Shakspere, Personal Recollections
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John A. Joyce >> Shakspere, Personal Recollections
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Portia proposes to pay six thousand ducats rather than Antonio suffer, and
says to Bassanio:
_"First go with me to church and call me wife,
Then away to Venice to your friend.
You shall have gold
To pay the petty debt twenty times over!"_
Shylock swears out a writ and puts Antonio in jail, and demands trial
before the Grand Duke of Venice.
The Duke in open court, with all the witnesses and lawyers and people
present, implores Shylock not to insist to cut a pound of flesh from the
body of Antonio, and argues for mercy.
But, Shylock, impenetrable to the cries of mercy, says to the judge:
_"I have told your grace of what I purpose;
And by our holy Sabbath have I sworn,
To have the due and forfeit of my bond.
The pound of flesh which I demand of him
Is dearly bought, is mine, and I will have it;
If you deny me, fye upon your law!
I stand for judgment; shall I have it?"_
A learned doctor of laws, Bellario, is expected to appear as the advocate
for Antonio, and the Duke awaits him; but receives a letter saying that a
young lawyer named Balthazar will represent him, as sickness prevents his
presence.
Portia disguised like a doctor of laws appears in court.
The Duke asks: "Come you from old Bellario?"
Portia replies: "I did, my lord."
Antonio and Shylock stand up in court, and Portia, after surveying each,
inquires:
"Is your name Shylock?"
He replies: "Shylock is my name."
She says to Antonio: "You stand within Shylock's control, do you not?"
He responds: "Ay, so he says."
Portia asks: "Do you confess the bond?"
Antonio replies: "I do."
Portia: "Then must the Jew be merciful?"
Shylock asks: "On what compulsion must I? Tell me that?"
Then Portia rises in court and makes this lofty, never to be forgotten
speech:
_"The quality of mercy is not strained;
It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven,
Upon the place beneath; it is twice blessed;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes;
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty:
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above his sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself,
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this,--
That in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation; we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy, I have spoke this much
To mitigate the justice of thy plea;
Which, if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence against the merchant there."_
Shylock, with unforgiving spirit, replies:
_"My deeds upon my head! I crave the law,
The penalty and forfeit of my bond!"_
Portia asks:
_"Is not Antonio able to discharge the money?"_
Bassanio replies:
_"Yes; here I tender it for him in the court;
Yea, twice the sum,"_
and still appealing to the Duke, says:
_"To do a great right, do a little wrong,
And curb this cruel devil of his will!"_
Portia says:
_"There is no power in Venice can altar a decree established."_
And Shylock, lighting up with joy, replies:
_"A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel!"_
Preparation is made to cut the pound of flesh from the breast of Antonio;
and this brave old Christian merchant says to his dearest friend, Bassanio:
_"Fare you well!
Grieve not that I am fallen to this for you;
For herein fortune shows herself more kind
Than is her custom; it is still her use
To let the wretched man outlive his wealth,
To view with hollow eye and wrinkled brow,
An age of poverty."_
Portia, speaking to Shylock, says:
_"Take thou thy pound of flesh;
But, in the cutting, if thou dost shed
One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods
Are, by the laws of Venice, confiscated
Unto the State of Venice!"_
The Jew finding himself absolutely blocked consents to take the money
offered.
Yet, Portia tells him that his property and life are now at the mercy of
the Duke because he has conspired against the life of a citizen of Venice,
and bids him:
_"Down, therefore, and beg mercy of the Duke!"_
Then the great Duke, judge of the court, speaks to Shylock:
_"That thou shalt see the difference of our spirit,
I pardon thee thy life before thou ask it;
For half thy wealth, it is Antonio's,
The other half comes to the general state!"_
Shylock bravely replies:
_"Take my life and all, pardon not that;
You take my house, when you do take the prop
That doth sustain my house; you take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live!"_
Then Antonio says if the Jew will give up all his property to Lorenzo and
his daughter Jessica, and become a Christian, he the "Merchant of Venice,"
will be content.
