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OP
SHAKESPEAEE'S
SONNETS.
LOITDOIT: BY PRINTED
AND
PARLIAMENT STREET
AN
INTRODUCTION
TO
THE
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONNETS.
BY
EICHAED
SIMPSON.
LONDON N. TEUBNER
"
CO.,
60
PATERNOSTER
ROW.
1868.
PREFACE.
Tfe
following
chapters
are
reprinted
from
The
Chronicle,
where
they
first
appeared.
They
were
compiled
from
collections
made
long
ago
as
notes
to
Shakespeare's
Sonnets,
and
it
is
hoped
that
as
they
stand
they
will
be
of
some
use
in
pointing
out
the
sequence
of
ideas
in
which
poem
both
needs
and
rewards
the
pains
of
commentator.
Clapham,
February
17,
1868.
CONTENTS,
CHAP.
PAGE
I.
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE
PHILOSOPHY
.
II.
THE
ANALYSIS
OF
LOVE
.
16
III.
THE
THREE
PHASES
OF
LOVE
.27
IV.
THE
TRUE
ORDER
OP
THE
SONNETS
.
36
V.
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS
.
47
VI.
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
.
60
VII.
VULGAR
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS
.
70
VIII.
CONCLUSION
.
75
THE
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAKE'S
SONNETS.
CHAPTER
I.
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHY.
pliilosophywill naturally first turn to his The epic poet relates facts as he finds lyricalpoems. his own in story ; the lyric poet reveals them feelings, of his own and the motives and thinking acting ; the dramatic epic and lyric tells the story poet is both
"
IN
default
of
direct
information, tlie
student
of Shakespeare's
like
the
one,
and,
and
lil^e the
other in
exhibits obedience
his
to
persons
acting
speaking
the lyric poet is most springs of their natures. he is consciously and tionally intenpurely^-personal,because But the dramatic exhibitinghimself. poet is personal the and which he because thoughts too, feelings puts of his characters all ultimately drawn into the mouths are from
can
Hence
his be
own
consciousness.
as
Not
that
these
characters
of what their creator is. representations he he Their is, but what production reveals, not what himself. not feels he might be, or should be, if he were been If Shakespeare had Othello, or lago, or Hamlet, or acted Falstaff, or Henry V., or Hotspur, he might have But then he was and thought as they do in his dramas. taken
himself, and
not
another.
"
I
B
am
that I
am,"
as
he
says
in
one
of have
his sonnets.
tlie if he
to
knowledge
had been
of
what
he
than
might
himself
thought
no
other
affords actual
he, the
own
clue
the
therefore
dismiss
his
dramas,
and
lyrical poems.
the Adonis moods
sonnets
Among
The Venus
these and
alone Lucrece
are are
purely personal.
dramatic
and of
the
stories,
feeling and
which
are
author. he does
in the
the poet goes out of himself; poems Lover's it Complaint. But in the sonnets
; it
is the And
poet who
speaks
some
is himself
whom
he
describes.
presupposed in certain have been sonnets purely imaginary, still there also it may is the man Shakespeare who professes to tell us his which, though feelings and ideas in regard to relations is almost so natural, that personal character imaginary, are how to as easily manifested by his determinations it could the be by "act as on supposition of their reality, though
his
of
the
facts
action
in
real
circumstances.
For
in
these
sonnets
Shakespeare is not tellingus what he should be if he were lago or Othello, and not Shakespeare ; but what he should be if,remaining what he he were placed in certain was, imaginary relations with others. If this all, we were might approach Shakespeare's with chance of finding there the sonnets some feehngs,\ But' and dispositions, judgments of the poet himself.
when
we
examine
so
them limited
to
we,
first
of
all, find
of
them
so
'
monotonous,
there into
seems
in be
their
little
gained
man. are
them then
the
myriad-minded
that the
sonnets
in
the
but mere strictly original, that all the great poets who echoes expressed themselves it as of verse in this kind ased of a a recognized medium that notorious so special kind of philosophy. This was of this philosophy had made the usual texts sonnets students and discussion. In the nineteenth subjectsof dialectical to wrap be thought superannuated trifling century it would
thought
"
not
up
in,
or
to
extract
out
of, what
its
seems sense.
mere
love We may
song
read
or
anything deeper
Dante's
or
than
superficial
as we
Petrarch's
poetry
listen
to
Handel's
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHY.
Beethoven's
music, thoronglilyenjoying
never
tlie
emotions
it
excites,but
of the world
seeking in
of life.
key
as
to the
soon
mysteries
think of
and
extractingphilosophy out of a nursery rhyme. But even this seeming absurdityis none. The rhyme is a nursery extinct of an deposit,a fossilized remnant philosophy. three First the \ comes Philosophies grades. pass through '' the or earnest, or religiousgrade; next mj^thological, poetic grade ; last of all the old woman's, or children's tale. tales were the legends of a Grrimm's nursery once theology ; they next gave form to the imaginationsof a whole people; and they have finally degenerated into what Thales first reverenced the originof water as they are. all things; Pindar used the philosophy of Thales as cal poetibut it could be turned to now no machinery ; practical but In the to the lovesame point a joke. purpose way in its full earnestness in Plato and Dante philosophywas ; in it became Petrarch and it Shakespeare ; and poetry ironical for became an an subject amusing essay in Burton. As serious men extract primeval mythology out of nursery wish to comprehend the philosophy of the tales, so, if we old sonnet must writers,we put our minds into sympathy with their pretensions, admit and their claims to be the
-
teachers their
of the
the
men
of their
times, who
of studies
as
did, in fact,make
serious
as
works
text-books
that
of
or schools,
that of natural
science
to
be
teachers
their
of
merely exponents
claim.
tells him reader
admitted
Dante
Virgil his
of
as
ideal
and, in dedicatingthe
Can
the
opening
that
must
Grande,
in
his
work, the
the subject, the
note diligently
agent, the
of
form,
or
the object,
philosophy; after which the words themselves have to be interpretedin their three senses, moral, and literal, anagogical. His two philosophical and the Convito, are works, the Vita Nuova mentaries simply combringing out the recondite meaning of his own When certain physicians and canzoni. and natural sonnets Petrarch philosophers disdained poetry as no real science, defended it. of the poet," he wrote, "is "The business
title,and
kind
b2
to
of lying,as the nnleamed feign,in tlie sense snpbut of putting toto feign (fingere) in the gether sense and the truth of things beautifying; to adumbrate
or
natural of
in
artificial
colours, to
the removal interest search." forth"
more
cover
them of which
with the
veil
pleasant fiction,on
out, with
the
The
; and
shines of
all the
in its
because Basil.
essence
of difficulty
the
1581.)
of truth
poet
the of
"bodies
stripoff
the
the
crust
poet's truth
philosophicalcritic in turn has to external sensuous hibit metaphor, and exthat lies beneath. Similarly Santil"
of invention an Spaniard, defines poetry to be useful things, which being enveloped in a beautiful veil, are arranged, exposed, and concealed according to a certain and calculation, measurement, weight." (Apud Morley, i. so History of Evglisli Poetry^ 31.) Montaigne even goes far as to say that philosophy is little else than kind of a sophisticated poetry. And the poets were of thought and accepted as masters science. Professors' sole chairs
were
lana, the
founded
in Italian
ties universithere is
a
solelyof
In
to
Dante,
been which
have
broken
met
on some
up old
into
small
associations
to
a new
academies,
or
generally to
one.
listen
sonnet,
lectures. these of Pico of
a
to
lecture
on
Many
notes
are
published
of similar among works
commentaries The
Petrarch
most
to
names
be
found in the
commentators.
only
of
Italian
treatise
della Mirandola
on a
comment
canzone a
Some Tasso
editions
on
of Casa's sonnet
poems
contain
lecture
by Torquato
'n
una
the
Questa
Brevi E
e
o'
due
trapassa,
oscura
fredda.
our Tasso, mystically mean life. Some, he says, only live
The and
sense,
two
our
hours,
rational
says
the
; others
things, the
hour. the
their eyes to intellectual open sequent taxed For this he was by a sub-
lecturer
same
academy
with
making
Casa
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHY.
our
intellectual hours. It
men
life was
was
cold and
kind of
dark,
one
of
our
the
fashionable.
intellectual and those of and of
observing
classes
"
that
those
original genius
he divides into
culture;
the
latter
he distributes investigators.Thus into three tators, grades the gods, the imi"
the
commentators
; and
we
see
that
to hear
its
common
in
meetings
and the of the
of academies of the
the
poems
imitators fact
lectures
commentators.
explainsone
exhibits
Lost
a
little
academe,"
were
the
and
recited
own
sonnets, and
sonnets
commented
them.
under
Shakespeare's
similar stances. circum-
They are first mentioned by Meres in 1598, who his private Shakespeare's sugared sonnets among
a or
be
presumed,
academy,
whom Nuova. about
proposes
we
of the Vita
no
think
of
this,we
the the
need
feel
difficulty
Thomas of Shakespeare's
of the interpretation
dedication
which
Thorpe
publisherprefixedto
in 1609.
"
first edition
only begetter of these insuing sonnets, Mr. W. H., all happiness,and that eternity the well-wishing poet, wisheth promised by our ever-living in setting forth. T. T." the sonnets adventurer As are addressed Mr. W. H. partlyto a man, partlyto a woman, have been their only begetterin (whoever he was) cannot of sole parent, sole inspirer, the sense sole object; and or the only alternative that has been thought of is to suppose that "begetter" means But collector. W. H. was thing somethan the it to more collector; was him, Thorpe that the had made the poet promises of eternity implies,
sonnets
"
To
with
which
if not under
the
sonnets to
abound.
Even
the
not
later
then,
but
written
him,
were was
written,
not
merely one the dumb eloquence of whose beauty had forced Shakespeare to write whose to him and one arguments disputations ; but voked prothe poet to embody his conceptionof the "two loves, of and comfort despair," in his magnificent series of We imagine W. H. to have been either the Earl sonnets.
his influence.
So he
of
Southampton
and back
come
or
some
other had
over
young
with
man
of into
birth
and
wealth, wit
had
beauty, who
brimming
travelled
Italy, and
and love-
academies
Petrarch and which he Platonism, upon philosophy, with Shakespeare, and by his discussions disputed with begot the
sonnets.
Shakespeare is always a philosopher,but in his sonnets is a philosopher of love. A.11 the great sonnet he writers affected derived one was particular philosophy, which from the Banqiiet of Plato. Socrates was originally posed supof this school of thought, and to be the first founder
Shakespeare's adherence
called his in his of
to
"
it
was
so
notorious
a
that
he
was
epitaph
mind. I know
"
Socrates
I
ingenio,"
says that In the
Socrates
in
one
in the
turn
declare,"
love. In
Socrates
TJieages,"that
matter
one
"
small every
what
as
belongs
well small of of and
I surpass
else, past
this
"
present." enlarged
universe, and
that could this
Platonic the
knew From
sophy philogreat
love the
itself into
he who
sustaining
knew the
force
kernel
be
known.
passed to Dante became and Petrarch, and a distinguishing characteristic revi^^l of the sixteenth of the Italian Italy century. Prom and it radiated taken was through Europe, by Surrey up treated such and with by none depth Spenser. But it was has all his devoted and variety as by Shakespeare, who and and sonnets perhaps half his plays, to the poems, subject. Platonic The philosophy, as adopted by the sonnet
Platonic
schools books
science
writers, discussed
matter, love
is
the the
matter
and
method
of
love.
For
its
passion for the beautiful,or rather, as Love Plato says, for begetting or creating in the beautiful. solicited and act of the mind, excited is an by a beautiful object,and having for its object the production of a new of, the old, or already existing, beauty in, and by means beauty. Beauty, on the other hand, is that quality which Truth renders is understood anything an object of love. Beauty is by being true but loved for being beautiful. become the only metaphysical quality which can an object Thus it is both and physical metaof the physical sense. physical it excites,appertains love, the passion which ; and and that of spirit. It is to both spheres that of matter
"
THE
SHAKESPEAEIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHY.
enables it to assume tlie community of love wMcli It is both material of universality. and spiritual, character both active and contemplative. It comprehends the whole of the its generation, upholding, and universe movement It lies at the foundation, not only of every act progress.
this
"
of
every
agent, but
eternal
creative
act
which
upholds, the whole variety of things and ideas. worlds Love which in this system equally describes is a word the transcendental of man, action of God, the intelligent activity of the animal, the nutritive the sensitive activity activity mechanical the chemical of the plant,and or activityof and masses. is the doctrine of Such inorganic elements Love is theology,logic, Petrarch. Boethius and morals, and It is the natural history, sphere of astronomy. politics, which all sciences are superficial segments. Apprehension
affirms
Hegel's idea of the universal Becoming, of which Being and not Being are the It is the principle in which all contradictions two moments.
prelude
to
doubts kind of
or
denies
all ; but
Love
ciles recon-
solution
and
reconciliation
;
; which
in
differentiation
which
maintains
and fuses together subject in spiteof distinction, identity and and matter, perception and thing, the object,mind This ideal and the real. conception of love imparts a ethical character to the love philosophy. Its great special mark is toleration. does it It does
not
fix
its view
on
isolated
of a multitude regard truth as consisting of independent truths ; but it looks at truth as a and in which system which comprehends all realities, every in connection and is mutual ence. dependcomprehended part and not For evil different it,good are substances, but evil is good misplaced. In things evil there is a soul of goodness ; and reformation not in annihilating consists^ the evil thing,but in translating it in developing that it which soul of goodness within gives it life and vigour, and it erringlyseeks. in directingit to the good which
truths, nor
"
room one
the
rival
fanatic, or
like the
cease
losingboth
eclectic.
to
by seeking the
For there is
a
between
them
contradictions like
concave
coalesce
and
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKES
PEAEE's
of
SOJS'N'ETS.
convex,
the
inside
and
outside
bowl. be
This
ethical
character
the
move expected to rethe philosopher from any very conspicuous part on ever howworld's are stage. His theories impracticable, beautiful dreams. Petrarch as was a thorough men speci-
of the
love
philosophy
may
of the
kind
"
scholar, or
my
rather
a.
woodman,
beeches,
or,
with
reed under the bitter laurel,more fervent in working fragile than love of literature happy in my works, with more than sectarian, but knowledge of it. No hungry for weakness truth, the difficulties of which, coupled to my and ignorance, and my fear of entanglingmyself in errors, make unit
me
often embrace
doubt
truth.
Thus
I,
to
of the become
multitude, the
an
of the
low, have
nothing affirming
that which I
(Petrarch, Berum
The former
to
part of
Jonson
doubting everything,except doubt about." to sacrilege Seyiilium Lib. I. Ep. V. 0pp. p. 745.) this description fits Shakespeare as he
and Milton
; the
appeared
The
world
as
he
is
characterized divisions.
are
critics. culture
separates
of the which
man,
into
two
great
of the
movement
through his creative In the second, they are conscious. In sought in phenomena which are independent of him. the first division, the encyclopgedia consists chiefly of human sciences logic,psychology, ethics, language. In the natural second, it consists or chiefly of the inductive The sciences. love philosophy belongs to the first "era. for the second, the great problem of For that, as well as philosophy is to find a universal principleor notion which unites and comprehends in itself the unity and diversity of
"
sought in is activity,
of
the in
two
worlds first
sera
of
matter
and
mind. be
But
it could
only
be
the
that love
was
principle. The
the mind
;
of
man
supposed
concentration
to
have of will
a or
real the
action due
on
matter
when,
by
ciation enun-
In be
such the
magic spells,material efiects could be produced. to of opinion love would a state naturallyappear of things, principlethat solves the contradictions
of
THE
SHAKESPEAEIAN
LOVE^^^Si^KgiffiSSJ^'^ 9
can
shows
whole.
tiow contraries
It
was
be united
into
thus
understood
of all
by
;
the
by Empedocles, things by the play of explained three forces love, and hatred ; by Aristophanes, necessity, who "There mingled all were no gods till Love sang with the different of the things ; and by the mixture
Phsedrus
the
"
different
Heaven
race
came
to
be, and
blessed
Ocean, and
Earth, and
was were a
the
undying
on
of
the .'ill
even
which
animated
principle urged
end.
wards to-
by
a
was
"
blind
instinctive
to
desire
"
their
all
natural tend
Good
defined
"
be
that
things
or
covet," and
"
the
chorus
of schoolmen
respond
in of each thing has its term appetite the good. All things, even those which unconscious, are of appetite, desire the good." Love, the root and queen for such as was philosophers the law of the universe
to
Aristotle
"
The
"
Boethius
says:
"
Hanc Terras Et
Hie
return
seriem
ligat
et
pelagus regens
ccelo
imperitansamor.
nunc
si frena retniserit
amat
Quidquid
Bellum
'
invicem
continuo
nunc
gerit;
incitant
Et
quae
socia fide
Pulchris Certant
motibus
solvere machinam.
ii. met.
8.)
is the Great and wonderful 614) of love, which so mightily and so fast binds the power least immense to the by an invisible but not insensible which union, and rules with equable force things between there is no have parity. What a scope must this principle
And
Petrarch
(0pp.
*'
p.
in
men
who
even
are
and and
not
sensible,when
it
can
bind of
together
nature
incongruous
unite
not
elements
! with its
The
water
with know
earth the
sea
; rivers
would
stars
the
shores, nor
their
courses,
Love
tied them
together.
to
cause
the loved
turn." the
"
Thus
one
love
appeared
in which
to the
philosophicpoet
were
be
principle
all contradictions
tive which
swallowed
up
all
solved
the
10
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE'S
unlocks all
SOITNETS.
held
the
secret
key
which
the
treasures
of
knowledge.
