grows out of the soil where it is rooted, uncontrouled, uncouth and wild, uncramped by any of the meannesses of custom. It is "of the earth, earthy." It seems almost to have been dug out of the ground, with a soul instinctively superadded to it answering to its wants and origin. Vulgarity is not natural coarseness, but conventional coarseness, learnt from others, contrary to, or without an entire conformity of natural power and disposition; as fashion is the common-place affectation of what is elegant and refined without any feeling of the essence of it. Schlegel, the admirable German critic on Shakespear, observes that Caliban is a poetical character, and " "always speaks in blank verse." He first comes in thus: "Caliban. As wicked dew as e'er my mother brush'd Drop on you both a south-west blow on ye, Prospero. For this, be sure, to-night thou shalt have cramps, Shall, for that vast of night that they may work, All exercise on thee: thou shalt be pinched As thick as honey-combs, each pinch more stinging Caliban. I must eat my dinner. This island's mine by Sycorax my mother, Which thou tak'st from me. When thou camest first, Thou stroak'dst me, and mad'st much of me; would'st give me Water with berries in't; and teach me how To name the bigger light and how the less That burn by day and night; and then I lov'd thee, And shew'd thee all the qualities o' th' isle, The fresh springs, brine-pits, barren place and fertile : Of Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you! For I am all the subjects that you have, Who first was mine own king; and here you sty me The rest o' th' island." And again, he promises Trinculo his services thus, if he will free him from his drudgery. "I'll shew thee the best springs; I'll pluck thee berries, I'll fish for thee, and get thee wood enough. I pr'ythee let me bring thee where crabs grow, And I with my long nails will dig thee pig-nuts: Shew thee a jay's nest, and instruct thee how In conducting Stephano and Trinculo to Prospero's cell, Caliban shews the superiority of natural capacity over greater knowledge and greater folly; and in a former scene, when Ariel frightens them with his music, Caliban to encourage them accounts for it in the eloquent poetry of the senses. "Be not afraid, the isle is full of noises, Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not. Sometimes a thousand twanging instruments Will hum about mine ears, and sometimes voices, That if I then had waked after long sleep, Would make me sleep again; and then in dreaming, I cried to dream again." The poet This is not more beautiful than it is true. here shews us the savage with the simplicity of a child, and makes the strange monster amiable. Shakespear had to paint the human animal rude and without choice in its pleasures, but not without the sense of pleasure or some germ of the affections. Master Barnardine in Measure for Measure, the savage of civilized life, is an admirable philosophical counterpart to Caliban. Shakespear has, as it were by design, drawn off from Caliban the elements of whatever is ethereal and refined, to compound them in the unearthly mould of Ariel. Nothing was ever more finely conceived than this contrast between the material and the spiritual, the gross and delicate. Ariel is imaginary power, the swiftness of thought personified. When told to make good speed by Prospero, he says, "I drink the air before me." This is something like Puck's boast on a similar occasion, “I'll put a girdle round about the earth in forty minutes." But Ariel differs from Puck in having a fellow feeling in the interests of those he is employed about. How exquisite is the following dialogue between him and Prospero! "Ariel. Your charm so strongly works them, That if you now beheld them, your affections Would become tender. Prospero. Dost thou think so, spirit? Ariel. Mine would, sir, were I human. Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling Of their afflictions, and shall not myself, One of their kind, that relish all as sharply, Passion'd as they, be kindlier moved than thou art ?” It has been observed that there is a peculiar charm in the songs introduced in Shakespear, which, without conveying any distinct images, seem to recall all the feelings connected with them, like snatches of half-forgotten music heard indistinctly and at intervals. There is this effect produced by Ariel's songs, which (as we are told) seem to sound in the air, and as if the person playing them were invisible. We shall give one instance out of many of this general power. "Enter FERDINAND; and ARIEL invisible, playing and singing. ARIEL'S SONG. Come unto these yellow sands, Curt'sied when you have, and kiss'd, (The wild waves whist ;) Foot it featly here and there; And sweet sprites the burden bear. [Burden dispersedly. Hark, hark! bowgh-wowgh: the watch-dogs bark, Bowgh-wowgh. Ariel. Hark, hark! I hear The strain of strutting chanticleer Cry cock-a-doodle-doo. Ferdinand. Where should this music be? i' the air or the earth? It sounds no more: and sure it waits upon ARIEL'S SONG. Full fathom five thy father lies, Of his bones are coral made : But doth suffer a sea change, Hark! now I hear them, ding-dong bell. [Burden ding-dong. Ferdinand. The ditty does remember my drown'd father. This is no mortal business, nor no sound That the earth owes: I hear it now above me." The courtship between Ferdinand and Miranda is one of the chief beauties of this play. It is the very purity of love. The pretended interference of Prospero with it heightens its interest, and is in character with the magician, whose sense of preternatural power makes him arbitrary, tetchy, and impatient of opposition. The TEMPEST is a finer play than the Midsummer Night's Dream, which has sometimes been compared with it; but it is not so fine a poem. There are a greater number of beautiful passages in the latter. Two of the most striking in the TEMPEST are spoken by Prospero. The one is that admirable one when the vision which he has conjured up disappears, beginning "The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces," etc., which has been so often quoted, that every school-boy knows it by heart; the other is that which Prospero makes in abjuring his art. "Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and groves, And ye Have I made shake, and by the spurs pluck'd up And deeper than did ever plummet sound, We must not forget to mention among other things in this play, that Shakespear has anticipated nearly all the arguments on the Utopian schemes of modern philosophy. "Gonzalo. Had I the plantation of this isle, my lordAntonio. He'd sow it with nettle-seed. Sebastian. Or docks or mallows. Gonzalo. And were the king of it, what would I do? Letters should not be known; wealth, poverty, And use of service, none; contract, succession, No use of metal, corn, or wine, or oil; And women too; but innocent and pure: No sovereignty. Sebastian. And yet he would be king on't. Antonio. The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning. Gonzalo. All things in common nature should produce Without sweat or endeavour. Treason, felony, Sword, pike, knife, gun, or need of any engine Would I not have; but nature should bring forth, Of its own kind, all foizon, all abundance To feed my innocent people! Sebastian. No marrying 'mong his subjects? Sebastian. Save his majesty!" |