Part 6

117 NOTICES of Sir PATRICK COLQUHOUN’S Essay on _The Authorship of Shakespeare_. In the London journals, as follows:

_a_--In the _Globe_, May 23, 1879.

_b_--In the _Daily Telegraph_, May 24, 1879.

_c_--In _Bell’s Weekly Messenger_, June 2, 1879.

_Unc._

Sir PATRICK COLQUHOUN’S paper was read before the Royal Society of Literature, London, May 21, 1879. It has never been printed. He holds Shakespeare “to have been a mere theatrical manager, who bought the plays of poor authors, and perhaps suggested certain buffooneries for the delectation of the gods,” etc. This essay has since been recast and considerably augmented; and it is probable that it may yet be published in book form.

118 THE SHAKESPEARE PLAYS, THE THEATRE, ETC. WHO WROTE SHAKESPEARE? By O. F. [O. FOLLETT, of Sandusky, O.] Printed for private circulation. Sandusky: May, 1879. Pamphlet, pp. 47.

_Anti-Sh._

“If, then, Shakespeare _did not_ write Shakespeare, who did? The question is already answered. BUT ONE MAN COULD. Only one [Bacon] was fully equipped for the task in its full proportions. * * * It has been _“aut Cæsar aut nullus”_--Shakespeare or nothing. Not a line, not a scrap, not a sentiment outside the dramas and poems has been vouchsafed to us, as a test of style, or by which to measure capacity. Without preparation, without drill, this man is master of all learning, law, physic, theology, nay, of state-craft as well. If Shakespeare proper was all this, then Shakespeare the poet was a miracle, and may be worshiped--and Stratford may well be his shrine.”

119 THE SO-CALLED SHAKESPEAREAN MYTH. By F. R., Barrie. [FRANCIS RYE, of Barrie, Ontario, Canada.] In the _Canadian Monthly_ for July, 1879. (See pages 76-79.)

_Pro-Sh._

An answer to Mr. Morgan’s articles in _Appletons’ Journal_.

120 WHO WROTE SHAKESPEARE’S PLAYS? By HENRY G. ATKINSON, F.G.S. In the _Spiritualist_, London, July 4, 1879.

_Anti-Sh._

Mr. ATKINSON is an ardent Baconian. His writings on the subject consist principally of short articles in various periodicals, which will be found noted hereafter.

“It would be absurd to expect to find the same variety in Bacon’s philosophical writings as in the plays, where we have philosophy and poetry combined, together with wit, humor, and every kind of character and turn of sentiment. But here is Ben Jonson’s account of Bacon. Bacon’s prose, says Judge Holmes, is Shakespearian poetry, and Shakespeare’s poetry is Baconian prose. Jonson says: ‘There happened in my time _one_ noble speaker, who was full of gravity in his speaking. His language, where he could spare, or pass by a jest, was nobly censorious. No man ever spoke more neatly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough, or look aside from him without loss. He commanded when he spoke, and had his judges angry and pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections more in his power. The fear of every man who heard him was lest he should make an end.’ Here, then, we have related, from one most capable of judging, those very qualities of mind we should expect to find in the writer of the plays, but which Shakespeare was never known to have exhibited at any time, or in any place; and we have not a scrap of his play-writing existing, or ever known to have existed, nor referred to in his will. Some of his finest plays were not known to exist until seven years after his death, in the collected folio of 1623.”

121 ON RENASCENCE DRAMA, OR HISTORY MADE VISIBLE. By WILLIAM THOMSON, F.R.C.S., F.L.S., Melbourne, Australia: Sands & McDougall, 1880. 8vo. pp. 359.

_Anti-Sh._

DR. THOMSON’S title is adopted from Bacon’s _History of Learning_: “Dramatic poetry is as history made visible; for it represents actions as if they were present, whereas history represents them as past.” He continues in this work the argument as to the political purpose of certain of the Shakespearian plays, which he classes under the style of the Renascence Drama; and, reasoning from that standpoint, claims the authorship for Bacon. The book commences:

“The political purpose of the Renascence Drama has never been defined. And yet for a patriotic object the series of plays so named were evidently written. The motive is avowed in prologue, epilogue and induction; and everywhere throughout the works the aim is obvious. You are required to

‘Think you see The very persons of our noble story As they were living.’”

