Page:Notes and Queries - Series 9 - Volume 10.djvu/52

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NOTES AND QUERIES.

B. x. JULY 19, woe.

So prove it,

That the probation bear no hinge, nor loop, To hang a doubt on.

' Othello,' III. iii. 365-7.

Again I turn to the curious old play with the queer title, and I find probation used as Shakespeare uses it :

Have we not had manifest probation, Have not men of God beene put to silence ? LI. 1206-7 (Jahrbuch, p. 46).

Now for a case where Shakespeare is supposed to have consulted Plato in the original Greek. I select it because it has the place of honour in Dr. Theobald's book, being his first shot ; and because it is believed tc be a poser.

In 'Troilus and Cressida,' III. iii. 95-123, and in ' Julius Csesar,' I. ii. 51-70, there are distinct allusions to the Platonic idea " that the eye sees not itself, but from some other thing, for instance a mirror. But the eye can see itself also by reflection in another eye," &c. The passage occurs in 'First Alcibiades,' which Dr. Theobald asserts was not translated when Shakespeare was living. I need hardly observe that it is possible to get ideas, whether in the original Greek or in Latin, without going to the originals or to translations for them. Very little that is good in Greek and Latin authors had been allowed to sleep in its old garb by the many thousands of English scholars who had mastered those languages ; and consequently our old literature abounds with a variety of information, more or less complete, drawn direct from original sources. Hence, although there may not nave been a set translation of Plato's work ready to Shakespeare's hand when he incorporated that author's idea in his plays, it does not follow that the idea could not have been extracted from an English writer, and in terms precisely parallel to those employed in the original Greek. Now it is a very curious fact, and one which I always bear in mind when trying to fix the date of any of his compositions, that the books or other matter wnich had most recently attracted or impressed Shake- speare are the very ones from which he will borrow or to which he will allude ; and it sometimes happens that such works will not have been issued from the press many months or even weeks before the registration or acting of some of his poems or plays. Close attention to this rule will, in many instances, fix the date or.Jbime of composition of some of the plays and poems. Here we have a case in point. Let us look at some dates. ' Troilus and Cressida ' was composed in or about 1603, 'Julius Caesar' in or about 1600;

both plays were most certainly written after April, 1599, the date of the registration of Sir John Davies's ' Nosce Teipsum.' Now it was not from Plato at all that Shakespeare obtained his idea and the phraseology in which he clothed it, but from the poem of Sir John Davies, who expounds it at great length. The passages necessary to establish the fact that Shakespeare borrowed from Sir John Davies would take up too much room, and it is not necessary to my argument to prove the borrowing in this case. The sugges- tion is that the Platonic idea must have oeen derived from the original Greek, and that Shakespeare's ignorance of the latter pre- cluded him from consulting Plato, whose work was not then translated. Consequently, say the Baconians, Shakespeare did not write 'Troilus and Cressida' and 'Julius Caesar.' If I can show that Plato's idea is expressed in parallel language in 'Nosce Teipsura,' I shall have proved that Shakespeare had no need to consult original sources, and that the argument of the Baconians is altogether out of court.

Is it because the Mind is like the Eye, (Through which it gathers Knowledge by degrees) Whose rays reflect not, but spread outwardly ; Not seeing itself, when other things it sees ?

Arber's ' English Garner,' vol. v. p. 144.

That Power (which gave me eyes, the world to

view)

To view myself, infused an Inward Light, Whereby my Soul, as by a Mirror true, Of her own form, may take a perfect sight.

But as the sharpest Eye discerneth nought, Except the sunbeams in the air do shine : So the best Soul, with her reflecting thought, Sees not herself, without some light divine.

Ibid., p. 147.

Other cases of supposed borrowing from Greek and Latin sources, which Dr. Theobald adduces, could be disposed of more effectually than this one, and I need not travel beyond Lyly's ' Euphues ' for material to prove how utterly unsafe it would be to follow the lead of Dr. Theobald, who, apparently, has not

xtended his studies in old English literature beyond Shakespeare and Bacon.

C. CRAWFORD.

53, Hampden Road, Hornsey, N.

(To be continued.)

DUNWICH OR DUNMOW A BlSHOP's SEE.

The East Anglian bishops are understood to lave had their seat at Dunwich until the Bishopric was divided between Dunwich and Imham. I have reason to believe that rather Dunmow was the first seat. Our early anti- quaries may be excusftd for having adopted the Suffolk town, seeing that they lived at