have brought both her temporal and eternal welfare into peril. Here again, therefore, all revolves around the point of right, as Shakspeare himself plainly enough indicates, Act II. Sc. 3.; and still more distinctly (Act III. Sc. 5.) in the conversations between Lancelot and Jessica. The penalty which the court imposes upon the Jew, by which he is compelled to sanction the marriage of his daughter with Lorenzo, annuls these struggling contrarieties externally and accidentally, rather than furnishes atrue intrinsic adjustment of them. Lastly, right and wrong are in the same manner again carried to their extreme points, and consequently to a nicely balanced ambiguity, in the quarrel, with which the piece closes, between Gratiano and Nerissa, and Bassanio and Portia, about the rings which they have parted with, in violation of their sworn promises. Here, again, the maxim "Summum jus summa injuria," is clearly reflected here, too, right and wrong are driven dialectically to a strait-to that extreme boundary where both become indistinguishable and pass into each other.

:

Thus, then, does the intrinsic meaning and signification of these several and seemingly heterogeneous elements, combine them together into unity; they are but so many variations of the same theme. Human life is considered as a transaction of business, with right or justice as its foundation and centre. But the greater the stress that is laid upon this foundation, and the more it is built upon, the more unstable and weak it appears; and the more deeply and definitely it is taken, the more superficial and eccentric does it seem, and the more fatally is it disturbed by its own gravity. No doubt, the end of law and justice is to maintain and support human society. Nevertheless, they are not the true basis and centre of existence, and neither do they constitute the full value of life, nor comprise its whole truth. On the contrary, when conceived in such narrow one-sidedness, the whole structure of life is dialectically dissolved; right becomes wrong, and wrong is right; law and justice do in truth form but one aspect of a many-sided whole. They have not their validity and truth, in and by themselves, but they ultimately rest on a higher principle of true morality, from which they issue like rays from the focus of light. Absolutely speaking, man has no rights, but merely duties; he is created by God not for right, but for duty. But his very dutics become in turn, and

X

in regard to others, his own rights also, and there is absolutely no true and living right which does not involve a duty, and is itself an obligation. Ultimately, therefore, human life rests not on any arrogated right, but on the grace of God; and the divine mercy, which calls him to union with God, is the true and substantial basis of his existence. The conformity of the human with the divine will is the true life-giving morality of man; and this alone gives to right and wrong their true import and significance. This truth is thus beautifully expressed by Shakspeare:

"But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,

It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then shew likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,-
That in the course of justice, none of us

Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;

And that same prayer should teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy."

That another power, which withdraws itself from outward view, and higher than the material one-positive right-lies at the ground of human life, is clearly shewn in the character and fortune of Antonio. A strange unaccountable gloom has taken possession of him; he is weary of his former pursuits; he is so suddenly changed, that he has much ado to know himself. And yet he knows not what it is, nor how he came by this mysterious something, which defies all the efforts of his friends to remove it, and gives place neither to cheerful amusement, nor to the suggestions of reason. It is only when the misfortunes which, even in his highest success, had disturbed his soul with an ill-defined boding, have actually overtaken him, that all becomes clear. It was the very magnitude of his earthly wealth, to which, however, his heart did not cling exclusively, that unconsciously hampered the free flight of his soul, and like a heavy burden weighed upon his spirit: oversatiety of earthly success had made life itself loathsome. This overflow of earthly mammon, which brings temptation in its train and leads away the mind an unwilling captive, involves in it more or less of sin, especially when man has brought the burthen upon him

self. And accordingly it oppresses him; it brings with it a penalty, not indeed from the tribunal of common law and justice, but from that higher power of morality—a penalty which, if it be not legally, is nevertheless morally due. Antonio is himself conscious of this truth, and accordingly he sees in his punishment a mercy, and says,

"Grieve not that I am fallen to this for you;

For herein fortune shows herself more kind
Than is her custom: it is still her use

To let the wretched man outlive his wealth,
To view with hollow eye and wrinkled brow,
An age of poverty; from which lingering penance
Of such a misery doth she cut me off."

ACT IV. Scene 1.

Having thus discovered the idea which gives to the whole its organic unity, we shall be able to determine the artistic form to which it belongs. It is manifestly a comedy of intrigue, after Shakspeare's usual manner. The comic view of things is evi dently the basis on which the dramatic structure is here raised. It is only from this poetical position that the picture which it draws of life, under the one-sided aspect of law and rights can be explained and justified. For the exclusiveness in which this single but indispensable spring of action is employed as the fundamental principle of the whole of life, appears ultimately destroyed by the dialectic of irony. For by shewing the insufficiency of this principle in various situations and circumstances, the truth, which is occasionally hinted at, that extreme right, when it is insisted upon, becomes a palpable wrong, is placed by the contrast in the fullest light. Right and wrong become indistinguishable when carried to their utmost limits, and are finally merged in the source of all true life-the love and mercy of God.

