Chapter VII: Part 7

In the year of the world 3105, say the chronicles, "at what time Joas ruled in Judah, Leir the son of Baldud was admitted ruler over the Britons." He was a wise and powerful prince, who maintained his country and subjects in a state of great prosperity, and founded the town of Caerleir, now called Leicester. He had three daughters, Gonerilla, Regan, and Cordelia, "which daughters he greatly loved, but specially Cordelia, the youngest, far above the two elder." Having attained a great age, and becoming enfeebled both in body and mind, "he thought to understand the affections of his daughters toward him, and prefer her whom he best loved to the succession over the kingdom. Whereupon he first asked Gonerilla, the eldest, how well she loved him; who, calling her gods to record, protested that she loved him more than her own life, which by right and reason should be most dear to her. With which answer the father, being well pleased, turned to the second, and demanded of her how well she loved him, who answered (confirming her sayings with great oaths) that she loved him more than tongue could express, and far above all other creatures of the world." When he put the same question to Cordelia, she answered, "Knowing the great love and fatherly zeal that you have always borne toward me (for the which I may not answer you otherwise than I think, and as my conscience leadeth me), I protest unto you that I have loved you ever, and will continually (while I live) love you as my natural father. {186} And if you would more understand of the love that I bear you, ascertain yourself, that so much as you have, so much you are worth, and so much I love you, and no more." Her father, displeased with this answer, married his two eldest daughters, one to Henninus, duke of Cornwall, and the other to Maglanus, duke of Albany, "betwixt whom he willed and ordained that his land should be divided after his death, and the one half thereof immediately should be assigned to them in hand; but for the third daughter, Cordelia, he reserved nothing."

It happened, however, that Aganippus, one of the twelve kings who then governed Gaul, heard of the beauty and merit of this princess, and desired to have her in marriage. He was told that she had no dowry, as every thing had been bestowed on her two sisters; but Aganippus persisted in his request, obtained Cordelia's hand, and carried her in triumph to his kingdom.

Meanwhile, Leir's two sons-in-law, beginning to think he was reigning too long, seized violently upon the land which he had reserved for himself, and assigned him only a sufficient income to live and maintain his rank. Even this allowance was gradually diminished; but what caused Leir most pain was the extreme unkindness of his daughters, who "seemed to think that all was too much which their father had, the same being never so little; insomuch that, going from one to the other, he was brought to that misery that scarcely they would allow him one servant to wait upon him." The old king, in despair,' fled from the country, and took refuge in Gaul, where Cordelia and her husband received him with great honors, and raised an army and equipped a fleet to restore him to his possessions the succession of which he promised to bequeath to Cordelia, who accompanied her father and husband on this expedition. {187} The two dukes having been slain, and their armies defeated, in a battle fought with Aganippus, Leir reascended his throne, and died two years afterward, forty years after his first accession. Cordelia succeeded him, and reigned five years; but in the mean while, her husband having died, her nephews, Margan and Cunedag, rebelled against her, conquered her, and cast her into prison, where, "being a woman of a manly courage, and despairing to recover liberty," she committed suicide. [Footnote 24]

[Footnote 24: Holinshed's Chronicle, History of England, book
ii., chaps. 5, 6.]

This story is borrowed by Holinshed from Geoffrey of Monmouth, who probably constructed the history of Leir from an anecdote of Ina, king of the Saxons, and the answer of the "youngest and wisest of the daughters" of that king, who, under circumstances similar to those in which Cordelia was placed, gave a similar answer to her father, that, although she loved, honored, and revered him in the highest degree that nature and filial duty could require, yet she thought it might one day happen that she would more ardently love her husband, with whom, by the command of God, she was to constitute one flesh, and for whom she might leave father and mother. It does not appear that Ina disapproved of the "wise speech" of his daughter; and the sequel of Cordelia's history is probably a development added by the imagination of the chroniclers to this primary fact. However this may be, the anger and misfortunes of King Lear had, before Shakspeare's time, found a place in several poems, as well as formed the subject of one drama and several ballads. {188} In one of these ballads, mentioned by Johnson, under the title of "A lamentable Song of the Death of King Leir and his three Daughters," Lear, as in the tragedy, goes mad, and Cordelia, having been killed in the battle gained by the troops of the King of France, her father dies of grief upon her body, and her sisters are condemned to death by the judgment of the "lords and nobles of the kingdom." Whether the ballad preceded Shakspeare's tragedy or not, it is very probable that the author of the ballad and the dramatic poet derived their facts from the same source, and that it was not without some authority that Shakspeare, in his _denouement_, departed from the chronicles, which give the victory to Cordelia. This _dénouement_ was changed by Tate, and Cordelia restored to her rights. The play remained on the stage in this second form, to the great satisfaction of Johnson, and, says Mr. Steevens, of "the upper gallery." Addison, however, pronounced against this change.

