fulfilment of the rest, makes us inclined to believe Shakespeare before all men.

We

The subject of Hamlet is positively a limitless one. leave the reader to read a volume between the lines of the text. He will find every word a revelation, every touch the work of a painter who has used up nature, and even the play upon words, to illustrate his deep meaning. Hamlet is the work of a great historian. It is the result of a great philosophy. And it is the prophecy of a more than inspired teacher. Artist, historian, philosopher, dramatist, prophet, are all contained in Hamlet. A god could have done no better than our Poet has in this marvellous work. For

a god could but have been understood within the limits of human comprehension. Hamlet has a threefold unity. The unity of art, the unity of rationalism, and the unity of history.

To add to all this, the whole three are united in perfect harmony. Take the touches of the Churchyard-scene, and its succession. First, discussion as to progress, and its recognition. Then the surmisal of law, next the criticism of progress, and that of history. Finally, if Mr. Buckle is not far wrong, the reduction of all life to an eternal conservation and reappearance. Hamlet is indeed a little history of man. It is the microcosm of the macrocosm. No wonder Hamlet was a play our Poet constantly retouched and altered.1 His conception of this tragedy must have gone through many slow processes and evolutions of thought. The length of Hamlet's address to his mother is in keeping with the importance of the Reformation. But we see how difficult, nay impossible, to realize the schism in the action of the play. For the Queen can only in words divide her heart in twain; not in action. But finally we have her drinking to Hamlet. Shakespeare has dwelt dramatically

1 Knight, Delius, and Staunton give good evidence that Shakespeare constantly altered Hamlet. There is an earlier edition extant, in which the names of the characters are different. For example, Polonius in this first (quarto, 1603) edition is entitled Corambis.

alone upon the epochs and crises of history. The Playerscene, the revelation of the Ghost, the death of Polonius, all these are points upon which history and the play itself hinge. Every minor event, every gradual decay or growth, is in the text, or summed up in an appearance or return. Such is the grand chorus of Fortinbras, running like a thread all through the play. Another is the spread of education, by the revolution of Laertes. A third, by Hamlet's banishment to England. And over all this the insanity of Ophelia, in contrast to the one-sided mania of Hamlet, hangs like an unutterable pall, to heighten the contrast and the effect.

But before all this comes the exquisite beauty of the Churchyard-scene. The decay of what is dearer to men even than their lives (which they count as nought in its defence), is represented by the aptest of images, a churchyard. Death is indeed at its busiest when progress and beliefs are at stake. How many lives have been sacrificed over questions of policy and belief! And here we have the sharp contrast of mockery, ridicule, and laughter, with the dread end. Everything gives way before those arch-clowns Time and Progress. What genius, to represent Progress uprooting institutions as skulls ! And how great the art, that could represent man interrogating Progress, and criticizing himself, by Hamlet's conversations with himself.

Hamlet must be recognized as the History of Man. Nobody recognized more distinctly than our Poet that Reason is the son of Time. We are told so in more than one play. Shakespeare was the most complete evolutionist that we can realize. He was a firm believer in science. And he was a Utopian believer in the future of man-an optimistic future-after the end of the tempests of Man's Apprenticeship.

The words of one Leonard Digges promise to be fulfilled to the letter, aye, to such a degree as to make men believe that they have indeed shaken hands with Shakespeare, but have not known him until three centuries have passed over his

head. Those words are (speaking of his works): "They would keep him young for all time, and the day would come when everything modern would be despised, everything that was not Shakespeare's would be esteemed an abortion; then every verse in his works would rise anew, and the Poet be redeemed from the grave."

CHAPTER VIII.

WE may now endeavour to realize the whole unity of

1

Hamlet. That unity is the unity and prospects of history, when the latter becomes worthy of its name. For mere despotism and stagnancy is not properly history. Chronicles may hand down records of the deeds of kings and of nations, but progress only exists with the first inspiration of the breath of freedom. Shakespeare has therefore very properly left out all irrelevant matter. The Dark Ages are the proper starting-point of modern history. As they broke up, so the history of Europe began to evince a growth and development, which is in striking contrast with the credulity, superstition, and ignorance of anterior centuries. The first thing to be represented dramatically was the breaking up of darkness and ignorance. Doubt illuminates itself by the light of the revival of learning. Increased liberty gives and takes fresh power from this movement, whilst out of it springs a force which is well represented by Hamlet. The latter, we maintain, like the King, is an attribute, not a personification. Hamlet re

presents the genius of truth and justice-seeking. He is the human symbol, which wars for righteousness on earth. He is well indicated when we use the word Truth in connexion with him.

1 We mean progress in the sense of modern history. Evolution is progress, of course, and is identical with universal history; but we believe that in this cosmical sense Shakespeare has given us the "descent of man" in "The Tempest."

As the birth of Hamlet is contemporary with that of liberty, Shakespeare has opened his play with the feeble and abortive attempts of Fortinbras. At the same time Doubt and Certainty succeed each other at intervals, until Certainty is expressed by the revelation of the Ghost.1 Hamlet recognizes evil, and sees that he is born merely to set things right. This is his sole mission, and, prompted by justice and reason, he makes up his mind to expose error, wrong-doing, or evil.

Side by side with Hamlet, we are presented with his enemies. These are expressed successively by despotism, tyranny, authority, bigotry, self-interest, and gradually modified into literary controversy. The principle of each side is never lost to view. And this principle is explained artistically by making the son of Polonius revenge his father. Guildenstern and Rosencrantz fill up the interval by personifying self-interest in power and the languid indifference of the world generally. Hamlet is pictured as first attacking and repudiating the Roman Catholic Church pictured in Ophelia. The result is the Reformation, which we must understand completed when he persuades his mother to cleave her heart in twain, and throw away the worser half of it.

With this act authority and the spirit of certainty is overthrown. Therefore it is contemporary with the death of Polonius. Soon after, we have the appearance of Fortinbras, which expresses the immense stride liberty has gained through the Reformation. The death of Certainty being gradual, we have Ophelia continuing this decay in phases of dissent and scepticism. She finally is buried. All this time Hamlet artistically seems to lack power to kill the King. But we maintain the King is only a fiction, or symbol of abstract error, necessary for the drama alone. Therefore the King is in reality dying all through the

1 We have not sufficiently explained Hamlet's father. Our belief is that Christ or pure Christianity is typified through him. Thus the Ghost is a revival of purity leading to the Reformation.