Portia then triumphantly asks:
_"Art thou content, Jew, what dost thou say?"_
And poor old Shylock gasps:
_"I am content."_
Thus ends one of the most barefaced swindles of the ages; and my friend
William is responsible for the nefarious and systematic machinery of
roguery and persecution injected into the play to satisfy Christian hate
against the wandering Jew.
In looking around the world even to-day, we might truthfully exclaim:
"O, Christianity! Christianity! how many crimes are committed in thy name!"
The fifth act of the "Merchant of Venice" winds up with harmonious love and
prosperity for all concerned.
At the beautiful home of "Belmont," Bassanio, Portia, Lorenzo and Jessica,
as well as Gratiano and Nerissa are married and living in blissful
association.
In the moonlit, lovelit conversation between Lorenzo and his Jewish wife,
Jessica, Shakspere wings in some of his finest classical allusions, a word
banquet for all passion struck lovers.
Lorenzo seated amid waving trees, trailing vines and perfumed flowers
illuminated by the mystic rays of Luna, says to Jessica:
_"The moon shines bright; in such a night as this,
When the sweet wind did gently kiss the trees,
And they did make no noise; in such a night,
Troilus, methinks, mounted the Trojan walls,
And sighed his soul towards the Grecian tents
Where Cressid lay that night."_
Jessica replies:
_"In such a night
Did Thisbe fearfully o'ertrip the dew;
And saw the lion's shadow ere himself,
And ran dismayed away."_
Then Lorenzo talks:
_"In such a night
Stood Dido with a willow in her hand
Upon the wild sea banks, and waved her love
To come again to Carthage."_
And Jessica:
_"In such a night
Medea gathered the enchanted herbs
That did renew old Aeson."_
Lorenzo then triumphant speaks:
_"In such a night
Did Jessica steal from the wealthy Jew;
And with an unthrifty love did run from Venice,
As far as Belmont."_
Jessica satirically replies:
_"In such a night
Did young Lorenzo swear he loved her well;
Stealing her soul with many vows of faith,
And ne'er a true one."_
Lorenzo fires back this answer:
_"And in such a night
Did pretty Jessica, like a little shrew
Slander her love, and he forgave it her."_
Jessica gets in the last word, and says:
_"I would outnight you, did nobody come;
But hark, I hear the footing of a man."_
Lorenzo declines to enter the house for rest or sleep, but still discourses
of love and music:
_"How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!
Here will we sit and let the sounds of music
Creep in our ears; soft stillness, and the night,
Become the touches of sweet harmony.
Sit, Jessica; look, how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold;
There's not the smallest orb, which thou beholdest
But in his motion like an angel sings.
Still quiring to the young-ey'd cherubins;
Such harmony is in immortal souls;
But, whil'st this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot have it!
By the sweet power of music; therefore, the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones and floods.
Since naught so stockish, hard and full of rage
But music for the time doth change his nature,
The man that hath no music in himself
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night
And his affections dark as Erebus;
Let no such man be trusted."_
Portia, Bassanio and friends arrive from the trial of Antonio at Venice,
and at the brilliant home of Belmont all is peace and love.
Bassanio discovers that the young lawyer in disguise was Portia, and she
twits him for giving away his ring to the young advocate, as a recompense
for clearing Antonio from the toils of Shylock; and then she discourses to
her friends about music by night:
_"Methinks it sounds much sweeter than by day;
The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark,
When neither is attuned; and I think
The nightingale, if she should sing by day
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.
How many things by season, seasoned are
To their right praise and true perfection!
Peace, there, the moon sleeps with Endymion
And would not be awaked."_
(Music ceases and all retire.)
_Music murmurs through the soul
Hopes of a sweat heavenly goal,
And enchants from pole to pole
While the planets round us roll!_
CHAPTER XVI.
THE SUPERNATURAL. "HAMLET."
_"The time is out of joint; O cursed spite,
That ever I was born to set it right."_
_"Had all his hairs been lives, my great revenge
Had stomach for them all."_
Shakspere, in January, 1600, was at the height of his dramatic renown, and
at the age of thirty-six was the ripest philosopher in the world, knowing
more about the secret impulses of the human heart than any other man.
