Page:The Psychology of Shakespeare.pdf/196

Rh ness.

This self-examination and

interrogation

is a common

feature in convalescence from insanity; although, it must be admitted, that the transactions here represented, and as the exigences of the drama perhaps require that they should be represented, are more sudden and distinct than the real opera

tions of nature.

Lear's timid consciousness of infirmity of mind, “I fear I am not in my perfect mind,” is in fine con trast to the energetic assertion of his frantic state : “Let me have surgeons, I am cut to the brains.”

The state

ment of his age affords a delicate touch of that intellec tual weakness which accompanies the state of repose and exhaustion. He does not see that four-score and upward is not an exact, but an inexact statement. “Be your tears wet,” seems a return to the half-dream, half-delusion ; he

still doubts the personality of Cordelia, and when he at tains conviction on the point, the idea that she will avenge her wrongs upon him does not at once forsake him; and yet it lasts not long, and he desires her to forget and forgive. The physician wisely apprehends danger from the weak mind throwing itself back upon the memory of its injuries and sufferings, and interrupts the colloquy. The high honour and worth with which Shakespeare invests the physician here and elsewhere, deserves notice.

In Macbeth, although the angry

king rejects an agency which cannot work social and political cures, the physician is represented as a wise and dignified

person.

In this play of Lear the character is still more

exalted; and it would be easy to prove that throughout Shake speare's writings, there is no character held in more honour

than that of the medical man.

Even the starved apothecary

in Romeo and Juliet, is gifted with a conscience.

Shake

speare, in this respect, presents a remarkable contrast to Molière, with whom the physician of his day was the favourite

butt of ridicule ; but Shakespeare's esteem for physic was founded upon knowledge, while Molière's contempt of it was