e
of _Othello_. Desdemona, as Mrs. Jameson remarks, shows less quickness
of intellect and less tendency to reflection than most of Shakespeare's
heroines; but I question whether the critic is right in adding that she
shows much of the 'unconscious address common in women.' She seems to me
deficient in this address, having in its place a frank childlike
boldness and persistency, which are full of charm but are unhappily
united with a certain want of perception. And these graces and this
deficiency appear to be inextricably intertwined, and in the
circumstances conspire tragically against her. They, with her innocence,
hinder her from understanding Othello's state of mind, and lead her to
the most unlucky acts and words; and unkindness or anger subdues her so
completely that she becomes passive and seems to drift helplessly
towards the cataract in front.

In Desdemona's incapacity to resist there is also, in addition to her
perfect love, something which is very characteristic. She is, in a
sense, a child of nature. That deep inward division which leads to clear
and conscious oppositions of right and wrong, duty and inclination,
justice and injustice, is alien to her beautiful soul. She is not good,
kind and true in spite of a temptation to be otherwise, any more than
she is charming in spite of a temptation to be otherwise. She seems to
know evil only by name, and, her inclinations being good, she acts on
inclination. This trait, with its results, may be seen if we compare
her, at the crises of the story, with Cordelia. In Desdemona's place,
Cordelia, however frightened at Othello's anger about the lost
handkerchief, would not have denied its loss. Painful experience had
produced in her a conscious principle of rectitude and a proud hatred of
falseness, which would have made a lie, even one wholly innocent in
spirit, impossible to her; and the clear sense of justice and right
would have led her, instead, to require an explanation of Othello's
agitation which would have broken Iago's plot to pieces. In the same
way, at the final crisis, no instinctive terror of death would have
compelled Cordelia suddenly to relinquish her demand for justice and to
plead for life. But these moments are fatal to Desdemona, who acts
precisely as if she were guilty; and they are fatal because they ask for
something which, it seems to us, could hardly be united with the
peculiar beauty of her nature.

This beauty is all her own. Something as