1811.] 
are counter-balanced by other passages 
as favourable to the Mouse of Lancaster, 
Nor is it possible to determine whether 
he inclined most to the Red or to the 
White Rose. The truth is, that private 
individuals bad Jong ceased to take any 
personal‘iuterest in the quarrel. Near 
a century had elapsed since the contend- 
ing titles were united in Henry VIII. ; 
and Shakespeare manifestly aimed at 
nothing more than to make the different 
characters of his historic dramas speak 
and act in a manner conformable ta his- 
toric and dramatic probability. 
The envious flood 
Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth 
To find the empty Vast, and wandering air. 
Ibid, Scene 4. 
Vast is here a substantive. So, in the 
Winter’s Tale, “ Shook bands as over a 
vast.” 
vast and middle of the night.” And in 
Milton we read “ Michael bid sound th’ 
archangel trumpet,—Through the vast 
of Heaven it sounded, &c.” Vasty is 
the adjective commonly used by Shakes- 
peare as “the vasty deep; vasty Tartar; 
Arabia’s vasty wilds; War’s vasty jaws,” 
ke. 
Richmond. God and your arms be praised, 
victorious friends, 
The day is ours, &c, 
Although this performance exhibits all 
the characteristic faults of the great au- 
thor, they are redeemed by a wonderful 
display of his highest excellencies. And 
T can discern in this draina no mixture 
of spurious and insipid trash, no alloy 
of adventitious dullness. Notwith- 
standing the great ability with which the 
courtship scene between Richard and 
the Lady Anne is written, the mind re- 
volts at its incredibility; yet, who can 
wish it obliterated? That in the fourth 
act between Richard and the queen dow- 
ager is of great though not equal merit 
in point of composition ; and, likewise, 
(were the repetition pardonable) much 
too far removed from the limits of pro- 
bability. Both scenes bear the aspect 
of a too severe satire on the sex—* re- 
Jenting, shallow, changing, woman!” 
The character of Richard is exceeded by 
no effort of dramatic skill in the whole 
compass of the poet’s rich and boundless 
invention. The vein of humour which 
pervades almost every scene in which he 
appears, isasensible and almost necessary 
relief to the deep and tragic villainy of 
his atrocious acis. It may be transiently 
yemarked that, although the greater part 
‘ 
‘ 
Critival Remaris on Shakespeare. 
And, in Hamlet, ‘ In the dead> 
413 
of the crimes charged upon Richard rest 
upon imperfect and presumptive evi- 
dence, he who could condemn Livers, 
Vaughan, and Grey, and above all 
Hastings, the great and zealous friend of 
the House of York, to death, without 
any pretence of justice or form of trial, 
must be capable of any wickedness. 
After all the ingenuity that has been ex- 
ercised upon the subject, I see no reason 
to doubt that the infant princes were 
murdered in the Tower by his command, 
or contrivance. ‘fo believe that one 
was slain, and the other allowed to es- 
‘cape, is to abandon an easy and probable 
hypothesis, and to embrace in its stead 
an arbitrary and extravagant supposition, 
Dr. Johnson observes, that the allusions 
to the plays of Ilenry VI. which occur 
in Richard TII. are no weak proofs of 
those disputed pieces. This is true, but 
it is material to remark that there are no 
allusions whatever to be found in this 
play tothe first part of those doubtful 
and disputed dramas. 
Henry VIlU.—Act IIT. Scene 2. 
_ In the interesting dialogue between 
Wolsey and Cromwell, the chagrin and 
anguish of the Cardinal are strongly de- 
pictured, notwithstanding the efforts of 
the fallen statesman to conceal, not froin 
Cromwell only, but from himself, the real 
state of his mind. He labours to persuade 
himself that he feels his heart new opened ; 
and that the pomp and glory of the world 
are become hateful to him; and ‘he af- 
fects the most perfect calmness, resignas 
tion, and fortitude, le even ventures, 
in reply to the affectionate enquiries of 
his faithful servant, to affirm that he was 
never so truly happy:— 
I-know myself now, and I feel within me 
A peace above all earthly dignities, 
A still and quiet conscience. 
But, when the intelligence of the king’s 
marriage with Anne Boleyn is commus 
nicated to him, he breaks out into ex+ 
clamations which plainly discover how 
bitterly the recollection of his former 
prosperity affected him. 
O Cromwell !——All my glories 
In that one woman I have lost for ever: 
Wo sun shall ever usher forth mine honours, 
Or gild again the noble troops that waited 
Upon mj smiles, &<. 
At the conclusion of this conversation 
Cromwell thinks it expedient to exhort 
him to have patience. ‘The cardinal re- 
plies, ‘ So I have,—Farewell the hopes 
of court, iny hopes in Heaven do dwell :” 
thus making lis hopes of Heaven the 
j mere 
