Page:William Hazlitt - Characters of Shakespear's Plays (1817).djvu/86

56 imaginary characters, or long-forgotten incidents, he takes the bolder and more desperate course of getting up his plot at home, casts the principal parts among his nearest friends and connections, and rehearses it in downright earnest, with steady nerves and unabated resolution. We will just give an illustration or two.

One of his most characteristic speeches is that immediately after the marriage of Othello.

In the next passage, his imagination runs riot in the mischief he is plotting, and breaks out into the wildness and impetuosity of real enthusiasm.

One of his most favourite topics, on which he is rich indeed, and in descanting on which his spleen serves him for a Muse, is the