Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 6.djvu/301

 13 S. VI. MAY 29, 1920.] NOTES AND QUERIES.

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Shakespeare's, was the foundation of his play." (' Leopold Shakespeare,' Introduction, p. xliv.)

And at page cxxvii this ardent student of and recognised authority on the poet finally deprives him of the last shred of originality in Shylock, thus :

" Shakespeare may well have known, and Burbage must have known, of the Portuguese Jew physician, Lopez, who, with other Portuguese, was hung and quartered while alive on June 7, ] 694, for conspiring to poison Queen Elizabeth .... Lopez was brought into other plays. See Mr. 8. C. Lee's paper in Gent's Mag., January, 1880. Mr. Lee has since found at the Record Office, the record of the beginning of a trial of another Jew in England about this time."

These and many others, jauntily travers- ing the Pilgrims' Way to Stratford, hand in hand, headed by W. C. Hazlitt,* wrest the wreath of originality from Shakespeare's brow and substitute therefor the cap and bells of a mere imitative faculty.

Latest of all, the rear of this strange pro- cession is brought up by Canon Hanauer in The Jewish Missionary Intelligence of May, 1920, in an article entitled ' Jews in Damascus,' in the following terms :

" During a conversation with a young British soldier, we turned to the Jewish question. He remarked that he had some knowledge of the Jews in London, in Whitechapel and Petticote Lane, and that the character of Shylock in the ' Merchant of Venice ' was just the same, they being unpleasant and disagreeable people, with whom it was almost, impossible to get on. Here- upon, I told him that there are many Christians \vho are just as unpleasant and disagreeable, and that Shakespeare, with a most lamentable want of moral courage, had inverted and dis- torted the facts of the story, which was derived from a biography of Pope Sixtus V. (A.D. 1585 1500), by Gregorius Leti. In the original story the Jew, Samson Carneada, was in reality the victim, and Paul -Secchi, a wealthy Roman merchant, a heartless, bloodthirsty creditor. The Pope was the judge. Both the Christian and the Jew were condemned to death, the former for murderous intent, the latter for selling his life, but in his case the sentence was commuted to that of the galleys with the option of paying a fine of 2,000 crowns to a hospital lately founded by the Pope. My visitor was much surprised at this information."

The turn which Canon Hanauer gives to this story is, I venture to affirm, both questionable and unhappy. I do not ques- tion it in itself, but I do gravely question the fourfold insinuation that Shakespeare, with " a most lamentable want of moral courage, had inverted and distorted the facts" thereof in inventing his own character

founded is one which, in slightly varied forms, occurs in several collections of tales. "j
 * " The story on which the ' M. of V.' is mainly

of Shylock. l~am quite'as " much surprised at this information" as was the Canon' s- visitor. What unquestionable proof is there- that this story, beyond all other similar conjectures and statements, was the iden- tical source whence the poet drew his conception of the Venetian Jew ? Unless this proof be forthcoming how can it be possible to base upon such a story charges of moral cowardice, inversion and< distortion ? And, presuming that this story and none other, was the original of this play, wherein lie these insinuations in regard to Shylock ? Even if our poet had assimilated the broad features of the tale by what canon of art was he constrained to adopt any or~ every detail the Jew depicted therein- as the prototype of his own ? His own creation bears the hall mark of originality which, however much we may be disposed to question in some phases its absolute truth to nature, is admittedly that of a supreme master. Shylock is neither a caricature (a- stage Jew) nor a type, but such as his creator wished him to be and made him sui generis, the product of his own brain and, as I maintain, plagiarised from no existing type English or Venetian. Fur- nivall's summary of this wonderful creation should be the final word thereupon :

" Shylock's tribal hatred of Antonio and the Christians was surely wholly justified, and so was his individual hatred to a great extent. A cur when kicked will bite when he sees a chance. It is only the hate that springs from avarice in Shylock that we can condemn. That his whole hate was intense, we may judge by bis risking 3,000 ducats, dearer to him than his daughter's- life, to gratify it. The hereditary self-restraint in the man, and his hypocrisy, ' O father Abra- ham, what these Christians are,' &c., are notice- able. His appeal to justice, ' Hath not a Jew eyes," &c., is unanswerable, and is not yet ad- mitted in many a land calling itself civilised. .... But at last comes, ' I am not well.' and one wishes he had been spared the spiteful punishment of being made a Christian. His was a strong nature, capable of good ; 'tis the fallen angel who makes the worst devil : but devil or not, Shylock carries our sympathies with him."

William Hazlitt's estimate, from which I cull a few sentences, is second only to this in its penetration and fairness :

" Shylock is a good hater ; ' a man no less sinned against than sinning.' If he carries his revenge too far, yet he has strong grounds for ' the lodged hate he bears Antonio,' which he explains with equal force of eloquence and reason. He seems the depositary of the vengeance of his race ; and though the long habit of brooding over daily insults and injuries has crusted over his temper with inveterate misanthropy, and har.dened^him against the contempt of mankind, this adds^but