to moderate as well as to the highest talents; and distinguished men of at least two previous ages had attempted explanations of the obscurities of the great poet, or often mystified what they could not successfully explain. Ample room yet remained for trials of skill by others. Every discussion added to the fame of the subject. But simple admiration was deemed insufficient without comment. Several therefore wrote upon him who were little entitled to write upon anything—and as the worm thrives upon the carcase of the author, critics sought their peculiar nutriment or distinction by fastening and fattening upon his fame.
Time has so little diminished this passion, or rather mania, that it has grown nearly to a literary nuisance. Editors and commentators upon Shakspeare appear at every turn in all societies. In the club-house we meet three or four of a morning; in the park, see them meditating by the Serpentine, or under a tree in Kensington Gardens; no dinner table is without one or two; in the theatre you view them by dozens. Volume after volume is poured out in note, comment, conjecture, new reading, statement or mis-statement, contradiction, or variation of all kinds.
Reviews, magazines, and newspapers, repeat these with so little mercy on the reader, as to give occasional emendations of their own. Some descant upon his sentiments, some upon his extravagances, some upon his wonderful creations or flights of imagination, some upon his language or phraseology. Several suppose that he wrote more plays than he acknowledged; others, that he fathered more than he had written. While the last opinions are still more original and
