His Sympathy with Life 
In this pastoral drama, and throughout 
his Poems and Plays, Shakespeare manifests 
the keen pleasure with which the face of 
Nature filled his soul. The beauty and 
fragrancy of flowers and woods, the move- 
ments and music of birds were a joy to 
him. But he combined with this enjoy- 
ment a feeling of pity for the frailty and 
suffering of living things. A recent and 
most able writer on Shakespeare has stated 
as his opinion that “‘the wild creatures of 
the fields and woods, because they have 
never run the risk of familiarity with man, 
are outside the circle of Shakespeare’s 
sympathetic observation.” I venture to 
think that a more mistaken judgement 
could hardly have been pronounced. 
Shakespeare was not a man of science, but 
he obviously had some of the best qualities 
of a naturalist—quickness and accuracy of 
eye and sympathy with life, not of man 
only, but of every creature that lives and 
feels. This sympathy shows itself in his 
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