Page:The New Monthly Magazine - Volume 102.djvu/308

292 it is the dim phantasmagoria of the hell it ever bears within itself? What are those thoughts? We must first be damned eternally ere we can know. And yet Shakespeare in half a dozen words has made us feel what they must be." If the comment is daringly expressed, at least it is in harmony with the daring mystery of the thrilling text, of imagination all compact.

There is an excellent analysis of the seemingly inconsistent character of Oliver, in "As You Like It." "He is not a mere brutal, grasping elder brother; but being somewhat morose and moody in his disposition, he first envied and then disliked the youth who, although his inferior in position, is so much in the heart of the world, and especially of his own people, that he himself is altogether misprised. The very moody disposition which makes him less popular than his younger brother, led him to nourish this bitter dislike, till it became at length the bitter hate which he shows in the first scene of the play. Had Oliver been less appreciative of the good in others, and less capable of it himself, he would not have turned so bitterly against Orlando. It is quite true to nature that such a man should be overcome entirely, and at once, by the subsequent generosity of his brother, and instantly subdued by simple, earnest Celia. But his sudden yielding to sweet and noble influences is not consistent with the character of the coarse, unmitigated villain whom we see upon the stage, and who is the monstrous product, not of Shakespeare, but of those who garble Shakespeare's text." Equally true is Mr. White's refusal of the stage version of Jacques, as a melancholy, tender-hearted young man, with sad eyes and a sweet voice, talking morality in most musical modulation. "Shakespeare's Jacques," on the contrary, "is a morose, cynical, querulous old fellow, who has been a bad young one. He does not have sad moments, but 'sullen fits,' as the Duke says. His melancholy is morbid; and is but the fruit of that utter loss of mental tone which results from years of riot and debauchery." Among other Shakspearian creations characterised by Mr. White with more or less felicity and detail, are, Falstaff, Glo'ster, Angelo, Bottom, Viola, Desdemona, Rosalind, and Imogen.

But the essay on Isabella appears to us a piece of perverted ingenuity. That by a diligent aggregation of certain particulars in her actions and speeches, an air of plausibility may be thrown over Mr. White's presentment, or mispresentment of the "very virtuous maid," is true enough; but when, with every wish to rid our mind of prejudice and prepossession, we strive to realise what Shakspeare meant Isabel to be, how he regarded her, and what place he desired for her in the heart of the great world, which is just,—we find it impracticable to recognise Mr. White's version, and are only too glad to escape, in this instance, from the refracting medium of the critic to the poet's fontal light. "I shrink,” says Mr. White, on one occasion, "from thrusting myself between my readers and their spontaneous admiration of Shakespeare." It is not often that his presence is felt to be obtrusive, or that we are not happy in his aid; but here it is otherwise. In Isabella, Mr. White sees an embodiment of the iciest, the most repelling continence." She is a professional pietist, chaste by the card. She is "deliberately sanctified, and energetically virtuous." She is "a pedant in her talk, a prude in her notions, and a prig in her conduct." Hers is a "porcupine purity." "She has solemnly