In the chapter on the Preoccupations of Bacon the reader may find
help in making up his mind as to whether Bacon, with his many and
onerous duties and occupations, his scientific studies, and his
absorbing scientific preoccupation, is a probable author of the
Shakespearean plays. Mr. Greenwood finds the young Shakspere
impossible--because of his ignorance--which made him such a really
good pseudo-author, and such a successful mask for Bacon, or Bacon's
unknown equivalent. The Shakspere of later life, the well-to-do
Shakspere, the purchaser of the right to bear arms; so bad at paying
one debt at least; so eager a creditor; a would-be encloser of a
common; a man totally bookless, is, to Mr. Greenwood's mind, an
impossible author of the later plays.

Here, first, are moral objections on the ground of character as
revealed in some legal documents concerning business. Now, I am very
ready to confess that William's dealings with his debtors, and with
one creditor, are wholly unlike what I should expect from the author
of the plays. Moreover, the conduct of Shelley in regard to his wife
was, in my opinion, very mean and cruel, and the last thing that we
could have expected from one who, in verse, was such a tender
philanthropist, and in life was--women apart--the best-hearted of
men. The conduct of Robert Burns, alas, too often disappoints the
lover of his Cottar's Saturday Night and other moral pieces. He was
an inconsistent walker.

I sincerely wish that Shakespeare had been less hard in money
matters, just as I wish that in financial matters Scott had been more
like himself, that he had not done the last things that we should
have expected him to do. As a member of the Scottish Bar it was