madness is feigned; and different actors do not scruple to modify particular scenes according to their own conceptions, without strict regard to the text. To some of these licences it may be necessary to refer, although with no diminution of respect for those who have devoted their great abilities to the personation of a part to which no performance can fully do justice. None of them have fallen so far into error as one to whose worship the shade of Shakspeare is most indebted; for Garrick made the bold experiment of omitting the scene with the grave-diggers, with all its wit and all its humorous sadness.

The Play itself ranks so highly among the works of genius as to justify the most devoted study. It has been declared by Coleridge, the most imaginative of those who have undertaken such a study, to be "the darling of every country in which the literature of England has been fostered ;" and it has been translated with the most faithful care into almost every language of Europe. The German translation of it, by Augustus William Schlegel, is considered by those most competent to form an estimate of its merits, as

approaching to an absolute transcript of the original, and as not merely rendering the expressions, but preserving the feelings and sentiment and poetry throughout.* It is to be regretted that the disappearance of a manuscript of a French translation by M. Léon de Wailly (referred to in vol. 83 of the "Edinburgh Review"), has deprived literature of a rare example of close and admirable translation of dramatic poetry from the English language into French. The specimens given of it by the reviewer, including the soliloquy in the beginning of the Third Act, and also the description of the manner of Ophelia's death, could not be surpassed. Among the great writers of other countries, who have recorded their admiration of this particular play, may be mentioned the honoured names of Goethe, Lessing, Wieland, Schroeder, Horn, Villemain, and Guizot, and more recently, Professor Gervinus. In our own country we can refer to Coleridge, Campbell, Wilson, Hallam, and to living commentators of various qualifications and attainments. To the admiration thus implied, may be

* 66 Blackwood," vol. xxxvii., p. 242.

added the unmistakeable testimony of all readers and all playgoers in all countries. Gervinus remarks, that whenever the name of Shakspeare is mentioned, the play of Hamlet first comes to remembrance; and John Kemble observed that in every copy of Shakspeare's works it appeared that Hamlet had been the play most read. It is plainly observable in our theatres that spectators, of all classes and ages, are never wearied of representations of it: crowded audiences listen to the truthful dialogues as if fearful to lose a word; and the calmer reader in his study derives gratification, at each perusal of the passionate soliloquies, from the belief that he knows more of Shakspeare's mind and meaning than he did before.

In the short life of any one man, the fleeting nature of literary fame is illustrated by the indifference of younger readers to works that were but half a century before in every reader's hands. Each genera

tion seems to require to be instructed or amused in a new form, or delighted by new combinations of

fancy, and new modes of expression. The exceptions

are not many in modern times, but Shakspeare is one amongst the most remarkable in any age. As time has advanced, and knowledge has become more widely diffused, his works have become more known, and more appreciated. With every year of lengthening life, the lovers of poetry, and the observers of mankind, feel the links which bind their affections to Shakspeare grow stronger. In youth, the spirit and action of his scenes excite the attention and the imagination; in maturer years, the wonderful variety and truthful delineation of the characters, and the exquisite beauty of the images that enrich almost every page, are more sensibly appreciated; and when many ordinary enjoyments of life are diminished by still advancing time, the reader recurs to Shakspeare, and finds the charm unbroken, and that there is superadded an almost reverential sense of the profound philosophy so often conveyed in words not harsh and crabbed, but charming, and "musical as is Apollo's lute." Thus, through all the stages of life delighted and instructed, we are disposed to yield full assent to the warmly expressed judgment of Hallam, that "the name of Shakspeare is

the greatest in our literature, it is the greatest in

all literature."

The limited subject of the few pages now offered to the reader is the play of Hamlet; of which production we may perhaps as confidently and justly say, with another of our great English writers, that if other plays may be more poetical, or more terrible, or more pathetic, yet "for the exhibition of human nature, this unrivalled effort must continue to be the admiration of learned and unlearned, as long as the English language shall exist."