s
soul-searching flashes, its ear-cleaving thunder-claps, its meteoric
splendours,--without the contagion and the fearful sympathies of nature,
the fates, the furies, the frenzied elements, dancing in and out, now
breaking through and scattering,--now hand in hand with,--the fierce or
fantastic group of human passions, crimes, and anguishes, reeling on the
unsteady ground, in a wild harmony to the shock and the swell of an
earthquake. But my present subject was _Troilus and Cressida_; and I
suppose that, scarcely knowing what to say of it, I by a cunning of
instinct ran off to subjects on which I should find it difficult not to
say too much, though certain after all that I should still leave the
better part unsaid, and the gleaning for others richer than my own
harvest.

Indeed, there is no one of Shakespeare's plays harder to characterise. The
name and the remembrances connected with it, prepare us for the
representation of attachment no less faithful than fervent on the side of
the youth, and of sudden and shameless inconstancy on the part of the
lady. And this is, indeed, as the gold thread on which the scenes are
strung, though often kept out of sight and out of mind by gems of greater
value than itself. But as Shakespeare calls forth nothing from the
mausoleum of history, or the catacombs of tradition, without giving, or
eliciting, some permanent and general interest, and brings forward no
subject which he does not moralise or intellectualise,--so here he has
drawn in Cressida the portrait of a vehement passion, that, having its
true origin and proper cause in warmth of temperament, fastens on, rather
than fixes to, some one object by liking and temporary preference.

"There's language in her eye, her cheek, her lip,
Nay, her foot speaks; her wanton spirit looks out
At every joint and motive of her body."

This Shakespeare has contrasted with the profound affection represented in
Troilus, and alone worthy the name of love;--affection, passionate
indeed,--swoln with the confluence of youthful instincts and youthful
fancy, and growing in the radiance of hope newly risen, in short, enlarged
by the collective sympathies of nature;--but still having a depth of calmer
element in a will stronger than desire, more entire than choice, and which
gives permanence to its own act by converting it into faith and duty.
Hence, with excellent judgment, and with an excellence higher than mere
judgment can give, at the close of th