Such
is the substance For its
of love
according to
the Italian
or
the
Platonic
sonnetteers.
method,
of six
academicians
give,after Plato, a
love
end.
to
degrees,by which from its imperfect beginnings to its complete ascends The first step belongs to the outward eyes, the second
steps
inward merges becomes eyes into the memory. and reason, of In the idea the third
ladder
the
step the
visible
memory
imagination of
of material mind
; the
beauty
The
universal
a new
beauty.
plating contem-
fourth the
step begins
idea
to
series
of
beauty
is found
be in and
mind,
the
and
thus
the
to
is transferred
from In
body
the
to
soul, from
material intellectual
beauty.
which,
fifth
step
vision,
with the individual only conversant the lightof beauty, receives beauty in itself,"by becoming able to perceivethe beauty of minds. The the loving soul gathers last step is when of intellectual difierences beauty in up all the degrees and all-comprehending divine mind. one (Crescimbeni, della six steps are Bellezzch, grouped in two sets p. 14.) These of three. First, love guided by the outward eyes devotes itself to the visible beauty which happens to strike it. Under the guidance of the memory this beauty becomes larities generalized;it is stripped of the accidents and particuthe of perception, and love becomes fancy. Under devoted to the one guidance of the idea, love becomes objectin which it sees or itaaginesall the imaginary properties it of beauty to be individualized. Thus, begins in And with ends and the one. through all, amj, passes the whole now begins the second triad. The one in whom idea of sensible only represents beauty is individualized such beauty to the mind of the lover ; apart from him, or
"
in relation
to
one
the
eyes
and
minds
of
others, the
beloved
rest.
objectis
Hence in
but
the
he is
himself, but
is the
we
he
This
sense,
fourth
representedin step,wherein, by a
love that of the loves.
is
the kind
get
in the
to
the
beauty
Next, by
and
now
present
mind
we
kind
lectual of intel-
memory,
get
to
this generalize
individual
mental
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-
PHILOSOPHY.
11
it becomes
tbe
more once
beauty
of all minds.
and
Lastly,
we
"
idea
that
is
once
individualized, and
universal last
beauty
mind.
with the
is at the
Divine
three
Thus the
three
first; and
one,
intellectual
begins
reaches love
all in
love, like the sensible, through the all, and at last in all. Thus, the scale of one
"
correspondsto the scale of logic simpleapprehension, and gives a prelude to the ment movejudgment, and reason of the Hegelian category Identity, Difference,and have, first,the apprehension of beauty Comimmity. We through the eyes, the judgment of beauty in the memory, the reason of beauty in the ideal ; and, again,the apprehension of beauty in our own soul, the judgment of beauty in all souls, the reason of beauty in the one all-embracing
" "
soul. idea is
Such
is the
is conceived
universal
dissipatedinto
are
reunited
ments fragthese
love, all
"
pulsations of
contractions of
the the
intellectual
ladder
beautiful eyes the
of
love
"
deserves
is the the
stage
arouses
birth
face
anchor The eyes
on
to be
of
clang
is of the
a
; the
upon
next
are
it ; and
love
is born.
This
simple afiair.
love face
a
questionis,what
is to become from
enter
when
they
new
feed
upon Hence
stage ;
the
"
comes
from
deepen
for the
into memory.
true
ment develop-
own
whole
wide
which
it from
the the
mind,
condition free
eyes seat."
alone,
sence Ablove. looks it
as
stage of
to act
the
can
through
the absent
all
tokens
that
memory remind
of
a
the memory object. And anything serves reminder and a pempsfison. Such comparisons withouti absence/ Memory is at the same would forgetfulness : wit^DutTforgetfulness memory
are
possible imtime
be
un-
12
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONN^ETS.
from distinguishable
its
which makes them into gives them that indistinctness which fit a whole kind, general representations Forgetfulness also purifies the conceptionby lopping ofi* the less striking accidents,and leaving nothing but the nucleus. The beautiful face fades away into an inconstant conception attaches of beauty, which itself to every beautiful image which every loved the such
one.
eyes Thus
present,
as a
and
enables and
the token in
are
mind of the
to
treat
image
symbol
"
absent
the
same
poet who
Your eyes absence
mistress
nor
lips like
may,
without
use
Nature of the
of her
for
comparisons,and
to
splendours
universe
enhance this
or means
patch
a
beauty. By
upon and beloved the
is forced
mind.
Love,
now
which
in the
no
stage
is intolerant
exclusive, and
recognizes
forced
sees
but
that
of the
all hinted lover
face,is
reflected
to
things, because
at
memory
in
the
and
the The
new
undergoes
lover
constancy.
all these
inconstant
is seduced of
into for
shipping wor-
beauty
his lover
selves, them-
to
heart
only
mirror
refuse cultus
of them
:
"
his his
mistress.
constant
does
not
worship, but
"
gives
away,
these
them
only a
relative
You
As
with
your
shadow
I with
did
play."
chosen it
in
the
idea
of
the
objectof perceives
the
one.
overcome
present beauty
lover
"
to blot
out
the
absent
constant
absence
demonstrates
that
"
he
across are no
left him
reside
with
her died
and
to
thus, in Platonic
her. his
phrase,in part
Persuaded
himself
that
are no
his afiection is
mistress's
longer single.
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHY.
13
home
as
"
Eacli
and says which
lives
in
the
other, and
his
to
own comes
in
that"
new
"
thinks,
acts, and
"
maintains he
being
also soul in of
Crescimbeni
no
"
Thus
Hve
the
himself
the
alone, but
with
as
beloved
longer object, \
so
his has
by
the the
his
loving death,
is the the
he of
has the
that,
and of
"
lives."
This
lover
counterpart
logical doctrine
"
identityof
man,"
man
knowing
Bacon,
he
and
known.
The
mind
is the
A
an
"and
knowledge
The mind
is the
mind,
but
knoweth.
; for
itself is
a
accident which
knowledge
that
is all
double
of
of
knowing
every
a new
form
with takes
change
form souls
knowing,
mind
as
and
the
thing
it enters
known
; so
in the
into
which
the
two
loving
have
have,
a
enveloped
live
they
is the which
double
unity
AH
of
being.
to
are
This
unity beauty
in
guarantee of constancy.
the
senses
the
beauties
collect
are
referred
and And
whose
image
of
memory,
to it.
beautiful the
to their
thus of
three
love
contemplation
sensible
beauty
the
completed.
The three of in when of the the
higher grades
into lives but the in the
of love
sensible
intellectual
mind.
; but
version con-
is bom
into the
beautiful does
face
not
it lives with
being beauty
decay decay of the sensible beauty which engendered it. It survives age and If it still lives when wrinkles. the beauty which begot it is dead, its life has to depend on other clearlycome some the of the soul, no beauty on beauty longer on that of And the this intellectual love body. through the goes It begins with same the indigrades as the sensible love. \idual soul of the beloved as apprehended one, by the loving consciousness ; it enlarges into love for the general of the nature soul, as distinguished by the judgment ; and it perfects itself in love for the universal soul as prehended comfor the universal sacred by reason soul, the
"
Love
the
"
"
14
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE's
itself
in
SONNETS.
universal
the
love
"
which
comprehends
and
unites
all
differences These
two
of souls
general.
loves, the love of sensible and that of intellectuaL other in their beauty, are counterparts of each and their be described essence operation ; their processes may in the same If love terms. begins with corporeal not without the beauty, it is, as Crescimbeni sumption assays,
beauty of body is naturallya conclusive of beauty of soul, because is only an the one argument offshoot of the other, according to perfection of the
Ariosto's
words
*
that
"
"
Che Tutto
se
la faccia
pud
del
cor era
dar
fede
"
benigno, et
tutto
discrete'
Such
is
the
necessary
assumption
of
love
in
its lower
is established, and love is grades. Afterwards, when without to it refutes the idea, strong enough supports, go and contrasts with even beauty of mind beauty of body, that confessingwith Duncan
"
no
art
construction
in the face.
This the
its six
The
steps
her
may
be
illustrated
by
in is
examples
poetry
of
of
poets.
woman
lowest for
stage
sensuous
is the
love of the
as
concrete
individual
charm,
the
second
a
love
beauty,
Herrick
eyes,
or
black
component
as
separate epigrams
songs,
analyticalprocess reunites the lover its scattered limbs, and worships universal beauty either in the face,which is its symbol, or in nature, which lyricalpoems displays it at large. Wordsworth's In the this fourth in are degree, or first step of grade. intellectual with love, the lover is no longer taken up corporealbeauty, but with that of the mind and character ; how the the poet no man looks, but what longer remarks he is, and gives us, not a pictureof his face,iDut of his grade gives personality. This is epic poetry. The next beauty. This is us a philosophical analysisof intellectual the ideal of lyrical poetry. The sixth grade puts together and contemseparated in the analysis, again all that was degree
third
this
THE
SHAKESPEARIAN
LOVE-PHILOSOPHT.
15
plates
every includes
concrete
intellectual
beauty perfection,
wliicli
that soul
compreliends
love which which has come bethat their
of other
beauty
loves,
of in the which
and that
symbol
action characters.
highest
men
beauty,
to
or
exhibit
This of
poetry.
to
philosophy
love
will
be
key
stand,
to
Shakespeare's
without
Sonnets,
us
explaining
put
them
as
they
and
obliging
or
to
new
arbitrary
allusions.
order,
to
invent
biographical
facts
to
fit
their
CHAPTER
II.
THE
ANALYSIS
OF
LOVE.
LOVE,
parte,
either
or or
says lez.
Benedetto
Varolii
(Lezioni
directed be of
d^
to
Amor,
the mind
2 da
Ima,
or
ed. the
or
1561), being
mind,
both.
may And may the
beauty only,
love, kinds,
Love daemon is
are
of
the of
the
body
the
of love
body
both
to
only, body
of
and
this
be
composite
of
mind,
of
three
according
the
or
the
or
proportions
intellectual
of the
composition.
the
of
mind
only,
;
love, is called
good
love,
loves The
genius
dasmon
love
or
body
The
only,
three
or
or
animal
the
not
genius.
but
composite passions.
called
daemons,
or
only
love
affections
first
is
chivalrous
the
as a
(sometimes
of the of
senses,
divine).
the
and
.It
con-
templateschiefly
oFthe
beauty symbol
mind,
regarding
and the
beauty employ*Civil,
but
with of
body
only
spiritual
or
hearingalso
domestic
not
love,
best,
body,
senses,
only
with
spiritual, but
the love is
but
without
overstepping
or
limits directed
modesty
to
civility.
and
Vulgar
;
plebeian
love of
both is loved
body
sake
but of its
the
own
body beget
love,
prevails,
As it is
and the
it
for
the
pleasures.
to
function
means
of
of
love,
Varchi
the noble
continues,
or
beauty
which its
by
loves is
beauty,
and
chivalrous
mental
more
beauty,
prone
are
corporeal
itself
to to
beauty
only
men,
as
token,
minds,
to
more
devote
youiig
the of
whose
he
of and
says,
apt
science
receive
those
on
beautiful
women.
impressions
The
virtue
and the
than
civil,
conversant
especially
more
vulgar
with
love,
the
contrary,
being
more
directly
themselves
corporeal
to
women
beauty,
than
to
are
prone who
are,
to
as
devote
men, to
Shakespeare
It
I
says
two
in
Sonnet
20, nothing
of
their the
purpose.
is
the
daemons
love,
not
intermediate
THE
ANALYSIS
OP
LOVE.
17
He
in his sonnets.
"
TtVo loves
of comfort
do spirits, is
a man
and
despair,
me
Which,
The
The better
suggest
coloured
still; ill."
angel
rightfair,
worser
a spirit
woman,
intermediate
passions
"
"
chivalrous in his
love, domestic
dramas and
love,
vulgar
love
are
illustrated
sonnets
first series
of
is addressed daemon
manrlghtjair," who
represents the
directed to him in their l5Te"; thesonnels are passionate affection,but the affection is one of the purest friendship ; certain and the twentieth a sonnet, not "without ness coarse-
imputation of a have Greek which would at once sentiment changed the comfort of his love into despair. Shakespeare's conception made clear from will be extract Pico more by an
of
comment
on
Benevieni's
made calls
Canzone.
Love him love
a
He
Guido
he
Cavalcanti
woman,
as
prega," Benevieni
reason,
simply
is that
as an
Amore,
holds
imperfectto a perfect thing ; and the Pythagoreans symbolized imperfect nature Besides, by the male. by the female, and perfectnature he adds, vulgar love is more made sant converappropriately
same
to
vulgar
the
it is prone to material males, because such\ no pleasures. Heavenly love, on the contrary, runs the spiritual beauty of is towards bent risk, but its whole is much which the mind and intellect, more perfect in men with females than than in
women.
Wherefore
the
votaries
have,
mind,
with
part, loved
the
some
worth
corporeal beauty.
loose
women,
They
never
have raise
men
not
who
but, perfection,
With such
a
like
chaste
transform
only
Alcibiades,but
Athenians.
all the
So Parmenides Nicomachus.
the of
Theophrastus
to
intention those
the
was
simply
loved the of
make
occasion tlie
they
is
contemplation
beauty
of
of the
body
an
emana-
18
tion leads and
on we
to
and
the
beauty
from
of the
the
soul
angels, while
more
angelic
of of
templation, con-
beauty
may and
rise arrive
to
sublime
degree
Plato
at
Grod, the
first fountain
all
beauty. This, he
his love.
sought
Plato, in
one
from the
that love of
man
:
Phaedrus, proposes
to
man
"
exemplars
; one
of
of
to
womaa
"
Alcestis
and and
woman
Orpheus
Achilles
Eurydice ;
Patroclus.
the his
was
third
of
man
to
man
"
mind, and,
the
perhaps, in
the
highest love ; it was but masculine not feminine beauty that fired the imagination and with the glowing sentiment passion which idealizing which the stimulus of philosophy, and raised a man was of life, and even above the vulgar and selfish pursuits above With the the fear of death. Plato, personal beauty was of sense between the world the and one point of contact
notion,
world of ideas. in
no
general Greek
last
Justice visible
and
Temperance
could became
clothe visible
themselves in the
shape, but
Beauty
beautiful he mind
beauty, love,
itself to another the
corporeal youth; by
idea of it Thence
it transfers
of the the
as
step it passes
in all
to
generalized
minds.
beauty
objects,bodies
well
enlarges itself to comprehend the worship of beauty in templation public institutions,in arts and sciences, till it ends in conand That described from Greek the love in
worship
of
man
of the for
man
self-beautiful.
can
be and
as
ardent
as
that
Shakespeare's sonnets,
at
yet entirelyfree
His afl'ection for of
to
VAm'die.
a
Estienne soul be
as
Boethie, which
that in his of
was
and
of women, Medici
represented
friend.
ardent Browne
not
Shakespeare
fifth
his
Sir
loves
Thomas he does
Eeligio
of
(Pt. ii.
" 5, 6) hopes
if he
never
the
his friend he
"
nearest
"I
yet,"
I
says, my
are
"
cast
true
affection
do
woman,
but
have
loved
There
friend three
virtue, my
nature
"
soul, my
"
God
natures
most
mystical unions
two
in
one
one
soul in two
are
bodies.
reallydivided, yet
they
so
THE
ANALYSIS
OP
LOVE.
19
rather
nnited than
as
they seem
distinct
but souls."
one,
and
some
make of the
two
And
earliest
duality English
absent to an poetry that is left to us consists of addresses of which of Shakespeare's reminds one friend, the tone
sonnets.
a
In called lord.
Codex
it
"'
Exoniensis In
to him
he his lord and and he
poem absent
Wanderer.
seems
of his
That
kisses,
his knee
lays days
head,
in former
His
gifts enjoyed."
And the
(p. 442), " The Exile's Complaint," poem that although he and his lord had often laments solitary
a
in
similar
promised
have and
that been
yet
the
death, they
but
sorrow,
imaginationof the
"
The
far
There Under
my
a
sits
rocky shelter,
with
Whitened
storm."
With unites
ness
Plato, love
two
is not the
merely
the
the
friendshipwhich
and mutual kindV
it is ;
bands
of virtue
reminiscence
sometliing better
than
see,
immortality. is founded low* down the stimulus on high feeling passion. Love indeed, if it is to be perfect, suppresses
this
of future
Still in
and
the
this
stimulus, or
it into
in the
rather
diverts
it from
bias,and
Love
forms trans-
is universally,
alike,an impulse of brutal form, seeks onlymaterial human, it consciously pleasure; but as soon as it becomes bestow seeks to an immortalityon what is mortal, to render
fades and dies. Its first human semblance of
impulse immortalityby generating, for beauty, a new beloved to through a person person, in its decay (Plato,Sympos. c. 32, one replace the original thus to preserve the immortality of the species p. 207), and
amidst the destruction fuel ; and
of
the
individual. kindled
Of
this
impulse
pre-
Beauty
is the
l^ve
by
beauty is not
c2
PHILOSOPHY
OP
SHAKESPEAEE'S
of
SONK-ETS.
msely the
i(TTiyap
Tu) ov
love
tov
of
but beauty,
in generation
the beautiful.
teal tov
tokov
it'
kuXov
6 epioc, a\Xa
ttjqyevrrjtrewQ
the
which doctrine (Sympos. p. 206). It is Shakespeare puts into the two opening lines of his sonnets,
K-aXw
as
to be
it
were
"
the text
and
motto
we
of the
whole
"
From That
fairest creatures
therebybeauty'srose form
"
The itself
the
of this
impulse
manifests
in the in
it is
purified and
it is transformed
exalted
"domestic"
or
"civil For
love;"
there the
"chivalrous the
love."
impulse
is not
towards
the perpetuation of corporeal beauty, but towards of mental creation sympathy is beauty. The material Then union. the comes transfiguredinto intellectual in in those few whom "celestial love," privileged persons climbs to the the faculty contemplation of beauty in its Idea have
; when
no a man
has
attained
to
man
eyes
root
for the
colours is the
(Si/mp.c.
and
woman,
Thus the
of all love
gold or generation
or
fancy (says
vision which
Messer
Francesco
c.
Cattani
to be
da
(TAmore, L. iii.
Ave
3)
conceives
nounce pro-
desires in the
not
only
in the
to
enjoy it,but
and in the
make
it." is
This
A^ilgar
love
always
is
a
material.
But
is material
into
its roots
earth,
An
the
it has
and
to transmute science.
flowers fails to
imperfect love
detain
us.
a
complete
The has
Shakespeare
poem
to
to
devote is
a
it
"
his Venus
Lacrece
contrast
between love
to
Tarquin.
later sonnets
this animal
and is neither
love, which
suppress the wife the
nor
shadow over-
heroine
the
"
mistress, but
"
Cressida,the
contrast
bad the
angel
of
But
the
between
civil love
'
TEE
AIs^ALTSIS
OP
LOYE.
