Eighteenth Century Essays on Shakespeare Part 15

"But," continues Mr. Upton, "it was a learned age; Roger Ascham a.s.sures us that Queen Elizabeth read more Greek every day, than some _Dignitaries_ of the Church did Latin in a whole week." This appears very probable; and a pleasant proof it is of the general learning of the times, and of Shakespeare in particular. I wonder he did not corroborate it with an extract from her injunctions to her Clergy, that "such as were but _mean Readers_ should peruse over before, once or twice, the Chapters and Homilies, to the intent they might read to the better understanding of the people."

Dr. Grey declares that Shakespeare's knowledge in the Greek and Latin tongues cannot _reasonably_ be called in question. Dr. Dodd supposes it _proved_, that he was not such a novice in learning and antiquity as _some people_ would pretend. And to close the whole, for I suspect you to be tired of quotation, Mr. Whalley, the ingenious Editor of Jonson, hath written a piece expressly on this side the question: perhaps from a very excusable partiality, he was willing to draw Shakespeare from the field of Nature to cla.s.sick ground, where alone, he knew, his Author could possibly cope with him.

These criticks, and many others their coadjutors, have supposed themselves able to trace Shakespeare in the writings of the Ancients; and have sometimes persuaded us of their own learning, whatever became of their Author's. Plagiarisms have been discovered in every natural description and every moral sentiment. Indeed by the kind a.s.sistance of the various _Excerpta_, _Sententiae_, and _Flores_, this business may be effected with very little expense of time or sagacity; as Addison hath demonstrated in his Comment on _Chevy-chase_, and Wagstaff on _Tom Thumb_; and I myself will engage to give you quotations from the elder _English_ writers (for, to own the truth, I was once idle enough to collect such) which shall carry with them at least an equal degree of similarity. But there can be no occasion of wasting any future time in this department: the world is now in possession of the _Marks of Imitation_.

"Shakespeare, however, hath frequent allusions to the _facts_ and _fables_ of antiquity." Granted:-and, as Mat. Prior says, to save the effusion of more Christian ink, I will endeavour to shew how they came to his acquaintance.

It is notorious that much of his _matter of fact_ knowledge is deduced from Plutarch: but in what language he read him, hath yet been the question. Mr. Upton is pretty confident of his skill in the Original, and corrects accordingly the _Errors of his Copyists_ by the Greek standard.

Take a few instances, which will elucidate this matter sufficiently.

In the third act of _Anthony and Cleopatra_, Octavius represents to his Courtiers the imperial pomp of those ill.u.s.trious lovers, and the arrangement of their dominion,

--Unto her He gave the 'stablishment of Egypt, made her Of lower Syria, Cyprus, _Lydia_, Absolute Queen.

Read _Libya_, says the critick _authoritatively_, as is plain from Plutarch, ???t?? ?? ?p?f??e ??e?p?t?a? as???ssa? ????pt?? ?a? ??p??? ?a?

?????S, ?a? ?????? S???a?.

This is very true: Mr. Heath accedes to the correction, and Mr. Johnson admits it into the Text: but turn to the translation, from the French of Amyot, by Thomas North, in _Folio_, 1579; and you will at once see the origin of the mistake.

"First of all he did establish Cleopatra Queene of aegypt, of Cyprus, of _Lydia_, and the lower Syria."

Again in the Fourth Act,

--My messenger He hath whipt with rods, dares me to personal combat, Caesar to Anthony. Let th' old Ruffian know I have many other ways to die; mean time Laugh at his challenge.--

"What a reply is this?" cries Mr. Upton, "'tis acknowledging he should fall under the unequal combat. But if we read,

--Let the old Ruffian know _He_ hath many other ways to die; mean time _I_ laugh at his challenge--

we have the poignancy and the very repartee of Caesar in Plutarch."

