to employ it
in tracing the principles of human conduct. Accordingly, he has prejudiced
his claims as a literary critic. He is not interested in Shakespeare's art
for its own sake; but that he should use Shakespeare's characters as the
subjects of moral disquisitions is eloquent testimony to their truth to
nature. His classical bias, excusable in a Professor of Latin, is best
seen in his essay "On the Faults of Shakespeare,"(30) of which the title
was alone sufficient to win him the contempt of later critics. His essays
are the dull effusions of a clever man. Though they are not inspiriting,
they are not without interest. He recognised that the source of
Shakespeare's greatness is that he became for the time the person whom he
represented.

Before the appearance of Richardson's _Philosophical Analysis_, Thomas
Whately had written his _Remarks on Some of the Characters of
Shakespeare_; but it was not published till 1785. The author, who died in
1772, had abandoned it in order to complete, in 1770, his _Observations on
Modern Gardening_. The book contains only a short introduction and a
comparison of Macbeth and Richard III. The fragment is sufficient,
however, to indicate more clearly than the work of Richardson the coming
change. The author has himself remarked on the novelty of his method. The
passage must be quoted, as it is the first definite statement that the
examination of Shakespeare's characters should be the main object of
Shakespearian criticism:

"The writers upon dramatic composition have, for the most part,
confined their observations to the fable; and the maxims received
amongst them, for the conduct of it, are therefore emphatically
called, _The Rules of the Drama_. It has been found easy to give
and to apply them; they are obvious, they are certain, they are
general: and poets without genius have, by observing them,
pretended to fame; while critics without discernment have assumed
importance from knowing them. But the regularity thereby
established, though highly proper, is by no means the first
requisite in a dramatic composition. Even waiving all
consideration of those finer feelings which a poet's imagination
or sensibility imparts, there is, within the colder provinces of
judgment and of knowledge, a subject for criticism more worthy of
attention than the common topics of discussion: I mean the
distinction and preservation of _character_