Cortez was thought the perfect image of a hero for slaughtering the
Mexicans, and the noblest of Christian missionaries for putting the
heretical Montezuma to death--we think Cortez not quite so respectable a
character as Greenacre or Burke. And it is most just that each century
should pass its predecessors in review, and apply its own lights to
bring every feature forward. What progress would there be open to the
human mind if we were for ever to go on viewing incidents exactly as
they were viewed when they occurred? Are we to go on believing Galileo
an infidel, because his discoveries were condemned by his
contemporaries? Are we to think all the butchers, conquerors, and
destroyers of mankind, great men, because their own age was terrified at
their power, and proclaimed them heroes? The time may come when the
great Bunn's efforts to make Drury-Lane into a squeaking, dancing, and
dirty imitation of the Italian Opera, will not be considered conducive
to the triumph of the legitimate English drama. Many things of this
sort, my dear friend, may take place, and most justly; for each present
generation is as the highest court of legislation--it can repeal all old
acts, but it cannot bind its successors. Now, do me the favour to finish
the pot of porter which, in my mind's eye, I see you dandling on your
crossed knee, while your left hand, with easy elegance, is supporting
the bowl of your pipe--and see how these observations apply to
Shakspeare. He has ruined the stage; he has fixed its taste for ever, by
establishing one unvarying standard for plot, language, and
character--and that is his own. There can be no progress--not merely
meaning, by progress, improvement, but, positively, no change. He blocks
up every access to the dramatic Parnassus--he has acquired an entire
monopoly of the heroines in Collins' Ode--and woe to the intruder into
the sacred precincts of his zenana. Well, he _was_ a tremendous Turk,
that old swan of Avon--there is no denying the fact; but what I complain
of is, that no other Leda should be looked at for a moment but only his.
No man can look at the Swan for an instant, and doubt that the king of
gods and men has disguised himself in that avatar of web-feet and
feathers. Jupiter is only enveloped, not concealed; but, at the same
time, is it possible to be blind to the fact, that he has degraded
himself to the habits of the flat-billed bird--that he waddles most
unmercifully when by chance he leaves t