the differences between the ancient and the modern stage, between the French and the English stage, and between the practices which have prevailed at different periods on the English stage to which playwrights willingly or unwillingly conformed. The field, however, is by no means of this unrestricted nature and extent. By classical, it hardly needs to be said, is not meant here the Greek or Roman drama, but the modern which assumed that title, which professed to be a direct descendant of the ancient, and was not unfrequently disposed to believe that it had improved upon its parents. Its enemies, on the contrary, have been fond of applying to it the term pseudo-classical. Between its methods and those of the romantic drama controversy has raged with violence for fully three centuries. Upon Shakespeare, as the chief representative of the latter, the brunt of the attack almost from the outset has fallen. National feeling has been aroused by it, and there have been times when the conflict of opinion threatened to assume something almost of the character of an international quarrel.

It is the English sentiment at different times which I have sought to portray, and not the foreign, save so far as the latter affected the attitude exhibited towards Shakespeare by Shakespeare's countrymen. In one way the difficulty of this task cannot well be overrated. It is never an easy matter to ascertain the prevailing state of mind of a whole people in regard to any author or subject, even when ample testimony exists for contemporaries in the opinions of all sorts which are put forth in profusion by persons occupying various points of

view. Far less easy is it when the evidence transmitted from the past is scanty and imperfect, and as a consequence almost invariably one-sided. In such a case there is always special danger of being unduly impressed by the little which chances to have come down. Scattered remarks, of no particular weight in themselves, have formed the foundation of many misleading statements in regard to Shakespeare's popularity at different periods. They have had the luck to survive the oblivion which has overtaken the others, and frequency of repetition has at last conferred upon them among the many an authority to which they are not in the least entitled. It is only by a full examination of the whole field that we can correct the erroneous inferences drawn from the assertions of individuals. In particular, it is only by the careful study of the critical writings, now often deservedly forgotten, of the men who took part in the controversies which went on between the adherents of the two dramatic schools, that we can get any real insight into the nature of the conflicting views which were held from time to time in regard to Shakespeare.

One exception there is to the statement that this work does not pretend to deal directly with foreign opinion. It is in the case of Voltaire. This author occupies a most conspicuous position in the controversies that took place in regard to Shakespeare's dramatic art; and in the varying views entertained about it, the words he said, and the influence he exerted not only on the Continent but in England itself, can never be disregarded. It was my original intention to make the part he played the subject of a chapter in the present volume. But the

mass of matter accumulated speedily rendered it manifest that it could not be satisfactorily compressed in so short a space. For Voltaire not only affected the opinions of others in regard to Shakespeare, his own reputation in turn suffered in the reaction which his hostile criticism of the poet provoked. No small share of the derogatory opinion expressed of him in England was due not so much to his attacks on theological belief as to his attacks on Shakespeare. The feeling showed itself early and grew in strength as time went on. For the adequate representation both of his own state of mind, and of the state of mind in reference to himself which he called into being, a separate treatise became indispensable.

So much for the controversies belonging to this first class. It was to those of the second, as has been said already, that the title of Shakespearean Wars was intended to be applied. These deal generally with the efforts to establish the text of the dramatist and with the linguistic and literary quarrels to which they have given rise. There was, however, enough of bitterness displayed in the controversies about his art to make the title not inappropriate to them also. Still, as the discussion was here mainly of general principles, it had nothing of the virulence which inevitably attends the discussion of words and meanings. The quarrels of Shakespearean critics and commentators have left enduring records of themselves in English literature. In them have been engaged some of the greatest authors of our speech, and for that reason, if not for themselves, they must always be of interest to educated men.

The moment, in truth, we take up the story of the settlement of Shakespeare's text, we are entering into a region of peculiarly embittered controversy. The odium philologicum has always worthily maintained its place alongside of the odium theologicum as a grand fomenter of the evil passions which assail the human heart. Perhaps, indeed, unsoundness on a point of etymology or syntax may be rightly deemed by the judicious to betoken on the whole a profounder depth of depravity than unsoundness on a point of doctrine or church discipline. At all events, I doubt if in the house occupied by the odium philologicum there is a mansion roomier and fouler than that given up to the odium Shakespeareaпит. Jealousies have been awakened by it and longcontinued friendships broken; unfounded calumnies have been spread abroad which have never ceased to follow their unhappy victim; and the course of its whole history is strewn with the wrecks of reputations which, when not wrought by personal wrongdoing, have been occasioned by revenge, envy, malice, hatred, and all uncharitableness.

Of these quarrels of Shakespeare's commentators and critics it has always been the correct thing to express disapprobation, when it has not been the object to satirize. Speaking for myself, I am far from looking upon them as the unmixed evil which it is the fashion to regard them as being. Critics and commentators, indeed, would rarely be selected as constituting the ideal of a happy family. It is not from such a nest of hornets that one expects to gather honey. But if sweetness does not come from that quarter, penetration

frequently does. Few, in truth, appreciate the incalculable services which have been wrought by wrath in behalf of the advancement of learning. Love of an author will do much to promote inquiry and stimulate research; but in the case of no commentator will it ever operate with its fullest efficiency save when it is reinforced by a hearty hatred of another commentator, and a hearty contempt for the ridiculous opinions which he has seen fit to express. As little in the mental as in the material world can light exist without heat. At least this has been true of the past; and there seems little reason to think that it will be otherwise in the immediate future. When in the physical world some instrumentality shall have been devised which will illuminate and at the same time not burn, then we may have faith that in the intellectual and spiritual worlds men will learn to perform not merely the comparatively easy duty of loving their enemies, but the much harder task of bearing patiently with and even forgiving the imbecility which puts an interpretation upon an author's words and ideas entirely different from their own.

On this very point one announcement it is desirable to make. In no volume of this series shall I attempt to carry the account of these controversies down later than the beginning of the nineteenth century. It is a natural termination. No sharp dividing line exists, it is true, between periods in which belief in one thing ceases and belief in another begins. But with the close of the eighteenth century the old faith and the old assertions about Shakespeare's dramatic art may be said, in a general way, to have gone out; with the beginning of the nineteenth