This correction was first made by Sir Thomas Hanmer, and Mr. Johnson hath received it. Most indisputably it is the sense of Plutarch, and given so in the modern translations: but Shakespeare was misled by the ambiguity of the old one, "Antonius sent again to challenge Caesar to fight him: Caesar answered, That _he_ had many other ways to die than so."

In the Third Act of _Julius Caesar_, Anthony in his well-known harangue to the people, repeats a part of the Emperor's will,

--To every Roman citizen he gives, To every sev'ral man, seventy-five drachmas-- Moreover he hath left you all his walks, His private arbours, and new-planted orchards, On _this_ side Tyber.--

"Our Author certainly wrote," says Mr. Theobald, "On _that_ side Tyber-

_Trans_ Tiberim-prope Caesaris hortos.

And Plutarch, whom Shakespeare very diligently _studied_, expressly declares that he left the publick his gardens and walks, p??a? t??

??ta??, _beyond_ the _Tyber_."

This emendation likewise hath been adopted by the subsequent Editors; but hear again the old Translation, where Shakespeare's _study_ lay: "He bequeathed unto every citizen of Rome seventy-five drachmas a man, and he left his gardens and arbours unto the people, which he had on _this_ side of the river of Tyber." I could furnish you with many more instances, but these are as good as a thousand.

Hence had our author his characteristick knowledge of Brutus and Anthony, upon which much argumentation for his learning hath been founded: and hence _literatim_ the Epitaph on Timon, which, it was once presumed, he had corrected from the blunders of the Latin version, by his own superior knowledge of the Original.

I cannot, however, omit a pa.s.sage of Mr. Pope. "The _speeches_ copy'd from Plutarch in _Coriola.n.u.s_ may, I think, be as well made an instance of the learning of Shakespeare, as those copy'd from Cicero in _Catiline_, of Ben. Jonson's." Let us inquire into this matter, and transcribe a _speech_ for a specimen. Take the famous one of Volumnia:

Should we be silent and not speak, our raiment And state of bodies would bewray what life We've led since thy Exile. Think with thyself, How more unfortunate than all living women Are we come hither; since thy sight, which should Make our eyes flow with joy, hearts dance with comforts, Constrains them weep, and shake with fear and sorrow; Making the mother, wife, and child to see The son, the husband, and the father tearing His Country's bowels out: and to poor we Thy enmity's most capital; thou barr'st us Our prayers to the G.o.ds, which is a comfort That all but we enjoy. For how can we, Alas! how can we, for our Country pray, Whereto we're bound, together with thy Victory, Whereto we're bound? Alack! or we must lose The Country, our dear nurse; or else thy Person, Our comfort in the Country. We must find An eminent calamity, though we had Our wish, which side shou'd win. For either thou Must, as a foreign Recreant, be led With manacles thorough our streets; or else Triumphantly tread on thy Country's ruin, And bear the palm, for having bravely shed Thy wife and children's blood. For myself, son, I purpose not to wait on Fortune, 'till These wars determine: if I can't persuade thee Rather to shew a n.o.ble grace to both parts, Than seek the end of one; thou shalt no sooner March to a.s.sault thy Country, than to tread (Trust to't, thou shalt not) on thy mother's womb, That brought thee to this world.

I will now give you the old Translation, which shall effectually confute Mr. Pope: for our Author hath done little more than throw the very words of North into blank verse.

"If we helde our peace (my sonne) and determined not to speake, the state of our poore bodies, and present sight of our rayment, would easely bewray to thee what life we haue led at home, since thy exile and abode abroad.

