in eager, mounting youth this was Shakespeare's own choice: Prince
Arthur in "King John" longs to be a shepherd: and this crowned saint has
the same desire. From boyhood to old age Shakespeare preferred the "life
removed":
"O God, methinks it were a happy life
To be no better than a homely swain;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials quaintly point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run;
How many make the hour full complete;
How many hours bring about the day;
How many days will finish up the year;
How many years a mortal man may live.
* * * * *
So minutes, hours, days, months, and years,
Passed over to the end they were created,
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave."
All this it seems to me is as finely characteristic of the gentle
melancholy of Shakespeare's youth as Jaques' bitter words are of the
deeper melancholy of his manhood:
"And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot
And thereby hangs a tale."
The "Third Part of Henry VI." leads one directly to "Richard III." It
was Coleridge's opinion that Shakespeare "wrote hardly anything of this
play except the character of Richard. He found the piece a stock play
and re-wrote the parts which developed the hero's character; he
certainly did not write the scenes in which Lady Anne yielded to the
usurper's solicitations." In this instance Coleridge's positive opinion
deserves to be weighed respectfully. At the time when "Richard III." was
written Shakespeare was still rather a lyric than a dramatic poet, and
Coleridge was a good judge of the peculiarities of his lyric style. Of
course, Professor Dowden, too, is in doubt whether "Richard III." should
be ascribed to Shakespeare. He says: "Its manner of conceiving and
presenting character has a certain resemblance, not elsewhere to be
found in Shakespeare's writings, to the ideal manner of Marlowe. As in
the plays of Marlowe, there is here one dominant figure distinguished by
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