He seems to have been fond of many different kinds of characters. Men of action, that is, men who do things, and men of thought, whose philosophy and understanding take hold of the facts of life and look deep into their meaning, were equally understood and loved by Shakespeare. How do we know this? We know because he created such thinkers as Hamlet, and his King Richard II, and Macbeth, and such men of action as are in his great historical plays and especially Othello. But we cannot help thinking that Shakespeare loved men of action better and was more devoted to them than he was to those who were thinkers chiefly. A critic named Hazlitt wrote of Shakespeare, "His talent consisted in sympathy with human nature in all its shapes, degrees, depressions and elevations." Sympathy of this kind is not only a great gift, but it is also a very rare one. His universal sympathy is one reason why we admire Shakespeare so much. There are other facts about Shakespeare's life that we learn from his plays. His youth was brilliant, full of happy exuberance and exaltation, confident and swift. At this time, he wrote such plays as _Romeo and Juliet_, 1592, the great historical plays, 1592-1594, and again in 1597-1598, _A Midsummer Night's Dream_, 1594-5, _As You Like It_, 1599, _Twelfth Night_, 1600, _Julius Caesar_, 1600. You do not need to remember these dates, but notice how rapidly one great play follows another. Shakespeare's full maturity, following youth, {44} begins about 1599. Later than 1600, he wrote such plays as _Hamlet_, 1602, _Othello_, 1604, _Macbeth_, 1606, _King Lear_, 1607, _Anthony and Cleopatra_, 1608. These are generally regarded as his greatest plays. In the last years of his life we can think of him as living at New Place in Stratford, with peace, happiness and tranquility. His young daughter Judith must have been his special, much-loved companion. We imagine that possibly Miranda in _The Tempest_ is like Judith; Shakespeare may have been thinking of himself a little when he wrote some of Prospero's speeches. To this period belong three calm, wise and beautiful plays which were the last that he wrote, _Cymbeline_, 1610, _The Winter's Tale_, 1611, and _The Tempest_, 1611.