Shakspeare;--when I know this, and know too, that by a conceivable and
possible, though hardly to be expected, arrangement of the British
theatres, not all, indeed, but a large, a very large, proportion of this
indefinite all--(round which no comprehension has yet drawn the line of
circumscription, so as to say to itself, 'I have seen the whole')--might
be sent into the heads and hearts--into the very souls of the mass of
mankind, to whom, except by this living comment and interpretation, it
must remain for ever a sealed volume, a deep well without a wheel or a
windlass;--it seems to me a pardonable enthusiasm to steal away from
sober likelihood, and share in so rich a feast in the faery world of
possibility! Yet even in the grave cheerfulness of a circumspect hope,
much, very much, might be done; enough, assuredly, to furnish a kind and
strenuous nature with ample motives for the attempt to effect what may
be effected.


[Footnote: 'Advancement of Learning, book 1. 'sub fine.']

[Footnote 2: Confestim Peneos adest, viridantia Tempe, Tempe, quae
cingunt sylvae superimpendentes. 'Epith. Pel. et. Th.' 286.]





SHAKSPEARE, A POET GENERALLY.


Clothed in radiant armour, and authorized by titles sure and manifold,
as a poet, Shakspeare came forward to demand the throne of fame, as the