And this only high and profitable form
of study and discipleship can set before itself, even in the work of
Shakespeare, no pattern so perfect, no model so absolute, as is afforded
by the style or manner of his second period.
To this stage belong by spiritual right if not by material, by rule of
poetic order if not by date of actual succession, the greatest of his
English histories and four of his greatest and most perfect comedies; the
four greatest we might properly call them, reserving for another class
the last divine triad of romantic plays which it is alike inaccurate to
number among tragedies or comedies proper: the _Winter's Tale_,
_Cymbeline_, and the _Tempest_, which belong of course wholly to his last
manner, or, if accuracy must be strained even to pedantry, to the second
manner of his third or final stage. A single masterpiece which may be
classed either among histories or tragedies belongs to the middle period;
and to this also we must refer, if not the ultimate form, yet assuredly
the first sketch at least of that which is commonly regarded as the
typical and supreme work of Shakespeare.
Pages:
54
55
56
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78