e frequently been induced by the rhyme to leave
out something necessary than to insert anything superfluous. Many of
his rhymes, however, are faultless: ingenious with attractive ease,
and rich without false brilliancy. The songs interspersed (those, I
mean, of the poet himself) are generally sweetly playful and
altogether musical; in imagination, while we merely read them, we hear
their melody.

The whole of Shakespeare's productions bear the certain stamp of his
original genius, but yet no writer was ever further removed from
everything like a mannerism derived from habit or personal
peculiarities. Rather is he, such is the diversity of tone and color
which vary according to the quality of his subjects he assumes, a very
Proteus. Each of his compositions is like a world of its own, moving
in its own sphere. They are works of art, finished in one pervading
style, which revealed the freedom and judicious choice of their
author. If the formation of a work throughout, even in its minutest
parts, in conformity with a leading idea; if the domination of one
animating spirit over all the means of execution, deserves the name of
correctness (and this, excepting in matters of grammar, is the only
proper sense of the term); we shall then, after allowing to
Shakespeare all the higher qualities which demand our admiration, be
also compelled, in most cases, to concede to him the title of a
correct poet.

It would be in the highest degree instructive to follow, if we could,
in his career step by step, an author who at once founded and carried
his art to perfection, and to go through his works in the order of
time. But, with the exception of a few fixed points, which at length
have been obtained, all the necessary materials for this are still
wanting. The diligent Malone has, indeed, made an attempt to arrange
the plays of Shakespeare in chronological order; but he himself gives
out only the result of his labors as hypothetical, and it could not
possibly be attended with complete success, since he excluded from his
inquiry a considerable number of pieces which have been ascribed to
the poet, though rejected as spurious by all the editors since Rowe,
but which, in my opinion, must, if not wholly, at least in great
measure be attributed to him.

_FRIEDRICH SCHLEGEL_

* * * * *

INTRODUCTION TO LUCINDA

By CALVIN THOMAS

Professor of Germanic Languages and Literatures, Columbia University