sted into the rents made by managers in his
divine dramas; nay, it is only some three or four of his pieces that can
be borne at all by our all-intelligent public, unless the burthen be
lightened by dancing, singing, or processioning. This for the stage. But
is it otherwise with "the _reading_ public"? We believe it is worse; we
think, verily, that the apprentice or his master who sits out Othello or
Richard at the theatres, does get a sort of glimpse, a touch, an
atmosphere of intellectual grandeur; but he could not keep himself awake
during the perusal of that which he admires--or fancies he admires--in
scenic representation. As to understanding Shakespeare--as to entering
into all Shakespeare's thoughts and feelings--as to seeing the idea of
Hamlet, or Lear, or Othello, as Shakespeare saw it--this we believe
falls, and can only fall, to the lot of the really cultivated few, and
of those who may have so much of the temperament of genius in
themselves, as to comprehend and sympathize with the criticism of men of
genius. Shakespeare is now popular by name, because, in the first place,
great men, more on a level with the rest of mankind, have said that he
is admirable, and also because, in the absolute universality of his
genius, he has presented points to all. Every man, woman, and child, may
pick at least one flower from his garden, the name and scent of which
are familiar. To all which must of course be added, the effect of
theatrical representation, be that representation what it may. There are
tens of thousands of persons in this country whose only acquaintance
with Shakespeare, such as it is, is through the stage.

We have been talking of the contemporary mass; but this is not all; a
great original writer _of a philosophic turn_--especially a poet--will
almost always have the fashionable world also against him at first,
because he does not give the sort of pleasure expected of him at the
time, and because, not contented with that, he is sure, by precept or
example, to show a contempt for the taste and judgment of the
expectants. He is always, and by the law of his being, an idoloclast. By
and by, after years of abuse or neglect, the aggregate of the single
minds who think for themselves, and have seen the truth and force of his
genius, becomes important; the merits of the poet by degrees constitute
a question for discussion; his works are one by one read; men recognize
a superiority in the abstract, and learn to be