As to the episode of the Earl of Gloster, Shakspeare has imitated it from the adventure of a king of Paphlagonia, related in Sidney's "Arcadia;" only, in the original narrative, the bastard himself deprives his father of sight, and reduces him to a condition similar to that of Lear. Leonatus, the legitimate son, who, having been condemned to death, had been obliged to seek service in a foreign army, on learning the misfortunes of his father, leaves all at the moment when his merits were about to gain him a high rank, in order to hasten, at the risk of his life, to share and succor the misery of the old king. The latter, restored to his throne by the aid of his friends, dies of joy on crowning his son Leonatus; and the bastard Plexirtus, by a feigned repentance, succeeds in disarming the anger of his brother.

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It is evident that the situation of King Lear and of the King of Paphlagonia, both persecuted by the children whom they preferred, and succored by the one whom they rejected, struck Shakspeare as fitted to enter into the same subject, because they belonged to the same idea. Those who have blamed him for having thus injured the simplicity of his action have given their opinion according to their own system, without taking the trouble to examine that of the author whom they criticised. Starting even from the rules which they are desirous to impose, we might answer that the love of the two women for Edmund, which serves to effect their punishment, and the intervention of Edgar at this part of the _dénouement_, are sufficient to acquit the play of the charge of duplicity of action; for, provided that all the threads at last unite in one knot which it is easy to seize, the simplicity of the progress of an action depends much less upon the number of the interests and personages concerned in it than upon the natural and clearly visible play of the springs which set it in motion. But further, we must never forget that unity, in Shakspeare's view, consists in one dominant idea, which, reproducing itself under various forms, incessantly produces, continues, and redoubles the same impression. Thus as, in "Macbeth," the poet displays man in conflict with the passions of crime, so in "King Lear" he depicts him in conflict with misfortune, the action of which is modified according to the different characters of the individuals who experience it. The first spectacle which he brings under our notice is the misfortune of virtue, or of persecuted innocence, as exemplified in Cordelia, Kent, and Edgar. Then comes the misfortune of those who, by their passion or blindness, have rendered themselves the tools of injustice, namely, Lear and Gloster; and upon these the effort of compassion is directed. {190} As for the wicked personages, we do not witness their sufferings; the sight of their misfortune would be disturbed by the remembrance of their criminality; they can have no punishment but death?

Of the five personages subjected to the action of misfortune, Cordelia, a heavenly figure, hovers almost invisible and half-vailed over the composition, which she fills with her presence, although she is almost always absent from it. She suffers, but never complains, never defends herself: she acts, but her action is manifested only by its results; serene regarding her own fate, reserved and restrained even in her most legitimate feelings, she passes and disappears like a denizen of a better world, who has traversed this world of ours without experiencing any mere earthly emotion.

Kent and Edgar each have a very decided physiognomy; the first of them is, like Cordelia, a victim to his duty; the second interests us at first only by his innocence. Having entered upon misfortune at the same time, so to speak, that he entered into life, and equally new to both conditions, Edgar gradually develops his faculties, learns their character at once, and discovers within himself, as need requires, the qualities with which he is gifted; in proportion as he advances, his duties, and his difficulties, and his importance increase; he grows up and becomes a man, but, at the same time, he learns how costly is this growth; and he finally discovers, when bearing it with nobleness and courage, the whole weight of that burden which he had hitherto borne almost with gayety. Kent, on the contrary, a wise and firm old man, has known all and foreseen all from the very outset; as soon as he enters upon action, his march is determined and his object defined. He is not, like Edgar, urged by necessity or met by chance; his will determines his conduct; nothing can change or disturb it; and the aspect of the misfortune to which he devotes himself, scarcely wrings from him an exclamation of grief or pain.

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Lear and Gloster, in an analogous situation, receive from it an impression which corresponds to their different characters. Lear, impetuous and irritable, spoiled by power and by the habit and need of admiration, rebels both against his position and against his own conviction; he can not believe in what he knows; his reason offers no resistance; and he becomes mad. Gloster, naturally weak, yields to his misery, and is equally incapable of resistance to his joy; he dies on recognizing Edgar. If Cordelia were alive, Lear would still find strength to live; but he breaks down by the effort of his grief.

Amid all this confusion of incidents and coarseness of manners, interest and pathos have never, perhaps, been carried further than in this tragedy. The time in which Shakspeare laid his action seems to have emancipated him from all conventional forms; and just as he felt no difficulty in placing a King of France, a Duke of Albany, and a Duke of Cornwall, eight hundred years before the Christian era, so he felt no necessity for connecting the language and the characters of his drama with any determinate period. The only trace of intention which can be remarked in the general color of the style of the drama is the vagueness and uncertainty of the grammatical constructions, which seem to belong to a language still quite in its infancy; at the same time, a considerable number of expressions which bear a close resemblance to the French language, indicate an epoch, if not correspondent with that in which King Lear is supposed to have lived, at least far anterior to that at which Shakspeare wrote.

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Macbeth.

(1606.)

In the year 1034, Duncan succeeded his grandfather, Malcolm, on the throne of Scotland. He held his right of his mother, Beatrice, the eldest daughter of Malcolm; the younger daughter, Doada, was the mother of Macbeth, who was thus cousin-german to Duncan. The father of Macbeth was Finleg, thane of Glamis, mentioned under the name of Sinel in the tragedy, and in the chronicle of Holinshed, on the authority of Hector Boëtius, from whom the narrative of the events concerning Duncan and Macbeth is borrowed. As Shakspeare has followed Holinshed's chronicle with the utmost exactness, it becomes necessary to give the facts as therein related; and they are, moreover, in themselves replete with interest.

