hesitation in throwing over the tradition which has the warrant of
antiquity and setting up in its stead this ridiculous invention,
for which not only is there no shred of positive evidence, but
which, as Lord Campbell and Lord Penzance point out, is really put
out of court by the negative evidence, since "no young man could
have been at work in an attorney's office without being called upon
continually to act as a witness, and in many other ways leaving
traces of his work and name." And as Mr. Edwards further points
out, since the day when Lord Campbell's book was published (between
forty and fifty years ago), "every old deed or will, to say nothing
of other legal papers, dated during the period of William
Shakespeare's youth, has been scrutinized over half a dozen shires,
and not one signature of the young man has been found."

Moreover, if Shakespeare had served as clerk in an attorney's
office it is clear that he must have so served for a considerable
period in order to have gained (if indeed it is credible that he
could have so gained) his remarkable knowledge of law. Can we then
for a moment believe that, if this had been so, tradition would
have been absolutely silent on the matter? That Dowdall's old
clerk, over eighty years of age, should have never heard of it
(though he was sure enough about the butcher's apprentice), and
that all the other ancient witnesses should be in similar
ignorance!

But such are the methods of Stratfordian controversy. Tradition is
to be scouted when it is found inconvenient, but cited as
irrefragable truth when it suits the case. Shakespeare of
Stratford was the author of the Plays and Poems, but the author of
the Plays and Poems could not have been a butcher's apprentice.