21
and
the
chivalrous
is the
love
is worth that of
considering.
chivalrous love
The the
end
tion connec-
of
civil love
marriage ;
is the Codex
servente
and
his mistress.
to
The
text
book
Amoris, attributed
no
King Arthur,
Andrew,
capable of showing
chaplainof
articles. love
Pope
The
Innocent
thirty-
VI. and
Masculus
(Art. non plena pubertate amare), which riage might naturally and properly end in mardecet amare (Art. XI. Non pudor est quarum
solet nisi in Yet civil
as
which
the
chivalrous it
was
love
was
love,
and
cut
own
development,
if the the lovers vehicles lover
was
failed
to
special
allowed and
on,
or
married. forbidden
his
The love
to
only
were
senses
of chivalrous
the
eyes of
ears.
The
go A
beyond gazing
Two
hearing,or
lovers
successful lower
love.
grades
of
lover
the
initiated by the lady giving grade (the ecoide) was him of the higher grade (the ami) gloves or girdle ; one the first and by her giving him a kiss generallythe last he could hope to receive from It is to this kiss that her.
"
Art. XII.
ex
refers
non
(Verus
was
amans
alterius
nisi
suae
affedu
of
cupit amplexus).
forbidden mind
to
On
all other
chivalrous
limits
actus
amans
love
transgress
Quilibet
Art. XXX.
amantis
coamantis
woman
imagine
was a man a
chivalrous the
of the
friendshipbetween
and
woman,
to
that the
and The
woman
regulation
took
of
it
by
of
feudalism.
the
as man
the
The
place of the
office of infeodation their
lord,
that
was
of
a
follower.
a knight receiving
servente
complete feudal
dominus,
been and
times some-
; the
vassal
often
called M.
his
dame
by
Fauriel
to have
by
the
Church.
his
When
as
ami, he knelt
between and
to
before
lady,his
swore
to
hers, and
protect her
to
knight was accepted two hands joinedpalm her faithfully till serve
a
against
all
evil
and
outrage.
the
other
22
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE's
him
was
SOXNETS.
"him
her
tenderest with
a
affections,gave
Chivalrous
in
to his mistress
ring,and
inconsistent
raised w^ith
up married
him
kiss.
love
love, because
of the lover
marriage
the
chivalrous
nation subordibounds
nob
is
impossible,the
life is her favours is not had
own an
of
and fancy are eyes ideal. The lady is not The French in
passed,and
supreme,
nor
the
domestic,
voluntary.
accurate
mistress,but
wife.
not
have
been
His have
have
her There
servente, but
was no
he
could
more
her husband.
than this between
law
of love
rigidly
of love.
enforced
by
a
the
Provencal
and his other the
Parliaments
Marriage
chivalrous allowed married
to
servente
lady
she
was
that
Avas
to another.
causa
first article
amore non
of
the
Code
defined
that
The
"
conjugiiab
between
awe
est
excusatio
recta."
division
married of
and
chivalrous
love, which
w^as
one
all the
raptures and
in accordance find In
no
fancy
the
made
quite
but the the
habits
Europe,
races
could North.
the
Greek
or
a
of
either
natural
or
impulse
refined the
or
relationship,never
of the She
was
idealized
beyond
the
commonplace,
Jor
or
unenthusiastic.
eraipa
nurse,
pleasure,
yvvri
for
body
the
servant
Germans
kind
of
religiousveneration
utilitarian
women,
these
to
very veneration
surpassing
were
they
state.
marriage
a
preposterous.
woman
It
receive
not
from allow
Germans
a
worship,but
Southern
a
wife in
worship.
man a
The
idea
marriage
his
was,
it the
sought
mother
not
children,
to
housekeeper,
to share
stewardess, but
a necessarily
or
companion
commune
his his
a
sorrows,
:
friend in the
wdth
sense,
was
mistress
the
chivalrous
presence
terror
amans
to
the
and
prescribedby
in coamantis
XV.
scere.
Omnis
consuevit In
Art. XVI.
repentina coamantis
visione
tre-
THE
ANALYSIS
OF
LOVE.
23
the
miscit
of him of
a
amantis)
"
whom
he
was
to
regard as
depositary
kind
of
celestial
force
and
by
love.
assiduous It is
imagination of Fouque
so
that this.
marrias^e could
would
our a
extreme
relation
as
would Familiarity of
The Yet
domestic it
was
subjection
continual
of the wife
annihilate
the
tendency
that other such hand
chivalry into
was
English poets to change the mistress of wife. Mr. proofs Morley points out many
Chaucer's
that the endeavour. Earl of
M.
Taine
on
the
Surrey was the first to do so. Spenser (in the Amoretti) was probably the first who exalted wife mistress. into a a Fouque completed the ideal in his French knight. love Chivalrous gives us this ideal. Shakespeare never
says of
woman
is not
an
element Labour's
of his world.
Lost look forward
Even
to
the
shippers wor-
marriage the end of their hopes, and receive their year'spenance as fact in his biography. with This is a significant discontent. life whose He Michel Angelo, a man probably resembled the artist was was a dualism, in whom sharply separated Michel from the house-father the citizen. and Angelo's his long correspondence with nephew turns entirelyon domestic hint about art or philosophy. a matters, without It exhibits him maintainer and ruler of his family, the as unsentimental, concise. quiet, steady,cautious, practical,
in Love's If his the
same we
want sonnets.
the
other
side of his
character, we
must
turn
to
Shakespeare's
love, with
of character. If
we
characteristic
chivalrous kind
or they would probably be entirelyoccupied with domestic should philosophy, no expect no municipal affairs. We eesthetics,little historical gossip. We might find a close of the net of his plays, but calculation proceeds of one it was which of the idea on structed. concertainlyno indication
Yet
to to
great
may
men
strive
to
have
some
confidant
whom find
one
they
they
words
may
or
It is their bliss impart their ideas. to whom capable of understanding them, one without measuring their speak interjectionally, is the where completing their thought. But
to
great
is
man
find
his
to
equal ?
content
Greatness
himself with
is
solitary.
mere
He
generally forced
the
mask
of
woman
with intelligence,
or an
the
deep
friend.
blue
eyes
of
confiding
enthusiastic
place of judgment, and the the domestic of relations of the thing signified. But wife and soon man destroy the illusions of imagination, is more than and the artist no one exposed to be miserable demand his wife should from who intelligent sympathy his with tion condias a thoughts as well as with his moods affection, of marital to have Shakespeare seems his ship upon avoided this rocJ^ ; Milton it. speare Shakeran
the
kept
his home
his
active and
aff'ections and
for
his
wife
and for
a
dren, chilthe
town,
and
sought
elsewhere He
was
recipients of
as
his
artistic
sentiments.
Nestor
how to keep his Virgil,and knew affections domestic un poetical dreams, entangled with to the true plain, uncoined, and homespun constancy of his own Henry V. And when love Shakespeare suppressed the chivalrous of woman, he extracted of its peculiarities, and with some modified his Platonic them friendship. In the Platonic is a beautiful mind the the beloved idea one youth whose mind in his beautiful lover forms begetting a beautiful But receives. one body. The lover gives all,the beloved well
as
a
"
Socrates
in the beloved
chivalrous
one,
idea
the
tables
are
turned
the
lady,
the
the dispenser; the Knight one, generous the source of waits her bounty ; her eyes are to him upon all strength ; they furnish not all love, all knowledge, is the which rouses only the stimulus guides him, and the end which in Biron's be read speeches in in the the
him,
blesses Love's
but
the
light that
may
him..
Labour^
s
All this
Lost. the
larly Simi-
Sonnets
the
the
male
friend beloved of
who
takes into
to
place of
the and the
lady
is not
out
Platonic his he
youth
mind
whom
lover
adorn feudal of
all but
wealth is the
educate
soul;
and
"master-mistress,"
in one, lover love. the
chivalric
mistress
the
whose beauty from eyes his all knowledge, and strength, Platonists of
derives On
other
acknowledged the only, and suppressed the chivalrous reallyfollowed Plato of love, kinds ideal. ultimate They admitted only two a vulgar and heavenly. In vulgar love they admitted
THE
ANALYSIS
OF
LOVE.
25
of the the
own
the moved
mistress,
the
because
"
they
but
in
fonnd
in
lover
heavenly
superior, because
makes him desire In
it is the
to
which the
mind
beloved
; he
youth.
and
this relation
beloved
The he
youth
lover
gives, is formed
greater ;
ideal
wax
by
the
of
beauty.
becomes
the chivalrous
a
bestows The
forms.
the
lover
a
remains
woman.
youth Shakespeare, on
the the
contrary, the
only becomes
becomes
a
vassal, as
he
in
love, but
also
woman,
takes
whom all the position, the positionof one on sacrifices are imposed, whose duty and happiness are selfand long liferenunciation, self-abnegation, perpetual fidelity,
wife's
sacrifice
in and
one
who
conquers
by
of
submission In
purity.
there In
as
is
feminine
state
element
capable
the
the the of
highest
the Lord
is
of prayer he
Christian himself
In
to
well
Christian
woman
be
the
spouse
whom
professes worships.
exalted
and feeling,
how,
was
in his
something of the same the first series of Shakespeare'ssonnets shows artistic friendships, cultivated his feminine he had
had
must
friendshipthere
element, and
thus in that his he shown
nursed
the
woman
within
to
him. power
as own
It
have
attained
of plays, the power before or one ever painted them theory that each human being,man both
the
no
It
woman,
was
his
possessed
will the mine and
woman
natures,
the gave shame
masculine such
"
"
and
feminine
"
the
to
the
feelings. Hence
with and let
woman
expressionsas
mother
"
play
into
eyes,"
me
all my it The
"
came
eyes,
up
to
tears,"
"nature
custom
are
holds,
the gone ness," shrewish-
what
will ; when
motherly
is
"
"
the
tends
to vice
in
elements,
mother,
derived
from
seems
the
from
the
Shakespeare
one
sometimes
reallydivorced.
great
"
sensation
"
26
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONNETS.
brings again,
of three."
out
the
woman.
"
Cymbeline,
0
what which Coriolanus of
"
finding
I ?
"
all
his
to
cries An
out
out,
am
occasion
calls
an
resolution
"
brings
man were
the author
man.
to
as
if kin."
a
,
himself,
and
no
And
Cleopatra
of
woman
My
me." male
placed,
have
nothing
speare ShakeHe
sought
makes of Richard soul
elements. the
two
say, soul
"My
the
female
my
my still this
beget
same
generation thoughts
brain which
of
breeding
little male world." and themselves
thoughts,
Not
these soul
people
contrasted
only
but still
are
and
as
female,
"
the
thoughts
self-
they
generate
are
breeding,"
contented,"
and
propagating,
none
by
like each
contrast,
"
"
no
thought
another,
new
self-sufficient,
intercourse
modified
by
by
this
perpetual
Such
founded he the exhibits
was
generating
and
;
thoughts.
practice
where heart he
Shakespeare's
it the and may be
the the
upon
from
Sonnets,
formation
tender,
of
a
gentle
love.
by
sufferings
contradictions
patient
THE
THEEE
PHASESsidf^OiP^iS^lA.
^y
27
CHAPTER
III.
THE
THREE
PHASES
OF
LOVE.
LOYE, has
which the The may other
as
sonnet- writers, philosophical twofold movement internal, one a altogether be called its mania, phrenzy, enthusiasm; or its ecstasy. outwards from within reaching
conceived
bj
the
"
"
warfare, and
the
manifestation
of its
the soul finds its peace and rest. strength ; in the second The unlovingsoul is in a state of dull stupefaction ; it is and a Love is first a disturbance its own lees. on settling worked by a thorough dislocation, change,a transformation and
As
in the
combinations.
Love
is
or revolutionary
volcanic
of war, force of love ; and this rest is found which wrenches the soul from seek tion. its true is
an
to a country givesa new conformation to society. But as organization peace is the end is the object of the disturbing rest in its end so
ment, move-
it to
life in union
act both
with
the
of object
Love
of the
it has
of the afiecits
In both
aspects
original
its mania, and its ecstasy. embryonic state of immobility, witli which be soul the a dulness Intellectually begins may made idleness, or by the perpetual either by clownish of universal ploddingwhich leaden contemplation prisons
"
and spirits," up the nimble " which entirely keep the of their books."
dedicates base
itself to show
"
slow
arts
"
brain," and
no
heavy toil,"
Love
is the
"
save
authority from
incubation
whose spirit
28
PEILOSOPHT
OF
SHAKESPEARE's
tlie inert soul.
SOI^NETS.
motion
into
When
it enters
begins,and
with
. . .
the
motion
of all elements
cas as thought in every power, And to a double gives power power. every Above their functions and their otiices.
Courses
swift
It
stirs
up
was
the
first mania
in Plato
the into
soul. four
This kinds
"
mania the
or
phrenzy
by phetic prothe mania inspiredby Apollo, mystic orgiastic of Bacchus, the poeticenthusiasm inspired by the Muses, and the supreme of love cated communiand mightiest mania Phito held From all of them by Aphrodite or Eros. the versal greatest blessingsto arise. He appealed to the uniconviction noble that they were something more than direct sound and were gifts of the gods. sense, the in Shakespeare, in the famous speech of Theseus Midsummer NigJifsDream^ on\j recognizes three of these phrenzies those of the lunatic, of the lover, and of the chieflyin their poet ; and, unlike Plato, he regards them
furor
"
divided
intellectual of the
aspect.
He
looks
at
them
all
as
disturbances
attains imagination or fancy,which in all three cases all the other an exaggerated development, overshadows the man to be of ^nd makes faculties, seem imagination in all three all compact." He the one law by which states The the phrenzied imagination acts. cases seethingbrains the apprehend some shaping fancy feeling,for which which the creates some immediately supposititious cause, cool reason, when appealed ta, refuses to acknowledge.
"
Such
That It
tricks hath
if it would
strong imagination
but
some
apprehend
some
comprehends
bringerof
that
joy, joy.
or
In
these
apprehended joy
as
feeling
always comprehends
or
suggests
or
its necessary
an
tant, concomi-
stance imaginary subforce which the feeling into the mind. insinuates or Thus the melancholy apprehended or felt by the lunatic comprehends or includes in itself the imaginary perception rather
as
its
bringer
cause,
of
"
more
devils the
than lover
vast
hell
can
hold
"
the
tender
ings feel-
apprehends comprehend, in the vivid impression which they make, the imaginary perceptionof a beauty in his mistress' brow which little corresponds to
which
THE
THREE
PHASES
OP
LOVE.
29
the
of
: reality
and
the
undescribed
and
varied
emotions
comprehend in their 'tiery luminousness embodiments of them, and airy imaginary typifications nothings,to which onl}^his pen gives their place and their and with which he peoples the vacant name, spaces of earth
the
poet
and
heaven.
these bounds mind
phrenziesor manias have hitherto not; broken of personality. They have mightily stirred up caused it to dilate and contract, to press ; they have
spread
itself But dov/n
forward,
to
abroad,
the
even
spheresof thought.
they
and have
not
they have
walls have
broken
and
barriers confronted
outward
things, they
other than
not to
external
compelled it
its
an own
test
its
conceptions
self" his A
by
man
any
caprice. Knowledge,
Shakespeare
can no
adjunct
himself the the
to
our
in
than
look
into
its Where
depths
the self enables
without
reflective
mirror.
same
is,there
a man
mirror
to
see
which and
knowledge is ; and the to see himself,enables him Shakespeare by that strengthening immediately makes
it Nor
to
also this of
measure seem
his
knowledge.
which
does
our
not
merely
and
can we we
to indicate
knowledge
felt Avhen another that the the
belief
itself
another,
he
mean
or
convince
that
merely
under
does
imagination, when
monstrous,
with
spur
of
phrenzies,
confronted
empty,
realities,and unregulated, false, with He into them. brought harmony also,that means, the the accurate, philosophical knowledge, objectof which of ourself and of our is the contemplationand consciousness mental acts and own states, does not begin its existence in of direct of self- contembut the form plation self-contemplation,
in the
For
mirror
of external
phenomena
to
"
Till it hath
itself there
is married
Where
itself.
an a
Man's
sees
soul, in
not
itself
"
of forms reflect.
till it is Thus
forms
it
can
speculationbecomes,
in his
terminology,
or com-
"reflection,""reverberation," "communication,"
30
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE's
mind with the
SONNETS.
munity
mind
of the
knowing
and
known
object.
not
The
only by the presence, but by the reaction of external things. All all the fancied its imaginary causes, bringersor upholders the operators of the feelings which it assigns as which be shown to it a^jprehends,are nothing till they can be reflections of realities,brought back again to be them. to tested alongside of them, and thus married the fancy dies. union If Where such impossible, proves unintelligible, without the soul external things are imperceptible,
and external
is in darkness
ignorance
till it is
provoked
simply blank,
the soul
are can
on
the It and
other knows
hand its
without
own
things
far the the
as
is blind. reflected
acts
just
which
so
they
embodied
in
objects
senses
meaning,
so
worth, and
are
far
as
they
married
it knows the apprehend. And of these significance objectsonly of the to the intelligent powers
within the categoriesof its selfsoul, so far as they come the soul finds consciousness, of that intelligence by which within forces. itself For the this
measure reason
and
likeness
of
Shakespeare
is the time ethical the the lives
same
identifies union of
and soul
philosophy. Love,
with of
which the
another, is
senses,
at
intellectual
reason
"
marriage
nature. in
the
the
Without
with
immured
new
the
brain."
tiveness
love
the
senses
gain a
inquisinew new
character
is
rectified
"
"
bias its
and
makes
the
beloved
objectits
lies in its
academy.
The
intellectual
the and
side moral
of
love
on
the
those lies in its power over influence the will. desire, which chiefly side
to have
sought
awe
the
action
was, in
in solely
a
the the
which
beginnings of it inspired.
sense,
how first
the
man,
struck and
describes of
beauty,
rences reve-
shudders,
the the
with
terrors, then
beautiful
object as
of
god, then
he
again is
their
once
heated
with
emanation the
beauty
of
which his
has
received, and
pores,
more.
which
refreshes
wings
causes
soul, opens
softens the
skin,and
THE
THREE
PHASES
OF
LOVE.