Macbeth had rendered himself celebrated by his bravery, and "if he had not been somewhat cruel of nature," says the chronicle, "he might have been thought most worthy of the government of a realm." Duncan, on the other hand, was an unwarlike prince, and carried his gentleness and kindness to excess; so that if it had been possible to fuse the characters of the two cousins together, and to temper the one by the other, the people would have had, says the chronicle, "an excellent captain, and a worthy king."

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After some years of peaceful dominion, the weakness of Duncan having encouraged malefactors, Banquo, the thane of Lochaber, "as he gathered the finances due to the king," found himself compelled to punish "somewhat sharply" several notorious offenders, which occasioned a revolt. Banquo was robbed of all the money he had collected, and "had much ado to get away with life, after he had received sundry grievous wounds." As soon as he had recovered of his hurts, he proceeded to court to lay his complaints before Duncan, and at last persuaded the king to summon the rebels to appear before him; but they slew the sergeant-at-arms, who had been sent with the royal mandate, and prepared for defense, at the instigation of Macdowald, one of their most important chieftains, who, collecting his clansmen and friends around him, represented Duncan to them as a "faint-hearted milksop, more meet to govern a set of idle monks in some cloister, than to have the rule of such valiant and hardy men of war as the Scots were." The revolt spread particularly throughout the Western Isles, from whence a host of warriors came to join Macdowald at Lochaber; and the hope of plunder attracted from Ireland a large number of Kernes and Galloglasses, [Footnote 25] ready to follow Macdowald whithersoever it should please him to lead them. By means of these re-enforcements, Macdowald defeated the troops which the king had sent to oppose him, took prisoner their leader, Malcolm, and beheaded him after the battle.

[Footnote 25: The Kernes were a species of light infantry,
and the Galloglasses heavy-armed foot-soldiers.]

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Duncan, in consternation at this news, assembled his council, at which Macbeth, after having blamed the king severely for his lenity and slackness in punishing the offenders, which had given them time to collect an army, offered to undertake the conduct of the war in concert with Banquo. His offer was gladly accepted, and the mere report of his approach with fresh troops struck such terror into the rebels, that a great number of them secretly deserted; and Macdowald, having tried to make head against Macbeth with the remainder, was utterly routed, and forced to fly to a castle in which he had placed his wife and children; but, despairing of being able to hold out, and fearing the cruelties of his opponents, he killed himself, after having first put his wife and children to death. Macbeth entered without obstacle into the castle, the gates of which had been left open. He found only the body of Macdowald in the midst of his murdered family; and the barbarism of that rude age was revolted by the fact that, unmoved by this tragic spectacle, Macbeth cut off Macdowald's head, and sent it to the king, and hanged the body upon a gallows. He made the inhabitants of the isles purchase the pardon of their revolt at a very high price, which did not, however, prevent him from putting to execution all those whom he could find in Lochaber. The inhabitants exclaimed loudly against this violation of his pledge, and the reproaches which they heaped upon him irritated Macbeth to such a degree that he was on the point of crossing over to the isles with an army to take vengeance upon them; but he was dissuaded from this project by the counsels of his friends, and more particularly by the presents with which the islanders a second time purchased their pardon.

{195}

A short time afterward, Sweno, king of Norway, having made a descent upon Scotland, Duncan, to resist him, placed himself at the head of the largest portion of his army, and intrusted the rest to the command of Macbeth and Banqno. Duncan was defeated and put to flight; and he took refuge in the castle of Perth, in which he was besieged by Sweno. Duncan, having secretly informed Macbeth of his intentions, feigned a desire to surrender, and protracted the negotiation, until at last, having learned that Macbeth had collected a sufficient force, he appointed a day for giving up the fortress; and, meanwhile, he offered to send the Norwegians a supply of provisions, which they accepted all the more eagerly because they had suffered greatly from famine for several days. The bread and ale with which he furnished them had been adulterated with the juice of an extremely narcotic berry, so that, having eaten and drank greedily, they fell into "a fast dead sleep, that in manner it was impossible to awake them." Then Duncan sent word to Macbeth, who arriving in all haste, and entering without opposition into the camp, massacred almost all the Norwegians, most of whom never stirred, while the others were rendered so dizzy by the effects of the narcotic that they could make no defense. A large number of sailors from the Norwegian fleet, who had come to share in the abundance which prevailed in the camp, shared also in the fate of their fellow-countrymen; and Sweno, who escaped with ten others from this butchery, could scarcely find enough mariners to man the ship in which he fled to Norway. Those vessels which he left behind were, three days afterward, so tossed by an east wind, "that, beating and rushing one against another, they sank there," at a place called Drownelow Sands, where they lie "even unto these days (1574), to the great danger of other such ships as come on that coast; for, being covered with the flood when the tide cometh, at the ebbing again of the same some parts of them appear above water."

