y, he had none.

First Clown. What, art a heathen? How dost thou understand
the Scripture? The Scripture says, Adam digged; could he dig
without arms?"
(Act 5, Sc. 1.)

That Shakespeare's caricature of Tyler's rebellion is a fair indication
of his view of all popular risings appears from the remarks addressed by
Westmoreland to the Archbishop of York in the Second Part of "Henry IV."
(Act 4, Sc. 1). Says he:

"If that rebellion
Came like itself, in base and abject routs,
Led on by bloody youth, guarded with rags,
And countenanced by boys and beggary;
I say if damned commotion so appeared,
In his true, native, and most proper shape,
You, Reverend Father, and these noble lords
Had not been here to dress the ugly form
Of base and bloody insurrection
With your fair honors."

The first and last of Shakespeare's English historical plays, "King
John" and "Henry VIII.," lie beyond the limits of the civil wars, and
each of them treats of a period momentous in the annals of English
liberty, a fact which Shakespeare absolutely ignores. John as king had
two great misfortunes--he suffered disgrace at the hands of his barons
and of the pope. The first event, the wringing of Magna Charta from the
king, Shakespeare passes over. A sense of national pride might have
excused the omission of the latter humiliation, but no, it was a triumph
of authority, and as such Shakespeare must record it for the edification
of his hearers, and consequently we have the king presented on the stage
as meekly receiving the crown from the papal legate (Act 5, Sc. 1).
England was freed from the Roman yoke in the reign of Henry VIII., and
in the drama of that name Shakespeare might have balanced the indignity
forced upon King John, but now he is silent. Nothing must be said
against authority, even against that of the pope, and the play
culminates in the pomp and parade of the christening of the infant
Elizabeth! Such is Shakespeare's conception of history! Who could guess
from reading these English historical plays that throughout the period
which they cover English freedom was growing, that justice and the
rights of man were asserting themselves, while despotism was gradually
curbed and limited? This is the one great glory of English history,
exhibiting itself at Runnymede, reflected in Wyclif and John Ball and
Wat Tyler, and shining dimly in the birth of a national ch