Yet must I not give Nature all; thy Art, My gentle Shakspeare, must enjoy a part. And, after saying that — 66 the father's face Lives in his issue, obliterated. And it is because his un-so little credit for generosity and affecderstanding is thus wide and deep, and tion:his sympathies commensurate with that understanding, that his ethical teaching is, for all time, sound and true. He is no formal or formulating moralist; he never adds his voice to the mere party cries of his day, or concentrates his energies on any dogma. To speak of him as a zealous religious reformer is ridiculous; * far he apostrophized the "Sweet Swan of other was his business. But yet he was Avon." Again, in his lines prefixed to a great moral teacher, one of our greatest the portrait of the 1623 folio, he speaks - μετ' ἀμύμονα Πηλείωνα. All the world's of The gentle Shakspeare." In his a school, if we may adapt Jaques' words, "Timber," he writes "I loved the man, and all the men and women merely on this side idolatry, as much as any. school-children. Chaucer is a teacher in He was indeed honest, and of an open this great world-school, and in no lesser free nature," &c. That Chaucer inspired or special seminary; and the lessons he a similar affection and love appears from gives are "exceeding broad." They are the warmhearted language in which both such as life itself gives. They breathe Occleve and Lydgate make mention of out of his works in a natural stream, no him. It is the language of real attachmere accidents, but the essential spirit of ment, kindled by no mere brilliancy of them, to be discovered not by the labels wit, but by a kindly genial love-winning but in the works themselves: nature. Occleve, when the great poet had passed away, wails thus with an unwonted fervour: Oh! to what uses shall we put The wildweed-flower that simply blows? And is there any moral shut Within the bosom of the rose? But any man that walks the meed, A meaning suited to his mind. In Art like Nature, dearest friend; So 'twere to cramp its use, if I Should hook it to some useful end. There is just one point of personal likeness between Chaucer and Shakespeare that we wish to notice. Of each man, as his contemporaries knew him, the chief characteristic was a wonderful lovableness of nature. The special epithet bestowed on Shakespeare by the men of his day was not the Wise, or the Witty, but the Gentle. Thus Ben Jonson, in his lines "To the Memory of my Beloved the Author, Mr. William Shakspeare, and what he has left us "-lines which surely must have been forgotten by those critics, long since routed by Gifford, who gave the great-hearted "Ben" - O maister dere and fader reverent Allas! that thou thyne excellent prudence Allas! my worthy maister honourable, That combre-world that thee my maister slow— . O maister, maister, God thy soule reste! And so the verses of Lydgate, in his "Troye-book," which for the most part flow but dull and languidly, thrill with a sincere emotion when he speaks of him, whom he, too, calls his "dear master." The old "pantographer's " voice breaks, so to say, as he names the loved name, and recalls that vanished presence as he knew it, so sensitive, unexacting, self"charitable, and so Chaucer was just as much of a Lollard as Shakespeare was of a Puritan. A recent writer has, we believe, demonstrated-to his own satisfaction that disparaging, so Shakespeare was the latter. Certainly he was no Anti- pitous." Puritan; nor was Chaucer an Anti-Wiclifite. † One cannot but remember here the Koos, by which Aristophanes makes Dionysus describe Sophocles: ὁ δ' εύκολος μὲν ἐνθάδ', εύκολος δ' ἐκεῖ. Aristoph. Frogs, D. 82. And might not Goethe be described by some such epi thet? Did Shakespeare read the works of Chaucer? This is of course a question which has little or nothing to do with the unanimity of their geniuses. Wordsworth was by no means a poet of the Chaucerian type; yet he tells us how When Shakespeare came of age," the one great name of English literature was Chaucer. Spenser had not yet put forth all his strength. Sackville, and Surrey, and Wyatt were but lesser lights. To Spenser and to Shakespeare, looking back into the past, the one great prominent figure was that of Chaucer. He bestrode the world of English literature Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet like a Colossus, and the Gowers, and Oc breath Preluded those melodious bursts that fill And for a while the knowledge of his art heart Brimful of those wild tales Charged both mine eyes with tears. And at last he dreams, as we know, of Iphigenia and Helen, and the other disastrous or ill-starred