rtality" nor permits us to let
go the balm of its "eternal peace." How frightful "to lie in cold
obstruction and to rot; this sensible warm motion to become a
kneaded clod!" and yet, "after life's fitful fever," how blessed to
"sleep well!"

What we note about this mood--the mood of Shakespeare and the
natural man--is that it never for a moment dallies with philosophic
fancies or mystic visions. It "thinks highly of the soul," but in the
natural, not the metaphysical, sense. It is the attitude of Rabelais and
Montaigne, not the attitude of Wordsworth or Browning. It is the
tone we know so well in the Homeric poems. It is the tone of the
Psalms of David. We hear its voice in "Ecclesiastes," and the
wisdom of "Solomon the King" is full of it. In more recent times, it
is the feeling of those who veer between our race's traditional hope
and the dark gulf of eternal silence. It is the "Aut Christus aut Nihil"
of those who "by means of metaphysic" have dug a pit, into which
metaphysic has disappeared!

The gaiety and childlike animal spirits of Shakespeare's Comedies
need not deceive us. Why should we not forget the whips and scorns
for a while, and fleet the time carelessly, "as they did in the golden
age?" Such simple fooling goes better with the irresponsibility of
our fate than the more pungent wit of the moral comedians. The
tragic laughter which the confused issues of life excite in subtler
souls is not lacking, but the sweet obliquities of honest clowns carry
us just as far. Shakespeare loves fools as few have loved them, and it
is often his humour to put into their mouth the ultimate wisdom.

It is remarkable that these plays should commence with a
"Midsummer Night's Dream" and end with a "Tempest." In the
interval the great sombre passions of our race are sounded and
dismissed; but as he began with Titania, so he ends with Ariel. From
the fairy forest to the enchanted island; from a dream to a dream.
With Shakespeare there is no Wagnerian, Euripidean "apologia."
There is no "Parsifal" or "Bacchanals." From the meaningless tumult
of mortal passions he returns, with a certain ironic weariness, to the
magic of Nature and the wonder of youth. Prospero, dismissing his
spirits "into thin air," has the last word; and the last word is as the
first: "we are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is
rounded with a sleep." The easy-going persons who reluct at the idea
of a pessimistic Shakespeare should turn