31
and
then
Then
lie
tells
us
how with
the
an
whole
soul of
boils
throbs,
sometimes tormented
interval
joy,
again
made and has
phrenzied, frantic,
longing
been the
once cause
more
and
is destined of is this
to be
the
cure
pains.
In
beauty, he
and
humbled
tells us, the puts off its And from the beautiful and
swoons
through
soul and
awe.
serves
fear.
With
the
lover's
object
poets of
which the
citement ex-
simple reverence
school this of unbridled
Sappho
the
only
with Plato make the
enhances
an
downward
tendency
drowns the
reason.
and it
of
purifying
enumerates
trembling, the sweating, and developed by the agency of love, and declares them to be the signs of the struggle of the inferior and material part which the of is of our love nature, through being agency subdued and into the brought captivityby superiorand In spiritual faculties. conformity with this the Codex Amoris XV. and XVI.) declares the trembling of the (Arts. lover to be the constant and indispensable of true symptom
chivalrous how For he her love. Hence and Dante in his Vita
mere
Nuova
tells
us
fainted
swooned
to
at the
thoughts ; she inspired a flame kindled and humility in his heart charity, forgiveness, her salute wrought in him intolerable an bliss,which his soul, but made his body like a corpse. be the to "fallingsfrom us, vanishings," seemed
throes the the of the The diabolic
awe, natures
him
the
fied vivi-
These
death
which
possessed
sunken
or
obsessed of
flesh.
the
speech,
and
involuntary sighs
pulse, were
which
a an was
blushes, the
of the
to
eyes the
feverish
on
index
mighty strugglegoing
transform soul. its outward
within,
thus
destined of and
Love
became inward
kind
;
sacrament, with
men
signs and
of
might
story
go of Don
groans to confession
grace and
went
fasting and
and
perform
is
penances.
The
Quixote'sdevotion
only
slight exaggera-
32
tion
drive
on
PHILOSOPHY
OP
shakespeaee's
the
sonnets.
and
caricature into of
notes
of the
reality. Shakespeare
; but
same
does
not
desert,to meditate
in the
there in
of ascetic
nudity
he
tices, prackind
the
their
Dulcineas
his comedies
sets
down
of love
kind
and A
and fasting
groaning,tears
clothes. the cud
of
sighs,waning flesh,
lover
of this
unkempt
walked
hair, unheeded
apart, chewing fancy,keeping out of his mistress's view, and yet fancying that all he did had secret influence his claims her heart. her, and advanced over on and tremor which Platonism treated Thus, the awe the as
under great internal struggle,had grown, artificial system of the the to be a kind of romancers, not produced by a state magical charm, an afi'ectation, any
symptom
of
internal
In the of the
assumed
none
placeof
The
that
struggle.
and
awe
have
we
tremor
lover,
not
when
have
love,
an
its counterfeits.
part like
the
imperfectactor
him
of his
strengthweakens
But
his love.
tion devo-
which
fruit
nervous
these
his love
emotion. ethical
ecstasy of
to
love
was
stage,in which
a
lover
ceased bosom
be of
himself
person
lived
double Such
life
"
in the
the
loved.
breast
seem
warm
phrases
my
us
My
heart
is in
thy breast,"
Thy
encloseth
to
now heart," and the like,which poor in Sliakespeare's conceits, were days
frigid
blood
with
the
of
still
living philosophy,though
:
he
knew
well
enough
the
art,
"
Within
gentle
closure
And
which
he
between
the expressionby in sinua.ting a distinction justified his own living and acting self and that soul of his
in the
ecstasy of
:
love
had
taken
up
its abode
in
his
friend's breast
As As easy from
might
home
I from
myself depart
in
That
my is my
soul which
thy
breast
doth
lie.
of love.
The
with
ecstasy of love brings the lover into direct relations the person beloved, ai"d thus imparts to love a new
\
THE
THEEE
PHASES
OF
LOVE.
33
character.
and
Love, while
It is
a
it is
onlyin
the
is foolish fancy,
fantastical.
on
nothing
the
tillit is in the
real
object.But
emotion
and passion,
yet be directed in succession itself from a higher it climbs the scala amoris^or degrades to a lower kind of love,or is obliged to change by the mere
wane
and waste
was
of time.
But
writers
not
God
He
that of Mr.
Tennyson.
when
He
: sings
"
givesus
lends
that on which it throve To ripeness, and love is left alone. Falls off,
They, on
the
held contrary,
a
that when
one
objectfell off,
it only revealed
which behind it, on higher object the widowed getting forlove at once fastened itself, not faithlessly the object it had just it againin a but finding lost, better and plained exhigherform in the new object.This was be of abstraction to successive intellectually a process who tells us to abstract from Ficinus, by body its matter better and and place,
and
we we
and
have have
mind
; from
the
form
of mind
to
abstract
changein
time, and
keep
onlythe
we
position, commultiple
angel to
have it hand
was
abstract the
simple form,
God.
On
the
other
explained
God
men,
by Blosius,who finds in or or souls, every beautythat exists apart in angels, But in neither or animals, or or plants, suns, or stars.
of accumulation widowed the
to be
system is the
widowhood ladder
upwards on the the Thus, as Plato tells us Lycis, affection can be transferred by association from its primitive to new will object object ones, and yet the primitive stillremain the real one ; the other objects onlyoperating the mind by recalling to it, and carrying it back to, its on love. he Thus, the affection for the new primitive objects, is the affection for the old under other denominations one only says, and disguises. But this is onlyan analogous case ; it hajipens when the absent lover clings to every show which,
of love. in the reminds him of the beloved
one,
ever
finds her
and
declares of them
all-^
They
Drawn
were
of delight but sweet, but figures after you, you pattern of all those.
D
Here
love
lends
itself to many
collateral
It is
a
being
all main
false to its
great object.
live
a
objects are
second all former
with
snmmed in him.
in
the in
life
Thus,
"
friendshipsrevive
bos')!!! is endeared I
all hearts
Wliich
by lacking have supposed dead, there reigns love, and all love's loving parts, friends which all those I thought buried
. .
Thou Their
art the
images
doth
live
. . .
For
must
love
ever
is
objectsin
and of where the
by necessity progressive. It be loving higher objects,or loving the same First, it is born in the eyes, higher manner. by
nature
and
enthralled the
to
the
;
outward
show.
Theri it grows
eyes
see
eyes
for real his
not,
^hat
Then
is the
supplies
that the
presence.
object
of
"
of love
which
"
not
reality,the
his
not
own
secret
beloved but
breast
the heart*'
"
draw
the
unknown
image
of
which is
appropriately called of the feelingfor its own sake fancy." It is the activity of itself, and not yet solidly -"love enamoured grounded anchor in a wandering ship ready to bay. a Proteus any its ideal within It is naturallyinconstant, for it bears ; and, fit this ideal in the phrenzied glow of its imagination, it can
imagination.
"
This
stage
love
"
"
first to and
one
real
to
a
pei'^on
and
then
to
another
"
to
Hermia,
Helena, and back again to Hermia. Fancy, each is and ful shameitself; however, cures change painful shame and the hand, and the joy of reon one turn ; pain
then
on
the loves
longer
fidelity.Fidelityno
an
ideal
that
fits in-
difierentlyto all realities ; but it loves an ideal that is who found to and one correspond to one only to one of the corporeal satisfies the ideal, in spite of the wane first aroused the passion. The beauty which fancy with its corporeal images fades a,way ; and love is found to consist in the render, in a marriage of true minds, in a mutual and mental which, in spite of death correspondence, on pleteness time, constancy stamps the seal of immortality, and comit of infinitude. For impresses the semblance
"
THE
THREE
PHASES
OF
LOVE.
35
gathers up
which thus
into
the
one
sovereign love,
brother
There and
emerges
all in all ; and the love of the known known through death into the love of the un-
God.
is then
us a
allows and
underlies the
in
terms
all kinds
terms
of
loves,
of the
highest in
of
lowest,
A Persian
of school
the
mystics is said to transform into the the Bacchic interpretation couplets of Hafiz drunkenness devout For there is a spiritual most hymns. is like the the logicof one well as a material as one ; and all kinds of unites The logic of the other. unity which close ; and love is far more the religious interpretation that of the be far easier than must Song of Solomon speare's the first reading of ShakeOn of Hafiz's anacreontics. Sonnets to see seem we only the passionatelove for an earthlybeauty. The next reading may reveal to us that this love is as much directed to the beauty of mind as to that of body. A third reading begins to dim the personal outlines the object of Shakespeare'slove begins to than universal more expand into something more general, the individual friend immortality something to which and infinity themselves not strangers. As this gradual are in accord with the precepts growth in meaning is strictly of the philosophy which Shakespeare followed, it would
:
"
highest. by its
be
absurd which
out
to
overlook it
it,or
for
to
neglect the
scandals
or
as
natural have
tion explanabeen
tracted ex-
gives
Sonnets
such
of
40-42,
out
of the
of the words in
of the
Lord's
Prayer to
may
Sonnet
108.
Religious allusions
of a Piatonist the slightest without love-poetry profanity ; for they only express of the identity of the poet's sense love in all its forms, and the community and inter changeof the terms ableness appliedto its various phases. Thus, love of all kinds goes through three phases ; first it is dormant, then phrenzied, then ecstatic. And its end of the intellect by marriage with is the rest and peace truth and of the soul hj its marriage with the or reality, Both and presses objectivemind. intellectually morally it exthe progress of the soul from infinitesimal beginnings
to
an
end
all but
infinite.
d2
36
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONNETS.
CHAPTER
lY.
THE
TRUE
ORDER
OF
THE
SONNETS.
it Shakespeare's Sonnets, tliougli evidence of being issaed under the no positive author's superintendence, yet on the other hand bears none of the marks of surreptitious and unauthorized publication in the which are so conspicuous originalquarto edition of the several correct plays. The printing is exceptionally for the time, and the book is dedicated the publisherto by Mr. W. H., the of is the Sonnets, who only begetter for whom the poet made all apparentlyidentified as the man the promises of immortality which For him they contain. intended 1 they had been written or arranged in definite series, of a known to illustrate the progress philosophy. There is them to suppose to the printer, no that, in delivering reason he would broken their continuity and have confounded their order; and we ought therefore to suppose, till the contrary is demonstrated, that the order in which they
" "
edition
of
stand
is that
which
most
was
intended who
by
that
their
author.
on
It is true have
that taken
of those
have
written their
the Sonnets
it for have
granted
order
accidental, and
them in
new
therefore
taken
the
of liberty
merely arranging
is
larities, according to supposed internal simiand to events. or relationships persons But of those writers who have thus rearranged them none have to the trouble to enquire seem given themselves whether it might not be possible to explain them as a series in their present order. sumed They have first of all assome theory that the Sonnets are historical,or that they are versifications of separate sentiments mere and have thereupon proceeded to group ing them afresh,accordto the persons events or they are supposed to touch, or groups external
"
"
THE
TRUE
OEDER
OP
THE
SONNETS.
37
according
enunciate. And
common
to
the
sentiment
each
may
appear in the
chieflyto
yet, if
these
poems
are
"
examined
sonnet-philosophy of that since which had inspired compositionsof this kind ever is quite natural, and their rise their sequence they need new no grouping to make them into a singleorderly poem. in this light, Indeed, examined they appear to be articulated The most and subtlety and care. arranged with rare that the 154 it appear makes nets Sonexamination superficial series. The divided into two first, are consistingof to a fair youth ; the second, consisting of 126, is addressed to a black-haired, black-eyed, the remaining 28, is addressed
"
and
dark- featured
woman.
It
farther
growing, depicted in the first series is a and obstacles, and becoming ever triumphing over purer brighter; while the love sung in the second series is bad in its origin, morse, interrupted but not destroyedby fits of reand worse is with Such time. and growing worse of of the book the Sonnets. And general construction Shakespeare tells us that his intention was to exhibit two The such loves. opening quatrain of the 144th Sonnet is
love
as
that
the
follows
"
Two
The The
loves
Which,
worser
like two
better
have, of comfort and despair, still : do suggest me spirits, angel is a man right fair, coloured ill. a woman spirit
to
amor
The
the The
two
amor
loves
answer
amicitice love
and its
former
has
to itself with
renewed which
strength
is both
"
it is the true
infinite
the
The
motion is the
perfect and
the eternal
endless.
love
no,
alternation
of yes
at perfection.
without It is
attempt
"
full of
war.
change.
In
one no
selfand
times some-
at
:
Sometimes
triumphs,
definite the
other
there
is, however,
to
victory,
science, con-
perpetualapproach
and the wearied these
two
the
final
despair of
of
sense. are
indiSerence kinds of
In
the. two
love
put through
higher
love
undergoes
its
probation of
38
PHILOSOPHY
OP
Shakespeare's
sonnets.
error,
and
"
by
over
evil stillmade
better."
It also
The
that
goes under-
its
probation.
the
triumphs
of
jealousy,
triumphs
ever
disenchantments
experience,triumphs
of morals the unsusprinciples (Son. 129), over tained struggles of good resolution (Son. 146), and over the it finally stings of conscience, which perverts and blinds (Son. 151). Although these two kinds of progress in a form treated which abstract is perfectly and personal, imare of nothing prevents our supposing that many the real illustrations
events
the
may
may be
be often The
historical
used
as
"
that the
real
and the
philosophicedifice.
of the the
only postulate
makes
theory
are
Sonnets
here
advocated
is that
they
in
devoted to the exposition philosophical, of the received sonnet philosophy,and only in the second intention biographicalor historical,and therefore using in complete subordination real events to the philosophical
first intention
ideas.
This and theory both requires the both the
same
discovers
that in both
; that
series
gress pro;
of sonnets
in and that
cyclic character
; that
occur
is found
answers
the
sonnet
to
sonnet
sonnets
in the
equivalent phases
of each and it
series.
relationship may
be traced
throughout ;
that the order of the sonnets in distinctly proves both series is right, at least that series are the two or in each principle, striking "each arranged on one by that becomes the mutual so one ordering," counterpart of the subordinate the other, just as in the dramas plotsare plot,which they imitate either counterparts of the main It is not unor natural or ironically, by contradiction. directly, this that Shakespeare should method both employ The and in his dramas. in his sonnets importance of such for the interpretation of the poems structure is a double of it the author scarcely to be exaggerated. By means in a great measure explainshimself. He gives us a number the two series are in contact, thereby of points at which divisions of each series,its salient and marking the main points of transition, and its parallelism with significant This parallelism be readilyshown. the other: can the desire of love to see As the first series begins with itself in its ofispring, the second so beauty immortalize
THE
TEUE
ORDEK
OF
THE
SONNETS.
39
begins with the confession that beauty is profaned and One begins with disgraced,and its ofispringbastard. for the future of hope, the other with accents of. despair, amicitice looks forward to eternity, beauty. For the amor and looks the amor only to present pleasure, concujAscenticB
is reckless
two
of the
future.
This 8 of the
contrast
is found and
in No.
the
128
musical the
sonnets, No.
While in
of the
second.
former
to
poet
ransacks and
deepest mysteries of
for
reasons
"
increase,
the very
"
in
only
with and
waste
amor
confounds
ear,
while
scriptions preconcord
"
something
lips of
of the shame
different
performer.
which the
129th
the of
with to be, is parallel concufiscentice beauty,the ruin, tlie cold decay, the wastes unthriftiness
Time, the
on
which
in Sonnets
"
14
the
poet charges
is unwilling to fulfil the Beauty which duty of so preservation. In his eyes, if lust is "murderous," is selfish Beauty which does for posterity not care ;
"
self-
also
For
thou
art
so
possessed of
murderous
to
hate
That
'gainst thyselfthou
the
two
stick'st not
approach each other is in Sonnets 21 and 130. The two parts are perfect counterthe turn on same thought of the folly of ; both for the object of to find comparisons racking invention of turning heaven itself into love, and mere paint to be worthy of the highest love, it. A person colour may and or deeply stir the lowest passion, yet be nothing may The like sun, stars. two of or following sonnets moon, series give this thought a development which the second it lacks in the first. Attractiveness consists in something
next
The
point where
series
different
even
from
resemblance that
to
the
great works
from
of nature ideal
in
something point of
is distinct
the
usual
of
beauty.
The
next contact
is in Sonnets
second.
40-42
so
of the first
series, and
refer to the
evidently imaginary incident,that in all rearrangements of the sonnets they are put together. The earlier set is, however, clearly addressed to the better worser amor angel," the later to the spirit." The
same
133, 134
of the
or
These
real
"
"
40
PHILOSOPHY
OP
Shakespeare's
sonnets.
dies
no
reciprocal.But
At least it demands
as
the
no
baser
love
such
exclusive
lation conso-
the lover's
will
afford
the
of Sonnets laxity
however
(40-42),
be
friend, but
reason
to
quarrel with
lover, but
who him
may is not
to her
of his
friend.
In
the but
first
series, though the lover is contented with nothing his friend's whole this engrossing heart, yet with
he
not
affection
only earnestlyinvites
him free in his relations
him
to
to
women.
marry,
but
leaves expressly
Mine
be
thy love,and
thy
love's
use
their treasure.
(Sonnet 20.)
The
common
it,has this in
a
that
it lives in
higher
rior infethe
with, parallel
without love
touching the
of
a
level of the of
a
civil and
mistress.
domestic
wife,or
is Sonnet
"
placewhere
135 and
the
two
series touch
two
57
In
Sonnets
136.
The
latter
are
superficially
Will."
by the puns upon the name distinguished edition the final coupletof the original
by
the
same
of
57 is
a
distinguished
fool in thinks
character. that
Love
is such you
true
the
no
whatever
do, he
which
with
dares
not
rise to
absolute dare I
lity, humi-
question
my jealousthought of your Let none his friend. he suppressed, merge who the in
nor
where
them
am
them then
all one,
also
whole.
This
of
equally
not
Donne, Elegy
me."
Women is
of no Constancyis an everlasting change, not despair." Its only eternity everlasting growth. As Donne an says again, "Change and eternity." of music, joy,life, is the nursery Proceeding onwards, the 137th Sonnet, though materially "love
him,
correspondingwith
43-47,
and
two
sets
of sonnets
in the refer
to
first series
"
113, 114,
all of which
the
violence
THE
TEUE
OEDER
OF
THE
SO:
the
eyes
"
so
as
to
make
them
false,
Sonnet
case,
yet formallyhas
62. and The the
"
much of
more
real
sin
self-love love
blinds
sin of The in
vulgar
138th love
blinds deals
both
the other.
