Take, for example, that passage in the poem where Venus represents the loveliness of Adonis as sending thrills of passion into the earth on which he treads, and as making the bashful moon hide herself from the sight of his bewildering beauty:-- "But if thou fall, O, then imagine this! The earth, in love with thee, thy footing trips, And all is but to rob thee of a kiss. Rich preys make true men thieves; so do thy lips Make modest Dian cloudy and forlorn, Lest she should steal a kiss and die forsworn. "Now of this dark night I perceive the reason: Cynthia for shame obscures her silver shine, Till forging Nature be condemned of treason, For stealing moulds from heaven that were divine. Wherein she framed thee, in high heaven's despite. To shame the sun by day and her by night." This is reflected and reflecting passion, or, at least, imagination awakening passion, rather than passion penetrating imagination. Now mark, by contrast, the gush of the heart into the brain, dissolving thought, imagination, and expression, so that they run molten, in the delirious ecstasy of Pericles in recovering his long-lost child:-- "O Helicanus, strike me, honored sir! Give me a gash; put me to present pain; Lest this great sea of joys, rushing upon me, O'erbear the shores of my mortality, And drown me with their sweetness." If, as is probable, "Venus and Adonis" was written as early as 1586, we may suppose that the plays which represent the boyhood of his genius, and which are strongly marked with the characteristics of that poem, namely, "The Two Gentlemen of Verona," the first draft of "Love's Labor's Lost," and the original "Romeo and Juliet," were produced before the year 1592. Following these came "King Richard III.," "King Richard II.," "A Midsummer Night's Dream," "King John," "The Merchant of Venice," and "King Henry IV.," all of which we know were written before 1598, when Shakespeare was in his thirty-fourth year. During the next eight years he produced "King Henry V.," "The Merry Wives of Windsor," "As You Like It," "Hamlet," "Twelfth Night," "Measure for Measure," "Othello," "Macbeth," and "King Lear." In this list are the four great tragedies in which his genius culminated. Then came "Troilus and Cressida," "Timon of Athens," "Julius Cæsar," "Antony and Cleopatra," "Cymbeline," "King Henry VIII.," "The Tempest," "The Winter's Tale," and "Coriolanus." If heed be paid to this order of the plays, it will be seen at once that a quotation from Shakespeare carries with it a very different degree of authority, according as it refers to the youth or the maturity of his mind.