The author reviews _The Tempest_, _Twelfth Night_, _Julius Cæsar_, _Hamlet_, _Othello_, and others of the plays, from his view as to the political motive of Bacon in producing them, interpreting them as allegories bearing on persons and events of the time. In his elucidation of _Twelfth Night_, he goes so far as to indicate “the persons represented in false names” for all the leading characters. A recapitulation of these may be interesting to the student of history, as well as the student of Shakespeare: _Duke Orsino_ is Sir Philip Sidney; _Sebastian_, Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex; _Sir Toby Belch_, Sir Francis Knollys; _Sir Andrew Aguecheek_, the Earl of Leicester; _Malvolio_, Sir Walter Raleigh; _Fabian_, Sir Fulke Greville; _Feste, the clown_, Dick Tarleton; _Olivia_, Queen Elizabeth; _Viola_, Penelope Devereux; and _Maria_, Lettice Knollys.

A critic has said of Dr. Thomson’s argument: “If he has succeeded in anything, it is in unearthing a wealth of verbiage, which is more than proof against a powerful microscopic analysis. Whatever may be his object, he conceals it by his language.” An extract from an article in the _Freeman’s Journal_, Dublin (title 154), will give evidence of the scope of the book:

“He [Dr. Thomson] argues from the identity of the language in the plays and Bacon’s works--from the difficulty of finding where Shakespeare, who was all but totally uneducated, got all the wondrous learning that the works attributed to him exhibit--from the notorious fact of Bacon’s universal learning--and from facts connected with the dates of the publication of the poems and dramas, which can scarcely be reconciled with the incidents of Shakespeare’s life, and which fit in admirably with the stages of Bacon’s chequered career. Dr. Thomson argues also, with considerable acumen and subtlety, from the inferences which the allegorical and political interpretation of such plays as even Hamlet and Macbeth require; and he argues to the same effect from the sonnets, and from the non-dedication of the sonnets to the Earl of Southampton in 1609, to whom in 1593 the poems of _Venus and Adonis_ and _Lucrece_ were dedicated. This circumstance, which is such a crux on the ordinary interpretation that Shakespeare was the author of the sonnets, and that Southampton was his loving patron, is easily explicable on being reminded that in the interval between the appearance of the two sets of poems, the Earl of Southampton, on his liberation from prison, had become a deadly enemy of Bacon.”

122 “MR. HUDSON’S FOUR REASONS.” (See _Shakespeare: his Life, Art, and Character_. By Rev. H. N. HUDSON. Vol. I, p. 269, edition of 1880.)

_Pro-Sh._

* * * “It was Lord Bacon, not Shakespeare, who enjoyed so richly the friendship and patronage of the generous Essex; and how he requited the same is known much too well for his credit. I am not unmindful that this may yield some comfort to those who would persuade us that Shakespeare’s plays were written by Lord Bacon. Upon this point I have just four things to say:

“_First_--Bacon’s requital of the Earl’s bounty was such a piece of ingratitude as I can hardly conceive the author of _King Lear_ to have been guilty of.

“_Second_--The author of Shakespeare’s plays, whoever he may have been, certainly was not a scholar; he had indeed something vastly better than learning, but he had not that.

“_Third_--Shakespeare never philosophizes; Bacon never does anything else.

“_Fourth_--Bacon’s mind, great as it was, might have been cut out of Shakespeare’s without being missed.”

Noticing the above, Dr. Ingleby adds another reason:

“_Fifth_--Bacon excelled all writers of his day in prose; but the very best of the verses attributed to him (not all his, by the way) are fourth-rate; while Shakespeare’s verse is everywhere incomparably better than his prose; and he thus excelled where Bacon most faulted.”

123 THE AUTHORSHIP OF SHAKESPEARE. A controversy between H. G. ATKINSON, F.G.S., and Mr. CHARLES C. CATTELL. London: H. Cattell & Co., n. d. [1880]. Pamphlet, 12mo. pp. 16.

_Unc._

This consists of three papers on each side of the question, reprinted from the pages of the _Secular Review_, London.

124 THE AUTHORSHIP OF SHAKESPEARE’S PLAYS. A review of Holmes. In the _Southern Quarterly Review_, New Orleans, January, 1880. By the editor, DANIEL K. WHITAKER. (See pages 172-179.)

_Pro-Sh._

125 JUDGE HOLMES’S “PARALLELISMS” BETWEEN SHAKESPEARE AND BACON. By WM. J. ROLFE. In _Shakespeariana, Literary World_, Boston, April 10, 1880. 2 columns.

_Pro-Sh._

126 SHAKESPEARE. A letter from Mr. JOSEPH CROSBY, Zanesville, O. In the _Church Eclectic_, Utica, N. Y., November, 1880. (See pages 719-728.)