Sonnet in
a
heart
in and
seeming
pretence
Sonnets the the love
vulgar
deal
contrary way
to that
in which in
are
67-70
of
with
false
seeming
and of
and
false surmise
friendship. The
counterparts
the lover
139th
140th
Sonnets
In for
Sonnets
to be
88-90.
the
earlier
friend
wronging
him, and
at once,
him,
if he
put him
however,
In the call upon him upon and faithful of the
friend's the
conduct, whatever
warns
later him
lover
; he slander
will do
her
lays
mad,
to
sort, but
at
her,
least
pretend
the madness
be
to him.
Sonnets
of the lover's
141-143
senses
develope
and is
a
ideas of the
falsehood The he
can
the
judgment.
of which she pursues
are,
fondness
account
give no
and
but him
to
pleased to dote,"
and which
to
it makes
experience
she
can
her
kindness
only
in In
the the
vals intersame
spiritthe
wishes if he
to
lover,
be
in
Sonnets
friend's
92-94,
is if
warns
spared false,wishes
cannot
knowledge
live
of his
falsity,
a
face
time
he
have
enjoy
at
kind
same
the
his
worse
that
beauty already
false The
apple,
what
as
his
seems
lilies
weeds, if his
144 Its is him has
virtue been
it the
"
to be. to both
quoted
key
If the
playing
out." in
with
the
lover's
tress, mis-
the
first
series, is found
that
lover declares
his absence
If I have
argue
falsehood
"
...
Like
Those And Mine
liim
that
travels gave
I return my
ranged, again.
heart another my best
"
blenches
worse
youth,
of love.
. . .
essays
proved thee
never more an
appetite I
newer
wiirgrind
older
On
to try proof,
friend.
42
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
"
SONNETS.
His
erringlove, we
to his true with
see, has
fired liim
a
oat," and
new
made
him
return
love.
After
brief and
tion reconcilialyrical
his mistress
a
himself, with
the
in Sonnet
quarrel with
in Sonnet
146,
and
votary of the
147
148 of
of
afresh the recognizes his passion, in terms Sonnets better the have and in of his Sonnet the
delirium
and very
false
seeing
of
the
counterparts
false vision and of
the
where which lover
where
the
119,
the Then
and
"
madding
fever
"
passion,
temporary
are
barrier and
friend,
149
while
hess and love
balances
unkind-
mistress of
corresponding unkindness
Sonnet
friend love lover 120 with the that nobler of the
lover, in
of the of the
lover,and mutually
that his
proves inflicted
depth
endured.
by
a
the
torments
The
tells his
friend of
proof
his
love, and
senses
should
bring togetherthe
series the and 150 and
falsehood of his very him It is necessary to her. to parallelSonnets, 121 of the first
that
the
of
the
second,
it within
in
to
understand
code of
former,
bring
to be to be
the
higher love.
'Tis better When
not
vile than
vile esteemed
receives reproach of
being.
it is his
In
Sonnet
150
the
very vileness and the lines quoted will mean, vile,for vileness itself will than
to be
mistress's
him. be
So
really affection,
thereby lose all love. Lastly, the of each a comparison between concluding Sonnets 124, 125, and 151, 152 (for 126 is merely a tag or series, appendix to the first series, as 153 and 154 are to the second),will show how the higher love in its last development becomes into a religion, while the lower sublimated
love
esteemed
vile
and
perverts conscience
and
truth, the
corner-stones
of of the
manner religion. In this unsatisfactory of despair closes. love It has bad a too good a philosopherto exhibit was
poem
alike
to bliss ; but
he shows
how
of the
two
THE
TEUE
OEDER
OF
THE
SONNETS.
43
which
he
one sings,
steadily upwards
descends
in in
lapses,the
halts. powers intellect
too
One
rapidly in independence
spiteof spite of
of all
the in
a
of
slough of
weak Thus
a
the of
other
one
whose will
knows
is
it. the
each
two
that
shows
besides
other and
; the
first
more
comprises
;
much
more are
fully than
to
the
of
desire.
sonnets
are
dedicated, to
second
a
only 26.
found
correspond
and,
so
proportionate number
in the
the
parallelismextends,
in both series. This remain
to be
far
order
is
to
found
is
that the sonnets prove author intended them It will form the
their
perhaps points
to
be
worth
contact.
exhibit
numbers
in in
of
the
column
second
sonnets
first
series,those
of the table both
series.
seen on
By
same
second be
it will
that the
the
series
are
and correlative,
arranged
principle.
But the
again,if
Platonic it
"
we
examine
the
we
first series
by
the
light of
That
scale of
love,"
to
in its main
outlines
of has love
two
adheres rigidly be
a
prescribedform.
of the
to
an
scale,it will
from
remembered,
sensible divisions
:
treats
impression
the of these
great
is ideal
first is
second
three the
love.
Each In the
divisions
subdivisions.
first division
(1) born
in
(2) nursed in the fancy through absence, and (3) in thought. Then after the transition to ideal generalized with sense, the heart supersedes the love, sentiment concurs In this second division (1) the heart,more trulythan eyes.
eyes,
44
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE's
SONNETS.
the
in the eye, furnishes the idea ; (2) the idea is purified furnace of jealousy universal (3) at last it is rendered ; and absolute six
in the
reason.
and
These
steps
are
in have
the the
of
beauty perfectly
1
"
25.
w^hereby
the
or
imagination
absence of tion dedicaThe third
the
solemn
in Sonnet
26, and
of
Sonnet
37.
step, the
with
triumph
two
another The
43.
into
Sonnets the
mark
the
transition the
of
sense
sentiment, through
sensible
of imagination. With powers division begins ; the heart now with much the
on
second
great
power
not
so
ideal eye, and the newly born the imagination of beauty the friend's continues the of worth
to next
feeds the
tion convic-
of
and end
;
constancy.
of Sonnet it is
a
This The
first
next
subdivision Sonnet
to
the
65.
begins
stage
love.
general prelude
love is led
all the
trials
ideal
The
ideal
beset it, which through the chief dangers which might it if it while their it from destroy conquest yielded, may its and its Love has to acquire triumph glory. struggle in succession with affectation, slander, death, jealousy, of utter This unworthiness. humiliation, and the feeling continues
to
the
end
of the
Sonnet
96.
From
thence
to
Sonnet
from
125
we
have
a
triumph
and is the
are
of ideal
love, gradually
and infinite, fervour As
transformed
into
sentiment love
volition
undistinguishable
religion. For
facultyfor the
of the and
objects it
seizes the
invested, by the
clearer
imagination, with
to take
attributes
infinite.
judgment
graduallybecomes
object begins
infinite. the first
:
"
really
of scale
divisions
Platonic
of love
I. 2. I. 3.
"
"
46"
65.
66"96.
97"125.
THE
TEUE
OEDEE
OF
THE
SONNETS.
45
It is natural
that scale
the
so
second
series of sonnets
the first.
to
see
should the it
not
respond
love is
to the
as clearly
For how
vulgar
can
it is hard that
be
idealized.
shall find
problem.
in Sonnets
first
step, love
The
step, the transfer of love is included in Sonnets the sightto the fancy, from 131, 132. his mistress's the lover thinks In the former face,in the on
127-130.
turns
second
her
black
The
third
into mourners pitying his eyes of fancy,is step, the generalization The
in Sonnets
133, 134.
lover
poet exhibits
share from the
this his
stage
the
willing to
a
mistress
transition
even
name
to imaginative
representedin
"
stranger
of the
or
manner
135-137.
with in of
Will," the
his his mistress's
lover, becomes
his
will
volition, and
heart,
spite judgment
over
knowledge, is obliged to pass a false The her. triumph of this false judgment upon falsehood, inconstancy,slander,the disillusion of the
the consciousness shown of wrong, and in Sonnets 138-143. every
cause
senses,
of
is jealousy,
Finally the rest the of the series,144-152, exhibits vulgar love in all its bad angel (144), by turns coaxing and deformity as a and graduallyworking up to a climax, leading to despair, love in hate, with darkened till it becomes and perverted
"
"
conscience.
may therefore
The be
main thus
divisions exhibited
:
"
of this
series
of
sonnets
I. 1. Sonnets 1.2. I. 3.
"
127"130.
II.
1. Sonnets
"
131,132.
11.2. II. 3.
"
"
Viewed
obvious
therefore
in the
the
light of
Platonic
their
scala
amoris,
the
series
that
of
sonnets,
that
celebrates
which
celebrates
love, are
with
arranged
This the
in fact
agreement
proves also which
main
scale.
beyond
is the the
present arrangement
right
any
one,
missibility inad-
postulates
outlines innumerable
of the
clear.
remain
46
difSculties
in of
detail, sentiments,
arising
from
repetitions,
in found the
apparent
earlier
placement missonnets
anticipations
only
sonnets to
of
which in the
ought
later in
nature
be
higher
of But Love these is
up ideas
in which
the
scale,
had arise
reappearances
stages.
difficulties
subject.
of
a
continually
and
"
bearing
the what of the
sun
second
former is it
child;"
"as
daily
new
old,"
continual
so
continually
the each
telling
side with better
is
told."
It
is
in
revolution,
and
anon,
same
wheel
turning growth,
up
some
ever
but
time
some
new
development,
undulation,
but of each in which
something
each
at
first.
It
is
an
successive
the
grows
an
stronger,
appearance
resembles unless
other,
causes
monotony
the
gradual
growth
is
well
observed.
lM:AGmATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
47
CHAPTER
IMAGINATIVE
y,
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
designof exhibiting through each degree of its scale, from the first conception of fancy in the eyes to heart and tinal possessionof the whole the intellect by ideal love, he naturally began with a definition of the force about he was whose to describe. Every word in progress
WHEN the
the
:"
fairest creatures
we
That
thereby beauty'srose
"Fairest,"
to
he
the
fair
the lover attaches says, because in the abstract, but to the one
"
himself
fair
not
which
itself to him as the highest : creatures," because approves " desire of generation in the beautiful," love, defined as the
subject to change and death. But this desire of generationis founded another desire on still more general; its roots lie in a still deeper ground, that beauty's rose desire The die." the might never here is full of import. In the range of its word rose from the it reaches associations be meaning that must of the Rose to the sublime given to it in much of the Roviaunt
applies only
to creatures
" "
"
conception
Paradiso.
of Dante The
in
the
30th
and
31st
cantos
of
"
his
rose
of
beauty
"
is the the
of of
love.
kindled desire
by
the
beauty
from
are man are
the
And
root
the
desire,
to wish
when
love
to
and both
is the
causes
of domestic lover
; and
they
the
produce an excellent mind in the beautiful body of the beloved youth. But this Platonic creation hardly satisfies for the mind for immortality, when the aspiration disappears
the
youtli dies.
a
Hence
arisen
friend likeness that
current
before
had
one
would
to
urge of
marry her
and
to
transmit
his
out
posterity.
advice
Mr.
Gerald
to
Massey
niece
has
pointed
the
Cecropia
Philoclea, in
Sonnets,
based.
but
"
of
the
arguments
you
"
on
which
they
so
As be of
made of 13.
a
child
of
mother,
do
mutandis,
;
a
Sonnet
father in
let your
so."
crystal
string
like
seems
Sonnet
8.
Sidney,
his much
only an pressed
he
echo
him into
"
time.
the mouth
arguments
which
put
:
"
Cecropia's
you will
country
or
than
the
throats
thousand
men." French-
accordance,
makes
then,
this struck
the first
the
his the
age, friend he
beauty
the Moon
youth
was
to
love.
One
the
Egyptian
gods
to
whip
of
with
which
he
excited
scatter
seeds
step in
he
urges is wasteful,
a a
Of the earth. like kind is fertility upon Shakespeare's friendship. In the first nine his friend to on general grounds ; marry
the
Sonnets
his of lect neg-
shameful, unjust,
an
malversation in which
trust,
he has
a
and
wilful
dilapidation of
Then
estate
only
series
life-interest. of rhetorical
with
the for
5th
Sonnet
begins
First
comes
arguments
the
marriage.
Hero and
same
thought, coupled
own
with
Marlowe's in
Leander, and
drama
reproduces
Ends
a
Shakespeare's
7th
was
of
on
that of
Well.
Sonnet often
name
is founded in her
proverb
she the
Queen
successor
beth's Eliza"
mouth
"
when
to
to
Men
says
risingsun."
their backs
On
on
the the
other
hand,
turn
settingsun,
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
49
and
the
only way
of
an a
to
son
retain and
their
successor.
homao^e is
The which
to
receive Sonnet
excited
it is
so
person
on
8th has
acoustic that
we
phenomenon
"
of to it the invention trace may the twelfth and the harmonic sesstops on the organ of the notes two quialtra. If two strings sound any triad in complete accord, the third will be note perfect attention
spontaneously produced
vibration. draws From
an
in
the
air
an
Mark
another, ordering. Resembling sire and child and happy mother, Who all in one, one pleasing note do sing ; Whose speechless song, being many, seeming one
to
sweet string,
husband
Strikes each
in each
by
mutual
Sings this
From this
to
thee
*'
thou
singlewilt
prove
none."
and point the arguments become less rhetorical, to the feelings. Do you keep single directly appeal more for fear of wetting a widow's eye? But the whole world will be a widow and weep if you leave no copy of yourself. You
cannot
love
others
when the
commit
this
murder
on
In Sonnet
to introduce
other
grounds,
In calls him the his
to
"make he my
thee
another
of me." Now he
l^th
friend
Sonnet
"
advances
still farther.
Dear
love," and
and know will do in
entreats affectionately
the that
14th truth
he
declares and if he
himself
shall
beauty
so, but
that and
is truth's
and
beauty'sdoom
the
date."
in which
to influence
poet, seeming to despair of being his friend's conduct, declares that he himself,
confer
as
by
will
war
immortalityupon
from
on
him.
He
he takes
war
new."
"
You and
might
"
make
Time,
way
skill."
"
Without
such
witness
of scription you
sweet own your truth, he says, my de^ believed such witness ; with
of its
in of
finally, casting
hope
E
50
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAEE'S
his
SONNETS.
triumphantlyannounces
him"
.
own
power
of
immortalizing
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee Do thy worst, old Time : despite thy wrong live young. ever My love shall in my verse
"
"
...
This
was
common-place
beloved
was
of sonnet
to
writers.
The
fading
the
beauty
of the
have
everlastinglife in
in his illustrations Mr. Knight prints, of the poet's verse. of Spenser,Daniel, and Drayton, Sonnets, similar sonnets with remarks which his unacquaintance with the show
philosophy common
sonnet
to them
and
most
of
the
other
as
great
"
writers.
consists
They
in
considered
that in
Love,
"
Aristotle
that being loved loving than passive receptivity that it gives rather rather than The lover receives. gives himself, and does in order to confer The-. so immortality on the beloved. of is seized its friend, with soul, taken with the beauty melancholy when it reflects that this beauty is only lent, not given, to the world; and its first aspirationis that At such die. first,while never friendsliip grace may is more in the wish than in the will, the incipient lover, with kind of distant a respect, only urges his friend to immortalize himself; failing in this, he proceeds, timidly says, it is action
_.
rather
than
at
more
to first,
associate and
himself
with
his in
friend, to express
direct
personal
interest
his
existence,and
to
him. something that shall immortalize The highest expression of this friendshipis doubtless 'Seneca. In self-sacrifice. quid amicum says paro ? mori in Ut habeam possim, ut habeam quem pro quo morti et impendam." exilium cujus me opponam sequar, undertake
"
"
"
In
the
first
sonnet
of the
Vita
Nuova,
Love
Dante, carrying Beatrice sleepingin his arms, the poet's heart in his hand. He wakes her, and feeds her with then the burning heart, and The departs in tears.
poet asks
Cavalcanti
his friends alone
Your That And
to
the interpret
:
"
fearful vision.
Guide
solves it
he bore
heart
to your
away,
for he
perceived
was laying claim, lady Death this,sustained her with your heart. fearing
To
friend is the
not
it does
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
51
brief
remainder
The
of
life cannot of
spends.
sonnet
problem
Cicero
:
love,
find that
_
as
writers, was
one
to
some
immortality.
while
memory
survives is
says for
of
friends^ both^.lixip
tender the then
the ..daad^.^tiiLJiEfiaL_3sdjd^
veneration
and
preserved with
of the from Thus
regretjji^.
can
the
rescue
bosom
survivor. evil
Sometimes
survivor
his friend
report
of the
and
it becomes
was
his
duty
to
O
to live.
Hamlet
says to
"
Horatio, who
about
drink
the remains
a
poison
me
wounded
name.
from
pain
that
It
was
lover
Mnemosyne
confer.
that The costs
the
rates commemo-
poeta
poet
friend, not
and from whose labour
verses a
in
a a
way
nothing beyond
distilled with
single resolution
tedious
the
of
than
the
brain and
and
heart, in
become
which Dante
monument
durable
brass.
to "to
"
begins
Beatrice her which memory
the
Vita
Nuova ends
never
heart
resolve woman"
any
resolve her
bii'th to embalmed
the
and
Biviua made
Commedia,
eternal.
in
which
manner
In like
how incapable his lines begins by protesting of expressingLaura's are beauty,graduallyfinds that they confer fame her (Son. 39), and carry her name upon the language is understood wheresoever (Son, 96), and, after her death, boasts that they shall give her an eternal fame
"
Petrarch, who
E,
se
mie
tuo
rime
alcuna
cosa
ponno, eterna.
qui memoria
(Son,55,sulla Morte.)
he tells Malatesta
And
that bust
in
one
of his miscellaneous
Sonnets
a
in poetry givesimmortality
can
rival.
Mr.
Knight
reverts
the
more,
same
boast.
and for the last
time,
of
corporealreproduction.
E
The
poems
52
wliicli
Bense
PHILOSOPHY
OP
Shakespeare's
the beloved
sonnets.
were
to
immortalize
for they were offspring, thine "from knowledge I derive." eyes my which he poet, in spite of the confidence diffident like
a
his
in
some
"
eyes
yet the
feels
are so
expresses,
"
"
of his
woman,
a
You
one.
