SHAKESPEARE: HIS LIFE, ART, AND CHARACTERS. WITH AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF THE ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF THE DRAMA IN ENGLAND. _FOURTH EDITION, REVISED_. BY THE REV. H.N. HUDSON, LL.D. VOLUME I. GINN AND COMPANY Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1872, by HENRY N. HUDSON, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. TO MR. JOSEPH BURNETT, OF SOUTHBOROUGH, MASS. Sir: The Memories of a Friendship running, I believe, without interruption through a period of more than five-and-twenty years, prompt the inscribing of these volumes to you. H.N. HUDSON. BOSTON, January 1, 1872. CONTENTS. LIFE OF SHAKESPEARE ORIGIN AND GROWTH OF THE DRAMA IN ENGLAND MIRACLE-PLAYS MORAL-PLAYS COMEDY AND TRAGEDY SHAKESPEARE'S CONTEMPORARIES SHAKESPEARE'S ART NATURE AND USE OF ART PRINCIPLES OF ART DRAMATIC COMPOSITION CHARACTERIZATION HUMOUR STYLE MORAL SPIRIT SHAKESPEARE'S CHARACTERS A MIDSUMMER-NIGHT'S DREAM THE MERCHANT OF VENICE THE MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING AS YOU LIKE IT TWELFTH NIGHT ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL MEASURE FOR MEASURE THE TEMPEST THE WINTER'S TALE [Illustration: Etched by Leopold Fluming after the Chandos painting.] LIFE OF SHAKESPEARE. * * * * * Shakespeare,[1] by general suffrage, is the greatest name in literature. There can be no extravagance in saying, that to all who speak the English language his genius has made the world better worth living in, and life a nobler and diviner thing. And even among those who do not "speak the tongue that Shakespeare spake," large numbers are studying the English language mainly for the purpose of being at home with him. How he came to be what he was, and to do what he did, are questions that can never cease to be interesting, wherever his works are known, and men's powers of thought in any fair measure developed. But Providence has left a veil, or rather a cloud, about his history, so that these questions are not likely to be satisfactorily answered.