yed by the same words in
the present day, but also with the customs and ideas, political,
religious and moral, that predominated during the period in which his
works were produced. Without such information, it will be found
impossible, in many matters of the first importance, to grasp the
writer's true intent, and much will appear vague and lifeless that was
full of point and vigour when it was first conceived; or, worse still,
modern opinion upon the subject will be set up as the standard of
interpretation, ideas will be forced into the writer's sentences that
could not by any manner of possibility have had place in his mind, and
utterly false conclusions as to his meaning will be the result. Even the
man who has had some experience in the study of an early literature,
occasionally finds some difficulty in preventing the current opinions of
his day from obtruding themselves upon his work and warping his
judgment; to the general reader this must indeed be a frequent and
serious stumbling-block.

2. This is a special source of danger in the study of the works of
dramatic poets, whose very art lies in the representation of the current
opinions, habits, and foibles of their times--in holding up the mirror
to their age. It is true that, if their works are to live, they must
deal with subjects of more than mere passing interest; but it is also
true that many, and the greatest of them, speak upon questions of
eternal interest in the particular light cast upon them in their times,
and it is quite possible that the truth may be entirely lost from want
of power to recognize it under the disguise in which it comes. A certain
motive, for instance, that is an overpowering one in a given period,
subsequently appears grotesque, weak, or even powerless; the consequent
action becomes incomprehensible, and the actor is contemned; and a
simile that appeared most appropriate in the ears of the author's
contemporaries, seems meaningless, or ridiculous, to later generations.

3. An example or two of this possibility of error, derived from works
produced during the period with which it is the object of these pages to
deal, will not be out of place here.

A very striking illustration of the manner in which a word may mislead
is afforded by the oft-quoted line:

"Assume a virtue, if you have it not."

By most readers the secondary, and, in the present day, almost
universal, meaning of the word assume--"pretend that to be, which in
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