It must be maintained, then, that, so far as the Sonnets are concerned, evidence on the whole is wanting of Shakespeare's faith in the tenets of orthodox Christianity. With the Sonnets before us it is doubtful whether we can fairly admit, with due regard for truth, that he regarded the Christian faith with "distant and imaginative reverence." But if this were admitted no further concession could be easily allowed. It is possible, however, to indicate certain theological or philosophical tenets which Shakespeare seems to have regarded with more or less of approval, though obviously the subject requires to be approached with caution and reserve.

CHAPTER XI.

PHILOSOPHY IN THE SONNETS.

ADDRESSING ourselves to the inquiry, then, with all due caution, we shall perhaps find grounds for thinking that Shakespeare accepted, with more or less definiteness, three philosophical doctrines, forming together a system of some completeness (1) The doctrine of the Anima Mundi, the Soul of the World; (2) the doctrine of Necessity; (3) the doctrine of the Cycles. So far as the Sonnets are concerned there are clear indications of (1) and (3); and the third implies the second. These doctrines, it is true, are not tenets of the Christian faith; but, as Dean Plumptre has justly observed, Shakespeare's philosophy "is not a Christian view of life and death. The ethics of Shakespeare are no more Christian, in any real sense of the word, than those of Sophocles or Goethe."

"1

The first of the doctrines just indicated is obviously contained in Sonnet 107, which speaks of—

"The prophetic soul

Of the wide world dreaming on things to come."

These words could scarcely be looked upon as a mere poetical embellishment, even if they stood alone; but this is by no means the fact. We are here concerned mainly with the Sonnets; but the evidence of the Plays may be used as subsidiary and illustrative. Thus, with regard to the "prophetic soul" of the world, may be adduced a remarkable passage in Richard III., Act ii. sc. 3, lines 41-44

1 Commentary on Ecclesiastes, Appendix, "Shakespeare and Koheleth."

"Before the days of change, still is it so ;
By a divine instinct men's minds mistrust
Ensuing danger; as, by proof, we see

The water swell before a boist'rous storm."

Shakespeare has been regarded as having borrowed here from Holinshed, who says "Before such great things, men's hearts of a secret instinct of nature misgive them, as the sea without wind swelleth of himself some time before a tempest." And a connection has been suggested with St. Luke xxi. 25, 26, where the Evangelist speaks of "the sea and the waves roaring; men's hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth." Such allusion and suggestion are probable enough; but it is observable that the "secret instinct of nature," of which Holinshed speaks, has been transformed into a "divine instinct" by Shakespeare, the latter expression being obviously a closer approach towards "the wide world's prophetic soul" as spoken of in the Sonnet. In this connection may also be remembered the various instances of forebodings to be found in Shakespeare, as well as the dreams and apparitions which come as precursors of following evils. There are in Hamlet notable examples. In relation to the "grand commission" of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, and the embassy to England, there was in Hamlet's heart" a kind of fighting that would not let him sleep" (Act v. sc. 2). Similarly, when the hour for the final catastrophe has come, he says, "Thou wouldst not think how ill all's here about my heart; but it is no matter." "It is but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving as would perhaps trouble a woman” (Ibid.). These and the like we may take as instances of "the prophetic soul of the world" speaking in and through the individual; and, so far as Hamlet himself is concerned, such indications are accordant also with the fact that he is the creature of destiny, kept back by an invisible restraint, and able to act only when his "fate cries out," or otherwise

It would be easy to

gives the sign and scope for action. derive illustration, in like manner, from Macbeth, who also appears as the puppet of the invisible. But, passing this by, the reader's attention may be called to a very noteworthy passage in the Second Part of Henry IV., Act iii. sc. 1, line 45 seq. Here, moreover, the doctrine of the cycles and the necessary sequence of events in the world comes before us together with that of the foreboding of the prophetic soul:

"K. Hen. O God! that one might read the book of fate, And see the revolution of the times

Make mountains level, and the continent,

Weary of solid firmness, melt itself

Into the sea! and, other times, to see

The beachy girdle of the ocean

Too wide for Neptune's hips; how chances mock,
And changes fill the cup of alteration

With divers liquors. O, if this were seen,

The happiest youth, viewing his progress through,

What perils past, what crosses to ensue,

Would shut the book, and sit him down and die."

King Henry then relates that ten years had not passed since his predecessor, Richard, and the Earl of Northumberland were, in fullest friendship, feasting together. Two years later Northumberland had become the bosom friend of Henry himself, having fallen out with Richard, "giving him defiance." Then Henry tells how Richard had made a certain prophetic speech:

"Northumberland, thou ladder, by the which

My cousin Bolingbroke ascends my throne;'
Though then, Heaven knows, I had no such intent;
But that necessity so bow'd the state,

That I and greatness were compelled to kiss :

'The time shall come '-thus did he follow it

'The time will come that foul sin, gathering head,

Shall break into corruption '-so went on,

Foretelling this same time's condition

And the division of our amity."

The Earl of Warwick replies that the lives of men repeat

what has happened before, and that, in this way, if a man knows the past, he may make a "perfect guess" as to the future. The passage expresses the doctrine of the cycles, and is extremely interesting with reference to the Sonnets in which this doctrine is set forth with even greater clear

ness:

"War. There is a history in all men's lives,
Figuring the nature of the times deceased,
The which observed, a man may prophesy,
With a near aim, of the main chance of things
As yet not come to life, which in their seeds
And weak beginnings lie intreasured.

Such things become the hatch and brood of time;
And, by the necessary form of this,

King Richard might create a perfect guess,
That great Northumberland, then false to him,
Would, of that seed, grow to a greater falseness;
Which should not find a ground to root upon,
Unless of you.

K. Hen. Are these things then necessities?
Then let us meet them like necessities."

The king, it will be seen, takes what is said as involving a necessary sequence of things, the doctrine of necessity being, as already observed, implied in that of the cycles. In order, however, that the full force of the passage may be recognised, it is desirable to take into account what precedes. The king has been unable to sleep. He is greatly troubled by despatches which have been received, giving evidence of sedition and corruption in the state, and he is in anxious perplexity as to the future. That, under such circumstances, he should desire to "read the book of fate" is not surprising. But one might have thought that his attention would have been directed to the vicissitudes of state affairs, the chances of war, and the calamities by which kings have been overthrown. Instead of this, however, he speaks of changes in the physical structure of the world, the levelling of mountains, the shrinking back of ocean, and the melting of the firm and solid continent.