We can understand the
co-existence of any degree of partial or excited genius with evil ways,
but we cannot understand the existence of such calm and universal
genius, wrought out in his works, except in association with all that is
noblest in human nature. Nor is it other than on the side of the
argument for his rectitude that he never forces rectitude upon the
attention of others. The strong impression left upon our minds is, that
however Shakspere may have strayed in the early portion of his life in
London, he was not only an upright and noble man for the main part, but
a repentant man, and a man whose life was influenced by the truths of
Christianity.
Much is now said about a memorial to Shakspere. The best and only true
memorial is no doubt that described in Milton's poem on this very
subject: the living and ever-changing monument of human admiration,
expressed in the faces and forms of those absorbed in the reading of his
works. But if the external monument might be such as to foster the
constant reproduction of the inward monument of love and admiration,
then, indeed, it might be well to raise one; and with this object in
view let us venture to propose one mode which we think would favour the
attainment of it.
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