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Article WILLIAM SHAKSPERE. ← Page 3 of 17 →
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William Shakspere.
been told that he left 2 or 300 lib . per annum thoro aud thereabout to a sister . I havo heard Sir Wm . Davenant and Mr . Thomas Shadwell ( who is counted the best comoedian we havo now ) say , that ho had a most prodigious witt , and did admire his naturall parts beyond all other dramaticall writers . He was wont to say , that he never blotted out a line in his life ; saA'd Ben Jonson , ' I wish he had blotted out a thousand . ' His comcedies will remaine witt as long as the English tongue is understood for that he
handles mores Jiominnm ; now oiu- present writers reflect so much upon particular persons and coxcombeities , that twenty years hence they will not be understood . Though , as Ben Jonson sayes of him , that he had but little Latine and lesse Greek , he understoode Latine pretty well , for he had been in his younger yeares a schoolmaster in the country . " * Out of this jumble it is difficult to understand anything , or even to comprehend the aim of the Avriter in collecting or
concocting such a budget . The most charitable AUCAV Ave can take of it is that Aubrey has gathered a feAV scraps of tradition , and arranged them after his OAVU fancy ; yet , he has done this iu so strange and incomprehensible a manner , that he cannot even pay the poet a compliment without A'enturing upon a fallacy , as when he asserts that Shakspere " understoode Latine pretty well , for he had been in his younger yeares a schoolmaster iu the country . " He does , indeed , produce an authority for the
statement ; but , alas ! for poor Aubrey ' s gossip , Shakspere might have been a schoolmaster in the country all his life Avithout possessing the slightest knoAvledge of Latin . This fact would prove nothing either way with respect to his classical attainments . How many country schoolmasters at the present day could go through the Latin declensions ? We are also informed
in this marvellous memoir that Stratford-upon-Avon could boast of tAvo Shaksperes at one and the same time , and that both of them were butcher ' s boys . What a glorious age for the annals of calf-killing ; the butcher ' s trade was Avithin a hair's breadth of becoming illustrious ! The graver portion of mankind have regarded the existence of one Shakspere as a remarkable and a
most fortunate event ; to Aubrey we are indebted for the information that another Shakspere , " not at all inferior to him for a naturall witt , " Avas the early associate of the poet , and that he " dyed young . " What a tragedy in one sentence ; Avhat a loss for literature ; what a worthy subject for almost universal lamentation ! To say the least of itsuch a coincidence would be the
, most extraordinary that had ever yet occurred . In estimating the value of Aubrey's evidence , we must remember Avhat Antony Wood , his friend and contemporary , says of him : —¦ " He was a shiftless person , roA'ing and magotio headed , and sometimes little better than crazed . And being exceedingly credulous woulel stuff
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software.
William Shakspere.
been told that he left 2 or 300 lib . per annum thoro aud thereabout to a sister . I havo heard Sir Wm . Davenant and Mr . Thomas Shadwell ( who is counted the best comoedian we havo now ) say , that ho had a most prodigious witt , and did admire his naturall parts beyond all other dramaticall writers . He was wont to say , that he never blotted out a line in his life ; saA'd Ben Jonson , ' I wish he had blotted out a thousand . ' His comcedies will remaine witt as long as the English tongue is understood for that he
handles mores Jiominnm ; now oiu- present writers reflect so much upon particular persons and coxcombeities , that twenty years hence they will not be understood . Though , as Ben Jonson sayes of him , that he had but little Latine and lesse Greek , he understoode Latine pretty well , for he had been in his younger yeares a schoolmaster in the country . " * Out of this jumble it is difficult to understand anything , or even to comprehend the aim of the Avriter in collecting or
concocting such a budget . The most charitable AUCAV Ave can take of it is that Aubrey has gathered a feAV scraps of tradition , and arranged them after his OAVU fancy ; yet , he has done this iu so strange and incomprehensible a manner , that he cannot even pay the poet a compliment without A'enturing upon a fallacy , as when he asserts that Shakspere " understoode Latine pretty well , for he had been in his younger yeares a schoolmaster iu the country . " He does , indeed , produce an authority for the
statement ; but , alas ! for poor Aubrey ' s gossip , Shakspere might have been a schoolmaster in the country all his life Avithout possessing the slightest knoAvledge of Latin . This fact would prove nothing either way with respect to his classical attainments . How many country schoolmasters at the present day could go through the Latin declensions ? We are also informed
in this marvellous memoir that Stratford-upon-Avon could boast of tAvo Shaksperes at one and the same time , and that both of them were butcher ' s boys . What a glorious age for the annals of calf-killing ; the butcher ' s trade was Avithin a hair's breadth of becoming illustrious ! The graver portion of mankind have regarded the existence of one Shakspere as a remarkable and a
most fortunate event ; to Aubrey we are indebted for the information that another Shakspere , " not at all inferior to him for a naturall witt , " Avas the early associate of the poet , and that he " dyed young . " What a tragedy in one sentence ; Avhat a loss for literature ; what a worthy subject for almost universal lamentation ! To say the least of itsuch a coincidence would be the
, most extraordinary that had ever yet occurred . In estimating the value of Aubrey's evidence , we must remember Avhat Antony Wood , his friend and contemporary , says of him : —¦ " He was a shiftless person , roA'ing and magotio headed , and sometimes little better than crazed . And being exceedingly credulous woulel stuff