I could see a great change in his life and thought; for a shade of settled
melancholy characterized his action, since the death and burial of Spenser,
and the downfall of Essex and Southampton, through the vengeance of Cecil
and Bacon, jealous courtiers, who poisoned Queen Elizabeth against the most
noted Lords of her court.
Shakspere's theatrical company became involved in the conspiracy of Essex,
and an edict was issued against the Blackfriars and Globe playhouses
performing their dramatic satires. Children players took their places.
Through the particular vengeance of Lord Bacon, charges of treason were
trumped up against Essex, the former benefactor of Bacon, and in due course
the head of Essex went to the block in February, 1601.
Thus perished one of the brightest, bravest and loftiest peers of England,
a victim to the spleen, hate and tyranny of the ugly Elizabeth, a woman
without conscience or morality, when her personal interest was involved.
She shines out as one of the greatest and most infamous queens of history,
and so long as lofty crime is remembered she will remain on the top
pedestal of royal iniquity.
In the course of our classical and historical readings, William had become
very much interested in the tragic story of Amleth or Hamlet as told by the
Danish writer, _Saxo_--and _Seneca_, the great Roman, in his story of
_Cornelia_ gives the same tragic tale, while Garnier, the French dramatist,
as well as Kyd, the friend of Shakspere, made plays out of the tragic
history of the Prince of Denmark.
But it was left for my friend William to gather up the historical bones of
the ancient story, and articulate them into a breathing, living,
passionate, divine being, whose lofty words and phrases should go sounding
down the centuries, thrilling and reverberating in the soul-lit memory of
mankind.
The supernatural or spiritual part of creation had ever a fascinating
influence upon the Bard of Avon, and all the outward manifestations of
nature were infallible hints to him of the inward sources of the Divine,
and an absolute belief in the immortality of the soul! His own mind was the
best evidence of divinity!
Night after night in the winter of 1600, William would read over, and
ponder upon "scraps of thought," that he had at various times put into the
mouth of Hamlet, and in our new quarters, near Temple Bar, I assisted him
in composing the dramatic story of the melancholy Dane.
That is, I blew the bellows, and when his thought was heated to a red rose
hue he hammered out the play on the anvil of his genius, and made the
sparks fly in a shower of pristine glory.
His literary blacksmith shop was richly furnished with all the rough iron
bars and crude ingots of vanished centuries; and all the best dramatic
writers of London filled his thought factory with contributions of their
inventions. He worked many of their rough pieces of thought into his
dramatic plots; but when the phrase, scene and act were finished and placed
before the footlights for rendition, it sailed away, a full rigged ship of
dramatic grandeur, showing nothing but the royal workmanship of a master
builder, the Homer, Phidias and Angelo of artistic perfection.
Mankind cares but little for the various kinds of wheat that compose the
loaf, the wool or cotton that's in the garment, the timber or stone in the
house, or the kind of steel in the battleship or guns; all they look for is
the perfect structure, as they may see to-day in Shakspere's greatest
play--"Hamlet."
While Hamlet is the central figure of the play, old Polonius, the
diplomatic double dealer, Laertes, his son, and Ophelia, his daughter, act
prominently, while Horatio and the ghost of Hamlet's father express words
of lasting remembrance.
Cruel Claudius, the king who murdered Hamlet's father, stole his throne and
seduced his wife, is shown up as a first-class criminal villain, while
Gertrude, the mother of the young prince, is one of the most sneaking,
mild, incestuous queens in history. Such she devils, with heaven in their
eyes and face, honeyed words on their lips, and gall and hell in their
hearts, are the real seducers of infatuated, willing, ambitious man; and
each should dangle at the end of the same rope or hemlock together!
