ure, unveiled, as
he gives us the last words of his favourite heroine: we must read them
backwards and forwards to catch the portrait they enclose. We see the
unconscious elevation of Cordelia's mind, not so much superior as
invulnerable to mortal ills; we see this dignity and lovely pride cast
down by pity and love, and then in answer to Lear's troubled and anxious
look we hear in measured and steadfast tones the reassurance of perfect
peace.

Remark too Shakespeare's habit of looking upon the world as a masque or
pageant, not to be treated with too much respectful anxiety as if it
were as real as ourselves. He who can give so perfectly the texture of
common life, the solidities of common sense, likes to wave his wand over
the domain of sturdy prose and incontrovertible custom, and to show how
plastic it is, and how easily pierced, and how readily transformed. He
has a malicious pleasure in confusing the boundaries of nature and
fancy, and mocking the purblind understanding. In the "Midsummer Night's
Dream" we have an ambiguous and bewildering light, with the horizon
always shifting, and the boundaries of fact and fable confused with an
inseparable mingling of forms; both outwardly, as when Theseus enters
the forest on the skirts of the fairy crew; and inwardly in the memories
of the lovers. And we are expressly told after the enchantment of the
"Tempest" that this summary dealing with the solid world was not merely
by way of entertainment but was a presentation of truth. And Macbeth,
after grasping all that life could offer of tangible reward or palpable
power, pronounces it

"such stuff as dreams are made of."

No doubt something will be said on the other side, of Shakespeare's
broad and indulgent humanity, and of his toleration even of vice itself
when it is convivial and amusing. It should be remembered, however, that
his comedies while more realistic are not so real as his tragedies. They
are, as he himself insists, entertainments; to which jovial sensuality,
witty falsehood, and even hypocrisy when it is not morose are admitted,
as diverting in their very aberration from the mean rule of life. So
that a touch of rascality is a genuine element in comedy, as a touch of
danger in sport, and the provocation of the moral sense is part of the
fun. But they are all under guard. The moment they pass a certain
boundary and break into reality, the moment that intemperance leads to
disorder, and vice to suffering, as