Stay! before we waste epithets of indignation, let us consider. If these people mean that Shakspeare's women are inferior in power to his men, I grant it at once; for in Shakspeare the male and female characters bear precisely the same relation to each other that they do in nature and in society--they are not equal in prominence or in power--they are subordinate throughout. Richardson remarks, that "if situation influences the mind, and if uniformity of conduct be frequently occasioned by uniformity of condition, there _must_ be a greater diversity of male than of female characters,"--which is true; add to this our limited sphere of action, consequently of experience,--the habits of self-control rendering the outward distinctions of character and passion less striking and less strong--all this we see in Shakspeare as in nature: for instance, Juliet is the most impassioned of the female characters, but what are _her_ passions compared to those which shake the soul of Othello? "Even as the dew-drop on the myrtle-leaf To the vex'd sea." Look at Constance, frantic for the loss of her son--then look at Lear, maddened by the ingratitude of his daughters: why it is the west wind bowing those aspen tops that wave before our window, compared to the tropic hurricane, when forests crash and burn, and mountains tremble to their bases! MEDON. True; and Lady Macbeth, with all her soaring ambition, her vigor of intellect, her subtlety, her courage, and her cruelty--what is she, compared to Richard III.? ALDA. I will tell you what she is--she is a woman. Place Lady Macbeth in comparison with Richard III., and you see at once the essential distinction between masculine and feminine ambition--though both in extreme, and overleaping all restraints of conscience or mercy. Richard says of himself, that he has "neither pity, love, nor fear:" Lady Macbeth is susceptible of all three. You smile! but that remains to be proved. The reason that Shakspeare's wicked women have such a singular hold upon our fancy, is from the consistent preservation of the feminine character, which renders them more terrible, because more credible and intelligible--not like those monstrous caricatures we meet with in history-- MEDON. In history?--this is new! ALDA.