Nature,
of you. You should be deprived me making you man, mistress that cannot be mine, be, your love may ; as my whether devote not." This or yourself to women you Its familiarity marks sonnet transition. vance a a is^ great adin
the
lightway
in
in which both
the
the
friend's
is treated
it marks
persuasions to marriage, and the of moral deficiency depth in this early stage of friendship, which is at present a mere fancy,"bred in the eyes, and the desire of mortalizi imcorporeal beauty, and dependent on
"
abandonment
the
it.
see
Behind
a
new
the
materialism element
of this
love
"
we
here
and
there
has time
arising,the
gentle
this
heart"
new
unacquainted
not
with
but
the In
friends the
becomes
the
Sonnet before
or
poet, having
refuses
to
his eyes,
or
compare
or
moon,
simply though
that it is
so
fair
as
as
bright
the
seems
similar
one,
the this
different
positions occupied
and
by
Sonnet
by
InTo.98.
to
It
thing,in
attention
frigidly drag in that of the sun and flowers ; and another and moon thing,in his absence, make all beautiful to mere things in nature types and which memorials of his beauty. This is a distinction has made little seems peculiarto Shakespeare. Petrarch
difference between the his
of the
beloved,
withdraw
present
with that
and which
his he
absent
mistress
in her.
regard to
He
similitudes
to her
compliments
her soul sun's
tells her
face
if she and
sun,
died, and
the
were
the the
earth
contrast
lightwould
Laura
comes
goes
back
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
53
slie makes
fine
so
weather
makes
laurel, and
sun
forth.
She like
were
is
conqueror's
in this
Petrarch
a
particular. He
itself
a
it robe
necklace, the
ornament
heaven contains
and
for
;
riches
(Son. 15)
her lipsrubies, her teeth pearls,her sapphires, eyes forehead her smile ivory,her hair gold, her hands silver, sunshine (Son. 40), her fragrance that of April flowers (Son. 64), her eyes brighter than sun, moon, stars, fire, and and like the most diamond, crystal, lightning, glass, Maker's self. From all this artificial conventionality Shakespeare
separates himself.
So is it not Stirred by Who heaven
a
with
me,
as
with
that
to
Muse
painted beauty
himself
as
his v^rse
doth
use.
ornament
"Painted
the
"
beauty
"
means
simply
"
"a
woman,"
was saw
and
refers
to
artificial handsomeness
which
"
in fashion herself in
late in
a
:
Elizabeth's
reign.
and
The
Queen
never
true
old," as Jonsontold
sometimes would
Drummond
her
"they
nose." "I
one
vermilion
(in the Quartos) says to Ophelia about her sex, heard of your paintingstoo : Grod hath given you
you make
"
face, and
1623
"
yourselves
becomes
out
another."
In
"
the
"
folio
of
painting
death. false
face
"pace."
the old false
see
Perhaps
Queen's
"aces Sonnets and
went face-painting
at
were
the
date
the
rule,
we
by
Mer-
68, 69,
the
127.
Shakespeare makes
Love's Labour's Hall it. the
tives invec-
'Jiant
in practice Tiwion
an
Lost, The
also
it,and
satirizes
Shakespeare's
form of
"
and
wigs
was
outward
of
mere
conventionalities
phrases, silken terms precise, Three-piled hyperboles, spruce affectation, Figures pedantical,
.
feelingthat in the presence of a great concentrated passion all pedantry is out of place. The wipes away from the memory purpose
All That
saws
and
of his artistic
past
youth
observation
copied there.
54
He the
PHILOSOPHY
OP
Shakespeare's
sonnets.
hates face.
The
the
use
of the
rouge-pot as
upon
much another
for
poetry as
foi*
next
of sonnet
Sonnet
common-place
All
that beauty that doth Is but the seemly raiment in thy breast doth Which
cover
thee
me.
This
Sonnet
must
be
taken in
in
connection form.
with
The
the 24th
reciprocal of each lover admiration for the other's beauty,though it effect that interchange of heart is only which to seems in perfected love, yet does it in a very superfullypossible ficial is its still in cradle it has not Fancy yet ; way.
"
"
show of
that
this
is
beauty'sexternal
been
"
delivered
but
from
the
thraldom know
of
not
the
intermediate
they see, another place common(23) turns upon and trouble of the philosophy the awe which sesses posthe lover and makes him the in tongue-tied presence of his friend. This trembling, prescribed by the Codex Amoris, is spoken of in the 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th Sonnets
Sonnet
"
draw
what
eyes The
of
Dante's
Vita
Nuova,
nor
and
in
several
of
Petrarch's, as
can
Sonnet neither
34, where
he says that
cry,
nor
in Laura's
speak,
would
are
sigh;
and is
his
its
tongue
words
ask
frozen,
his
"
and
says
friend
is not
to
but
"
his eyes are what silent love hath to read hear with eyes belongs to love's fine wit."
are
writ
for
to
These
Sonnets
phases of love entering The 25th Sonnet sums by the eyes. up the happiness of this love : court favourites live in the royal eye, and die of It is only the perpetual and a frown. present smile of
that maintains Happy
Where I may
of descriptive clearly
the various
fortune
the warrior's
I, that love
not remove, and
nor
fame.
am
But
beloved
be removed.
With
the 26th
of the
Sonnet Love
now
we
enter learns
the
second
degree of
to be
the
scale of love.
"written
through
second
absence
dependent ina so
eyes.
This
clear that
it from
its
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.'
all the
55
proper
is the will not
place to
venture
make
to to
verses
it tlie the
prefaceto
in
Sonnets.
The
It lover
introduction
show
are
poems himself
of absence. his
clothed
with
friend's
favour
"
I dare to boast how I do love may thou Till then, not show my head where Then
thee
raay'st prove
me.
of the poet's imperfect utterance There 23. to Sonnet refers back clearly pen, this Sonnet he said that his verses expressed his thoughts better than bare till his words could are do; here, that these verses and meditates them them the friend takes on alone, and The by his favour puts apparel" on their tattered love. sence of aband 28th Sonnets 27th depict the first miseries of the "shadow" through this wretchedness ; but friend the shines, brightening the day, and gilding the gination night for already the first efiect of absence upon the imaof Sonnet is to mitigate the realism 21, which abjures all hyperbole. In Sonnet 29, perhaps the most of the friend's exquisite of the series, the remembrance In its reference
to
the
"
"
Bweet
love
is made
the
one
antidote
sorrows
]
\
of Kfe
and
31,
again,it becomes
loves
"
the
new
sub-
vanished
32
a
life^
in which
"all
losses
are
restored," and
closes kind
friends revivified.
Sonnet
beginswith
Sonnet
of the
"
26, with
opening motive. in my verses my says to his friend, think over in the other, when I am think them over supply their defects by your kind thoughts."
"
images of dead which this little series, and of repetition largement enIn one place the poet
the absence
"
dead,
In the
progress
more
of
love
we
shall
find
that
the
poet
thought (in Sonnet 71), and begs his his poetry alike after death, if and to of the remembrance little series brings pain. Another Sonnets begins with the 33rd, when the unkind thoughts which their appearance. besiegethe absent begin to make 33 the lover doubts of his friend's constancy : In Sonnet
reverts to this
friend
forget him
"
He The
was
but
one
hour from
mine,
me now.
region cloud
hath
masked
him
In the 34th
the lover
endures
some
at disgrace
his friend's
56
hands.
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEABE's
SONNETS.
But
can
in the touch
35th
his
he*declares that
that he
even
no
doubts
makes
or
graces dis-
love, and
himself
an
to his friend's misdeeds accessory Then, from the notion that the accessory
of
blame
with
the
must
he concludes, principal, be
Sonnet
his friend
to
36,
to
that
return
absence
to
one
whose
ask
have
also
; and
share.
friend's
As
his friend
is identified his
can
him,
concern
so
his
good report
his And of
becomes
personal
be
this, with
the
unworthiness,
only
own
maintained
by separation.
Even
separation has
his friend's
its
wealth, and
substantial when he
comfort
(Sonnet
37).
blessed
He
"
feels himself
blessed
knows
in
his friend is
Look,
This
what
is best,that
I have
; then
best
ten
I wish
thee,
me
wish
times
happy the
It is characteristic that
more
of this
early stage in
which
it dwells first the
ladder such
of love
as are
all the
or
on qualities
are
In
stage, love
is taken
in the is
not
through
kindled
is kindled
second, it
enters
and
wit.
38. Sonnet stage in the scale begins with the 26th, it is a dedicatoryand introductorysonnet. declares due that
to
poet
whatever the
excellence
is all
inspiration they
"
friend,who
is the
O
tenth
Muse
give thyselfthe
thanks
if aught in
me
perusal stand
againsttliysight.
data of and imagination, the
"
stage of
so
gathers them
second
one
all up lives."
on
whom
lover
lives
life ;
that, as Crescimbeni
With the benefits
to
but two
he has
39, moralizes
to
as
absence, which
one
teaches
"
how well
make
one
twain,"
two
dissolve
one.
two,
as
to combine
into
a
Then
three all
Sonnets Sonnets
has
some
have in
been connection
a
stumbling-block to
with
interpreters.
Sonnets
tell clearly
disgraceful story.
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
mistress,
married He
uses
woman,
witli whom
as a
lie has
guilty
go-between, and his friend supplants him. Interpretedbiographicallyof the his friend, the poet and story is shocking. It is also tains mainwho improbable in the highest degree that the man he about so a silence himself, or who, when dignified his own does 121, asserts so speak, as in Sonnet clearly superiorityto vulgar scandal, should have only lifted the veil to let us behold such a disgraceas this. On the other makes Elizabeth which hand, Mr. Massey's interpretation, Vernon the speaker and Lady Rich the person addressed, however and successful in ingenious in its combinations can upholding Shakespeare'sdignity, only itself be upheld internal organization of the by destroying the whole of them Sonnets, and in some making black by literally But into white. in our naturally theory they fall most into place. The love of the friends has tried by to be jealousy, but in this stage of love the jealousy which be friend would preference for another suspects a in the premature ; its place is found stage of ideal love. Here we jealousy, require the more superficial which would of the friend keep to itself those special gifts kindle the lover's fancy. Now could the lover which not be jealousof his friend's wife ; he has seventeen devoted intimacy.
his friend
sonnets to not
one
theme,
an
invitation
to
him
;
to in
He 20
women
could he
be
mistress his
has
"
relations
this love
as
sure." thy love, and thy love's use their treaHe could not be jealousof his friend's friend; for jealousybelongs to a higher stage of love, that ideal which admits of no in affection, and which, plurality
;
"
Sonnet
women
119 which
some
shows, cancels
Sonnet
real
we
also the
freedom The
with
respect
he has
to
20
cause
grants.
for
manner
have this
owns
indicated.
merely
to
excuse
alludes it.
to
theft, to
in Sonnet
it,to
that the Sonnet
33, 34 forgiveit,
excuse
He
he that
in itself, and in disgraceful quite reason enough why his friend 40 he refers that it must 41 he
for it is
36
should
more
remain
In Sonnet separate from him. declares to the transaction, and and his friend into
explicitly
make him
not
foes
; in
Sonnet
again excuses
it,
58
and
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
finds in it
SONNETS.
in Sonnet
"
42
he
even
fresli
symptom
of
love
But Sweet
here's the
I
me
are
one
alone.
is not
of love
moral It is
the
but
yet moral.
yet
what
scale
shows
by
stages this
a
fancy is graduallytransformed
affection. the
from
it must
are
non-moral
moral
On
the
other
hand,
be remembered
that all
symmetrical ; the earlier the later. And which foreshadow a general formula may in a lower application be quiteimmoral represent true may Mr. Gerald morality in a higher one. Massey's interpretation but these Sonnets saves Shakespeare's reputation; The are capable of a better vindication. highest ainor is amicitice is directed of which to God. man capable who Now reads Sonnets that they 40-42 will see any one itself to the stage of are as applicableas the Song of Solomon If God Love. of an divine deprives a man object of either by taking it to Himself ing or earthlyaffection, by raisin it an affection which guishes to Him supplants and extinall human loves, the only permissiblefeelingin is that which in these three man Shakespeare formulates Sonnets, They contain a genuine and unassailable analysis of their first and of love, though the disagreeable nature observer to obvious meaning rather tempts the common neglectexamining the real depth of their truth and beauty.
This
stage
of love
ends
with
short
series of three
nets, Son-
nature bring to lightthe unsatisfactory It is shadowy and unsubstantial. of this merely imaginary love. It does not attain to the deep recesses of the soul ; which it lives rather in the imaginationand senses, tied are material of which elements the to the four posed, body is comthan in the nimble which is distance thought to is all one. absence With or nothing, and bodily presence
43-45, which
the
first division
to
a
of the first
great
has eyes,
is
brought
close.
Shakespeare
in the
the
imagination,and
not
yet idealized
first
"
whole To
heart.
The recapitulate.
stage
of love
is
represented
IMAGINATIVE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
59
in
Sonnets
to
25.
In
the
first
nearer
twenty
to
the his
lover
is
presented re-
gradually
with
a
coming
object,
with
"
ning begina
distant
respect,
'21
to
ending
express
close
intimacy.
of
two
Then
Sonnets
the
it
first
unity
the
love's lovers
simple
into
26 It
nor
apprehension,
one.
which
confounds
is shown
The
stage
i^r-"^
/ / /
Sonnets
its trials.
to
37.
is
not
Here
troubled
unity
the
is
put
of
tlirough
absence
by
of
duality
nor
(26-28)
sorrows
by
station,
and
"
by
private
as
(29).
would
envelopes
all former them
sublates,"
aij^J
in
Hegelian
a
loves,
to
a
restoring
new
them
different
form,
to
raising
death self-inflicted
to
me
life all
(30,
31).
It
expects
survive
as
(32)
it
excuses
offences,
the it
reckoning
sufferer
an
them
wounds,
offender
am a
and
making
;
accessory
from conduces
the I
(33-35)
man,"
love
to
hence
cries,
how
"depart
absence
for
to
sinful of
and
shows The
not
the
in
growth
Sonnets
(35-37).
45.
it
third
stage
ceases
is
to
exhibited be troubled it
;
38
trials
Love
surmounts
only
in them life should of
one
by
even
the
which
the
second into
its
own
stage
assimilates Absence
becomes is
them,
the that
and
turns
essence.
dualistic
of
love,
live
and divided
and
;
proves
that
;
it
expedient
itself
friends
a
(39)
a
jealousy proof
very
becomes
my friend of becomes
reunion and I
are
this
"
dualism,
fresh the
that
"
(40
"
42)
and
of
insuf"ciency
stages
carry of
out
the
a
rialistic mate-
elements
these
first
to
love thp
force
which of
an
suggests
and
helps
into
an
transformation
imaginative
ideal
love
(43
"
45).
60
PHiLOSOPnY
OP
Shakespeare's
sonnets.
CHAPTER
VI.
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
love occupiesthe three lower IMAGINATIVE the scale, and ideal love the three higher.
grades in
Ideal love sensible
begins beauty
mind.
46 and
with
;
the if
of in
for
for
This
change
What is
now
47.
the
to be
for the
before,the
eye
on
is
engraved the form of beauty the heart's tablets" (Sonnet 24) so now, the heart to play the painter,and to interpret the friend's heart to
played painter,and
"
the
the
lover's
consciousness. one's
To self. form
know Love
to that
man,
says
ferred trans-
Hamlet,
upon the
is to know the
when mind
from
beauty of
knowledge
and reveal
of one's
self j_forthis
we
grammar tokens
dictionary "whereby
to
us
which
the
hearts
love
and
Shakespeare then,
46, 47,
has
after
introducing the
how he
recurs
subject in
nets Son-
to show
acquires,of
to
itself,this
self-knowledge.
absence, which
the typifies asks This and himself leads
to
"
"
First
the
general topic of
absence
the of
lover his
to
fear
that
only
he
entire
friend
what
"
claim
"
him
knowledge
that he
"
his
own
no
desert,"
"
the should
confession be loved be
allege
two
cause
why
(50
show The in
he and
(Son. 49).
compared
love
The
next
Sonnets
"
51)
should
a
with
lo mi is to
rivolgo
how
indietro much
ciascun
passo."
transcends that
ideal
"dull
flesh,""the
to
beast
bears" him
its slowness
; but
sympathize
ardour of
with
the the
absence
in the
desire, and
triumph
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
61
flesh
of
retnm,
must
be
its
"
own
vehicle
; no
can
keep
abreast weak
mind
all such
auxiliaries of
therefore
Sonnet
52
even
except
friend's
on
rare
occasions, even
of his the lover Every object reminds stant friend's beauty (53),but nothing can represent his "conAnd heart." yet (54) it is not the visible beauty, heart invisible truth, which but the constant or gives a
shape.
man mere
his
worth.
This
outward
to
henceforth
and
"
and no truth, therefore, longer the in Sonnet is 5, the poet's verse its memory vein of and
live for
ever
(55)
The
last
dwell
in lovers'
a
eyes."
new comes feeling
With
Sonnet that
in.
of the
poet
few
finds
sonnets
asceticism love
only
He He
dulness."
once
imagination.
friend
checks
;
thinks where
of spirit
he his
wonders
he
what
he
is
doing, and
account
risingsuspicions by
friend's is
deepest self-humiliation.
he demand He
an
Being
of what
more
"
his he
slave, how
to search
finds it much
to
the purpose
in
some was
image
antique book,"
done of
"
since
mind
at
(59).
child
to
"
love bears
retires
into
"
cud of
a
meditation, and
birth
again
the old
burden and is
former
by remodellingits
thoughts,
birth
ideas. Such pre-existing new a higher character than natural "crawls to nativity,which maturity" and is eclipsed. life which The the poet promises to confer his new on shall stand to times in hope friend is one that (60). In Sonnet 61 the poet asks whether his friend's image which "visits him often is sent by him, or is conjured so up It he his love. his love. But if he is, own own replies, by the image, what be his own creates must worth that is All former ? capable of castingsuch a shadow tion self-inspec-
givingnew of altogether
"
"
ended
in self-abasement
:"
; this
ends
in
very
diff'erent
self-appreciation (62)
Methinks
No And
no
face
so
is as mine, gracious
no own
truth
of such do
account
worth
define,
As
surmount.