{196}

This disaster caused such consternation in Norway, that, for many years afterward, no knights were made until they had sworn to avenge their countrymen who had thus been slaughtered in Scotland. Duncan, in celebration of his deliverance, ordered solemn processions to be made throughout the realm; but while these thanksgivings were in progress, he was informed of the disembarkation of an army of Danes, under the command of Canute, king of England, who had come to avenge the defeat of his brother Sweno. Macbeth and Banquo hastened to meet them, defeated them in a pitched battle, and forced them to re-embark, and to pay a considerable sum for permission to bury their dead at St. Colm's Inch, where, says the chronicle, "many old sepulchres are yet to be seen graven with the arms of the Danes."

Such are the exploits of Macbeth and Banquo, of which Shakspeare, following Holinshed, has made use in his tragedy. A short time afterward, Macbeth and Banquo were traveling to Forres, where the king then lay, "and went sporting by the way together, without other company save only themselves," when they were suddenly accosted by three women "in strange and wild apparel, resembling creatures of the elder world," who saluted Macbeth precisely as it is related in the tragedy. Upon this, Banquo said, "What manner of women are you that seem so little favorable unto me, whereas, to my fellow here, besides high offices, ye assign also the kingdom, appointing forth nothing for me at all?" "Yes," saith the first of them, "we promise greater benefits unto thee than unto him, for he shall reign, indeed, but with an unlucky end; neither shall he leave any issue behind him to succeed in his place; whereas, contrarily, thou indeed shalt not reign at all, but of thee those shall be born who shall govern the Scottish kingdoms by long order of continual descent." {197} Herewith the women immediately disappeared. Soon afterward, the thane of Cawdor having been put to death for treason, his title was conferred upon Macbeth, who now began, as well as Banquo, to place great faith in the predictions of the witches, and to devise means for obtaining the crown.

He had a good chance of succeeding legitimately to the throne, for Duncan's sons were not yet of age to reign, and the law of Scotland ordained that, if the king died before his sons or direct descendants were old enough to undertake the management of affairs, the nearest relative of the deceased king should be elected in their stead. But Duncan having appointed his son Malcolm, while still under age, Prince of Cumberland and successor to the throne, Macbeth, who saw his hopes destroyed by this proceeding, thought himself entitled to take revenge for the injustice he had experienced. To this, moreover, he was incessantly stimulated by his wife, Guach, who, burning with desire to bear the name of queen, and being, says Boetius, "like all women, impatient of delay," continually reproached him with his want of courage. Macbeth, therefore, having assembled a large number of his friends at Inverness, or, as some say, at Botgosuane, communicated to them his design, killed Duncan, and repaired with his party to Scone, where he obtained possession of the crown without difficulty.

Holinshed's chronicle relates the murder of Duncan without any detail. The incidents which Shakspeare has interwoven into his drama are taken from another part of the same chronicle concerning the murder of King Duff, who had been assassinated more than sixty years before by a Scottish lord named Donwald. The following are the circumstances of this murder, as related in the chronicle:

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Duff had shown himself, from the commencement of his reign, very anxious to protect the people against malefactors, and "idle persons who sought to live only upon other men's goods." He put several to death, and compelled others to withdraw to Ireland, or else to learn "some manual occupation wherewith to get their living." Although, as it would appear, these fellows were connected only in a very remote degree with the high nobility of Scotland, the nobles, says the chronicle, "were much offended with this extreme rigor, accounting it a great dishonor for such as were descended of noble parentage to be constrained to get their living with the labor of their hands, which only appertained to plowmen, and such others of the base degree as were born to travail for the maintenance of the nobility, and to serve at their commandment." The king was consequently regarded by them as an enemy of the nobles, and unworthy to govern them, as he was, they said, devoted solely to the interests of the people and clergy, who at that time made common cause against the oppression of the great lords. The discontent increased daily, and several rebellions arose, in one of which some young gentlemen engaged, who were relatives of Donwald, the king's lieutenant of the castle of Forres. These young men were taken prisoners, and Donwald, who until then had faithfully and usefully served the king, hoped to obtain their pardon; but not succeeding in his attempt, he was filled with resentment. His wife, who was irritated against the king from a similar cause, spared no efforts to increase his anger, and reminded him how easy it would be to take his revenge when Duff came, as frequently happened, to reside at Forres without any other guard than the garrison of the castle, which was entirely devoted to them; and "she showed him the means whereby he might soonest accomplish it."

{199}

Duff came to Forres a short time afterward, and, on the evening before his departure, when he had gone to bed after spending a longer time than usual at prayers in his oratory, Donwald and his wife sat down to table with the two chamberlains, whose "reare-supper or collation" they had carefully prepared, and feasted them so well that they fell into a lethargic sleep. Then Donwald, "though he abhorred the act greatly in heart," at the instigation of his wife, summoned four of his servants who were aware of his plot, and whom he had gained over by presents. These entered the king's chamber, killed him, carried his body out of the castle by a postern-gate, and, placing it on a horse which they had provided for the purpose, conveyed it to a place about two miles distant from the castle. Having got some laborers to help them to turn the course of a little river that ran through the fields, they dug a deep hole in the channel and buried the body in it, "ramming it up with stones and gravel so closely, that, setting the water in the right course again, no man could perceive that any thing had been newly digged there. This they did by order of Donwald, that the body should not be found, and by bleeding, when Donwald was present, declare him to be guilty of the murder." Donwald, in the mean while, was careful to be one of those who kept guard, and did not leave his post during the whole night. The subsequent circumstances relative to the murder of the two chamberlains are exactly as Shakspeare has represented them in "Macbeth;" and the same may be said of the prodigies which he relates, and which took place at the death of Duff. {200} The sun did not appear for six months, until at last, the murderers having been discovered and executed, it shone forth again upon the earth, and the fields became covered with flowers, "clean contrary to the time and season of the year."

