93 



of his countrymen, or the reigning dynasty in the strain 

 of adulation of part of Henry VIII., to please James I., 

 and in his portrayal of Shylock, in deference to the 

 traditional enmity borne by the mass of the people to the 

 Jewish race, I believe them all distinctly capable of 

 absolute disproof or explanation, but my time will not 

 permit me to refer to them this evening, involving as 

 these questions do conflicting historic and critical evidence 

 of a voluminous kind. 



In reply to all these charges the Germans point to the 

 plays themselves for ample refutation. To the direct 

 evidence afibrded by their plot, construction, and moral 

 design, for a complete absolution from any stigma of 

 taste or neglect, for a complete proof of its injustice. 

 I can do little more perhaps than this, or rather can do 

 nothing so effectual as this, bu.t as it may be presumed to 

 be begging the question, I will briefly recapitulate such 

 direct answers to these points as are afforded by indirect 

 evidence, and arguments similar to those advanced in 

 opposition. 



In reply to the first statement. If we are to accept the 

 testimony of the sonnets as an expression of the personal 

 feeling of the poet which is now the generally received 

 opinion in Shaksperian literature. The argument that 

 he was insensible to fame is not merely disproved, but is 

 shown to be directly opposed to the truth. The inference 

 that he did not seek immortality because he did not 

 publish his plays is merely a negative one, and is answer- 

 able by other statements on the same side. There is no 

 proof certainly that ho did intend to publish. There is 

 just as little that he did not. On the contrary, a candid 

 perusal of Ileminge and Cnndell's preface to the edition 

 of 1623, will show that it might have been his intention 

 to publish, but that his comparatively sudden death frus- 

 trated his purpose. He was a partner in the Globe and 