But thinke now with thy selfe, howe much more unfortunately then all the women liuinge we are come hether, considering that the sight which should be most pleasaunt to all other to beholde, spitefull fortune hath made most fearfull to us: making my selfe to see my sonne, and my daughter here, her husband, besieging the walles of his natiue countrie. So as that which is the only comfort to all other in their adversitie and miserie, to pray unto the G.o.ddes, and to call to them for aide, is the onely thinge which plongeth us into most deepe perplexitie. For we cannot (alas) together pray, both for victorie, for our countrie, and for safety of thy life also: but a worlde of grievous curses, yea more than any mortall enemie can heappe uppon us, are forcibly wrapt up in our prayers. For the bitter soppe of most harde choyce is offered thy wife and children, to foregoe the one of the two: either to lose the persone of thy selfe, or the nurse of their natiue contrie. For my selfe (my sonne) I am determined not to tarrie, till fortune in my life time doe make an ende of this warre. For if I cannot persuade thee, rather to doe good unto both parties, then to ouerthrowe and destroye the one, preferring loue and nature before the malice and calamitie of warres: thou shalt see, my sonne, and trust unto it, thou shalt no soner marche forward to a.s.sault thy countrie, but thy foote shall tread upon thy mother's wombe, that brought thee first into this world."

The length of this quotation will be excused for its curiosity; and it happily wants not the a.s.sistance of a Comment. But matters may not always be so easily managed:-a plagiarism from Anacreon hath been detected:

The Sun's a thief, and with his great attraction Robs the vast Sea. The Moon's an arrant thief, And her pale fire she s.n.a.t.c.hes from the Sun.

The Sea's a thief, whose liquid surge resolves The Moon into salt tears. The Earth's a thief, That feeds and breeds by a composture stol'n From gen'ral excrements: each thing's a thief.

"This," says Dr. Dodd, "is a good deal in the manner of the celebrated _drinking Ode_, too well known to be inserted." Yet it may be alleged by those who imagine Shakespeare to have been generally able to think for himself, that the topicks are obvious, and their application is different.-But for argument's sake, let the Parody be granted; and "our Author," says some one, "may be puzzled to prove that there was a Latin translation of Anacreon at the time Shakespeare wrote his _Timon of Athens_." This challenge is peculiarly unhappy: for I do not at present recollect any _other Cla.s.sick_ (if indeed, with great deference to Mynheer De Pauw, Anacreon may be numbered amongst them) that was _originally_ published with _two_ Latin translations.

But this is not all. Puttenham in his _Arte of English Poesie_, 1589, quotes some one of a "reasonable good facilitie in translation, who finding _certaine_ of Anacreon's Odes very well translated by Ronsard the French poet-comes our Minion, and translates the same out of French into English": and his strictures upon him evince the publication. Now this identical Ode is to be met with in Ronsard! and as his works are in few hands, I will take the liberty of transcribing it:

La terre les eaux va boivant, L'arbre la boit par sa racine, La mer salee boit le vent, Et le Soleil boit la marine.

Le Soleil est beu de la Lune, Tout boit soit en haut ou en bas: Suivant ceste reigle commune, Pourquoy donc ne boirons-nous pas?-Edit. Fol. p. 507.

I know not whether an observation or two relative to our Author's acquaintance with Homer be worth our investigation. The ingenious Mrs.

Lenox observes on a pa.s.sage of _Troilus and Cressida_, where Achilles is roused to battle by the death of Patroclus, that Shakespeare must _here_ have had the _Iliad_ in view, as "the old Story, which in many places he hath faithfully copied, is absolutely silent with respect to this circ.u.mstance."

And Mr. Upton is positive that the _sweet oblivious Antidote_, inquired after by Macbeth, could be nothing but the _Nepenthe_ described in the _Odyssey_,

??pe???? t? ?????? te, ?a??? ?p?????? ?p??t??.

I will not insist upon the Translations by Chapman; as the first Editions are without date, and it may be difficult to ascertain the exact time of their publication. But the _former_ circ.u.mstance might have been learned from Alexander Barclay; and the _latter_ more fully from Spenser than from Homer himself.

"But Shakespeare," persists Mr. Upton, "hath some _Greek Expressions_."

Indeed!-"We have one in _Coriola.n.u.s_,