the minister of their curses, and to blast each other with his fearful vengeance.

Both in the folio and modern text of Richard III. parts have been omitted to preserve religious appearances. Mr. Knight confesses that one of Clarence's supplications, from the Redemption, was unnecessarily introduced. What then are we to say of the 'old odds and ends' by which Richard contemptuously characterises his cullings from holy writ, and the great variety of similar passages spread up and down the ancient and modern texts?

We have, in the scene between Queen Elizabeth and Queen Margaret, one of those fearful expressions of distrust in the interference of Providence, which shakes faith to its foundation, with the hand of a giant. Queen Elizabeth finds consolation in God, and argues his protection of her children. She exclaims

Wilt thou, O God, fly from such gentle lambs,

And throw them in the entrails of the wolf?

When didst thou sleep when such a deed was done?

To this eloquent, pious, and passionate appeal, Queen Margaret replies in words which crush all hope, and to which there is no answer. God has done it, argues Margaret—

When holy Harry died and my sweet son!

Shakspere, in Macbeth and other plays, reproduces this fell logic.

It is usual with devout writers-indeed, with writers with little or no pretension to this character-to bring the villains of their stories to conscience-stricken death-beds, and appal, by the terrors of the last hour, the daring wickedness of a life. Far different with our author, who arms his villainous hero against the last assault of religious monitions. With hell' before his eyes, he resolves to brave it. There is not an example more questionable, in a religious point of view, nor a resolution more blasphemous on record.

A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.

This fairy toy is not remarkable for grave speculation in philosophy, either of this life or the next. But that Shakspere should have given such themes any place, in such an

imaginative production as this, denotes his taste for these digressions.

The speech of Theseus, at the opening of the fifth act, is a curious combination of poetry and satire on religion. It is one of the best specimens to be found, in which our author is both delicate and ingenious in his scepticism. He remarks— Such tricks hath strong imagination;

That if it would but apprehend some joy;

It comprehends some bringer of that joy;

a passage evidently directed at the foundation of Natural Theology.

TAMING OF THE SHREW.

Religious levity is the striking feature of the small portion in any sense theological in this play. It has numerous examples of the violation of that command, thou shalt not take the name of God in vain.' Both Grumio and Gremio, as well as Petruchio, sin in this respect. These indecorous freedoms would not be tolerated in any living author. He would be denounced on all hands. Age, which makes all things venerable, seems to include impiety among its protegés.

ROMEO AND JULIET.

In the days of Shakspere dreams were held to be of supernatural origin. The celebrated dreams of holy writ had given sanctity to this phenomenon. Indeed, they are still regarded by metaphysicians, of the legitimate school, to be omens of the soul's immortality. It is not without surprise, therefore, that we find our poet, through the mouth of Mercutio, pronouncing 'dreams' as the

children of an idle brain,

Begot of nothing, but vain phantasy.

We are also presented with the creation of a priest, of whom, to say the least, he is far more philosophical than religious-indeed, so much so, that the poet's tender critics are constrained to admit, he has drawn from 'nature's mysteries' in his delineation of the Friar.

Besides the Lucretian touches, in which our Friar indulges in his famous soliloquy, his morality is very conspicuous as being the morality of mere reason. In the perusal of this play we have to confess that desperate lovers may run to death without preparation, and quote Romeo and Juliet in their favour; and priests may omit the warnings of their office, and plead the Friar in their extenuation.

The Friar is the pure invention of the poet, yet Shakspere draws him, as all his priests, not suitably to their profession. Byron introduces an abbot in Manfred, and makes him religious, though no one supposes he participated in the sentiments which he thought it right to concede to the character. Whilst Shakspere makes Roman Catholic priests philosophers, he renders Church of England clergymen only ridiculous.

THE MERCHANT OF VENICE.

Passages of the devoutest writers may be strained from their original purport, and applied by the irreligious to express their conceptions. But this play affords unmutilated and unforced speeches which have become the favourite quotations of bitter unbelievers.