Contrast Gertrude with Ophelia, and you have a fiend of chicanery and
crime, with a sweet angel of innocence: "Too good, too fair to be cast
among the briers of this working day world and fall and bleed upon the
thorns of life. Like a strain of sad, sweet music which comes floating by
us on the wings of night and silence, like the exhalation of the violet
dying even upon the sense it charms, like the snowflake dissolved in air
before it has caught a stain of earth; like the light surf, severed from
the billow, which a breath disperses, such is the character of the delicate
and sanctified Ophelia."
In December, 1601, the ban of disgrace was taken from the Globe Theatre,
and Burbage and William were permitted to continue their dramatic
exhibitions.
"Hamlet" was played the night before Christmas. The house was packed closer
than grass on an English lawn, and the applause was almost continuous, like
the moan or roar of a distant sea.
Shakspere played the Ghost, Burbage acted Hamlet, Jo Taylor played Horatio,
Heminge played Ophelia, Peele played Polonius, Condell acted Claudius,
Kempt played Gertrude, Cooke acted Laertes, and the other parts were taken
by the best stock actors.
The play opens up on a platform before the castle at "Elsinore,"
Copenhagen, Denmark.
Bernardo and Francisco are soldiers on night duty. Bernardo says: "Who's
there?" Francisco says: "Nay, answer me; stand and unfold yourself."
The ghost of Hamlet's father appears to the night officers, and also to
Horatio and Marcellus, but will not speak. They reveal the wonderful story
to Hamlet, who makes ready to see and talk to the Ghost the next night at
twelve o'clock.
In the meantime, the king, queen and courtiers gather at the grand throne
of the castle and talk of the late king.
Hamlet is moody and sad, and will not be comforted, although persuaded by
King Claudius and his mother.
Claudius addressing Hamlet, says:
_"But, now my nephew Hamlet, and my son
How is it that the clouds still hang on you?"_
Hamlet says (aside):
_"A little more than kin and less than kind.
Not so, my lord; I am too much in the sun."_
Hamlet's mother rebukes him about grieving for his father, and says:
_"Do not forever with thy veiled lids
Seek for thy noble father in the dust;
Thou knowest 'tis common, all that live must die,
Passing through nature to eternity!"_
Hamlet says:
_"Ay, madam, it is common."_
Queen says:
_"If it be,
Why seems it so particular with thee?"_
And then surcharged with suspicion of her secret villainy Hamlet exclaims:
_"Seems, madam! Nay it is; I know not 'seems;'
'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
Nor customary suits of solemn black,
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath,
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
Nor the dejected haviour of the visage,
Together with all forms, moods, shapes of grief
That can denote me truly; these indeed seem,
For they are actions that a man might play;
But I have that within which passeth show,
These but the trappings and the suits of woe."_
Then, after the exit of the old murder-king and his _particeps criminis_
queen--Hamlet ponders to himself on life and death in these lofty lines:
_"O, that this too, too solid flesh would melt,
Thaw and resolve itself into a dew!
Or that the Everlasting had not fixed
His canon against self slaughter! O God! O God!
How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable
Seem to me all the uses of this world!
Fye on't! O Fye! 'tis an unweeded garden,
That grows to seed; things rank and gross in nature
Possess it merely. That it should come to this!
But two months dead! nay, not so much, not two;
So excellent a King, that was, to this
Hyperion to a satyr; so loving to my mother,
That he might not beteem the wind of heaven
Visit her face too roughly. Heaven and earth!
Must I remember? Why, she would hang on him,
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on; and yet, within a month--
Let me not think on it--frailty, thy name is woman!
A little month, or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father's body,
Like Niobe all tears; why, she, even she--
O God! a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourned longer,--married with my uncle,
My father's brother, but no more like my father
Than I to Hercules; within a month;
Ere yet the salt of most unrighteous tears
Had left the flushing of her galled eyes,
She married. O, most wicked speed to post
With such dexterity to incestuous sheets!