beauties of bygone ages. It cleves, and Lydgates, and Barclays, "petty men, walked under his huge legs." would be less difficult to believe that Virgil did not know Ennius, than that Shakespeare did not know Chaucer. English literature then without Chaucer would be simply "Hamlet" without Hamlet. Shakespeare read the "Confessio Amantis" if "Pericles "* is in part at least his work, and it is not easy to deny it to be so in the face of the evidence for connecting it with him. That he should read Gower and ignore Chaucer would be as extraordinary as if the coming great genius of the close of the twenty-first century This question of Shakespeare's knowl-- whoever and whatever he is should edge of Chaucer has as yet received no make his study in Tupper, and let Brownproper attention whatever. Godwin, at ing grow mouldy on his shelf; or-not the beginning of this century, noticing to go too far into the future, although we "the high honour the poem of Troylus have not a shadow of doubt as to the verand Cryseyde' has received in having dict of posterity, unless, indeed, there presbeen made the foundation of one of the ently sets in a millennium of platitudes plays of Shakspear," remarked that "there-as if the Brownings and Tennysons of seems to have been in this respect a sort our own day should prize Kyd above of conspiracy in the commentators upon Shakespeare himself, or, to be quite defiShakspear against the glory of our old nite, delight in the perusal of " Jeronimo" English bard." This "conspiracy was rather than " Macbeth." Surely Chaucer's perhaps scarcely deliberate; it was language could be no insuperable barrier rather a mere concord of ignorance. to Shakespeare's acquaintance with him. Now, that Chaucer is becoming better It is, perhaps, slightly more obsolete than known, signs of Shakespeare's familiarity that of Gower; but it is only slightly so. with him are occasionally discerned. In some of the "Choral " passages of But not yet, as we have said, has this "Pericles" Shakespeare tries his hand at matter been properly investigated. Yet the Archaic style; he makes Gower it is quite certain that there is much valu- speak in the language wherein he was able illustration of the great Elizabethan born. The result is not perhaps faultdramatist to be derived from the great less; but it is enough to show that the Plantagenet tale-teller. Apart from any overt facts to be found The best authorities now incline to agree that the "Cuckoo and Nightingale" is not the work of Chaucer. We are glad to see some illustrations from Chaucer are given in Messrs. Clark and Wright's edition of "Hamlet," just published by the University of Oxford. * Oddly enough, the story of King Antiochus' incest which occupies the first part of "Pericles," is especially reprobated by the "Man of Law" in his Prologue, as one that Chaucer would in no wise tell. Chaucer evidently thinks that he whom he himself calls "the moral Gower" should have known better than to meddle with it. writer was not grossly ignorant of the older speech of his country. Old Dan Geffrey, in whose gentle spright The pure well-head of Poesie did dwell. There can be no doubt that the antique cast of Spenser's language is mainly attributable to Chaucer's influence. To Chaucer was accessible. Editions of him were published in 1542, 1546, 1555, and 1598. It may be well, perhaps, before pro-him the language of Chaucer seemed to ceeding any further, to notice a little more fully how predominant was the fame of Chaucer in the latter half of the sixteenth century. The best collection of commemorations of him yet made is that prefixed to Urry's edition of his works; but even that is extremely meagre. It would not be difficult to collect Chaucerian be the proper language of poetry. As the grammarian, L. Ælius Stilo, is said to have declared that had the Muses written Latin, they would have adopted the dialect of Plautus, so Spencer held that, had they spoken the English tongue, they would have modelled themselves on Chaucer. To Ben Jonson, Chaucer was the tribute from Latimer, Ascham, and others chief English classic of the older time; of the age immediately preceding the age see his "Grammar," passim. Daniel, in of Shakespeare. But it is more important his "Musophilus "—a poem full of fine to show that such tribute was voluntarily thought and fluent expression "containpaid by the very circle in which Shake-ing a general defence of learning" speare himself moved, or with whose grieving to think that a time may be comworks he could not but have been familiar. ing when Chaucer may fall out of rememThere is every probability