racle
of Delphi; wherein actual things are but marshalled into an ideal
order, so as to render Memory subservient to Imagination. In these and
such points, it is enough that the materials be apt to combine among
themselves, and that they agree in working out the issue proposed, the
end thus regulating the use of the means. For a work of art, as such,
should be itself an object for the mind to rest upon, not a directory
to guide it to something else. So that here we may justly say "the
mind is its own place"; and, provided the work be true to this
intellectual whereabout, breaches of geography and history are of
little consequence. And Shakespeare knew full well, that in poetical
workmanship Memory stands absolved from the laws of time, and that the
living order of art has a perfect right to overrule and supersede the
chronological order of facts. In a word, history and chronology have
no rights which a poet, as such, is bound to respect. In his sphere,
things draw together and unite in virtue of other affinities than
those of succession and coexistence. A work of art must indeed aim to
be understood and felt; and so far as historical order is necessary to
this, so far it may justly claim a prerogative voice. But still such a
work must address itself to the mind and heart of man as man, and not
to particular men as scholars or critics. That Shakespeare did this
better than anybody else is the main secret of his supremacy. And it
implies a knowledge far deeper than books could give,--the knowledge
of a mind so intuitive of Nature, and so at home with her, as not to
need the food of learning, because it fed directly on that which is
the original food of learning itself.

Hence the conviction which I suppose all true Shakespearians to have,
that no amount of scholastic advantages and acquirements could really
do any thing towards explaining the mystery of his works. To do what
he did at all, he must have had a native genius so strong and clear
and penetrative, as to become more than learned without the aid of
learning. What could the hydrants of knowledge do for a mind which
thus dwelt at its fountain? Or why should he need to converse with
Wisdom's messengers, whose home was in the very court and pavilion of
Wisdom herself? Shakespeare is always weakest when a fit of learning
takes him. But then he is stronger without learning than any one else
is with it, and, perhaps, than he would have been with it himself; as
the crut