Page:William Hazlitt - Characters of Shakespear's Plays (1817).djvu/131

Rh a smartly contested, three hours' inaugural disputation on its merits by the different candidates for theatrical applause.

The latter scenes of are full of the changes of accident and passion. Success and defeat follow one another with startling rapidity. Fortune sits upon her wheel more blind and giddy than usual. This precarious state and the approaching dissolution of his greatness are strikingly displayed in the dialogue between Antony and Eros.

This is, without doubt, one of the finest pieces of poetry in Shakespear. The splendour of the imagery, the semblance of reality, the lofty range of picturesque objects hanging over the world,