To return to Macbeth. The first ten years of his reign were marked by a wise, equitable, and vigorous government. Several of his laws have been preserved, of which the following are specimens:

"He that attendeth any man to the church, market, or to any other public assembly, as a retainer, shall suffer death, except he have living at his hands, on whom he so attendeth." The punishment of death was also decreed against all who became sworn retainers of any other person than the king.

"All manner of lords and great barons shall not contract matrimony with other, under pain of death, specially if their lands and rooms be near together."

"All armor and weapon borne to other effect than in defense of the king and realm in time of wars, shall be confiscated to the king's use, with all other movable goods of the party that herein offendeth." It was also enacted that "a horse kept by any of the commons or husbandmen to any other use than for tillage and laboring of the earth shall be forfeited to the king by escheat."

"Such as be appointed governors or (as I may call them) captains, that buy within those limits where their charges lie any lands or possessions, shall lose both lands and possessions, and the money which they have paid fur the same. And if any of the said captains or governors marry their sons or daughters unto any manner of person that dwelleth within the bounds of their rooms, they shall lose their office; neither shall it be lawful for any of their sons or copartners to occupy the same office."

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"No man shall sit as judge in any temporal court without the king's commission authorizing him thereto. All conventions, offices, and acts of justice shall pass in the king's name."

Other laws are intended to assure the immunity of the clergy and the authority of the censures of the Church, to regulate the duties of knighthood, the succession of property, and so forth. Several of these laws, some of which are rather singular for the time, were passed from motives of order and regularity; others were destined to maintain civil independence against the oppressive power of the officers of the crown; but most of them are evidently intended to diminish the power of the nobles, and to concentrate all authority in the hands of the king. All are mentioned by the historians of the period as wise and beneficent laws; and if Macbeth had obtained the throne by legitimate means, and had continued in the ways of justice as he began, he might, says Holinshed, "have been numbered among the most noble princes that any where had reigned."

"But this," continues our chronicle, "was but a counterfeit zeal of equity showed by him against his natural inclination." Macbeth appeared at length in his true colors, and the same feeling of his position which had led him to seek public favor by justice changed justice into cruelty; "for the prick of conscience caused him ever to fear lest he should be served of the same cup as he had ministered to his predecessor." Now begins the Macbeth of the tragedy. The murder of Banquo, executed in the same manner and for the same reasons as those which Shakspeare ascribes to him, was followed by a great number of other crimes, so that "at length he found such sweetness by putting his nobles thus to death, that his earnest thirst after blood in this behalf might in no wise be satisfied." {202} Certain wizards, in whom he placed great trust, had warned him to beware of Macduff, whose power, moreover, gave him great umbrage, and he only sought a pretext for giving vent to his hatred of him. Macduff, informed of his danger, passed over into England to invite Malcolm, who had taken refuge in that country, to return to claim his rights. Macbeth became acquainted with this plot, "for kings," says the chronicle, "have sharp sight like unto lynx, and long ears like unto Midas;" and Macbeth maintained spies in the houses of all the nobles of his realm. The flight of Macduff, the massacre of all his family, and his conversation with Malcolm, are all facts taken from the chronicle. Malcolm at first met Macduff's entreaties with objections based upon his own incontinence, and Macduff replied as in Shakspeare, with this addition only, "Make thyself king, and I shall convey the matter so wisely that thou shalt be so satisfied at thy pleasure in such secret wise that no man shall be aware thereof." The remainder of the scene is faithfully imitated by the poet; and all that concerns the death of Macbeth, the predictions that had been made to him, and the manner in which they were at once eluded and accomplished, is taken almost word for word from the chronicle, in which we see at last how, "by illusion of the devil, he defamed, with most terrible cruelty, his reign, which in the beginning was very profitable to the commonwealth." Macbeth had assassinated Duncan in the year 1040, and he was himself killed in 1057, after a reign of seventeen years. [Footnote 26]

[Footnote 26: Holinshed's Chronicle, "History of Scotland,"
vol. i., p. 168-176. The story of the murder of King Duff is
contained in p. 150, 151. It was probably of the facts
furnished by Hector Boëtius to this chronicle that Buchanan,
when relating in a much more summary manner the history of
Macbeth, said, "Multa hic fabulose quidam nostrorum
affingunt; sed quia theatris aut Milesiis fabulis sunt
aptiora quam historiæ, ea omitto."--_Rerum. Scot.
Hist._, lib. vii.]

