that as an historian we can rely
upon Shakespeare as correct. But to that in which he believed he rigidly
adhered; nor did he seek, as lesser artists (such as Victor Hugo and his
disciples) seek now, to turn perforce the Historical into the Poetical,
but leaving history as he found it, to call forth from its arid prose
the flower of the latent poem. Nay, even in the more imaginative plays
which he has founded upon novels and legends popular in his time, it is
curious and instructive to see how little he has altered the original
ground-work--taking for granted the main materials of the story, and
reserving all his matchless resources of wisdom and invention, to
illustrate from mental analysis, the creations whose outline he was
content to borrow. He receives, as a literal fact not to be altered,
the somewhat incredible assertion of the novelist, that the pure and
delicate and highborn Venetian loves the swarthy Moor--and that Romeo
fresh from his "woes for Rosaline," becomes suddenly enamoured of
Juliet: He found the Improbable, and employed his art to make it
truthful.

That "Rienzi" should have attracted peculiar attention in Italy, is of
course to be attributed to the choice of the subject rather than to the
skill of the Author. It has been translated into the Italian language by
eminent writers; and the authorities for the new view of Rienzi's times
and character which the Author deemed himself warranted to take, have
been compared with his text by careful critics and illustrious scholars,
in those states in which the work has been permitted to circulate. (In
the Papal States, I believe, it was neither, prudently nor effectually,
proscribed.) I may say, I trust without unworthy pride, that the result
has confirmed the accuracy of delineations which English readers relying
only on the brilliant but disparaging account in Gibbon deemed too
favourable; and has tended to restore the great Tribune to his long
forgotten claims to the love and reverence of the Italian land. Nor, if
I may trust to the assurances that have reached me from many now engaged
in the aim of political regeneration, has the effect of that revival of
the honours due to a national hero, leading to the ennobling study
of great examples, been wholly without its influence upon the rising
generation of Italian youth, and thereby upon those stirring events
which have recently drawn the eyes of Europe to the men and the lands
beyond the Alps.

In preparin