and a king whose 'crown is call'd content;' and again says, "What God will, that let your king perform; He has no will of his own; with a prophetic eye he looks into the future, and dies with a prayer on his lips, beseeching forgiveness for himself and his murderer. Death throws a halo of glory over his troubled life. His last moments bear witness to a great strength of soul, which is altogether turned inwards, to complete abnegation and the renunciation of all mere worldly interests; these he has acquired through the sufferings of his earthly existence. Herein may be found the deep ethical truth which this last part of the trilogy unfolds before us. In such times, as are here described, man is not complete master of himself, because the ground upon which he is standing is unsteady, and because he is but a single member of a thoroughly diseased organism. In such times it is only a mighty spirit sent by God that can restore order; as long as this higher messenger does not appear, evil must continue to rage until it has consumed itself. Henry, after having, by his own weakness and inactivity, himself been the cause of the mischief, then becomes an example to all, to bear the consequences nobly. The man who, in such times, does not feel himself animated by the higher spirit, had better suffer than act; he ought to look upon the times as a visitation from God, and to resign himself in calm hope; he ought, by submitting to it, to rise above the vanity and transitoriness of this earthly existence; he ought to suffer, and suffers justly, because he cannot act, that is, he cannot act truly and morally where in the general state of corruption, right and wrong, good and evil appear wrought into an inextricable knot. Who can presume to decide whether York or Lancaster is in the right? Is it not more likely that both are in the wrong, and hence that all those who support the one or the other side are wrong also! Such relations are not only of occasional occurrence in history; they are met with every day, more particularly where nations are in a state of discord, rebellion and civil war. For contending factions are invariably in the wrong, because they could never have come into collision without their having disturbed and disorganised Church and State-which rank higher than they do-and consequently without their having separated themselves from the moral foundations of human existence. And the more extensive the quarrel becomes, the more that it embraces all life-a firm standpoint becoming a matter of impossibility -the less should the individual man presume to come to a determination of his own; he ought then humbly to leave history and a higher guidance to untie the knot and to pass the verdict. Because wholly wanting in this humility, Margaret, after a short glimmer of good fortune, ruins herself, her husband, and her son. And because the latter and young Rutland, as beardless boys, venture precociously into the mighty torrent of fatal events which they hardly understood, they are justly swallowed up by the powerful elements. Further, because York would not rest satisfied in his own sphere, he falls beneath the cruel hands of his enemies, and soon after him the unhappy King himself pays the penalty for not having at the outset done that which he ought to have done, namely, to resign the office which he had neither the power nor the right to maintain. Again, because Warwick the King-maker, in proud arrogance, believed himself called upon to play the judge, where he ought prudently to have awaited his verdict, his life comes to an end after all his endeavours and efforts have proved of no avail. Clifford, Somerset, Oxford and others meet with an untimely end, because they supported a party where right and wrong fluctuated in indecision, and where in reality both sides were in the wrong. Edward IV., because he was not able to control himself, much less able to manage the difficult circumstances of restoring order in the distracted state, and further, because he presumed to undertake what he is incapable of performing, is precipitated from the throne which he had scarcely mounted, and although restored to it, we hear from his brother's (Richard's) words, that he will not long maintain possession of it. Lastly, the same fate (at the end of the drama) hangs over the heads of Lady Grey and her family, because they had allowed themselves to be persuaded to assume a place in history, to which neither she nor her lineage possessed any right or qualification. Accordingly, in all three parts we have a reflection of the same law, of the same conception of history, which again is but a modification of the fundamental theme of the whole trilogy; all the parts gather round one central point and arrange themselves into one great whole.' At the end of the trilogy Richard, afterwards the Third, comes conspicuously into the foreground. He, the terribly consistent villain, wholly ignorant of pity, love, and fear, an outcast of nature, and born to be an executioner, he it is who, in reality, alone remains in the possession of full and vigorous strength-as the dregs of the antidote to the poisoned age - and introduces the last act of the great tragedy. Let us again take a survey of the whole trilogy, the construction of which I have endeavoured to sketch. We have history represented in its degeneration into civil war, which is the consequence of the original disturbanc of its course and of the general demoralisation which increases with it. This is the theme upon which the whole trilogy is based, and which exhibits the two sides of life according to Shakspeare's conception. The three parts then show the principal stages in the development of such a state of things. History, when so degenerate, first of all casts out those that are good and noble but who are nevertheless not wholly unaffected by the spirit of their age, and at the same time shows that the great and pure are not understood and that they cannot keep themselves entirely pure. This is exhibited in the First Part by the events belonging to it (and hence, because appropriate here only, Shakspeare introduces Talbot's death into this first part in violation of the laws of chronology). History then continues falling into a wild state of chaos, where right and wrong flow into one another and can no longer be distinguished, and consequently where the bad and the good, or, to speak more correctly, the bad and those that are less bad alo drawn into the general vortex. This is the second stage VOL. II. T of which we have a representation in the Second Part. Having arrived at this climax, history demands that man shall not interfere with its course, and refrain from having any determination of his own, and that he shall leave all action to that man whom it has itself chosen to restore order. It therefore punishes every uncalled-for interference as unauthorised presumption, whereas the submissive spirit is inwardly exalted and glorified through suffering and death. This is the thought which connects the events of the Third Part into an organic unity. CHAPTER X. RICHARD III. THE fifth act of the great tragedy, that is, the play of King Richard III.' will not require a long discussion, for the significance of the piece is clear from our previous disquisition, and the celebrated character of Richard has been discussed, criticised, and examined from so many points of view, that I have but little to add. Hazlitt, also, who, after Coleridge, is one of England's best æsthetic critics, merely analyses the characters, and speaks incidentally of the great actor, Edward Kean. I shall, therefore, leave the reader to collect what is best from the chief commentators and critics.* But I must here observe that however successful and lifelike, however many-sided and extraordinary a character may be, it cannot of itself constitute a dramatic work of art. Characterisation is but one particular function of dramatic poetry; it is very important, but still not the first and highest object. It stands in the same relation to the entire organism as a portrait to an historical painting. In the latter every figure ought to be a living portrait full of individual reality, but receives its true significance only from its position and from its relation to the other figures; accordingly, the interaction of the several parts among one another, and their cooperation in the action represented, gives the picture its historical character. It is precisely the same with a dramatic composition, because it is so in real life. When viewed in this * My German readers I refer to Rötscher, Vischer and Gervinus, but more especially to W. Oechelhäuser, who (Jahrb. d. D. Shakspeare Gesellschaft, vol. iii.) has recently most thoroughly examined the character of Richard III. from all points, and not merely as he stands n the drama which bears his name, but also as he appears in the two last parts of Henry VI. |