* Baldock has or had a copy of the Electra, in the litte page of which some one had written the name of Wasse at it's author. * The Antigone, by Thomas May, the author of the completion of Lucan's Pharsalia, 1631. The Electra, printed at the Hague in 1649, anonymous. The Edipus, by Lee and Dryden, partly paraphrased, and partly original, 1679. The dipus, translated by Theobald, 1715. The Electra, also by Theobald, in 1714 or 1715; The Ajax, published anonymously, revised by Euripides is treated with the same, or even greater I have reserved the parallels to be found in Shakspeare for separate consideration; they are far too many and too striking to be presented to the reader without some comment. Mr. Upton, when he brought forward "the haver," Tòv exоvтa, as one of the strongest evidences of Shakspeare's scholarship, injured a cause which he seems to have been as little qualified to advocate, as Farmer and Johnson were, as far as Greek is concerned, to meddle with at all. Any one who has read Shakspeare with a view to comparing him with the Greek tragedians, and has also contrasted him in that particular with the more ἦσθα, πάσης highly educated of his fraternity, will, I believe, not Οἶσθ ̓, ὅτ ̓ ἐσπούδαζες ἄρχειν Δαναΐδαις πρὸς Ἴλιον, Ourself, and Bushy, Bagot here, and Green, What reverence he did throw away on slaves, And patient underbearing of his fortune, As 'twere to banish their effects with him. As were our England in reversion his, And he our subjects' next degree in hope. Richard II. act i. scene 4. Compare also in the same two plays : 652 ΙΦΙΓ. Οὐκ οἶδ ̓ ὁ φῂς, οὐκ οἶδα, φίλτατ' ἐμοὶ πάτερ. The passage in the Iphigenia should be thus read for reasons in would be too long to state IP. oux d' & ans. АГ. AS. θα συν μάλλον εἰς οξκτόν μ' άγεις First Lady. Madam, I'll sing. 'Tis well that thou hast cause: But thou shouldst please me better wouldst thou weep. Act iii. scene 4. Compare, again, the contention of Menelaus with the messenger; and the seizure of the letter, Iphig. 307, with that between York and Aumerle, Richard II. act v. scene 2.8 I could adduce many more instances: indeed, altogether his points of similarity are so many and so striking, that either we must allow him to have been not merely a scholar, but a most extensive one; a view, which the testimony of his cotemporaries, his h 8 I find that Hallam, in his view of French literature, during the sixteenth century, mentions a translation of the Iphigenia into French, in the year 1549, which was followed by one of the Hecuba in 1550. But this, of course, gives no clue to those who, with Farmer, deny Shakspeare all know. ledge of French, beyond a few colloquial expressions. h Reasonable weight is to be allowed to this, but not all that Farmer would claim for it. Ben Jonson speaks of Shakspeare as having "little Latin and less (or in another edition no) Greek;" Drayton, as owing all to his "natural braine;" Milton, as "warbling his native wood-notes wild." These are Farmer's best witnesses to Shakspeare's want of learning. Respectable as they are, surely their evidence is to be received with some little reserve. Here are three of the most erudite men of their times, speaking of one wholly unequalled in original power, who had not even enjoyed the then ordinary advantage of residence at an university. Common sense, as well as comparison with themselves, would tell them, that if they wished to pay a distinctive compliment to such a man, the stress must be laid on the selfdependence of his genius; and to do this, nothing was more likely than that they should incline to exaggerate his ignorance. Dryden is also cited as observing, "prettily enough," that "he wanted not the aid of books to read nature:" if by this Farmer meant us to infer, which is necessary to his argu * The French translations of the Iphigenia and Hecuba wase done I suffert, not from the original Greek but the Latin of Iravmus. own errors, and his preference of translations, where any consultation of the ancients was necessary, forbid ment, that because Shakspeare did not want them, he therefore did not use them, it is a pity that the rest of the essay is employed in shewing to a demonstration that he used so many. Then a more obscure witness is called, one Digges, a wit of the town, who, as might have been expected, goes beyond Jonson, and affirms, that Nature only help'd him, for look through This whole book, thou shalt find he doth not borrow Which is false. Had any writer of authority, from carelessness, or a onesided view, called Hooker the inflated, or the any-thing-else Hooker, instead of the judicious, a whole pack would have taken up the cry, and where or when would it have ended? Add to this, the unwillingness of people in general to give any man the credit for eminence in more than one department, as indeed has been well remarked by Pope, in reference to the present case, and by a later writer, in a short sketch of Burke: "When the example does occur, of an individual so richly gifted as to excel in two of the general or leading faculties of the mind, his reputation for the one will generally impede the establishment of his reputation for the other." Farmer, after shewing with great erudition many blunders of ignorance and carelessness, in consequence principally of the use of translations, and also that many mythological allusions, stupidly adduced to prove Shakspeare's learning, were floating in the older literature of England, and after again shewing his ignorance or loose knowledge of modern languages, has, amongst his concluding sentences, the following: "He (Shakspeare) remembered perhaps enough of his school-boy learning to put 'Hig, hag, hog,' into the mouth of sir Hugh Evans;" the remainder of the passage has respect to the modern languages. Admit that Shakspeare was for three years even at a school where Latin was taught at all, and who shall pretend to infer what such a man as Shakspeare may have acquired or not acquired there, or have added during a subsequent life of thirty-five or forty years; not much perhaps deeply or correctly, but probably more in a superficial way than his intimate associates may have been aware of. Dr. Johnson, a great admirer of Farmer's erudition, admits, that very likely Shakspeare knew enough of Latin to be acquainted with its constructions; but the knowledge of constructions in any language is almost always preceded by an acquaintance with the meaning of the more common our taking. Or these resemblances deserve to be accounted for, if possible, in some other manner, for as the majority of them cannot be considered as imitations, so neither ought they to be viewed as purely accidental. And, first, with reference to constructions, idioms, and forms of expression, such, for instance, as "to the death !” εἰς φθόρον, οι εἰς ὄλεθρον, here used as an ejaculation rather than imprecation; oxon, "by leisure;" the extraordinary pleonasm, "when once the service of the foot is gangrened," inρérnμа ποδῶν Todov; with others of the same kind. Compound epithets, too, as ȧveμóns, “wind-swift;" KakóμaVTIS, "ill-divining;" Kuvάppwv, "dog-hearted." Now, whatever may be the general opinion respecting Shakspeare's Greek erudition, whatever may be meant by his "native wood-notes wild," this at least must be admitted, that he was most intimately acquainted with the works of the earlier and cotemporary English poets; and whoever has watched with any attention the progress of the English language, must be sensible, that as, during the later periods, we have been adopting single words from the Greek, chiefly for utilitarian purposes, so we have been dis words. The fact is, that the writings of Shakspeare contain many Latinisms; and there are some expressions which, without some knowledge of Latin, would be wholly unintelligible. |