1 24 Shakspeare 



expression of his whole self, material and spiritual. 

 A joy and relief no doubt it was thus to fulfil 

 himself by the complete realization of his whole 

 being in the discharge of every function of which 

 its richly endowed nature was capable ; his natural 

 instinct urging him to do well in business what he 

 had to do — he could not have borne to do it ill — 

 and to reap the ensuing profits, and the silent 

 melody in his nature translating itself outwardly 

 into the elegance and golden cadence of poesy, 

 which was its own pleasing reward.* 



Unlike the professional poet of the closet, there- 

 fore, who, without having been structurally in- 

 formed mentally by feeling and working in union 

 and collision with men and things in the stress 

 and strife of life, sets himself with deliberate 

 purpose and labouring endeavour to write dramas, 

 he bodied forth living experience of them in his 

 scenes and characters. His art was the full, fresh, 

 incorporate expression of a life of work and 

 thought, in which might have been said of him, 

 as he makes Cassar say of Casca — 



He reads much ; 

 He is a great observer, and he looks 

 Quite through the deeds of men. 



That which he saw, felt and meditated on was 

 wrought into the living structure of his mind and 

 discharged as its natural function. A wonderful 



* "'Elegance, facility, and golden cadence' of poesy." — 

 Lovers Labour's Lost. 



