open, and generous
friend in the moment of felicity, because he was not promoted as he
expected. Othello was superior in place, but Iago felt him to be inferior
in intellect, and, unrestrained by conscience, trampled upon him.
Falstaff, not a degraded man of genius, like Burns, but a man of degraded
genius, with the same consciousness of superiority to his companions,
fastened himself on a young Prince, to prove how much his influence on an
heir-apparent would exceed that of a statesman. With this view he
hesitated not to adopt the most contemptible of all characters, that of an
open and professed liar: even his sensuality was subservient to his
intellect: for he appeared to drink sack, that he might have occasion to
show off his wit. One thing, however, worthy of observation, is the
perpetual contrast of labour in Falstaff to produce wit, with the ease
with which Prince Henry parries his shafts; and the final contempt which
such a character deserves and receives from the young king, when Falstaff
exhibits the struggle of inward determination with an outward show of
humility.

Order Of Shakespeare's Plays.

Various attempts have been made to arrange the plays of Shakespeare, each
according to its priority in time, by proofs derived from external
documents. How unsuccessful these attempts have been might easily be
shewn, not only from the widely different results arrived at by men, all
deeply versed in the black-letter books, old plays, pamphlets, manuscript
records, and catalogues of that age, but also from the fallacious and
unsatisfactory nature of the facts and assumptions on which the evidence
rests. In that age, when the press was chiefly occupied with controversial
or practical divinity,--when the law, the Church, and the State engrossed
all honour and respectability,--when a degree of disgrace, _levior quaedam
infamiae macula_, was attached to the publication of poetry, and even to
have sported with the Muse, as a private relaxation, was supposed to be--a
venial fault, indeed, yet--something beneath the gravity of a wise
man,--when the professed poets were so poor, that the very expenses of the
press demanded the liberality of some wealthy individual, so that
two-thirds of Spenser's poetic works, and those most highly praised by his
learned admirers and friends, remained for many years in manuscript, and
in manuscript perished,--when the amateurs of the stage were comparatively
few, and therefore for th