him, to cheat him of the fulness of his triumph by handing on the lamp of life: For nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence, This is a mitigation and a postponement of the universal doom, but it gives no sure ground for defiance. In the last resort the only stronghold against the enemy is found in the love which is its own reward, which consoles for all losses and disappointments, which is not shaken by tempests nor obscured by clouds, which is truer than the truth of history, and stronger than the strength of corruption. Love alone is not Time's fool. So the first series of the Sonnets comes to an end; and there follows a shorter series, some of them realistic and sardonic and coarse, like an antiMasque after the gracious ceremonial Masque of the earlier numbers. In this series is painted the history of lust, its short delights, its violence, its gentler interludes, its treachery, and the torments that reward it. There is little relief to the picture; the savage deceits of lust work out their own destiny, and leave their victim enlightened, but not consoled: For I have sworn thee fair; more perjured I, The Poems of Shakespeare in no way modify that conception of his character and temper which a discerning reader might gather from the evidence of the plays. But they let us hear his voice more directly, without the intervening barrier of the drama, and they furnish us with some broken hints of the stormy trials and passions which helped him to his knowledge of the human heart, and enriched his plays with the fruits of personal experience. CHAPTER IV THE THEATRE IN the Sonnets Shakespeare gave expression to his own thoughts and feelings, shaping the stuff of his experience by the laws of poetic art, to the ends of poetic beauty. In the drama the same experience of life supplied him with his material, but the conditions that beset him were more complex. When he came "Lowliness is to London he had his way to make. young ambition's ladder," and the only way to success was by conforming to the prevalent fashions and usages. Later, when he had won success, he was free to try new experiments and to modify custom. But he began as an apprentice to the London stage; his early efforts as a playwright cannot be truly judged except in relation to that stage; and even his greatest plays show a careful regard for the strength and weakness of the instruments that lay ready to his hand. The world that he lived in, the stage that he wrote for, these have left their mark broad on his plays, so that those critics who study him in a philosophical vacuum are always liable to err by treating the fashions of his theatre as if they were a part of his creative genius. He was not a lordly poet who stooped to the stage and dramatised his song; he was bred in the tiring-room and on the boards; he was an actor before he was a dramatist. 94 The dramatic opportunities of Stratford counted for something in his history. Primitive drama flourishes everywhere in children's games. The rural communities of Elizabethan England did not leave the drama to children, but enlivened the festivals of the year with ancient plays and pastimes, which served to break the dull round of country life. The Morris dance was a kind of drama; Shakespeare knew it well, and alludes to Maid Marian and the hobbyhorse. The rustic play of St. George has lasted in quiet districts down to our own day; Shakespeare had often been entertained by this uncouth kind of acting, and preserves memories of it in A Midsummer Night's Dream, or, better, in Love's Labour's Lost. The Pageant of the Nine Worthies, presented by the schoolmaster, the curate, the unlettered Costard, and the refined traveller from Spain, is a fair specimen of the dramatic art as it was practised in villages. The chief business of each actor is to dress himself up and explain in doggerel rhyme who he is. Sir Nathaniel, who is a foolish, mild man, and a good bowler, is something over-weighted with the part of Alexander. But he puts on his armour and speaks his lines: When in the world I liv'd, I was the world's Commander; By East, West, North, and South I spread my conquering might: My Scutcheon plain declares that I am Alisander. Here he is interrupted by Biron's jests, and, after a feeble attempt to regain the thread of his discourse. by beginning all over again, he is driven off the stage by Costard. The whole pageant, so grievously flouted and interrupted, is probably a very close study from the life, down to its very speeches, which, being written by the schoolmaster, are full of classical allusion, and make some attempt at epigram. Another type of drama, more ambitious and poetic, was not hard to come at in Shakespeare's childhood. The cycles of Miracle Plays were still presented, in the early summer, by the trade-guilds of many towns; and it may be that Shakespeare was taken by his father to see them at Coventry. But this is hardly likely, for his trivial allusions to them bear no witness to the deep impression which must have been made upon an imaginative child by that strange and solemn pageant, dragging its slow length along, and exhibiting in selected scenes the whole drama of man, his creation, his fall, and his redemption. Spectacles and diversions of this kind belonged to the age that was passing away, and had in them none of the intellectual excitement of a new movement. It was otherwise with the plays and interludes presented by the companies of travelling players who certainly visited Stratford. These men belonged to the new order; their plays savoured of modern wit and modern classical enthusiasm. The manner of their performances is very exactly recorded by Shakespeare in A Midsummer Night's Dream. They would present themselves to the steward of a great house, or to the officer of a corporation, and submit a list of their pieces, with a request to be allowed to perform. Just as Hamlet compels the actors, on their arrival, to give him a specimen of their skill, so Philostrate, who is simply an Elizabethan Master of the Revels, takes care, when the rustics come with their play, to hear it over before proposing it to his master. Then he recites to Theseus a list of the entertainments provided to beguile the time between. supper and bed. The plays are all mythological in subject, after the newest mode. The battle with the Centaurs, the death of Orpheus, the lament of the Muses, and last, the ever-memorable "tedious brief scene " of Pyramus and Thisbe, are the items on the bill. Theseus having made his choice, there is a flourish of trumpets; the Prologue enters, bespeaks the goodwill of the audience, presents to them each of the various characters who are to appear in the play, and, for their better understanding, briefly summarises the plot. Then he withdraws, taking with him Thisbe, the Lion, and Moonshine, who are not immediately required, while Pyramus and the Wall are left behind to begin the play. Thus were plays performed at the court of Duke Theseus of Athens; thus also were they given in the town hall of Stratford, before the magistrates and citizens of the borough. The habit of introducing each character to the audience has persisted in those modern plays where the business of the drama is suspended in order that a popular player may make an effective entrance, and establish friendly personal relations with the audience. The actors of Shakespeare's time were no more willing than their successors to lose themselves in the play. The true beginnings of the Elizabethan drama are to be found in these wandering companies of noblemen's servants. Even in Elizabeth's reign, a great country house, like Sir Christopher Hatton's at Holdenby in Northamptonshire, with its array of tenants and retainers, was a self-contained community; and the business of supplying merriment on festive occasions fell to those of the servants and dependants who had any special skill or aptitude in the arts of music, dancing, and recitation. Originally these amateur actors and musicians were content with their occasional performances, and did not travel. But the G |