The witticisms of this play are nearly all profane. An undisguised raillery is founded upon points of sacred writ. What dramatist, save Shakspere, ever represented the diffusion of the true knowledge of the gospel till it covers the earth as the waters cover the sea'-as tending to raise the price of pork,' by the proselytism of the Jews! Neither Rabelais nor Woolston have displayed more ingenuity in realising the ridiculous upon a serious subject than our poet has in this play. Upon what principle, therefore, we are to recognise in Shakspere a reverential mind,' and in others. who fall below him in the same walk of wit, a professed disbelief, it is difficult to determine.

Shylock is a character that excites sympathy, while the Christians figuring in the play only awaken reprehension and disgust. Their scoffs, gibes, taunts, drive the friendless Jew to desperation, and foment the bad qualities he displays. With coarse brutality they triumph at his fall. And when robbed of his daughter, his fortune, and his life, Christianity,

which, like mercy, should have dropped as the gentle dew from heaven, is made still to assail him. Gratiano would sooner bring him to the gallows than show him favour, and he is hunted into the folds of the church, as though it were a den, and the poor, fallen, and trampled Jew, a wild beast. Surely Christians were never before set, by a Christian, in so execrable a light!

It may be urged that these men are not intended to illustrate the spirit, but the abuse of Christianity. Then why did not our poet indelibly mark this? Admitting that the abuse only is intended, who does not see the tendency of such an exhibition as we have? The commonest observer must be led to doubt the efficacy of that faith that exercised so little power over its believers. Shakspere, who could show morality all forgiving, even questionable in its charity, makes religion all persecuting.

Towards the end of the drama we find our author, restrained by no pious scruples, introducing as an illustration a fragment of Pantheism, such only as we should expect Michelet in our own day to be avowing, or the French University to be tolerating.

The scepticism of this play is of a bolder cast than Shakspere has before ventured upon, and if these dramas are a true indication of his mind, we, in the Merchant of Venice, can trace the progress of his disbelief. The character of Launcelot is one of more sustained profanation than before, and seems the commencement of a systematic course of raillery to be carried on by Falstaff and his crew, through the subsequent plays.

THE FIRST PART OF KING HENRY IV.

Thus

Knight, after reciting the several editions of this play, beginning in 1598 to the folio of 1623, which he has adopted, says, 'not a few of the expressions which were thought profane, especially some of the ejaculations of Falstaff, have in the folio been softened or expunged.' went on what the Countess, in All's Well that Ends Well, calls a 'corruption,' the clown a 'purifying' of the text; continued by a Bowdler and a Knight to suit the times. But even now this play is eminently remarkable for open

and decided materialism, profane jests, and blasphemous expressions.

King Henry introduces himself by a mixed address of heathenism and scripture. That this passage contains-by the consent of critics-a text of sacred writ which few would suspect, may serve to illustrate the correctness of many of our inferences of a similar kind, which may otherwise look farfetched to those who have paid no distinct attention to this subject.

The holy resolution of Henry to proceed to the sepulchre of Christ is turned aside by an incursion of the Welsh. Predestination is employed to enforce the crusade to Jerusalem-soldiers were expressly ordained by God for the work,

Whose arms were moulded in their mother's womb

To chase these pagans, in those holy fields,

Over whose acres walk'd those blessed feet,
Which fourteen hundred years ago, were nail'd,
For our advantage, on the bitter cross.

Yet the event never comes to pass, and predestination so solemnly sanctified goes for nothing.

Glendower's autobiography is modelled upon the life of Christ-Hotspur is all eagerness and honour. He tramples every consideration of religion under foot; he is invulnerable to every assault of supernaturalism, and Shakspere has to apologise for his 'unprofitable chat.'

What Hotspur is from passion, Falstaff is professionally. This voluptuous sinner is the hero of profanity. The fall of Adam, Pharoah's lean kine, Lazarus, Dives, the Prodigal Son-the sayings of Christ; grace, salvation, repentance, everlasting burnings, are his topics of merriment. He bids defiance to 'Monsieur Remorse,' and on the field of death refuses to pray. Let the partizan of Shakspere's seriousness spend half an hour with Falstaff!ul't we he tol

THE SECOND PART OF KING HENRY IV.

This play is a fit companion to the Henries. Northumberland talks in a materialistic strain, which 'does him wrong,' says Travers. King Henry, in his night-gown speech, expatiates on the seeds' of Lucretius, and specu

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