THE MIND OF SHAKESPERE
an impulsive judgment which craves expression, but which we stifle because we did not expect it. And a few seconds later perhaps some unconsidering person says the very thing, and wins a prompt acclaim.
Is there not a hint of Shakspere in this? To be sure, he was no child, but a mature man, educated to some extent in the knowledge of his time, if not in the profundities of modern scholarship. His associates were probably better educated than he, and his daily conference with them must have subjected his thought to a thousand influences of wisdom which we shall never be able to trace specifically among his "sources." Yet with all this maturity, can we not imagine a grown person with whom for the most part expression has remained an instantaneous reflex of experience, who sees true habitually, as we less child-like folk do occa-
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