banishes Hamlet. They themselves provide. When our hero returns, it is as naked and alone. Shakespeare's meaning is undoubtedly as follows. Hamlet, as truth-seeking or progress, having in the death of Polonius fulfilled the death of intolerance and interference, has accomplished a great political mission. But before rationalism can again gather itself for another crisis, it must free itself from Guildenstern and Rosencrantz. This it does by means of Fortinbras or liberty, who rises with Hamlet, and is part of him. Fortinbras rises, in the very opening of the play, as abortive attempts at liberty. He disappears, to grow with Hamlet silently. This growth is typified in his sudden appearance as a large army in the centre of the play. Finally he comes in as conqueror at the end of the tragedy. He is part of Hamlet, and we are directly told in the Churchyard-scene that liberty and progress (or truth-seeking), were contemporary and identical births. The First Clown and Hamlet are one. Thus Hamlet is turned in upon himself. The monologue which follows the interview with the army of Fortinbras gives us to understand Hamlet benefits by liberty (accruing from the death of Polonius), to use his reason. In that use he gradually kills or escapes sophistry, casuistry, and indifference. We therefore believe England to typify science. The text is not unfavourable to such an hypothesis. For the Ambassadors of England are part holders of the dramatic situation at the end of the play. But this is a part we do not feel so certain of as the rest. We venture only to offer suggestions.

We may, now turn to Hamlet and his partisans. Our theory here is the same as that we have enunciated with regard to the King. Hamlet is a synthesis of qualities. He is evolved in the first act as a force. His birth is the result of Bernardo, Horatio, and Marcellus, furthered by the Ghost. The play opens in the depth of the night. This typifies ignorance and the undoubted reign of corruption,

which is given in the words "Long live the King." Presently Francisco is relieved. In short, scholarship arrives in the shape of Horatio. But he is the product of those before him, whom we suspect to be reading and printing. Doubt, as a Ghost, illuminates this revival of learning. And the whole go far to form a young Hamlet. Liberty arises with Fortinbras contemporary with these events; and we are thus given to understand that Hamlet is liberty, justice, and knowledge in co-partnership. Truth or progress is thus epitomized in Prince Hamlet.

In Hamlet's father we hear the ideal voice of Christianity. The Queen is simply human belief and custom. Her marriage to Claudius is the corruption of Christianity -the union of error in belief or belief in error. Hamlet is son of belief, and of that unadulterated union of ideal justice prior to the second century. Thus the gradual detection by Hamlet of the murder of his father at the hands of his uncle, is the artistic history of the Reformation. The Interlude is actually and undoubtedly an artistic parallel of Luther pointing out the corruption of the Romish Church. The Ghost represents the revival and shadow of ideal truth and justice, which, as scepticism, becomes a revelation in itself. When the heart of the Queen is cleft in twain, we may recognize Shakespeare's attempt to realize artistically the Reformation completed in its Protestant schism. Thus Hamlet's father is typical for truth as ideal justice, and the divine spirit of Christianity itself. This may account for the references of Horatio. and Hamlet in connexion with him. However, this interferes very little, whether accepted or not, with the whole character of the tragedy, or with its signification.

The most important and confirming solution of the tragedy will be found in our treatment of the Churchyard-scene. Here we find the very key of the play contained in the contemporary origin of Clown, Hamlet, and the rise of

