wont to control, and having witnessed such a "fair
encounter of two most rare affections," no wonder that Prospero longs
to be a man again, like other men, and gladly returns to

"The homely sympathy that heeds
The common life; our nature breeds;
A wisdom fitted to the needs
Of hearts at leisure."

The strength and delicacy of imagination displayed in the characters
already noticed are hardly more admirable than the truth and subtilty
of observation shown in others.

In the delineation of Antonio and Sebastian, short as it is, we have a
volume of wise science, which Coleridge remarks upon thus: "In the
first scene of the second Act, Shakespeare has shown the tendency in
bad men to indulge in scorn and contemptuous expressions, as a mode of
getting rid of their own uneasy feelings of inferiority to the good,
and also of rendering the transition of others to wickedness easy, by
making the good ridiculous. Shakespeare never puts habitual scorn into
the mouths of other than bad men, as here in the instance of Antonio
and Sebastian."

Nor is there less of judgment in the means used by Prospero for
bringing them to a better mind; provoking in them the purpose of
crime, and then taking away the performance; that so he may lead them
to a knowledge of themselves, and awe or shame down their evil by his
demonstrations of good. For such is the proper effect of bad designs
thus thwarted, showing the authors at once the wickedness of their
hearts and the weakness of their hands; whereas, if successful in
their schemes, pride of power would forestall and prevent the natural
shame and remorse of guilt. And we little know what evil it lieth and
lurketh in our hearts to will or to do, till occasion invites or
permits; and Prospero's art here stands in presenting the occasion
till the wicked purpose is formed, and then removing it as soon as the
hand is raised. In the case of Antonio and Sebastian, the workings of
magic are so mixed up with those of Nature, that we cannot distinguish
them; or rather Prospero here causes the supernatural to pursue the
methods of Nature.

And the same deep skill is shown in the case of the good old Lord
Gonzalo, whose sense of his own infelicities seems lost in his care to
minister comfort and diversion to others. Thus his virtue
spontaneously opens the springs of wit and humour in him amid the
terrors of the storm and shipwreck; and he is merry while others are
suffering, and