_Pro-Sh._

The paper of Mr. CROSBY was originally written as a private letter to Rev. Dr. James A. Bolles, who transmitted it to the _Eclectic_ for publication. It is quite comprehensive, occupying eight pages of the magazine, and is an answer to Mr. Morgan’s _Shakespearean Myth_ articles, and also to the other arguments against Shakespeare’s authorship.

“But our Shakespeare was _not_ an uneducated man; on the contrary, he was, for the time, a man of letters. We know that he received a fair grammar-school education, * * * and education at those grammar-schools was very thorough in those days. After he went to London, we soon hear of him in the best society; he was a natural absorbent, and no doubt had, in addition to the advantages of high-toned conversation, access to all such books as the time supplied. It is a great error to speak of Shakespeare, as many do, as an ‘inspired ignoramus.’ And then, after all, it was not mere scholastic knowledge that Shakespeare needed for his productions. Jonson had _this_, in an eminent degree; and his dramas are, I think, only the worse for it. Shakespeare knew enough to read Hall, and More, and Holinshead, and North’s Plutarch for his history; and enough of the modern languages to read Italian and other continental novels for the sake of the plots--the dry-bones, on which he built the flesh and blood of _life_ in his immortal works. The real books that Shakespeare studied were the _Book of Mankind_ and the _Book of Nature_, and these he knew by heart. He needed not a university to teach him these. While his style shows frequently, by the radical and exact senses in which he employs numerous words, that he had a competent knowledge of the Latin language, it is in his using the idiomatic powers of the English language, in their highest perfection, that its force and beauty consist. Jonson’s style, as a dramatic writer, is often marred, and enfeebled, and spoilt, by his exuberant Latin quotations, and magniloquence, and learned affectation; and that is why I say that Shakespeare’s ‘little Latin and less Greek’ stood him in better stead than all the ponderous learning and classic conceits that weighted the poetry of his rival.

* * * * *

“There is one argument that these theorists seem never to have examined, viz: that deducible from Shakespeare’s _poems_ and _sonnets_. These no one has ever disputed his authorship of. That _cannot_ be disputed, for he published them himself, and dedicated them to noblemen of the day, under his own name. And yet can any intelligent person read these works, and not be convinced that the same mind and hand produced them that produced the dramas? There are not only similar expressions, but whole lines, similes, metaphors, and turns of thought are constantly recurring, the same in each. This, to my mind, is as strong an argument as I could ask. A careful study of the poems and sonnets is a great help to understanding many things in the plays: and the fact that _one person wrote both_ is as undoubted and clear to me as noonday.” * * * *

127 WAS BACON SHAKESPEARE? By R. C. C. [RICHARD COLAMA CLOSE]. In the _Victorian Review_, Melbourne, Australia, for November, 1880. (See pages 54-70.)

_Pro-Sh._

An answer to Dr. Thomson’s _Renascence Drama_.

* * * “There has been no single instance, from the earliest historic times up to the present day, where the combination of a Bacon and a Shakespeare, the impersonations of the highest talent and the greatest genius, has found its centre in one man. It is possible, but not more possible than a miracle. Few have ever exceeded Bacon in the force, vigour, terseness, clearness, and splendor of his prose. None has ever exceeded Shakespeare, either as a writer of dramas or comedies. Bacon, as a prose writer, stands in the midst of a goodly company. The most we can say of Bacon is, that in this _genre_ he was _primus inter pares_. Shakespeare, as a dramatic genius, stood in lonely grandeur. He was first, and had no equals.”

(Mr. CLOSE is a barrister in Sydney, New South Wales.)

128 SHAKESPEARE’S BIOGRAPHY. Does it conform to the Author of the Plays? By “LANCER.” [O. C. STOUDER.] In the _Wittenberger Magazine_, Springfield, O., November, 1880. 2 pages.

_Anti-Sh._

129 THE AUTHORSHIP OF SHAKESPEARE. A reply to “Lancer.” By Mr. JOSEPH CROSBY. In the _Wittenberger_, December, 1880. 2 pages.

_Pro-Sh._

130 SHAKESPEARE: DID HE WRITE THE WORKS ATTRIBUTED TO HIM? With notes on “_What Shakespeare Learnt at School_.” By CHARLES C. CATTELL. London: Henry Cattell & Co., n. d. [probably 1881]. Pamphlet, pp. 16.

