To which the dying and convicted villain replies,-- “Thou hast spoken right; ‘tis true: The wheel is come full circle; I am here.” Could anything be put more plainly than the moral lesson in this? It would be easy to produce examples of fine design from his comedies as well; as for instance, from “Much Ado about Nothing:” the two who are made to fall in love with each other, by being each severally assured of possessing the love of the other, Beatrice and Benedick, are shown beforehand to have a strong inclination towards each other, manifested in their continual squabbling after a good-humoured fashion; but not all this is sufficient to make them heartily in love, until they find out the nobility of each other’s character in their behaviour about the calumniated Hero; and the author takes care they shall not be married without a previous acquaintance with the trick that has been played upon them. Indeed we think the remark, that Shakspere never leaves any of his characters the same at the end of a play as he took them up at the beginning, will be found to be true. They are better or worse, wiser or more irretrievably foolish. The historical plays would illustrate the remark as well as any. But of all the terrible plays we are inclined to think “Timon” the most terrible, and to doubt whether justice has been done to the finish and completeness of it. At the same time we are inclined to think that it was printed (first in the first folio, 1623, seven years after Shakspere’s death) from a copy, corrected by the author, but not _written fair_, and containing consequent mistakes. The same account might belong to others of the plays, but more evidently perhaps belongs to the “Timon.” The idea of making the generous spendthrift, whose old idolaters had forsaken him because the idol had no more to give, into the high-priest of the Temple of Mammon, dispensing the gold which he hated and despised, that it might be a curse to the race which he had learned to hate and despise as well; and the way in which Shakspere discloses the depths of Timon’s wound, by bringing him into comparison with one who hates men by profession and humour--are as powerful as anything to be found even in Shakspere.