knowing," which means complete absorption. He excites and suggests in
others the knowledge of the Ideas, which, beautiful objects represent.
Thus, through the works of Genius, others may reach an exalted frame
of mind, for, indeed, if we had not some artistic capacity for seeing
and feeling the Ideas which works of art represent, we should be
incapable of feeling or enjoying them. Perhaps, to make this abstract
thought clearer, it would be well to endeavour to find some examples
which will illustrate Schopenhauer's meaning. And Shakespeare offers
us incomparable examples. In his great tragedies--such as Othello, for
instance--we feel the knowledge or Idea of Life, in all its varied
human manifestations. Life, manifold, diverse, and abundant--and all
felt intuitively from within. Into his creations, Shakespeare pours
wide and overflowing knowledge of life; there is nothing narrow or
shut in, in his conceptions, but every character is alive in the great
sense, illustrating no narrow precept or trite morality, no cut and
dried scheme of a petty out-look on life, but the great morals of life
itself, as varied, as intangible and as inexplicable. He represents
this sense of varied life as manifested or objectified in his
creations, _i.e._, his characters. In _Othello_, for instance, we have
suggestions of love and jealousy that go down to the very depth of the
heart, through imaginative insight. And what we are brought close to,
is the vivid intense life of feeling that Shakespeare's creations
hold, and that we, ourselves, are capable of holding in our own
hearts. In this presentation, Shakespeare flashes the sense of life
with all its complexities of heart and brain into us. He does not
stand, as it were aside, as a commentator on the faults or weaknesses
of his characters, but he wafts us out of our circumscribed lives, out
of our limitation of thought, we know not how, into an atmosphere
quivering with passion, and felt by us all the keener, because we
recognise that the Poet never thought about _us_ at all. He excites