_Pro-Sh._

“It seems desirable that, in a publication of this kind, some reference should be made to the three articles by Prof. T. F. Baynes, which appeared in 1879 and 1880, on _What Shakespeare Learnt at School_. * * * That he could have been sent to one is certain, for the school at Stratford-on-Avon was restored in 1553 by Edward. VI, and the constitution and management were the same as other schools established at that period, and the course of instruction is known by the records preserved of Rotherham school, which gives a list of books generally used in the grammar schools of the country. * * * At that time, children were sent to the English side of the grammar school at the age of five, and at seven they commenced the study of Latin, the regular course taking about ten years; so that boys usually left school, for work or for university study, at fifteen. * * * The articles were published in _Fraser’s Magazine_ in 1879 and 1880, and, to my mind, sufficiently explain how the youthful Bard of Avon might lay up the treasures of learning deemed so essential in the production of his immortal works--his possession of which has been so often doubted, and in some instances positively denied to him. How such a man, living in such a time, and at such a place, could acquire the necessary classic knowledge, no longer remains a mystery.”

131 CARLYLE’S OPINION. (See _Thomas Carlyle_, by MONCURE D. CONWAY. New York: 1881.)

_Pro-Sh._

Speaking of Carlyle, on page 122, Mr. CONWAY says:

“He was more patient in listening to Miss Bacon, also introduced by Emerson, when she tried to persuade him that Shakespeare’s plays were written by Lord Bacon. Carlyle never thought much of the philosopher who had been unable to recognize such a contemporary as Kepler; and his only reply to Miss Bacon was, ‘Lord Bacon could as easily have created this planet as he could have written Hamlet.’ I have heard that when she had gone he added, to a letter written to his friend in Concord, the brief postscript, ‘Your woman’s mad.’

T. C.”

132 DID SHAKESPEARE WRITE BACON’S WORKS? By Rev. JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE. In the _North American Review_ for February, 1881. (See pages 163-175.)

_Pro-Sh._

“When we ask whether it would have been easier for the author of the philosophy to have composed the drama, or the dramatic poet to have written the philosophy, the answer will depend upon which is the greater of the two. The greater includes the less, but the less can not include the greater. * * * Great as are the thoughts of the _Novum Organum_, they are inferior to that world of thought which is in the drama. We can easily conceive that Shakespeare, having produced in his prime the wonders and glories of the plays, should in his after leisure have developed the leading ideas of the Baconian philosophy. But it is difficult to imagine that Bacon, while devoting his main strength to politics, to law, to philosophy, should have, as a mere pastime for his leisure, produced in his idle moments the greatest intellectual work ever done on earth.”

133 WHO WROTE SHAKESPEARE? By BACONIAN. [WILLIAM W. FERRIER, of Angola, Ind.] A series of eight articles in February and March, 1881, in the Angola (Ind.) _Herald_. Dated February 9, 16, and 23; March 2, 9, 16, 23, and 30.

_Anti-Sh._

The writer gives all the main points in the controversy from the Baconian standpoint. In his introduction he says that “a noted Shakespearean doubter--Dr. Farmer--lived in the eighteenth century, and that still earlier than this, as men began to study the literature and lives of the Elizabethan period, difficulties arose in regard to harmonizing the book Shakespeare with the man Shakespeare.”

We quote, from the third paper, as to one point only:

“The mind that wrote Shakespeare was a mighty mind. But it was one broadened and deepened, nurtured and cultured by the learning and experience of ages. These plays tell of more than mere genius. They tell of years of earnest study; of patient investigation; of a genius that made available all the concentrated resources of the times. Let us consider briefly the works and minds of some prominent in the middle ages, and find there, in this way, a consistency that is not in the life and works of William Shakespeare. English literature, that had originated in Caedmon, that had burst into full glory in Chaucer, and with him had also passed away, met again in its beauty and grandeur a glad welcome when Spenser, amid the blaze of the magnificent court of Elizabeth, placed at her feet the _Faerie Queene_. But Spenser’s life was a life leading to the production of grand ideal poetry. His education, combined with natural genius, had prepared him for it. * * * Early in the Christian Renaissance, there originated, within prison walls, a book which has the greatest hold, next to the Bible, upon the English people. That book was the _Pilgrim’s Progress_. * * * Linked with the name of the old prisoner of Bradford, this immortal book has came down to us in its journey adown the centuries; and the world that questions the authorship of Shakespeare, finds nothing inharmonious or incongruous between the life of Bunyan and this grand work. * * * Contemporary with Shakespeare was one known as a ‘genuine literary leviathan.’ It was Ben Jonson, erudite in all the classics, of whom it has been said, ‘he had so well entered into and digested the Greek and Latin ideas, that they were incorporated with his own.’ But Ben Jonson’s education made him this. * * * The years of the Christian Renaissance brought forth another work that the world will not let die. It is the immortal epic of Milton--_Paradise Lost_. But England has known no more erudite man than Milton; and whatever of profound knowledge there is found in his works, may be readily accounted for by cause and effect. * * * Thus, it may be seen, that from the works and lives of such as Spenser, Bunyan, Jonson, and Milton, no argument can be adduced in favor of William Shakespeare.”

