Read Daniel[1]--the admirable Daniel--in his
"Civil Wars," and "Triumphs of Hymen."
The style and language are just such as any very pure and manly writer of
the present day--Wordsworth, for example--would use; it seems quite modern
in comparison with the style of Shakspeare. Ben Jonson's blank verse is
very masterly and individual, and perhaps Massinger's is even still nobler.
In Beaumont and Fletcher it is constantly slipping into lyricisms.
I believe Shakspeare was not a whit more intelligible in his own day than
he is now to an educated man, except for a few local allusions of no
consequence. As I said, he is of no age--nor, I may add, of any religion,
or party, or profession. The body and substance of his works came out of
the unfathomable depths of his own oceanic mind: his observation and
reading, which was considerable, supplied him with the drapery of his
figures.[2]
[Footnote 1:
"This poet's well-merited epithet is that of the '_well-languaged Daniel_;'
but, likewise, and by the consent of his contemporaries, no less than of
all succeeding critics, the 'prosaic Daniel.' Yet those who thus designate
this wise and amiable writer, from the frequent incorrespondency of his
diction with his metre, in the majority of his compositions, not only deem
them valuable and interesting on other accounts, but willingly admit that
there are to be found throughout his poems, and especially in his
_Epistles_ and in his _Hymen's Triumph_, many and exquisite specimens of
that style, which, as the neutral ground of prose and verse, is common to
both.
Pages:
425
426
427
428
429
430
431
432
433
434
435
436
437
438
439
440
441
442
443
444
445
446
447
448
449