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Such is a general view of the facts to which Shakspeare undertook to impart a soul and life. He places himself simply in the midst of the events and personages, and, setting all these inanimate things in motion with a breath, he enables us to witness the spectacle of their existence. Far from adding any thing to the incidents furnished him by the narrative from which he has borrowed his subject, he omits many things; he is especially careful to lop off every thing that might injure the simplicity of his progress, and embarrass the action of his personages; and he suppresses every thing that might prevent him from fathoming them with a single glance, and portraying them with a few bold touches. Macbeth, with all the crimes and great qualities ascribed to him by his history, would be too complicated a being; it would be necessary for him to possess at once too much ambition and too much virtue for one of his dispositions to maintain itself for any time in presence of the other, and too cumbrous machinery would be required to make the balance finally incline to one or the other side. Shakspeare's Macbeth is brilliant only by his warlike virtues, and especially by his personal bravery; he has only the qualities and the defects of a barbarian; brave, but not a stranger to the fear of peril when he believes in its proximity; cruel and sensitive by fits and starts; perfidious through his inconstancy; always ready to yield to any temptation that presents itself, whether it lead to crime or to virtue--he displays, in his ambition as well as in his criminality, that character of thoughtlessness and mobility which belongs to an almost savage state of civilization. {204} His passions are imperious, but no series of reasonings and projects determines and governs them; they form a lofty tree, but one devoid of roots, which the least breeze may shake, and the fall of which is a disaster. Hence arises his tragic grandeur; it resides in his destiny more than in his character. Macbeth, if placed at a greater distance from the expectation of succession to the throne, would have remained virtuous; but his virtue, would have been restless, for it would have been merely the fruit of circumstance. His crime becomes a punishment to him, because it is circumstance which has forced him to commit it; this crime did not proceed from the depths of Macbeth's nature, and yet it clings to him, envelops him, enchains him, racks him in every part, and thus creates for him a troubled and irremissible destiny, in which the unhappy victim vainly writhes, doing nothing that does not plunge him still deeper, and with increasing despair, into the career which is henceforward prescribed to him by his implacable persecutor. Macbeth is one of those characters marked out in all superstitions to become the prey and instrument of the perverse spirit who takes pleasure in destroying them, because they have received some spark of the divine nature, and who, at the same time, meets with but few difficulties in his task, for the heavenly light darts but a few fleeting rays into their souls, which are obscured by storms at every instant.

Lady Macbeth is just exactly the wife of such a man, the product of the same state of civilization, and of the same habit of passions. She adds to this, moreover, the fact that she is a woman without prudence, without generality in her views, perceiving at once only a single part of a single idea, and giving herself up to it entirely, without ever admitting any thing that might distract or disturb her attention from it. {205} The feelings which belong to her sex are not unknown to her; she loves her husband, knows the pleasures of a mother, and could not kill Duncan herself, because he resembled "her father as he slept;" but she aspires to be queen, and for this cause Duncan must die; she sees nothing in the death of Duncan but the pleasure of being queen; her courage is easy, for she does not perceive any thing to make her recoil from the deed. When her passion is satisfied and the action committed, then only will the other consequences be revealed to her as a novelty of which she previously had not the slightest anticipation. Those fears, and that necessity for new crimes, which her husband had foreseen at the outset, she has never thought of. She was quite willing to throw the crime upon the two chamberlains, but it was not her idea to kill them; she did not arrange the murder of Banquo, or the massacre of Macduff's family; she did not see so far forward; she had not even divined the effect which would be produced upon her by such a sight, when she entered the room in which Duncan lay dead. She leaves it in agitation, no longer contemning the terrors of her husband, but merely urging him not to dwell too much upon images, by which we see that she is beginning to feel herself besieged. The blow is struck, and will reveal itself in the admirable and terrible scene of her somnambulism: there we shall learn what becomes of a character apparently so immovable, when it is no longer sustained by the blind fury of passion. Macbeth has become hardened in crime, after having hesitated to commit it, because he knew its character; but we shall see his wife, succumbing beneath the knowledge which she has acquired too late, substitute one fixed idea for another, die to deliver herself from its influence, and punish, by the madness of despair, the crime which she was led to commit by the madness of ambition.

{206}

The other personages, introduced merely to fill up this great picture of the progress and destiny of crime, have no other color than that of the position given them by history. The Witches are, indeed, what they should be, and I do not know why it is the custom to exclaim with disgust against this portion of the representation of "Macbeth." When we see these vile creatures the arbiters of life and death, of all the chances and all the interests of humanity, disposing of them in accordance with the most contemptible caprices of their odious nature, to the terror which their power inspires is added the dread occasioned by their unreason, and the very absurdity of such a spectacle only augments its effect.

The style of "Macbeth" is remarkable, in its wild energy, for a refinement which we may indeed blame, but which it would be wrong to consider as contrary to truth as it is to naturalness. Refinement of language is not incompatible with rudeness of manners and ideas; it seems even to be rather common in times and positions in which general ideas are wanting. The mind, which can not remain idle, then attaches itself to the slightest verbal connections, takes delight in them, and makes a habit of them, which we meet with in all analogous positions. Nothing can be more far-fetched than the spirit of the literature of the Middle Ages; and what we know of the speech of savages contains many choice ideas. Refinement is the characteristic of the wits of the lower classes; and even the insults of the common people are sometimes composed with a quite singular fastidiousness, as if, at those times when anger excites their faculties, their mind seized with greater facility and abundance upon relations of this kind, the only ones which it was capable of attaining.

