It has been quite too common to speak of Shakespeare as a miracle of
spontaneous genius, who did his best things by force of instinct, not
of art; and that, consequently, he was nowise indebted to time and
experience for the reach and power which his dramas display. This is
an "old fond paradox" which seems to have originated with those who
could not conceive how any man could acquire intellectual skill
without scholastic advantages; forgetting, apparently, that several
things, if not more, may be learned in the school of Nature, provided
one have an eye to read her "open secrets" without "the spectacles of
books." This notion has vitiated a good deal of Shakespearian
criticism. Rowe had something of it. "Art," says he, "had so little,
and Nature so large a share in what Shakespeare did, that, for aught I
know, the performances of his youth were the best." I think decidedly
otherwise; and have grounds for doing so which Rowe had not, in what
has since been done towards ascertaining the chronology of the Poet's
plays.

It would seem from Chettle's apology, that Shakespeare was already
beginning to attract liberal notice from that circle of brave and
accomplished gentlemen which adorned the state of Queen Elisabeth.
Among the "divers of worship," first and foremost stood, no doubt, the
high-souled, the generous Southampton, then in his twentieth year.
Henry Wriothesley, the third Earl of Southampton, was but eight years
old when his father died: the Southampton estates were large; during
the young Earl's minority his interests were in good hands, and the
revenues accumulated; so that on coming of age he had means answerable
to his dispositions. Moreover, he was a young man of good parts, of
studious habits, of cultivated tastes, and withal of a highly
chivalrous and romantic spirit: to all which he added the honour of