that Shake-brance-speaks with high enthusiasm of speare knew Spenser personally; one the triumphs he has already won: — can scarcely doubt that they met, during Spenser's London visits, at the house of the Earl of Essex, the close friend of the Earl of Southampton; for Lord Essex was an intimate friend of Spenser's, and the love Shakespeare 66 dedicated" to Lord Southampton was without end." Ben Jonson, Daniel, Drayton, Fletcher, were among Shakespeare's closest friends, according to traditions of value, as well as amongst his most eminent contemporaries. Now, all these five great poets confess, in one way or another, their knowledge and admiration of Chaucer. Spenser, in his "Shepherdes Calendar," in his "Faerie Queene," in his "View of the Present State of Ireland," either refers to or expressly mentions him; in "Mother Hubberd's Tale " he essays his manner, with such success as might be expected. Most noticeable is the passage in the last book of the "Shepherdes Calendar," which tells us Colin, that is, himself Wel could pype and singe, For he of Tityrus his songs his lere that Tityrus was Chaucer we know on the authority, if any authority is wanted, of his friend and annotator, Edward Kirke -and the passages in the "Faerie Queene," in which he gives full voice to his delight and love. One is the wellknown canto (the second of book iv.), in which, not without fear and trembling and a cry for pardon, he sets himself to conclude the "half-told" "story of Cambuscan bold ;" in the other, not so generally noticed, which occurs in one of the fragments of book vii., he speaks of — Yet what a time hath he wrested from time, Then follows a curious general prophecy † that, in fact, precisely applies to Chaucer. It anticipates that revival of which we have spoken in the beginning of this paper: the stronger constitutions shall withal The idle multitude surcharge their lays. Drayton, in his epistle "To my dearlyloved friend, Henry Reynolds, Esq., of Poets and Poesy -a survey, of singular interest for us now, of the poetry of his day, preceded by a rapid retrospect — begins his splendid catalogue with the name of Chaucer : That noble Chaucer in those former times And was the first of ours that ever brake Into the Muses' treasure, and first spake In weighty numbers, delving in the mine Of perfect knowledge, which he could refine, And coin for current, and as much as then The English language could express to men, He made it do; and by his wondrous skill Gave us much light from his abundant quill. Still more interesting in connection with our special topic is the Prologue of the "Two Noble Kinsmen," a play, as is well known, founded on the "Knight's Tale," mainly written by Fletcher, but in whose composition it seems highly probable Shakespeare himself took some part. Says the Prologue of the play it introduces : From me the witless chaff of such a writer That blasts my bays, and my famed works makes lighter Than Robin Hood." This is the fear we bring; Weak as we are, and almost breathless swim It would be easy to multiply these praises of Chaucer, did the limits of our space allow us; but surely we have quoted enough to show what an object of real veneration and love the old poet was in Shakespeare's time, and how sincere and earnest celebrations of him must have perpetually sounded in Shakespeare's ears. A priori, therefore, it might have been concluded that Shakespeare was familiar with the greatest English pieces of characterization, and humour, and pathos, that had appeared before him. But we need not rest content with an inference. If we turn to the plays themselves, we have abundant evidence of that familiarity. Chaucer, it is true, is not represented in the picture Shakespeare gives of Chaucer's age, in his plays of "Richard the Second" and "Henry the Fourth." Falstaff, it seems, was on speaking and jesting terms with John of Gaunt, who was Chaucer's great friend and patron. "John a Gaunt," as we learn, had once "burst" Shallow's head, and Falstaff had told him he had beaten his own name. But we see no Chaucer in the retinue of "time-honoured Lancaster." He is not by any means, however, conspicuous by his abthe Fifth," or Skelton and Surrey in sence, any more than Lydgate in "Henry "Henry the Eighth." Indeed, known in the Elizabethan age only as a poet, and not as a diplomatist or a politician, he would have seemed something out of place in a " History," when all the interest centres on the throne and its occupants; for Shakespeare's "Histories" do not aim at giving complete descriptions of the times with which they deal. They are regal rather than national pieces. In that very play of "Richard the Second" we hear nothing of Wat Tyler; just as in "King John we hear nothing of Magna Charta. It must also be noted that there was much material common to the times both of Chaucer and Shakespeare, which both have used. There were common authors, as Ovid, and common legends. is striking to notice how both poets deregard to the Romances of Chivalry, it With clined to use them. Chaucer's taste anticipated the taste of Shakespeare. And so with regard to allegory. Chaucer soon outgrew that form of writing, so fashionable in his age; Shakespeare scarcely ever adopted it, for he does not seem to have cared to write masques.