62
And
second elements
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEAUE's
SONNETS.
though
in
he
his it.
to
must
his
friend,his
all its able
to
that he
he would
have
not
person, o'erworn
be
comprehend
exists.
"
In and in
himself, however,
the
crushed
even
by
so
Time." he
"
only beauty
that which
his shall
wrinkles,
live in lines has
will black
beauty
; and
the shall
lines
his pen
traces
these
defy Time,
after the
they
celebrate
long been
features
of this
stage of
lover
ideal
comes
love
to the
are
the
ledge know-
heart.
First,he recognizes
slave and vassal
by
the
its
he defects; secondly,
determines
friend,whose
he feels himself
he recognizes its real nobility when he be ; and thirdly, of superlative excellence finds in it those which principles
his
modesty
will the
not
allow
him
to
attribute
not
to
himself.
sensuous
Henceforth
self-conscious
the
true
heart, and
the
of love. interpreter lover has become souls in therein substitute he has with
a
through
self-inspection, the
soul, and acquainted with his own general, he is perforce obliged to beauty for the material beauty which
And
the this substitution
spiritual
shipped. wor-
hitherto
an
indicates
to the
advance
of The
understanding from
has
now
the concrete
no
abstract.
or eyes for gold or colours only for the beauty of souls, of arts,of
He the
is
no
longer
distressed
fading of flowers, but does not fulfil its high promises, by art the soul which its aim, by science which misses which babbles, by political of oppression to which turned institutions are purposes and revolutionarydestruction, and by a religion which To this new forswears its faith. phase of love Sonnet 66 beautiful it is appropriate. In introduction is an as as famous indeed in with Hamlet's and common soliloquy, it expresses harmony with all Shakespeare's later tragedies, the poet'sdeep disgustwith the world, and society by by
waning
as
of fair
faces,or
he
saw
them,
and
declares made
that
his
ideal
to
love him.
was
which
life tolerable
y
But
Sonnets
67
68, should
this
love
continue
IDEAL
LOVE
IK
THE
SONNETS.
63
impiety and falsehood of the age ? In of order, he replies, To show false art what beauty was yore." Again, why, he asks in Sonnets 69, 70, should this which love live in a world only slanders it ? Slander, he ideal principlemanifests an replies,is inevitable when
alive amidst
the
"
itself in
own
action
; men
will
construe
this action
after
their
fashion. They
Ancl
beauty
they
of
that, in guess,
measure
deeds.
Sonnet 70 goes worth. simply approves character of the whole far to prove the purely philosophical While the love was and series. templated consimply imaginative, bute beauty, it was only an outward possibleto attrivious lascisensual faults all kinds of (Son. 36) to the And thus
slander
" " " "
has
him"
grace become
of the
friend.
Now, however,
that
the
to
friend
say
of
"
Thou
pure
the
unstained
ambush
Thou Either
hast
of young
not
In the two
next
Sonnets
(71,72) the lover with most and his verses to forget him
me
then
on
you
woe."
to
yet left
him, which
*'To and
verses
strong
that the
well
ere
long,"
the
poet
he
sees
pour
into spirit
immortality. Shakespeare the sovereignpoet who of" the passing forms sent to take note of chivalry and was In these Sonnets mediseval Catholicism. he reallyseems to feel himself to be the last minstrel and only herald of a beauty But that was he has a supreme dence confialready out of date. in his cause, and a confidence mingled with diffidence Hence his unwillingness to link his in his own powers. to himself to make love so indissolubly it perish with as Hence with his him. too, mingled yearnings for death and
Mr.
consecrates in
friend's
"
Carlyle
oblivion,his
in
-
confidence He
seems
that
to
his feel
cause
his
verse.
that
will his memory temporary oblivion, but that afterwards to perpetuate revive, and his writings will become a power the ideals
which
they embody.
64
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONNETS.
The
next to his
two
his
ideal his
Absent
and
or
present, it is the
sole
food
of
thoughts,
In Sonnet him
to to
the
only topic
ixionotonous
verse.
77 he
commit
book,
children
and
entreats
of his
brain,
with like
its waste
gives his friend a note his thoughts, the blanks. As tive imaginafriend
to
love leave
"
began
beseeching
the
children
ideal love himself, so not, however, of the body, but of the mind. the life of
to
the
world
was
up
mirror
the
old
that life, In
a a
it
itself
put
this nurse's
new
record
arms,
life lies
once
to
rise,and
man.
"to
take
acquaintance"
to
of
"
the
mind
of
The mirror of
Sonnet
and the
reads dial
;
this
effect and
"
is the
of
the
ebb
flow
development
ideas and the
mankind ages.
it
registers the
off then the
changes
of the
Take
reffection
it to the
serve
the purposes
it to your mit age ; transfer ; compaper will come to light in due time, and ; it of progress." For all advance rests on
; the
what
as
is
already secured
on
future
is built
on
the
present,
the After
present
this,
or
the
past.
Whether
or
the
purport of
jealousy,will be clear.
or
Drayton,
from
Daniel,
in the The
the
nine
other
place
here that ideal
affections
course
of
W.
H.
cannot
be
mined deter-
them. love
of the tried
argument
an
requires
tual intellec-
should
be
by
ideal
and
tried by an tive imaginajealousy,as imaginative love was 40-42. The in Sonnets fresh from poet, jealousy stay of the beauty he loved, and lamenting the transient from proposing it as the model for future ages, to be preserved of truth- tellingrecords in the unaffected verse, that the is should be indignant naturally subject priated approschool the whose of affected ing paintby men gross of rhetoric strained touches distort the and only The lover's object is to truth they pretend to describe. To him, the true think thoughts, not to speak fine words. mind of the ideal love in the heart and supplies presence
"
"
"
"
of education
and
skill.
He
has
not
to
ransack
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
65
what he
the
sees
universe
for
comparisons,but
love
"
has
only to
are
copy
in his ideal
Than
none
can
say
more
this rich
that praise,
you
alone
you.
(Son. 84.) It
Such
creation
object an unique.
In
to
is
the
of art.
to make
gives to
it for
its
ever
the
next
seems
to
yield
quishes relin-
jealousy.
his he
rival has
on
the
lover in
a
claims
his
As
previous
element. of love.
Sonnet,
Yet In the
attributes
this breach
unworthiness.
here self-depreciation 49
as
has
a
an
additional
of
a
Sonnet
it
was
simply
result
comparison
his ideal
himself,
known
by
self- reflection, to
in Jealousy gives rise in the lover to a self-depr,eciation The first was act a mere comparison with a third person. is an act of self-judgment. of self-apprehension ; the second in Sonnets 87-96. Such self-judgment the lover practises 87 is itself suggestive of The legalphraseology of Sonnet the of judgment. In the next, the poet excuses process his friend's lack of love by a confession of his own secret like that which makes to Ophelia. He Hamlet faults, owns
beforehand
Thou As half canst me not, love, disgrace I'll myself disgrace. (Son. 89.)
so
ill
But
once over
he
him
asks the
that, if
This
he
is
to
be
; that
threatened is the
evil may
(90).
Wretched
only bitterness
that
me
thou
most
ma3''st take
wretched make.
All this
(Son.91.)
such
a
Yet
would is
it cannot be death
be effectually
; and
taken
away. it
For
loss
death
never
is unconscious. know
If the
friend the
false,the
almost
rose
lover
will
(92, 93).
Then
but
lover His
has
only
"
colour
eyes,
;
the what
but
with
base
infection meet
sourest
"
?
:
sweetest
things turn
fester
by their deeds
than
Lilies that
smell
far
worse
weeds
(Son. 94.)
So
he
concludes
by warning
F
his
friend
that
though
his
66
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
in
SONNETS.
beauty
loses its ends
seems
covers
every
"
blot,yet
Thus
time
second of the of in
"
the
hardest
of ideal
knife
love which be
edge
a
(95.)
the
the
stage
love.
with
negative operation
very
judgment,
second
to threaten
existence the
same
It is to
noticed
ideal last but the
same
that
Sonnet
with
96,
the
last
the
love, ends
one
couplet as Sonnet in the second stage of imaginativelove. For situations but in a higher signifiever recur, cance.
stage of ideal love all the negationsof the and its scattered drawn rectified, premisses
The is the universal final
In
the third
are
judgment
up universal in in the into
one
conclusion.
soul, the
ideal all that this
was
"
sacred
love," winch
in itself, lower with
a
objectof
love, contains
found
transcendant of love.
sense,
grades
Hence
stage is fitly
introduced
three
beautiful
Sonnets, comparison
it is
to folly
which,
with
in
with
For
Sonnet
in
universe
though
own
hand,
the
and
stars,it
nature, better
above three
than
all
inanimate
world, and
spiritual beauty
and well-known
These
Sonnets
passage
of words (x. 8). -The identity Augustine's Confessions and imagery in the two writers will suggest an identity in their meaning. 100, 101, the poet Then, in Sonnets for her silence. rebukes his muse Though her song cannot immortalize it. In the next two improve beauty,it can It is not becoming silence. Sonnets, 102, 103, he excuses
to
merchandize his
verse
love
in
of
the
world's mend.
mart,
In
and
only mars
he declares
seasons,
it cannot
has that it has
Sonnet
its three three
a
104
love
passed through
united truth
"
great
"
the
elements
of love
"
"
beauty,goodness,and
still such, and
true ever
into
singlewhole
one,
so."
alone,
in
one.
have
never
often
lived
seat
kept
For
the final
To
stage
that he
of
love
is- the
synthesis
from
describe
it the
can
poet takes
of
find
beauty, and
them
as
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
67
if
been neither
can
shadowings
which eclipses his will
not
to
his
love.
The
moon,
after
love
declared
verses
repeat
paternoster of love
for
age
kills it
(108),but
The lover's of his
ness fickleinto
affections, the
which surrounds
misfortunes
his
name,
are
of
his
and life,
the fuel
scandal for
all made in
all-consuming,all-embracing love
The
"
Sonnets
the
two
next
sonnets
describe
the
of idealizing mind of
I
eye
that In
as
creates
out
images
"
beauty.
Sonnet
if the
115
poet
seem
corrects to
former
now
sonnets, such
love
say
for
the is
future
a
of his
that
babe
condition
of love
love
Sonnet, 116, he
celebrates
marriage of true minds, a union far above alteration like a star in the heavens. In the motion, guiding life, or tions series of four sonnets next (117-120),all the moral aberrathe of both then flame when
sets
the lover
and
friend of
are
first condemned
to make
even
and its
consumed the
once
in the furnace
love, in order
still better the flow
even
hotter. the
Better tide
is made
by
evil
turns, and
with
to
of
improvement
contradictions
"
in, everythingworks
aberrations all discords
nature
it,and
the in
one
and for
true
contribute
are
great conclusion
final concord.
resolved
the
The
of evil
soul in it
of
goodness
Evil
which
is made in the
to
consist
not
anything
causes.
intrinsic is
a
evil, but
of
reaction
which
which analyticpower, pares prefor the of perfected love. great syntheticprocess After the touching confession of evil and its uses, the lover proceeds to state the paradox (121) that it is better to be thought so. to be evil than evil The reaction from produces good under the organizingand healinginfluence
of love. itthe the But the evil
kind
report chases
in
Sonnet
122
he
6S
defends
away
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
the
SONNETS.
himself
for
which
seeming
in
carelessness 77
he
to
of
him
the table-book
which
had
Sonnet such
had
giving given to
full of of
his
friend, and
His
"
been
no
returned
notes.
memory
To
needed
reminders
his
friend
keep
to
"Were
thee
me.
Unkindness
becomes Time
a
is
turned
into
kindness, and
In
carelessness
123 he fies deof
sign of careful
and is not
Sonnet
the
love
has
character
In helped by any temporal records. 124 he enlargeson the eternal character Sonnet of his love. It is not of state, varying with the child fortune. It thralled depends not on the accidents of smiling pomp or discontent. It fears not the heretic policy which prefers the temporal to itself altogether the eternal, but proves and politicby showing itself invincible unchangeable. It seeks external and not refuses to base honours, (125) its claims and favour But to immortality on form. its of sacrifice is one highest act and eternity,
:
"
"
Which
But
my mixed
oblation,poor
with
me
but
free.
no
seconds, knows
for thee.
art
mutual
render, only
As
he
had
used
so
the
here
language
he
uses
of the
Lord's
of of the
Prayer
an
in
Sonnet
more
108,
solemn
the
language
act
still
than
oblation the
Eucharist.
a
offeringof
two
piece
of
; the
effect
is that
if the
hearts, the
ideal
to each
was a
other.
a
Then,
as
poet remembered
concludes
rite of
"
he proscribedreligion,
exclamation
informer
stands
true
soul,
impeached,
Sonnet the
126
series hence
and
imperfectin form, and though belonging to in its general tone, has no special place therein, it was is appended as a mere tag to it. That
is
placed here, and not at the end of all the Sonnets, is a first series down to this place farther proof that the whole who is so rarely for their object the have lovelyboy 27 that Mr. Gerald to after Sonnet alluded distinctly
*'
"
IDEAL
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
69
Massey
intermediate
true
reason
thinks
himself Sonnets
to
entitled
be is not and its
to
consider
to
most
women.
of
the The
why
elevation
sex
is
that
in
the
gradual through
more
of
love,
transformations
more
successive
stages,
more
object
with
and
sex,
or
generalized,
human
spiritual,
This
to
definite
personality.
reference toned
to account to
consideration
"
does
not
absolutely
so
preclude
the
sonnet
sweet
as
boy,"
108.
even
in it is of
late
and
reason
religiously enough
reference
But cessation
quite
the of
for the
the manhood
sudden and
personality
it
on
object imaginative
after love
Sonnet
is
27,
when
will second
be
remembered
just
entering
its
phase
In and
of this of
and of
analysis.
the with it has connection the
of
these
sonnets,
their
sonnet
more
agreement writers,
than which
trace
acknowledged
been
philosophy impossible
the makes often that bare
are
of
to
other do
manifestly
ideas,
and is
leading together,
thread the
covers
thread them
of
connection into
a
consistent
concealed
by
upon which with
the
variety
it
we
splendour
of
jewels
the
strung
skeleton
the
philosophic
traced of with
poet
the and this
have
most
tissues,
is
profusion
But
thought
all which may
images
wealth
was
simply
outline
current
astonishing.
of
under
idea
the
pre-existing
of the
part
if
of
Platonism
epoch
and
be
traced,
easily,
at
least
with
precision
certainty.
70
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE'S
SONNETS.
CHAPTER
VII.
VULGAR
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
IN
which
the the
second
progress
"
series of the
of Sonnets
"love of
correspondsto the in the of the former man series,so the right fair beauty which corresponds to the lower love is betokened in the second series by a gypsy-likewoman, with black
"
Shakespeare represents despair." As the beauty higher love finds its fitting symbol
eyes and
but
as a
hair, and
sentiment
complexion
not
as an
"
coloured
ill."
The
poet
represents this
love
looks for true higher aspirations.First, the lover who beauty cannot find it,but only its counterfeits (Son. 127), he surrenders himself and so in his despair to the black eyes which do not pretend to possess the true beauty, but by their very contradiction the
to
it become of this
its
most
eloquent
the
lover beauty representatives. By to its attractions stands, resigning himself (128), clearly what hell is it to a knowing leading him, but unable its temptations (129), appreciating its real to conquer him but confessing its mysterious power over deficiencies, (130). Secondly,in absence by himself alone," thinking
" "
side
on seem
face," he wonders
; and
how that
her
blackness
can
he
concludes
it is
only
in
her
deeds,
face, that she is black (131) ; or that if she is black, it is only in mourning for his pain (132) ; in his eyes. and this compassion of hers makes her beautiful fancy is strengthened by his friend's judgment. Thirdly,his own
His friend has has ended been carried messages
to
in her
and
from
his
mistress, and
the
fancy therefore
has
poet, whose
friend's The by supplantinghim. vated caught by the hooks that captiby judgment is thus confirmed
VULGAE
LOVE
IN
THE
SONNETS.
71
another's
three love
stage of
this
begins with
confessed
I and me." Will
Sonnet
to his
135.
mistress
previous sonnet the poet had "he [the friend]is thine, and
will
"
"
thy
"
thou
hast
both
him
First,
to
boot, thy and Will in overplus,"confounding by a verbal quibble his and perhaps his friend's name Will with his mistress's own and aiming no longer at her beauty,but at her convolition, sent and her kindness, even her kindness that was though of an abandoned For as his imagination had overpowered woman. his eyes, his had powered overso corrupt partiality his heart's judgment, and made it think that a several the wide to be it knew world's plot which that as Shakespeare common place (137). It is possible drew called was largely on Sidney, who Willy by
thou hast
"
"
"
will,and
"
"
"
"
his
friends,these
of lawless
later
sonnets, intended
are
to
illustrate the
to
progress
and the
to be
love,
purposely made
his into
"
Sidney'snotorious
a
kind
sonnets
their
famous thus
a
dedicated
meaning of Secondly,
having
towards vices truth
idealized
vicious the
corrupt love, and given it its bias its indulgence,the next stej^is to make
of virtues. Its falsehood
bear
semblance
becomes
(138), its inconstancykindness (139), and hypocrisy its life (140) ; its follybecomes its torment, and thereits atonement .forein some sense (141) ; its sinful loves and hates virtuous become (142), thoroughly confused and the the lover with contents himself mere finally dregs of his mistress's love ; asking only that he may have
his and will thus with
her, because
love
she
has
her the
will ideal in in
with
others
settingup inconstancy as
(143)
"love love
:
qualification
morals,
ticism scep-
of the
lower in
for
communism
philosophy, and
of the lower of in
pantheism
despair."
its ideal the
idealizations
And
the
last real their
we
stage
of the
state
exhibits love.
the In
it and
two
higher
can
kinds
as coexist,
in
Sonnets "the
Now,
to
however,
the
tempteth
angel from"
be
a
lover's
side, and
"would
corrupt
saint
72
devil
who abandons (144). Bat tlie man prefers to be dependent on his "female kindness (145), though it leads him to all his body and starve luxury, to pamper This love conducts its victim
"
"
the
higher love
unkind of outward soul
evil's"
sorts
his
(146).
same
to
and frantic,
at
the
time
conscious,
For
madness
sworn
I have
art
as
thee
as
Who
black
to
voluntary blindness
of his
to acts
an sees
(148), to
and
complete
to
and
fawning
loves
a
submission
caprices(149) ;
more,
the
more
it
which
(150), to
even
playful,half-serious devotion brutal most enjoyments (151) ; honesty through devotion to one
of
conscience
and
to
to
the
loss
of
whose
kindness, love,
while he
truth,
them Thus
and
constancy
seen
he
had
defended
defence series the
knew
to be
utterlyincapableof
that both of all the
(152).
of sonnets of go regularly love ; and in
it will be
through steps the each, corresponding step is treated in an analogous As the first series begins with the earnest desire to way. immortalize the beauty of the beloved itself in offspring, see one the second so begins with declaringthat beauty is its ofispring bastard. This dead, and despair for the future of beauty is naturally connected with the immorality of this lower love the with murderous, bloody, savage,
scale
"
"
rude, cruel
Gerald
"
"
nature
ascribed
to
to
it in
as are
Sonnet
the
"
124.