Fortinbras. Here we gasp for breath at the miraculous ingenuity and genius of Shakespeare. This scene has been a veritable stumbling-block to all criticism. The introduction of Clowns, and the curious conversations, are apparently out of harmony with the rest of the play. But, by our solution, the play comes out in double its striking clearness and spiritual interpretational force. For this Churchyard-scene, we maintain, is an epitome of progress and of the whole play. The two Clowns are Time and Progress. The First Clown is Hamlet himself. Shakespeare is laughing at us when he says, "Every fool can tell that." Hamlet and the Clown are one. Our hero is studying himself, and at once parallels historical criticism and the study of historical philosophy in general. In short, man learns how progress arose, and what it signifies. It is this part of our solution of Hamlet which we particularly insist upon, and which we claim as exposition of the extraordinary ingenuity of Shakespeare's genius and art. By turning Hamlet in upon himself, by means of another character, artistically separate but symbolically identical, Shakespeare gives us a sublime picture of the present day as pure prophecy. Progress is epitomized in this Churchyard-scene, where the ridicule which kills by criticism, metaphysical discussion, and satire, are given in two Clowns. They are actually Time and Progress, or Hamlet himself reforming over great space of time. Finally, Hamlet begins to study the science of history or progress, and in doing this he studies himself. When he learns how he was born, and that he is related to liberty and knowledge in general, we may not be thought too bold if we parallel such a recognition with Mr. Buckle's "History of Civilization." However, there it stands, as a question which criticism will finally decide to be the most marvellous

1 The wit lies in Hamlet asking the Clown (himself) when he (himself) was born. "Every fool can tell that."

piece of art and prophecy ever conceived and forestalled by genius, or let it perish as the wild chimera of a madman.

In conclusion, feeling how out of place it would be to carry into detail an interpretation of Hamlet, which might be rejected by criticism altogether, we have refrained from expanding this little work into those dimensions which could alone do justice to the subject. Sufficient for us if we have thrown a new light over this sublime tragedy.

Hastily written, our essay requires a few remarks in the Introduction, if not in the Preface. Hamlet is a subject which is always developing it never stands still. We fancy we have not sufficiently insisted upon the nature of the hero himself. To us Hamlet represents humanity and the growth of rationalism. He is both progress, truth-seeking, and liberalism. In the history of Hamlet we read the history of man. We wish to insist also upon the identity of Hamlet with Horatio. The latter seems the scholarship of the Hamlet school of thought. Progress, liberty, and knowledge are the constituents of Hamlet. They give birth to the latter in simultaneous interaction. The Players, therefore, are Hamlet himself in action. And they act and react upon each other. These Players are undoubtedly typical for the Reformers.

Again, we would call notice to the revival of learning, which we imagine is the main cause in the birth of Hamlet. That revival is pictured in the speech of Polonius to Reynaldo. Reynaldo is to combat all unorthodoxy. Whilst Laertes well represents his father in literature. This speech, coming immediately after the first act, when Hamlet and his friends determine "to go in together," shows us what Laertes typifies. It is the step which Polonius takes to combat the spread of learning and rationalism. To have neglected it would have been to overlook the direction Laertes takes. And the travels of Laertes represent that learning itself very well. Hamlet and Laertes both repre

sent two branches which the revival of learning split itself into. One was inquiry, reason, rationalism, resulting in progress, science, and liberalism. The other, theological

orthodoxy and toryism; opposing Hamlet, and leading into the mild conservatism of to-day, which threatens some day to coalesce with the principles of Hamlet (in all but name). Laertes defends tradition, antiquity, authority, the past. Hamlet attacks all the above. The result is a question of time alone.

We would remark here, that Hamlet is, in short, not only a political play, but essentially a philosophical one. For its philosophy is the philosophy of development, of the growth of knowledge, liberty, and progress. It is highly optimistic if so taken, as it looks upon time as the friend of man in the long run. Therefore we have termed it the Philosophy of History" of our Poet. The Philosophy of History embraces two principles, individualism and authority. Their mutual interaction is progress. We quote from the recent volume of Professor Flint upon the Philosophy of History:

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"As soon as political thought comes forth into life, it is found to oscillate between two poles-between despotism and anarchy-the extreme of social authority and the extreme of individual independence. Before political thought awakens, social authority predominates. The man as an individual does not exist, but is merged in the family, the clan, city, or nation. But in every progressive society there comes a time when its stronger minds feel that they are not merely parts of a social organism, that they have a life and destiny, rights and duties of their own, and simply as men. There are then two principles in the world—the principle of authority and the principle of liberty, the principle of society and the principle of individualism. These two principles co-exist at first in a few individuals; but, in process of time, they come not only to co-exist in some