s of
exegesis alike our safeguard must be a broad common-sense induction.

We are entitled to say at the outset, then, only this, that Shakspere at
the time of working over HAMLET and MEASURE FOR MEASURE in 1603-1604 had
in his mind a great deal of the reasoning in Montaigne's Essays; and
that a number of the speeches in the two plays reproduce portions of
what he had read. We are not entitled to assume that these portions are
selected as being in agreement with Shakspere's own views: we are here
limited to saying that he put certain of Montaigne's ideas or statements
in the mouths of his characters where they would be appropriate. It does
not follow that he shared the feelings of Claudio as to the possible
life of the soul after death. And when Hamlet says to Horatio, on the
strangeness of the scene with the Ghost:

"And therefore as a stranger give it welcome!
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in our philosophy"--

though this may be said to be a summary of the whole drift of
Montaigne's essay,[164] THAT IT IS FOLLY TO REFER TRUTH OR FALSEHOOD TO
OUR SUFFICIENCY; and though we are entitled to believe that Shakspere
had that essay or its thesis in his mind, there is no reason to suppose
that the lines express Shakspere's own belief in ghosts. Montaigne had
indicated his doubts on that head even in protesting against sundry
denials of strange allegations: and it is dramatically fitting that
Hamlet in the circumstances should say what he does. On the other hand,
when the Duke in MEASURE FOR MEASURE, playing the part of a friar
preparing a criminal for death, gives Claudio a consolation which does
not contain a word of Christian doctrine, not a syllable of sacrificial
salvation and sacramental forgiveness, we are entitled to infer from
such a singular negative phenomenon, if not that Shakspere rejected the
Christian theory of things, at least that it formed no part of his
habitual thinking. It was the special business of the Duke, playing in
such a character, to speak to Claudio of sin and salvation, of
forgiveness and absolution. Such a singular omission must at least imply
disregard on the part of the dramatist. It is true that Isabella,
pleading to Angelo in the second Act, speaks as a believing Christian on
the point of forgiveness for sins; and the versification here is quite
Shaksperean. But a solution of the anomaly is to be found here as
elsewhere in the fact that Shaks