* It would seem contrariwise that many things attracted them both. They both tell the story of Lucretia — Chaucer in his "Legend of Good Women," following Ovid, Shakespeare in his "Tarquin and Lucrece," partly under the influence, as we shall see, of a quite different work of Chaucer's. Chaucer briefly recounts the fall of Julius Cæsar in his "Monkes Tale," as Shakespeare so splendidly in his great play, both committing an error as to the scene, which they make the Capitol (so Polonius in "Hamlet"); both portray the tragic ends of Pyramus and Thisbe, in the "Legend of Good Women" and "Midsummer Night's Dream" respectively, Chaucer translating Ovid with all submission, Shakespeare giving his humour free play at a story which is Neither poet had any liking for alliteration; see the "Parson's' Trusteth wel, I am a Suthern man, I cannot geste rum raf ruf by the letter: and Shakespeare's ridicule in the "Midsummer Night's Dream." v. 1, and "Love's Labour's Lost," iv. 2. absurd enough, notably in the matter of that cracked wall, if one lets one's self realize it. Cleopatra is another of the "Saints of Cupid" in the Legend already twice mentioned, as she is also a famous Shakespearian " person; both Chaucer and Shakespeare holding a far too favourable opinion of her lover, whom the former describes a ful worthy gentil werreyour. Dido, Ariadne, Medea, Philomela, are well-known figures to both, though only the older poet, who, as living in the first glimmering of the Renaissance, lay humbly at the feet of the author of the "Heroides," honours them with special cele brations. styles each heroine "a martyr." Com pare "Pericles" i. 1. where Antiochus describes the fallen suitors of his daughter as martyrs, slain in Cupid's wars; " and the Princess' "Saint Denis to Saint To be imprisoned in the viewless winds, with that marvellously brilliant speech of She gallops night by night Through lover's brains, and then they dream of love : O'er lawyers fingers who straight dream on fees: The true power of Chaucer is not displayed in any one of the pieces just mentioned; for of the "Saints Legend of Cupid," as the Man of Law intitules it, undoubtedly the most valuable part is the Prologue; and as for the "Monk's Tale," we weary of it, even as the Knight with all his courtesy, wearied, and half agree with the free-spoken host-the very "able" chairman of the Pilgrim party Such talkyng is nought worth a boterflye, For therinne is noon disport or game. Certainly not in Shakespeare's treatment of the just mentioned stories is his knowledge of Chaucer, or Chaucer's influence upon him obviously manifested. The two works of Chaucer which evidently attracted Shakespeare most were "The Knight's Tale" and "Troylus and Cryseyde"; and the tokens of this attraction are to be seen in the "Midsummer Night's Dream" and in "The Two Noble Kinsmen," in "Venus and Adonis," "Tarquin and Lucrece," "Troilus and Cressida," and "Romeo and Juliet." The "Cokes Tale of Gamelyn," as everybody has long agreed, is not by Chaucer; but in the Elizabethan age it was believed to be so. Shakespeare was certainly acquainted with it, as well as with the prose ver- with Hamlet's rebuke of those unfortu sion of it incorporated in Lodge's "Rosa-nate catspaws, Rosencrantz and Guildenlynd," the source of "As You Like It." stern:Besides these connections, there are scattered throughout Shakespeare's plays and poems various other indications that the writings of Chaucer were anything but a sealed or an unopened book to him. To mention a few of these latter echoes: the Man of Law, as we have mentioned, names "The Legend of Good Women," "The Seintes Legende of Cupid," and Chaucer, in the Latin heading of the various parts of the Legend, Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck, &c.* 66 My worde, my werkes, ys knyt so in youre That as an harpe obeieth to the honde Comp. Lucretius, iv. 965 et seq. :- "Porro hominum mentes, magnis qui mentibus edunt |