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It is believed that "Macbeth" was performed in 1606. The idea of writing a tragedy upon this subject, which would necessarily be pleasing to King James, who had just ascended the throne of England, was probably suggested to Shakspeare by a short poetical dialogue, which the students of Oxford, in 1605, recited in Latin before the king, and in English before the queen, who had accompanied him to that city. The students were three in number, and probably spoke in turn. Their speech turned upon the prediction uttered to Banquo; and, in allusion to the triple salutation which Macbeth had received, they hailed James King of England, Scotland, and Ireland. They also hailed him King of France, which destroyed, somewhat gratuitously, the virtue of the number _three_.

{208}

Julius Cæsar.

(1607.)

Among those tragedies of Shakspeare to which public opinion has assigned a first rank, "Julius Cæsar" is the one of which the commentators have spoken most coldly. Johnson, the coldest of them all, contents himself with saying: "Of this tragedy, many particular passages deserve regard, and the contention and reconcilement of Brutus and Cassius is universally celebrated; but I have never been strongly agitated in perusing it, and think it somewhat cold and unaffecting, compared with some other of Shakspeare's plays."

It is to adopt an entirely false principle of criticism to judge Shakspeare by himself, and to compare the impressions which he has succeeded in producing, in a given style and subject, with those which he calls forth in another style and subject; as if he possessed only a special and singular merit, which he was bound to display on every occasion, and which constituted his sole title to glory. His vast and true genius must be measured on a larger scale; we must compare Shakspeare with nature, with the world; and in every particular case, the comparison must be made between that portion of the world and of nature which it was his intention to represent, and the picture which he has drawn of it. {209} Do not expect from the painter of Brutus the same impressions and the same effects as from the delineator of King Lear, or of Romeo and Juliet. Shakspeare penetrates to the inmost recesses of all subjects, and can derive from each the impressions which naturally flow from it, and the distinct and original effects which it ought to produce.

That, after this, the spectacle of the soul of Brutus should he, to Johnson, less touching and dramatic than the display of any particular passion, or of any particular position in life, is a result of the personal inclinations of the critic, and of the turn taken by his ideas and feelings. We can not find in it a general rule upon which we may found a comparison between works of an absolutely different kind. There are minds so constituted that Corneille will fill them with more emotions than Voltaire, and a mother will feel her nature more agitated and disturbed by Mérope than by Zaire. The mind of Johnson, more strong and upright than it was elevated, could understand tolerably well the interests and passions which agitate the middle region of life, but he never could attain to those lofty eminences in which a truly stoical soul can exist without effort or distraction. The age in which Johnson lived, moreover, was not an age of great devotements; and although, even at that epoch, the political climate of England preserved its literature in some degree from that effeminate influence which had enervated our own, it could not entirely escape from that general disposition of the national mind, that sort of moral materialism, which, granting, as it were, to the soul no other life but that which it derives from the contact of external objects, did not suppose it possible for it to be supplied with other sources of interest than the _pathetic_, properly so called--the individual sorrows of life, the anguish of the heart, and the storms of the passions. {210} This disposition of the eighteenth century was so powerful, that, when introducing the death of Cæsar upon our stage, Voltaire, who justly boasted that he had made a tragedy succeed without the aid of love, nevertheless did not think that such a spectacle could dispense with the pathetic interest which results from the painful conflict of duty and affection. In this great struggle of the last efforts of dying liberty against budding despotism, he sought out, and gave the first place to, an obscure and doubtful fact, but one which was adapted to furnish him with the kind of emotions of which he stood in need; and from the position, real or fictitious, of Brutus placed between his father and his country, Voltaire has constructed the basis and lifespring of his tragedy.

Shakspeare's drama rests entirely upon the character of Brutus; and he has even been blamed for not having entitled his work "Marcus Brutus" instead of "Julius Cæsar." But if Brutus is the hero of the play, the power and death of Cæsar form its subject. Cæsar alone occupies the foreground; the horror felt for his power, and the necessity of deliverance from it, fill the whole of the first part of the drama; the other half is consecrated to the recollection and consequences of his death. It is, as Antony says,

"Cæsar's spirit ranging for revenge;"

and, that his sway may not be lost sight of, it is still his spirit which, on the plains of Sardis and of Philippi, appears to Brutus as his evil genius.

{211}

The picture of this great catastrophe, however, finishes with the death of Brutus. Shakspeare desired to interest us in the event of his drama only as it related to Brutus, just as he has presented Brutus to us only in relation to the event. The fact which furnishes the subject of the tragedy, and the character which accomplishes it, the death of Cæsar and the character of Brutus--this is the union which constitutes Shakspeare's dramatic work, just as the union of soul and body constitutes life, both elements being equally necessary to the existence of the individual. Before the death of Cæsar was planned, the play does not begin; after the death of Brutus, it ends.

