ts journey to its
untried future, have become interwoven with an extensive network of
superstitions, varying more or less in every country and tribe.
Shakespeare has alluded to the numerous destinations of the disembodied
spirit, enumerating the many ideas prevalent in his time on the subject.
In "Measure for Measure" (iii. 1), Claudio thus speaks:

"Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;
To lie in cold obstruction and to rot;
This sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice;
To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence round about
The pendent world."[732]

[732] Cf. Milton's "Paradise Lost," v. 595-683.

We may compare also the powerful language of Othello (v. 2):

"This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven,
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl!
Even like thy chastity.--
O cursed, cursed slave! Whip me, ye devils,
From the possession of this heavenly sight!
Blow me about in winds! roast me in sulphur!
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire!
O Desdemona! Desdemona! dead!"

Douce[733] says that in the former passage it is difficult to decide
whether Shakespeare is alluding to the pains of hell or purgatory. Both
passages are obscure, and have given rise to much criticism. It seems
probable, however, that while partly referring to the notions of the
time, relating to departed souls, Shakespeare has in a great measure
incorporated the ideas of what he had read in books of Catholic
divinity. The passages quoted above remind us of the legend of St.
Patrick's purgatory, where mention is made of a lake of ice and snow
into which persons were plunged up to their necks; and of the
description of hell given in the "Shepherd's Calendar:"

"a great froste in a water rounes
And after a bytter wynde comes
Which gothe through the soules with eyre;
Fends with pokes pulle theyr flesshe ysondre,
They fight and curse, and eche on other wonder."

[733] See "Illustrations of Shakespeare," 1839, pp. 82, 83.

We cannot here enter, however, into the mass of mystic details
respecting "the soul's dread journey[734] by caverns and rocky paths and
weary plains, over steep and slippery mountains, by frail bank or giddy
bridge, across gulfs or rushing rivers, abiding the fierce o