Orlando marries Rosalind; the minor characters are
married as their hearts desire, and all ends happily.

The play treats of the gifts of Nature and the ways of Fortune. Orlando,
given little, is brought to much. Rosalind and Celia, born to much, are
brought to little. The Duke, born to all things, is brought to nothing.
The usurping Duke, born to nothing, climbs to much, desires all, and at
last renounces all. Oliver, born to much, aims at a little more, loses
all, and at last regains all. Touchstone, the worldly wise, marries a
fool. Audrey, born a clown, marries a courtier. Phebe, scorning a man,
falls in love with a woman.

Jaques, the only wise one, is the only one not moved by Fortune. Life
does not interest him; his interest is in his thoughts about life. His
vision of life feasts him whatever life does. Passages in the second
act, in the subtle seventh scene, corrupt in a most important line, show
that in the character of Jaques Shakespeare was expounding a philosophy
of art. The philosophy may not have been that by which he, himself,
wrought; but it is one set down by him with an extreme subtlety of care,
and opposed, as all opinions advanced in drama must be, by an extreme
earnestness of opposition.

The wisest of Shakespeare's characters are often detached from the
action of the play in which they appear. Jaques holds aloof from the
action of this play, though he is perhaps the best-known character in
the cast. His thought is the thought of all wise men, that wisdom, being
always a little beyond the world, has no worldly machinery by which it
can express itself. In this world the place of chorus, interpreter or
commentator is not given to the wise man, but to the fool who has
degraded the office to a profession. Jaques, the wise man, finds the
place occupied by one whose comment is platitude. Wisdom has no place in
the social scheme. The fool, he finds, has both office and uniform.

Seeing this, Jaques wishes, as all wise men wish, not to be counted
wise but to have as great liberty as the fool to express his thought--

"weed your better judgments
Of all opinion that grows rank in them
That I am wise. I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind,
To blow on whom I please; for so fools have.

... give me leave
To speak my mind, and I will through and through
Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,
If they will patie