It is, then, upon the character of Brutus, the soul of his drama, that Shakspeare has stamped the impress of his genius; and it is all the more admirable in this picture, because, while remaining faithful to history, he has made it also a work of creation, and has presented Plutarch's Brutus to us as truthfully and completely in the scenes which the poet has imagined, as in those which the historian had supplied. That dreamy spirit ever busied in self-examination, that disturbance of a stern conscience at the first indications of a duty that is still doubtful, that calm and resolute firmness as soon as the duty becomes certain, that profound and almost painful sensibility, ever restrained by the rigor of the most austere principles, that gentleness of soul which never disappears for a single moment amid the most cruel offices of virtue--in fine, the character of Brutus, as its idea is present to us all, proceeds animate and unchanging through the different scenes of life in which we meet it, and in which we can not doubt that it appeared under the very aspect with which the poet has clothed it.

Perhaps this historical fidelity may have occasioned the coldness of Shakspeare's critics regarding the tragedy of "Julius Cæsar." They could not discover in it those features of almost wild originality which strike us in the works which Shakspeare has composed upon modern subjects, foreign to the actual habits of our life, as well as to the classical ideas upon which the habits of our mind nave been formed. {212} The manners of Hotspur are certainly more original to us than those of Brutus, and they are also more original in themselves. The grandeur of the characters of the Middle Ages is strongly impressed with originality; the grandeur of the ancients arises with regularity upon the basis of certain general principles, which leave no other sensible difference between individuals than the difference of elevation to which they attain. This was felt by Shakspeare; he merely thought to enhance Brutus, and not to make him singular. The other personages, being placed in an inferior sphere, resume somewhat of the liberty of their individual character, because they are free from that rule of perfection which duty imposes upon Brutus. The poet also seems to play around them with less respect, and to allow himself to ingraft upon them several forms which belong to himself rather than to them. Cassius, disdainfully comparing the bodily strength of Cæsar to his own, and running through the streets of Rome by night in the midst of the storm, to assuage the fever of dangers which devours him, bears much greater resemblance to a comrade of Canute or of Harold than to a Roman of the time of Cæsar; but this barbarian tint throws over the irregularities of Cassius an interest which would not, perhaps, arise with such liveliness from the historical resemblance. M. Schlegel, whose opinions upon Shakspeare always deserve great consideration, seems to me, however, to fall into a slight error when he remarks that "the poet has pointed out with great nicety the superiority of Cassius over Brutus in independent volition and discernment in judging of human affairs." {213} I think, on the contrary, that Shakspeare's admirable art consists, in this piece, in preserving to the principal personage an entire superiority, even when he is mistaken, and in making this evident by the very fact that he falls into error, and yet is deferred to, and that the reason of the others yields with confidence to the mistake of Brutus. Brutus goes so far as to do himself a wrong; in his quarrel with Cassius, overcome for a moment by terrible and secret grief, he forgets the moderation which becomes him; in fine, Brutus is wrong once, and yet Cassius humbles himself, for Brutus has in fact continued greater than he.

Cæsar's character may perhaps appear to us rather too much disfigured by that boastfulness which is common to all barbarous times in which individual force, incessantly called upon to engage in the most terrible struggles, can sustain itself only by a lofty consciousness of its own power, and even has need to be supported by the idea which others entertain of it. It was necessary to display in Cæsar the force which had subjugated the Romans, and the pride which crushed them; Shakspeare had only one position in which he could manifest this state of the soul of his hero; and he, consequently, laid the color on too thickly. Nevertheless, his Cæsar, I confess, does not appear to me more false than our own. Shakspeare even seems to me to have better preserved, in the midst of his rhodomontades, those forms of equality which the despot of a republic ever maintains toward those whom he oppresses.

The tone of "Julius Cæsar" is more generally sustained than that of most of the other tragedies of Shakspeare. Scarcely, throughout the whole of the part of Brutus, do we meet with a single vulgar image; and the only one at all open to the charge of vulgarity occurs when he gives way to anger. {214} The visible care which the poet has taken to imitate the laconic language which history attributes to his hero has very rarely led him into affectation, unless perhaps in the speech of Brutus to the people, which is a model of the scholastic eloquence of the age in which the author lived. The language of Cassius, more figurative because it is more passionate, and distinguished by a less simple loftiness than that of Brutus, is nevertheless equally exempt from triviality. Antony's harangue is a model of adroitness, and of the feigned simplicity of a skillful tactician who is desirous to gain the minds of a coarse and changeful multitude. Voltaire blames Shakspeare, at least with severity, for having presented under a comic form the scene at the feast of Lupercal, the substance of which, he says, "is so noble and interesting." Voltaire sees here nothing but a crown demanded of a free people who refuse it; but Cæsar making himself, in presence of the people, the actor of a farce prepared for his own aggrandizement, and in despair at the applause bestowed on the manner in which he acts his part, was in truth, to the wits of Rome, something extremely comic, which could not be presented to them under any other form.

The action of the piece comprises the period from the triumph of Cæsar, after the victory gained over young Pompey, until the death of Brutus, which gives it a duration of nearly three years and a half.