cannot place them so high as Tieck does. Its excellence, however, proves nothing, since all essential matters, such as plan, composition, and first sketch, are in any case Rowley's. Shakspeare at most did but help him. Admitting, therefore, the justness of all that Tieck advances in support of his view, I am still of opinion that it is very doubtful whether Shakspeare wrote even a line of it. For the diction, on which in such cases the decision must ultimately depend, is so perfectly identical throughout, that even Tieck does not venture to indicate what parts he would assign respectively to Shakspeare and to Rowley. All that he does is to conclude from the striking superiority of the third and fifth acts, that the master-hand was at work there, an inference which would only be allowable after the fact of the pretended assistance had been established. The latter, however, must appear a purely arbitrary assumption, as long as even its advocates are forced to admit, that the language and versification, thought and imagery, bear throughout the same stamp, and that no decided difference can be discovered among them. And this language, as every unprejudiced reader must at once confess, is so perfectly un-Shakspearean (the piece, it should be remembered, was contemporary with the "Tempest," "Timon of Athens," &c.) —that even Tieck is obliged to have recourse to the gratuitous assumption, that Shakspeare possessed the talent of completely putting off his own style, and of adopting the most marked peculiarities of any other writer. Who, indeed, could fail to perceive that the diction of Shakspeare, with unfailing truthfulness, is wont to give different tones to different characters, and even to the same in different moments and under different affections? And yet through all these manifold variations it remains the same, just as, in the most diverse compositions of the most opposite forms and hues, it is as easy to detect the uniform colouring of Raffaelle, Titian, or Correggio. It is always Shakspeare that speaks, though he may speak differently, as speaking under different characters. It is, in my opinion, as difficult for a great master completely to disguise his style, as it is for him to assume a different bodily shape. Both in truth are but expressions of his spiritual nature, which man has not made, and therefore cannot at will unmake. At any rate there is an end at once of all critical estimates of style, if such a

power be admitted to be real-to the extent at least which Tieck here assumes. It becomes, in short, absolutely impossible to judge of the genuineness or spuriousness of a work from its style, if it be true that a writer can at pleasure adopt a different one in different works. But even if such a change be possible, still it must be remembered that no authority exists for asserting Shakspeare's joint authorship with Rowley, but the unsupported assertion of the bookseller Kirkman. When, however, in other cases as well as the present, Tieck appeals to this pretended talent, he does in fact but throw out of his hands all the weapons of criticism, and give up the game at once to his opponents. In short, the great judge of the great poet, before whom I must always bow, will I am sure pardon my love of truth,) it is impossible to admit the validity of this general method of criticising. He appeals too frequently to "certain usages" of Shakspeare,certain turns and modes of expression,-certain transitions common to him,—a certain way of turning and breaking off his thoughts,-in short, to things of which yet he is unable or unwilling to give a more precise determination. He arbitrarily assumes that Shakspeare worked in a number of different styles and manners, a position which, above all others, required to be established by instances from his acknowledged genuine works, whereas he only brings it forward in the case of the doubtful pieces whose genuineness he maintains. He adheres too little to any certain fixed and invariable primary form of Shakspearean poetry, which all his different poems do but serve to develope,—a style, in short, which is nothing less than pre-eminently Shakspearean. By such a mode of proceeding the critical estimate of genuine and spurious becomes a mere play of caprice. According to such principles, all the excellent pieces whose authors are unknown, in which this period of English literature abounds, might easily be ascribed to the great master himself. For my part, I have generally adopted a stricter rule; and this difference of critical principle will account for the frequency with which I have felt compelled to dissent from the decisions of Tieck.

Having now gone through the whole of Shakspeare's genuine and spurious works, I shall subjoin a chronological arrangement of them, in order to facilitate a critical survey of his career as a

poet. Of this table I must distinctly remark, that for reasons already given, and principally because of Shakspeare's practice of continually retouching and recasting his pieces, I by no means claim for it the certainty of history. The several periods into which I have broken my classification are, I consider, sufficiently well established, but within these limits the particular dates are conjectural.

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V.

CALDERON AND GOETHE IN THEIR RELATION TO SHAKSPEARE.

Ir would be a thorough misconception of the title of the present section, to suppose that it has for its object to exalt Shakspeare at the expense of his two great rivals. No doubt it has been disputed often enough which great man is the greater, and which the greatest of all. But there is something childish in all such comparisons, which, as they are generally made, follow either no fixed, or at best an arbitrary, standard. Undoubtedly there is an intellectual more or less. I, for my part, am convinced that Shakspeare is the greatest dramatic poet of all ages. But this my conviction cannot be otherwise made good to others, than by attempting, with the greatest possible accuracy, to deter mine in kind his artistic personality. For, in mind, quantity is at one and the same time quality—essence, and all mere measure of degree is absolutely excluded. But now, as already remarked, the personality of a poet cannot be set forth except by showing how, in conformity with his own character and times, and historical position, he first conceived the idea of art, and realised it afterwards in his own poems. When, therefore, the mutual relation of two or more poets is spoken of, it cannot be any comparison of their artistic greatness that is thereby meant, but merely their different relations to the idea of art, and especially of poetry-that is to say, the different character of their several conceptions and realisations of it. For in and by himself every genuine artist has an equal justification, and equally a vocation; rightly to be judged of, he must be viewed in his essential difference from all other poets; and it would be absurd to measure Calderon, for instance, or Goethe, by Shakspeare's personality, or, conversely, to judge of Shakspeare by theirs. But now, to the essence of an artist, the notion which he