Chapter II.

Time and Place.


To get at the heart of Shakespeare's plays, and to secure for
ourselves the material and the development of culture which are
contained in them, is not the work of a day or of a year; it is the
work and the joy of a lifetime. There is no royal road to the
harmonious unfolding of the human spirit; there is a choice of
methods, but there are no "short cuts." No man can seize the fruits of
culture prematurely; they are not to be had by pulling down the boughs
of the tree of knowledge, so that he who runs may pluck as he pleases.
Culture is not to be had by programme, by limited courses of reading,
by correspondence, or by following short prescribed lines of home
study. These are all good in their degree of thoroughness of method
and worth of standards, but they are impotent to impart an enrichment
which is below and beyond mere acquirement. Because culture is not
knowledge but wisdom, not quantity of learning but quality, not mass
of information but ripeness and soundness of temper, spirit, and
nature, time is an essential element in the process of securing it. A
man may acquire information with great rapidity, but no man can hasten
his growth. If the fruit is forced, the flavour is lost. To get into
the secret of Shakespeare, therefore, one must take time. One must
grow into that secret.

This does not mean, however, that the best things to be gotten out of