed himself more conscious of the nature and of Britain, the conduct of it was placed, in dis-of his task, and more faithful in his execution of homage to his just celebrity, in the hands of Pope. it than his predecessor. He disclosed to the pubI have said enough to convince my readers of the collated many of the earlier editions, and heared lic the very faulty state of his author's text, and falsity of the charges of stupidity and gross igno- the page of Shakspeare from many of its deformisuggested the proper means of restoring it: he rance, brought by Malone against the editor of the ties: but his collations were not sufficiently extensecond folio edition of our Poet's dramatic works. sive; and he indulged, perhaps, somewhat too I am far from assuming to vindicate this editor much in conjectural emendation. This exposed from the commission of many flagrant errors: but him to the attacks of the petty and minute critics; he is frequently right, and was unquestionably con- and, the success of his work falling short of his exversant, let Malone assert what he pleases, with pectations, he is said to have contracted that enhis author's language and metre. It was not, mity to verbal criticism, which actuated him during therefore, without cause, that Steevens held his la- the remaining days of his life. His edition was bours in much estimation. Malone was an invaluable collector of facts: his industry was indefati- taken, Theobald, a man of no great abilities and of gable: his researches were deep: his pursuit of little learning, had projected the restoration of published in the year 1725. Before this was undertruth was sincere and ardent: but he wanted the Shakspeare; but his labours had been suspended, talents and the taste of a critic; and of all the edi- or their result had been withheld from the press, tors, by whom Shakspeare has suffered, I must till the issue of Pope's attempt was ascertained by consider him as the most pernicious. Neither the its accomplishment, and publication. The Shakindulged fancy of Pope, nor the fondness for inno-speare of Theobald's editing was not given to the vation in Hanmer, nor the arrogant and headlong world before the year 1733; when it obtained more self-confidence of Warburton has inflicted such of the public regard than its illustrious predecessor, cruel wounds on the text of Shakspeare, as the as- in consequence of its being drawn from a somewhat suming dulness of Malone. Barbarism and broken wider field of collation; and of its less frequent and rhythm dog him at the heels wherever he treads. In praise of the third and the fourth folio editions indeed, did not wholly abstain from conjecture: of our author's dramas, printed respectively in 1664 but the palm of conjectural criticism was placed presumptuous admission of conjecture. Theobald, and 1685, nothing can be advanced. Each of these much too high for the reach of his hand. editions implicitly followed its immediate predecessor, and, adopting all its errors, increased them to ceeded Sir Thomas Hanmer, who, in 1744, publisha frightful accumulation with its own. With the ed a superb edition of the great dramatist from the To Theobald, as an editor of Shakspeare, sucfoxt of Shakspeare in this disorder, the public of press of Oxford. But Hanmer, building his work Britain remained satisfied during many years. on that of Pope, and indulging in the wildest and from the period of his death he had not enforced most wanton innovations, deprived his edition of at popularity to which his title was undeniable. all pretensions to authenticity, and, consequently, to Great, though inferior, men, Jonson, Fletcher, merit. Massinger, Shirley, Ford, &c. got possession of the stage, and retained it till it ceased to exist under the puritan domination. On the restoration of the monarchy in 1660, the theatre indeed was again opened; but, under the influence of the vicious taste of the new monarch, it was surrendered to a new school (the French school) of the drama; and its mastery was held by Dryden, with many subordinates, during a long succession of years. Throughout this whole period, Shakspeare was nearly for-planations to be just. gotten by his ungrateful or blinded countrymen. His splendour, it is true, was gleaming above the horizon; and his glory, resting in purple and gold upon the hill-summits, obtained the homage of a select band of his worshippers: but it was still hidden from the eyes of the multitude; and it was long before it gained its "meridian tower," whence it was to throw its "glittering shafts" over a large portion of the earth. At length, about the commencement of the last century, Britain began to open her eyes to the excellency of her illustrious son, THE GREAT POET OF NATURE, and to discover a solicitude for the integrity of his works. Aw and a more perfect edition of them became the demand of the public; and, to answer it, an edition, under the Superintendence of Rowe, made its appearance in 1709. Rowe, however, either forgetting or shrinking from the high and laborious duties, which he had undertaken, selected, most unfortunately, for his model, the last and the worst of the folio editions; and, without collating either of the first two folios or any of the earlier quartos, he gave to the disappointed public a transcript much too exact of the impure text which lay opened before him. Some of its grosser errors, however, he corrected; and he prefixed to his edition a short memoir of the life of his author; which, meagre and weakly written as it is, still constitutes the most authentic biography that we possess of our mighty bard.

mighty hand-by the hand of Warburton; whose The bow of Ulysses was next seized by a Shakspeare was published in 1747. It failed of success; for, conceiving that the editor intended to make his author his showman to exhibit his erudition and intellectual power, the public quickly neglected his work; and it soon disappeared from circulation, though some of its proffered substitutions must be allowed to be happy, and some of its ex

obtained once more an editor of great name, and seemingly in every way accomplished to assert the After an interval of eighteen years, Shakspeare rights of his author. In 1765 Doctor Samuel John son presented the world with his long-promised edition of our dramatist: and the public expectation, which had been highly raised, was again doomed to be disappointed. Johnson had a powerful intellect, and was perfectly conversant with human life: but he was not sufficiently versed in black-letter lore; and, deficient in poetic taste, he was unable to accompany our great bard in the higher flights of his imagination. The public general were not satisfied with his commentary o his text: but to his preface they gave the most un limited applause. The array and glitter of its words; the regular and pompous march of its periods, with its pervading affectation of deep thought and of sententious remark, seem to have fascinated the popular mind; and to have withdrawn from the common observation its occasional poverty of meaning; the inconsistency of its praise and censure; the falsity in some instances of its critical remarks; and its defects now and then even with respect to composition. It has, however, its merits, and Heaven forbid that I should not be just to them. It gives a right view of the difficulties to be encoun tered by the editor of Shakspeare: it speaks mopreceded him in the path which he was treading: destly of himself, and candidly of those who had

it assigns to Pope, Hanmer, and Warburton, those and was content to lose it!" Shakspeare lost the victims to the rage of the minute critics, their due world! He won it in an age of intellectual giants proportion of praise; it is honourably just, in short, the Anakims of mind were then in the land; and in what succeeding period has he lost it? But, not to take advantage of an idle frolic of the edi tor's imagination, can the things be which he asserts? Can the author, whom he thus degrades, be the man, whom the greater Jonson, of James's reign, hails as, "The pride, the joy, the wonder of the age!" No! it is impossible! and if we come to a close examination of what our preface writer has here alleged against his author, of which I have transcribed only a part, we shall find that one half of it is false, and one, some thing very like nonsense, disguised in a garb of tin sel embroidery, and covered, as it moves statelily along, with a cloud of words :