134 DID BACON WRITE FLETCHER’S PLAYS? By WILLIAM J. ROLFE. In _Shakespeariana_, _Literary World_, Boston, February 12, 1881.

_Unc._

“Bacon _did_ write Fletcher’s Plays, for the Judge [Holmes] proves it--just as he proves that he wrote Shakespeare’s plays.”

135 IS THERE ANY DOUBT AS TO THE AUTHORSHIP? In the _Harvard University Bulletin_, April 1, 1881.

_Unc._

A short list of the references for the use of students in debate.

136 “OUR CLUB.” SHAKESPEARE NIGHT, April 26, 1881. H. HOLL in the Chair. An address delivered by Mr. Holl, being in part an answer to Dr. Benj. W. Richardson. With letter to Dr. R. Pamphlet, 12mo. pp. 22.

_Pro-Sh._

The address of Dr. RICHARDSON’S, alluded to above, was delivered before “Our Club” (the original Hooks and Eyes, rechristened), at the annual Shakespeare dinner, in April, 1877. It has never been published. It seems, while expressing some doubts, to have opposed the Baconian hypothesis.

137 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE IN ROMANCE AND REALITY. By WILLIAM THOMSON. Melbourne: Sands & McDougall, 1881. 8vo. pp. 95.

_Anti-Sh._

This is a continuation of the _Renascence Drama_, including an answer to the criticisms of that work, but of a more practical turn--devoted more to the historical than to the allegorical and political argument.

“Not only is Bacon’s name always linked with that of Shakespeare, but no other name is ever so associated. No other author unwittingly enters men’s thoughts along with the author of the drama, except alone Bacon; and he is the only magician or creator of the prevailing Baconian philosophy. Alluding to Shakespeare’s forestalling Newton when making Cressida compare her heart to the center of the earth, drawing all things to it, it is asked how he knew what Newton was going to discover. But Voltaire long ago showed where Bacon forestalled Newton. How, then, did he know what Newton would discover? Either _both_ Bacon and Shakespeare forestalled Newton on the great physical discovery, or one mind did so in two different ways, at the same instant of time. * * * When Bacon explained to King James how ‘bodies fall toward the center of the earth,’ and ‘iron trembles under adamant,’ Shakespeare made Prince Troilus vow he would be true to Cressida,

‘As iron to adamant, as earth to the centre.’

While her love for him in return

‘Is as the very centre of the earth, Drawing all things to it.’”

138 SHAKESPEARE--THE PLAYS AND POEMS LOGICALLY AND HISTORICALLY CONSIDERED. Addendum to “Who Wrote Shakespeare?” By O. F. [O. FOLLETT]. Sandusky, O.: May, 1881. Pamphlet, pp. 12.

Anti-Sh.

A continuation of Mr. Follett’s first pamphlet.

139 WAS SHAKESPEARE A MYTH? By BROADBRIM. [J. H. WARWICK, Brooklyn, N. Y.] A series of three articles in the Angola (Ind.) _Republican_, May 25, June 8, and June 22, 1881.

_Pro-Sh._

The first two of these articles treat the subject, in the author’s words, “from the ground-work of fact and historical probability;” the concluding one invites attention to “the character of the age that produced Shakespeare,” with an analysis of “the character of those who have been instrumental in propagating the libels on his memory.”

140 ARTICLES in _Shakespeariana_. In the _Literary World_, Boston, of dates following:

_a_--Judge Holmes on Julius Cæsar, June 4, 1881.

_b_--New Champions of the Baconian Theory (Mrs. Windle and Dr. Thomson), November 5, 1881.

_c_--Morgan’s Shakespearean Myth, Dec. 3, 1881.

_Unc._

141 WAS BACON SHAKESPEARE? AN EXPOSITION OF THE GREAT CONTROVERSY. By E. W. TULLIDGE. In _Tullidge’s Quarterly Magazine_, Salt Lake City, Utah, July, 1881. 13 pages.

_Anti-Sh._