It is not, nor can it come to good;
But break, my heart, for I must hold my tongue!"_
Laertes before his departure for France gives his sister Ophelia some
advice and warns her against the blandishments of Hamlet. He says:
_"Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister,
And keep you in the rear of your affection,
Out of the shot and danger of desire;
Be wary then; best safety lies in fear,
Youth to itself rebels, though none else near."_
This innocent, beautiful girl gave this wise reply to her brother:
_"I shall the effect of this good lesson keep,
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother
Do not as some ungracious pastors do,
Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven,
Whilst, like a puffed and wreckless libertine,
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads
And recks not his own read!"_
Then Polonius, the wise old father, comes in to hasten Laertes off to
France, with this great advice:
_"There, my blessing with thee!
And these few precepts in thy memory
Look thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue.
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel.
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new hatched, unfledged comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel; but being in,
Bear it that the opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expressed in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man.
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous chief in that.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all; to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man!"_
_Good advice is very fine,
From those who think and make it;
Only one in ninety-nine
Will ever stop to take it!_
Hamlet and his friends, Horatio and Marcellus, go to the passing place of
the Ghost at midnight, and there, to the amazement of Hamlet, he sees the
apparition of his father, and exclaims:
_"Angels and ministers of grace defend us!
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damned,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
Thou comest in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane; O, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance; but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why thy sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurned
Hath opened his ponderous and marble jaws,
To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again, in complete steel,
Revisit thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous; and we fools of nature
So horridly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
Say, why is this? Wherefore? What should we do?"_
The Ghost passes across the stage and beckons Hamlet to follow, who
frantically rushes after the apparition and says:
_"Whither wilt thou lead me? Speak, I'll go no farther."_
Ghost utters in sepulchral voice:
_"Mark me!
I am thy father's spirit;
Doomed for a certain term to walk the night,
And for the day confined to fast in fires
Till the foul crimes done in my days of nature
Are burnt and purged away. But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison house,
I could a tale unfold whose lightest words
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood,
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their spheres,
Thy knotted and confined locks to part
And each particular hair to stand on end
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine.
But this eternal blazon must not be
To ears of flesh and blood. List! list, O list!
If thou did'st ever thy dear father love,--
'Tis given out that sleeping in my orchard
A serpent stung me. So the whole ear of Denmark
Is by a forged process of my death
Rankly abused; but know thou, noble youth,
The serpent that did sting thy father's life
Now wears his crown!"_
Hamlet exclaims:
_"O my prophetic soul! My uncle!"_
The Ghost then makes this remarkable speech:
_"Ay, that incestuous, that adulterate beast,
With witchcraft of his wit, with traitorous gifts,
O wicked wit and gifts, that have the power
So to seduce! won to his shameful lust
The will of my most seeming-virtuous queen;
O, Hamlet, what a falling off was there!
From me, whose love was of that dignity
That it went hand in hand even with the vow
I made to her in marriage; and to decline
Upon a wretch, whose natural gifts were poor
To those of mine!
But virtue, as it never will be moved,
Though lewdness court it in a shape of heaven,
So lust, though to a radiant angel linked
Will sate itself in a celestial bed
And prey on garbage.
But, soft! methinks I scent the morning air;
Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard,
My custom always of the afternoon,
Upon my secure hour thy uncle stole,
With juice of cursed hebenon in a vial,
And in the porches on my ears did pour
The leperous distilment; whose effect
Holds such an enmity with blood of man,
That quick as quicksilver it courses through
The natural gates and alleys of the body;
And with a sudden vigour, it doth posset
And curd, like eager droppings into milk,
The thin and wholesome blood: So did it mine;
And a most instant tetter barked about,
Most lazar-like, with vile and loathsome crust,
All my smooth body.
Thus was I sleeping, by a brother's hand,
Of life, of crown, of queen, at once dispatched;
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhoused, disappointed, unaneled;
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my head;
O, horrible! most horrible!
If thou hast nature in thee, bear it not;
Let not the royal bed of Denmark be
A couch for luxury and damned incest.
But, howsoever, thou pursuest this act,
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive
Against thy mother aught; leave her to heaven,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge,
To prick and sting her. Fare thee well at once!
The glow-worm shows the matin to be near,
And begins to pale his ineffectual fire!
Adieu! adieu! adieu! remember me!"_
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