My florist has standing orders to deliver early on the morning of this
day a chaplet of laurel. With it in my hand, I reach by a step-ladder
the nobly arched embrasure that is above my central book-case, and
crown there the marble brow of him whose name is the especial glory of
our literature--of all literature. The greater part of the morning is
spent by me in contemplation of that brow, and in silent meditation.
And, year by year, always there intrudes itself into this meditation
the hope that Shakespeare's name will, one day, be swept into oblivion.
I am not--you will have perceived that I certainly am not--a
'Baconian.' So far as I have examined the evidence in the controversy,
I do not feel myself tempted to secede from the side on which (rightly,
inasmuch as it is the obviously authoritative side) every ignorant
person ranges himself. Even the hottest Baconian, filled with the
stubbornest conviction, will, I fancy, admit in confidence that the
utmost thing that could, at present, be said for his conclusions by a
judicial investigator is that they are 'not proven.' To be convinced of
a thing without being able to establish it is the surest recipe for
making oneself ridiculous. The Baconians have thus made themselves very
ridiculous; and that alone is reason enough for not wishing to join
them. And yet my heart is with them, and my voice urges them to carry
on the fight. It is a good fight, in my opinion, and I hope they will
win it.
I do not at all understand the furious resentment they rouse in the
bosoms of the majority. Mistaken they may be; but why yell them down as
knavish blasphemers? Our reverence, after all, is given not to an
Elizabethan named William Shakespeare, who was born at Stratford, and
married, and migrated to London, and became a second-rate actor, and
afterwards returned to Stratford, and made a will, and composed a few
lines of doggerel for the tombstone under which he was buried. Our
reverence is given to the writer of certain plays and sonnets. To that
second-rate actor, because we believe he wrote those plays and sonnets,
we give that reverence. But our belief is not such as we give to the
proposition that one and two make three. It is a belief that has to be
upheld by argument when it is assailed. When a man says to us that one
and two make four, we smile and are silent. But when he argues, point
by point, that in Bacon's life and writings there is nothing to show
that Bacon might not have written the plays and sonnets, and that there
is much to show that he did write them, and that in what we know about
Shakespeare there is little evidence that Shakespeare wrote those
works, and much evidence that he did not write them, then we pull
ourselves together, marshalling all our facts and all out literary
discernment, so as to convince our interlocutor of his error. But why
should we not do our task urbanely? The cyphers, certainly, are stupid
and tedious things, deserving no patience. But the more intelligent
Baconians spurn them as airily as do you or I. Our case is not so
strong that the arguments of these gentlemen can be ignored; and
naughty temper does but hamper us in the task of demolition. If Bacon
were proved to have written Shakespeare's plays and sonnets, would
mankind be robbed of one of those illusions which are necessary to its
happiness and welfare? If so, we have a good excuse for browbeating the
poor Baconians. But it isn't so, really and truly.
Suppose that one fine morning, Mr. Blank, an ardent Baconian, stumbled
across some long-sought document which proved irrefragably that Bacon
was the poet, and Shakespeare an impostor. What would be our
sentiments? For the second-rate actor we should have not a moment's
sneaking kindness or pity. On the other hand, should we not experience
an everlasting thrill of pride and gladness in the thought that he who
had been the mightiest of our philosophers had been also, by some
unimaginable grace of heaven, the mightiest of our poets? Our pleasure
in the plays and sonnets would be, of course, not one whit greater than
it is now. But the pleasure of hero-worship for their author would be
more than reduplicated. The Greeks revelled in reverence of Heracles by
reason of his twelve labours. They would have been disappointed had it
been proved to them that six of those labours had been performed by
some quite obscure person. The divided reverence would have seemed
tame. Conversely, it is pleasant to revere Bacon, as we do now, and to
revere Shakespeare, as we do now; but a wildest ecstasy of worship were
ours could we concentrate on one of those two demigods all that
reverence which now we apportion to each apart.
It is for this reason, mainly, that I wish success to the Baconians.
But there is another reason, less elevated perhaps, but not less strong
for me. I should like to watch the multifarious comedies which would
spring from the downfall of an idol to which for three centuries a
whole world had been kneeling. Glad fancy makes for me a few extracts
from the issue of a morning paper dated a week after the publication of
Mr. Blank's discovery. This from a column of Literary Notes:
From Baiham, Sydenham, Lewisham, Clapham, Herne Hill and Peckham comes
news that the local Shakespeare Societies have severally met and
decided to dissolve. Other suburbs are expected to follow.
This from the same column:
Mr. Sidney Lee is now busily engaged on a revised edition of his
monumental biography of Shakespeare. Yesterday His Majesty the King
graciously visited Mr. Lee's library in order to personally inspect the
progress of the work, which, in its complete form, is awaited with the
deepest interest in all quarters.
And this, a leaderette:
Yesterday at a meeting of the Parks Committee of the London County
Council it was unanimously resolved to recommend at the next meeting of
the Council that the statue of Shakespeare in Leicester Square should
be removed. This decision was arrived at in view of the fact that
during the past few days the well-known effigy has been the centre of
repeated disturbances, and is already considerably damaged. We are
surprised to learn that there are in our midst persons capable of doing
violence to a noble work of art merely because its subject is
distasteful to them. But even the most civilised communities have their
fits of vandalism. ''Tis true, 'tis pity, and pity 'tis 'tis true.'
And this from a page of advertisements:
To be let or sold. A commodious and desirable Mansion at
Stratford-on-Avon. Delightful flower and kitchen gardens. Hot and cold
water on every floor. Within easy drive of station. Hitherto home of
Miss Marie Corelli.
And this, again from the Literary Notes:
Mr. Hall Caine is in town. Yesterday, at the Authors' Club, he passed
almost unrecognised by his many friends, for he has shaved his beard
and moustache, and has had his hair cropped quite closely to the head.
This measure he has taken, he says, owing to the unusually hot weather
prevailing.
A sonnet, too, printed in large type on the middle page, entitled 'To
Shakespeare,' signed by the latest fashionable poet, and beginning thus:
O undetected during so long years,
O irrepleviably infamous,
Stand forth!
A cable, too, from 'Our Own Correspondent' in New York:
This afternoon the Carmania came into harbour. Among the passengers was
Mr. J. Pierpont Morgan, who had come over in personal charge of Anne
Hathaway's Cottage, his purchase of which for L2,000,000 excited so
much attention on your side a few weeks ago. Mr. Blank's sensational
revelations not having been published to the world till two days after
the Carmania left Liverpool, the millionaire collector had, of course,
no cognisance of the same. On disembarking he proceeded straight to the
Customs Office and inquired how much duty was to be imposed on the
cottage. On being courteously informed that the article would be passed
into the country free of charge, he evinced considerable surprise. I
then ventured to approach Mr. Morgan and to hand him a journal
containing the cabled summary of Mr. Blank's disclosures, which he
proceeded to peruse. His comments I must reserve for the next mail, the
cable clerks here demurring to their transmission.
Only a dream? But a sweet one. Bustle about, Baconians, and bring it
true. Don't listen to my florist.