Mr.
Massey
of the
wishes
eyes
from
mistress
Sidney'sSonnets
was
the Stella,
"
same
Rich,
their
"
black with
takes
on
the head
of Shakespeare's
golden
to
locks purpose
which
Sidney sings.
speare's Shakein his dramas.
the
to refer to
conceptionof black-eyedwomen
Labour's for
"
Bironin hair
women
Love's
Lost
mourning
put
on
the
false hair
just as the lover speaks in Sonnet 127; and in Shakespeare's earliest play, Titus Andronicus, he Aaron had made needs no say that the only face which paint is the black one"
VULGAE
LOVE
IN
THE
S"l^E^p,.., "RN\A.
hue,
hue.
/3
Coal
In
black
it
is better than
scorns
another
another
that
to
bear
Thus, for
became the
certain
new
purposes fashion of
"
a a
hope, but
despair
not
the
face, like
"
creatures," but the mourning retrospect of a barren **egret, The idea of Sonnet solacing itself with present licence. out 128 is borrowed of his by Ben Jonson, Every Man Fastidious Brisk Humour, iii. 3, where says of his lady and sweet her lute, You the subject of her see fingersthere.
"
Oh,
...
she
tickles
it
so
that
she
makes
it
laugh
most
a
divinely.
thousand in another
I have
wished
times."
The
earlyplay of
One
doth
as
provoke
to
Murder's Poison
to lust
are
flame hands
smoke.
and
treason
the
of sin.
It is to
sonnets
remorse
be
noticed and
that
occur
the two
in the the
most the
same
directly religious
series. the For lower
(129
criminal
146)
second
of conscience
as
holds
place in
As such
so
love
are
passions in
to
higher.
are
passions
for
to
obstacles and
the
them,
purposes
love,
sorrow
obstacles
the
that
of a guiltylove. Again, it will be noticed progress in the imaginativestage of this lower love, conscience
againstthe
stage
the conscience
-on
animal has
tests proin whereas its ideal passionsonly ; to protest in generalagainst the care
at
lavished
the
body
when
the
expense
of the
soul.
For
as
higher love,
does
"
virtues,so
every
idealized, expands into political the lower love, when idealized, ramify into
eye, and
lust
one
of the of
pride
sonnet
"
of life."
Sonnet
146
reminds
Sidney's last
me,
Leave
And Grow
thou, my
rich in that
taketh
rust
Whatever
pleasurebrings.
imitated from the close of phraseology seems This blisful regno Chaucer's Canterbury Tales : may and the glorie by men purchace by poverte espirituel, loweness, the plente of joye by hunger an 4 thurst, and And its
"
74
PHILOSOPHY
OP
shakespeaee's
sonnets.
reste
by
travaile,
and
tlie
lif
by
detb
and
mortificacioun
of
synne."
Some
have find
seen,
of in in
these
some
later of latest
sonnets
find
their earliest
parallels,
dramas
;
as
we
others
we
them
his
Thus,
to
Sonnet
147
may
compare
Coriolanas's
"
affections
are
sick
man's
appetite,
increase
who
desires evil.
that
most
Which
would
his
While of
Sonnet Catherine
149 in
finds
curiously
VIII.
^
exact
parallel
29
"
in
speech
King
Henrij
Which
of
to
ii., 4,
friends
your
Have He
That
were
not
strove
love,
?
although
What
your
knew
of did
mine had
to
friend
anger,
mine
I
Continue He
was
in
liking?
Nay,
gave
notice
from
thence
discharged.
Perhaps
be
these,
may the that their
and be
sonnets
several taken
other
parallelisms
an
might
position com-
produced,
of
as
indication
was
over
long
was
period
not meant
of
time,
order
and of
the
order
arrangement
as
the
to
composition.
they
were
all
illustrate
some
special
would
phase
all
philosophical place,
them
and
system,
it
true
they
be
an
naturally
for the
would
easy
task
poet
give
their
arrangement.
CONCLUSION.
75
CHAPTER
VIII.
CONCLUSION.
autobiographical. It may be at racter chathat they paint the poet's ideas and conceded once his sentiments of what that they give us a good notion ; would have been in given situations. But the situations themselves, are they imaginary, or are they real ? Are for the framework devices to serve as they merely dramatic receive Can we true ? sentiments, or are they historically
are
THE
now question
once
more
how arises,
to be
considered
Sonnets
still to
as
true
histories
of the
we
poet, his
have in
friend, and
Sonnets
to take
mistress
If so,
should
explain the
the framework
to
directlycontradictory statements
It
more
natural
of the Sonnets
devised
progress
are
of love to the
But
the the
great outlines
may
own a
be true. actual
true
of imaginary, still multitudes and opinionsare The sentiments thoughts, and they may hold in
of the facts of his life. It
solution would be
many
statement
detail is necessary for the easy to say that whatever be classed among the inventions development of the theme may is not so necessary ia of the poet ; while whatever the
'
,
own
death
in Sonnet of
a
74,
the
of such a application For of instance, talking his dead calls poet body
the
coward
conquest
did he
wretch's
knife."
while
"
he
was
been in
stabbed, and
write
this sonnet
lame I, made by Again, in Sonnet 37 he says, and in Sonnet dearest spite Fortune's 89, Speak of my ; Are we to conclude lameness, and I straightwill halt." tions indicalame ? that he was Again, there are many really
danger
"
"
of time
in the
sonnets.
In
Sonnet
2 he
JSixes on
the
76
of
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAEESPEARE's
SONNETS.
age
with
forty as
In Sonnet
that 62
wliicli he
digs deep
"
trenches
heated
in and
field.
calls himself
beauty's chopped
the
autumn
reached least
an
forty
years
the
other
hand
when,
and
after
absence
and
renews
autumn
his
since he first knew him. Now years born in 1564, he was forty years old should have
1604, and
before
"
his about
sonnets
begun
handed
some
three about in
years
1600.
the
Yet
H.
they were
of
MS. Earl
before-l598. If
of
W.
Thorpe's
"
dedication
"
is the
friend of the first Southampton, or if he was the series of sonnets, Shakespeare had the already attained with him highest grade of ideal friendship by 1596, for he
dedicated
had known
and
Adonis the
to him
in
1593, and
during
1598.
smell
1596.
about
*'
There
indications
long play of
acted
last
Sonnet
occurs
94,
in
Lilies that
far
worse
than
weeds
the
III.,sometimes
was
attributed in
to
speare. Shake-
This been
play
in is
published
in
or
1596,
The
after
having
which
in divers
places
1594
one
London. 1595.
It was, Earl of
therefore,
probably written
the line
occurs
speech in
in
which
the
of Warwick
approves
"
of his
Salisbury,for
It consists that sin
suit.
to show
or an
of the and
sinner. form
Each of the
reason
knowledge aphorism,
the
Panza's
we
of Sancho one speech therefore,a place where proverbs. It is, whole for author and where an originality, of open plagiarism. It is more line was quoted from Shakespeare's his private 1595 known or among afterwards adopted by Shakespeare
or
should
look
-would
scorn
this 1594
it was
play.
of
Yet
in 1 594
1595,
when
he
was
only about
thirty years
father, scored
decrepit
of
time,
therefore,seem
dramatic
to be
imaginary, and
of the
poem.
to form
part
of the
framework
Once
more,
Sonnets
CONCLUSION.
77
another
in
78-86
are
devoted
is
to
one
poet,
to
who
supposed
Sonnet been have
"
to
his
friend's his
affection. friend
78 declares
so
"
that
and frequent,
notorious, that
him,
But
and the
begun
the
same
imitate
patron.
in
parison com-
poet
with
competitor, to
"
whom,
he whom
a
attributes he
"
boat
heavy ignorance," "learning,""grace," "majesty" (78) calls "a worthier pen" (79), "a better spirit," of tall buildingand of goodly pride in comparison
own
his
"
dumbness
and
"
and
"
"
to his
"
own
worthless
boat," and
"
saucy
bark
rior infe-
had to have phrases which Fuller seems in mind he told of Shakespeare and Ben when Jonson's 81 and 82 contests he (80) ; and, though in Sonnets to seems others, jealous of many imply that he was "both expression at the end of the latter yet an your he shows that has only one competitor. This poets with strained of rhetoric touches competitor wrote to kindle (82) ; he buried the life he strove (83) ; his of praise" were "comments "charactered with golden and all the filed." He Muses quill, precious phrase by able was an spirit," writing in polishedform of wellrefined pen borne was (85). His "great verse" along under his spirit was proud full sail ; by spirits taught above aided to write peers a mortal by "compitch;" he was afllable familiar by an by night ghost which nightly gulled him with intelligence" (86). These details less distinctly to Marlowe to point more in the seem or character of Dr. Faustus, aided by Mephistopheles. Now Marlowe killed in 1593. The of jealousyrefer sonnets was to a period of absence comprising part of the third year of the friendship which if therefore, they commemorate ; and take the contain indications be to we historical,we they that between 1590 must and 1592 Shakespeare's suppose dear friend and Sonnets to some patron had gained such the that all notoriety, poets of the day imitated them, and of the monopoly of his friend's favour, and tried to rob him of them, Marlowe, succeeded that one in so doing. This is to historians, and a piece of history completely unknown bred only in the seething brains of the historical commentators the Sonnets. When on Shakespeare published his far
to
his
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
"
78
Venus
PHILOSOPHY
OP
Shakespeare's
lie
sonnets.
and
Adonis
in
1593,
poet. "If the first heir never "prove deformed, I shall it yieldme still so a land, for fear
. . .
barren This
harvest."
neither
as a
in
in manuscript had he print nor a dramatist) poet (as distinct from the indications Each of the detail may
sonnets
Hence
be the whole
of of
jealousycannot
some
historical.
be
to
true
an
one,
but
compilationrefers only
ginary ima-
being.
It
a
Shakespeare had
1593. In 1592 Joliannes had
attained
certain
Robert
Greene
the him
was
the
absolute
Fac-totum,
characterized
In
only Shakeas a
in the
out
country," and
in stolen Blackfriars
daw
dressed
feathers.
1589
he
was
already a partner
by
Nash
as a
in
the
Theatre, and
shifting companion, born to the trade he had left to busy himself of Noverint, which with the of art, though he could endeavours Latinize his scarcely had therefore devoted himself to the study neck- verse, and of Seneca's ten tragedies, published in English in 1585,
attacked whence he stole
many "whole
good
"
to
see
what said he
use
Shakespeare
In
sentence
Nash
stole.
Sonnet
he laments
"
that
to
behold
And
In
Sonnet
"
67
he
complains
rnature
of
the
degeneracy
of
his
countrymen
bankrupt is,
Beggar'd In
has "A
of .blood to blush
through livelyveins.
King Henry
ruined the
complains
up with the
that
Wolsey
"
reflection It
beggar's
to
see
outworths
noble's
blood."
is in
curious
strong
the
Shakespeare,how anxious he was to prove his descent, and With of his ancestors. the "worship him, a gentleman whatever born is something better than a gentleman made self-made he had a far deeper he had for the honour man, who not only deserved but inherited sympathy for the man
"
CONCLUSION-.
79
his
honours.
We
find
most
Edward
II., but
of
to
productions
answer
the
feeling in Marlowe's strongly perhaps in the. Catholic Andreas as Philopater's day, such
the
same
Elizabeth's
Proclamation
of
November
against Elizabeth, which of English exiles. the representations be placed on More reliance,then, can
the Fifth's Bull
was
founded
the
expressionof
of
opinions
Yet
there
in
are
the
some
Sonnets
than
on
the
indication
facts.
to.
there,
...
myself a motley Most that I have true it is, Askance and strangely.
. .
to the
view.
on
look'd
"
truth
O, for my
The
sake
do
you
with
guilty goddess of
did
not
better
public
comes
means, it that
my for my which my
fortune
public manners
name
breeds.
a
receives
brand.
"
(111)
be player cannot for the But when search misunderstood. we meaning of such Sonnets 107, 124, 125, which as apparently teem with obtain such allusions to facts,we no can certainty. Mr. Gerald Massey has very ingeniouslyexplained Sonnet \ \ 107 as a song of triumph for the death of Elizabeth, and of Southampton from the consequent deliverance the Tower. But all the Sonnet its place much better when fits into these supposed allusions are not of specialfacts, interpreted, of love. but of the general circumstances Not his own fears (of death diviningeyes" of ending all love) nor the The
references
here
to
his
callingof
"
"
the
old
poets mentioned
dead
can
in
Sonnet
106, which
into his
to to
come
had
"ladies
and
set
a
lovely knights"
definite
terra to
figures of
love, which
an
friend,
been
supposed to be doomed the dying moon has emerged of the gloomy prognostications Uncertainty is now changed
stage of
love
end.
eclipse,and the have proved wrong. augurs into certainty, and this advanced
an
from
her
promises
endless
balmy
young
time
fresh
spite
love's
of
because,
shall be tombs
in my
monument
after
brazen
of
80
PHILOSOPHY
OP
SHAKESPEAEE's
Without
facts
SONNETS.
tyrants
even
are
Mr.
if the in
wasted
away.
either
nying dethat
poet had
those
in them
his
mind, he expressed
into
a
them
general terms,
melting
it
was
down
vehicle
for the
express.
philosophy
which
his
principalobject to
that
Again, when
in Sonnet
124
he declares
his love
Suffers not in smiling? pomp, nor falls the blow Under of thralled discontent, Whereto the inviting time our fashion calls,
and
ends
with
as calling
his witnesses
The fools of time
as
Which
die for
goodness
he
speaks
as or
if
he
and which
his
was
friend
belonged
to
that
the
"fashion"
faction
and
discontented
with
of consequently liable to the thraldom prison life. But he may be speaking only generally, and that love never true suffers by such thraldom. asserting The fools of time be of Essex's conspirators men may be also faction, as Mr. Massey thinks ; but they may which subsist only for selfish ends, and friendships, politic die in an atmosphere of truth and honour, false loves as that true of which he one distinguishedfrom sings in Sonnet Love's not Time'-s fool." 116, Again, the opening 125 seems to speak of some of Sonnet specialpageant in which the poet "bore laid "great bases the canopy," and which for eternity," at once collapsed perhaps through for the sonnet the treacheryof some concludes with spy,
"
Government,
"
"
an
upon
are
the
so
"
suborned
informer."
whatever guesses
terms to
that general,
can
they
lead
we
make, they
look for
have
to
the
us
cannot
serve
absolutelytell
to illustrate
a
known
tion only indicate in what direcfacts of Shakespeare'slife, of the details. They any history,not to discover
unknown.
Still
many
curious
will
instance. Sonnet
a
14
suggests
:
that
he
had
before children
paintingof
his
friend
after
saying that
would
CONCLUSION.
81
be mucli
of him
than
his
*'
on,
the
So should
this,Time's
in inward
pencil,or
worth
nor
you
live
yourselfin
Children
are
lines
with
which
they
drawn
lines of than
life ;
the the
of the
parent
he says
better
"
and
his "outward
fair,"or
"
poet's pen
worth."
was
When
this
if he had
the the
he his
been
"
pencil
Time's
referred
master
like GiuHo
Romano,
he himself would
of whom
" had says in the Winter^s Tale that and could put breath into his work, he eternity,
beguileNature of her custom, so perfectlyis he her ape." Again he speaks of his friend "growing" (18), Time lines or being grafted (15) "to by eternal to the poet's and to the an expressionequallyapplicable and concludes lines, painter's
"
"
"
So So
can breathe, or eyes can long as men long lives this,and this gives life to
see. thee
"
"
men's
breath
can
recite in
the
poet's,or
24 he
their says
see
the
lines. painter's
Again
Sonnet
Mine
eye hath
hath
stelled
heart.
Burbage, or
angel
like ?
Dante,
who,
he drew
man
"
gives us
when he every
to understand
was
run
through
Sonnets.
art
are
and the
by
none."
of Shakespeare's biographicaluses without They suggest, answering, questions on matters of fact. covering disThey illustrate the known, without And unknown facts. they furnish a certain key his inmost sentiments and to of perthoughts on numbers sonal, and even social, artistic, political, questions. religious of that philosophy of his which made They are a manual him, in the estimation of the person who wrote his epitaph.
Such, then,
82
PHILOSOPHY
OF
SHAKESPEARE's
SONNETS.
and over ingenio. They ouglit to be read over they avowedly again, in the lightof the philosophy which profess. They will be found to illustrate and fall in with the thoughts of the deepest writers on the subject of love. in the world When but St. Augustine says "There are two loves, the love of God extending to the contempt the love of self extending to the of self,and contempt of God," he gives the ultimate expression of the whole Socrates
scope
of the
our
Sonnets.
Old those
writers
who have
and
come
new,
those
after
to
who if in
poet and
his
have
been
him,
run
chosen
theme,
forced
of stating ; for this love philosophy is a way groove nature the realities of human one can no ; and say that the enabled Shakespeare to store, to arrange, to system which
economize,
and
to
exhibit
his
marvellous out
humanity is a system that has gone philosophy which has been exploded.
knowledge of date, or
of
a
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