INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. LESS is said to be known of Shakespeare than of any other writer who attained equal celebrity during his lifetime. This may be partly owing to the absence of that periodical literature which is now the rapid vehicle of information, and partly to his calling and the nature of his great works, which, however well adapted for the closet, were originally designed for the stage. We need not, therefore, be much surprised that the cravings of curiosity should have been satisfied with gossip and scandal, since there was nothing better to be had. It is now generally admitted that his parents held a respectable position in life, and that he must have had the advantage of a good grammar-school education. The stories of his stealing deer from Sir Thomas Lucy's grounds at Charlecote, and of his holding horses at the door of one of the London theatres, have deservedly fallen into discredit; but it is reasonable to believe that he was indebted to his mother for B early lessons of piety, and that he was conversant The with the Holy Scriptures from a child. reformation could not fail, from the very nature of it, to tinge the literature of the Elizabethan æra. It gave a logical and disputatious character to the age, and produced men mighty in the Scriptures. The butcher, the barber, and the baker were in the habit of chopping logic, each in his own sphere. Hence we need not wonder that the humour of or less, Shakespeare's clowns is always, more argumentative. The argals of the gravedigger in Hamlet are probably no fictitious corruption of the ergos which were then in every body's mouth. This particular consequence of the Reformation served to cramp the genius of Shakespeare, at least to the extent of giving a rough date to the period of his writings; the second effect, his profound acquaintance with Holy Writ, on the other hand, assisted to rise them above the trammels of place and time. Before proceeding to the immediate matter in hand, which is to show, by new evidence, the vastness of Shakespeare's Bible lore, it may be well to point out the kind of benefit which he may be fairly supposed to have thence derived. The Bible professes to make men "wise unto salvation." Such being its end and aim, it is for this purpose a sufficient and infallible rule both of faith and conduct. But since the wisdom here |