And this consideration serves to prove how erroneous and unfounded is the oft-repeated objection, that the last act is an unnecessary adjunct, which, after all interest has been exhausted, hobbles on feeble and languishing. It is nothing less than indispensable to the right understanding and completeness of the whole. It effaces the tragic impression which still lingers on the mind from the fourth act; the last vibrations of the harsh tones which were there struck, here die away; in the gay and amusing

trifling of love the sharp contrarieties of right and wrong are playfully reconciled. In the same way that in all the preceding scenes the tragic gloom, which the misfortunes of Antonio diffuse, is painted with the softest touch and lightest shades, and their bitterness seems dissolved into sweet, soothing, and melancholy strains, amid which a happier note may be not indistinctly heard, so the concluding act impresses on the whole its appropriate comic stamp, and puts a playful mask on the profound seriousness of the entire subject. We cannot, in short, sufficiently admire the artistic skill of our poet, who, at the risk of censure, and of failure of effect on the weak-sighted and superficial reader, dares to appear indeed to be violating the rules of his art, while he is constantly and steadily pursuing it, and was attaining it so surely and unerringly.

Equally untenable is the censure, that the clown of the piece, Lancelot Gobbo, with his silly gossip, is unsuited to the rest of the piece, and does not harmonize with the first four acts, or at any rate is redundant. Nothing of the kind. He is not merely in his place, but we could not do without him. As in all other comedies of Shakspeare, we have in him a comic representative of the leading idea. He exhibits it in travestie; it is concentrated in his living personality, and in all his individual deeds and pursuits, and therein rendered directly and vividly perceptible. Compare, for instance, the amusing humour and parody where he balances the right and wrong of running away from the Jew, (Act II., Scene 2); or when, in a similar spirit, he plays the Judge over Jessica and Lorenzo. (Act III., Scene 5.) In truth, we have not space to dilate upon his importance in the piece, or the amiableness of his personal character. This, however, we must say, that Shakspeare has employed him wherever possible, in order to bring out his fundamental idea.

As to its date, the "Merchant of Venice" must have been written before 1598, since it also is mentioned by Meres. It falls, therefore, within the first ten years of Shakspeare's artistic labours, and so in all probability belongs to the year 1597, to which it is assigned by Chalmers, Drake, and Tieck. Malone, who places it in 1598, without remark, does not appear to have considered that it could not well be written in this year, and yet

be mentioned by Meres. The date of the earliest impression is 1600. Wonderful, indeed, does the poet's progress appear, when we compare the "Two Gentlemen of Verona," or " All's Well," with the "Merchant of Venice."

"Measure for Measure," although ten years younger,* and in external form, in tone, and colouring, widely differing from the "Merchant of Venice," is nevertheless related to it by its ideal subject-matter. The basis on which its story is constructed is closely allied, and at the same time essentially divergent. A Duke of Vienna forms the determination of committing his sceptre and authority to another, under the pretext of being called to take an urgent and distant journey, and by exchanging the royal purple for a monk's hood to observe incognito the condition of his people, but especially the manner and effect of his vicegerent's administration. At first sight the design looks like a strange arbitrary whim, but more closely examined it appears to possess a reasonable motive both in the character and situation of the Duke. He is an ardent lover of virtue, and of pure and exalted morality. Accordingly, he has hitherto tempered his authority with prudence and mildness; he has been, he fears, even too mild, for vice and crime have of late increased among his subjects. Partly with a view of ascertaining whether his fears are well-grounded, and in that case of correcting his fault without the appearance of inconsistency, and partly perhaps from a longing for such an amusing interruption of the monotony of state, as might at the same time afford him an opportunity of observing both his chief mini

*Tieck places it in 1612; his reasons for so doing are drawn partly from the language and style, and partly from an allusion which he fancies he has detected in it to the literary club which usually assembled at St. Dunstan's Tavern, under the presidency of Ben Jonson. But the later origin of the piece-certainly it did not precede 1609—is vouched still more strongly by the profound masculine earnestness which invests the piece, and by the prevalence of the same tone of feeling which led Shakspeare to abandon the life and pursuits of London for his native town. Malone and Drake are unquestionably wrong in setting it down to 1603. Their arguments in favour of this date are drawn from trifling details and allusions, which, however, are all refuted by Tieck's discovery. Besides, the conjecture is not without weight, which supposes that Shakspeare was led to the composition of this piece by the rigoristic sentiments and arrogant virtue of the Puritans, which were fast spreading at the close of his artistic career.