...effect of the work is weakened. Notes are often necessary, but they are necessary evils.' Shakspeare was the man who, of all modern, and perhaps ancient...them, not laboriously, but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it—you feel it too. Those who accuse him to 2 have wanted learning give...

...justly ranks high among the prose writers of English literature. " To begin with Shakspeare. He is the man, who, of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets,...them not laboriously, but luckily ; when he describes any thing, you more than see it — you feel it. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give...

...verses addressed to Flet- haps ancient, poets, had the largest and cher, has the assurance to say, — most comprehensive soul. All the images of nature were still present to him, and !le' I"*"5" the™ "°; laboriously but luekily : when he describes any thmg. But the suffrage of Jonson...

...poet, author He was not of an age, but for all time! Ben Jonson (1573-1637) English dramatist, poet He was the man who, of all modern, and perhaps ancient...poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul. John Dryden (1631-1700) English poet, dramatist A quibble is to Shakespeare what luminous vapours are...

...dramatist.64 In the "Essay of Dramatic Poesy," for instance, Dryden writes of Shakespeare as the author who "of all Modern, and perhaps Ancient Poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul."65 The usage appeared in the fourteenth century and continued through most of the eighteenth...

...Fletcher, his rivals in poesy: and one of them, in my opinion, at least his equal, perhaps his superior, To begin, then, with Shakespeare, He was the man who...them, not laboriously, but luckily: when he describes any thing, you more than see it, you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give...

...was yet not rectified, nor his allusions understood; yet then did Dryden pronounce that Shakespeare 'was the man, who, of all modern and perhaps ancient...them not laboriously, but luckily. When he describes any thing, you more than see it, you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give...

...English Poetry" (II, 4), while Dryden, in the encomium in the Essay of Dramatic Poesy, commends him as "the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets had the largest and most comprehensive soul" — "soul" being the seat of inspiration and thus of poetic greatness. Such eulogizing presents Shakespeare...

...advanced as being 'natural' against the regulatory and formulaic Corneille and other French writers: To begin then with Shakespeare. He was the man who,...him, and he drew them not laboriously, but luckily. . . . Those who accuse him to have wanted learning give him the greater commendation. He was naturally...

...acknowledgement of a Shakespearean archetype. We are in some sense back with Dryden's claim that Shakespeare: 'was the man who of all Modern, and perhaps Ancient...comprehensive soul. All the Images of Nature were present to him, and he drew them not laboriously, but luckily'." I will now turn to another species...