“Now, by my life, this day grows wondrous hot;
Some _airy_ devil hovers in the sky,” &c.
Theobald adopts Warburton’s conjecture of “fiery.”
I prefer the old text: the word “devil” implies “fiery.” You need only
read the line, laying a full and strong emphasis on “devil,” to perceive
the uselessness and tastelessness of Warburton’s alteration.
“Richard II.”
I have stated that the transitional link between the epic poem and the
drama is the historic drama; that in the epic poem a pre-announced fate
gradually adjusts and employs the will and the events as its instruments,
whilst the drama, on the other hand, places fate and will in opposition to
each other, and is then most perfect, when the victory of fate is obtained
in consequence of imperfections in the opposing will, so as to leave a
final impression that the fate itself is but a higher and a more
intelligent will.
From the length of the speeches, and the circumstance that, with one
exception, the events are all historical, and presented in their results,
not produced by acts seen by, or taking place before, the audience, this
tragedy is ill suited to our present large theatres. But in itself, and
for the closet, I feel no hesitation in placing it as the first and most
admirable of all Shakespeare’s purely historical plays. For the two parts
of _Henry IV._ form a species of themselves, which may be named the mixed
drama. The distinction does not depend on the mere quantity of historical
events in the play compared with the fictions; for there is as much
history in _Macbeth_ as in _Richard_, but in the relation of the history
to the plot. In the purely historical plays, the history forms the plot;
in the mixed, it directs it; in the rest, as _Macbeth_, _Hamlet_,
_Cymbeline_, _Lear_, it subserves it. But, however unsuited to the stage
this drama may be, God forbid that even there it should fall dead on the
hearts of jacobinised Englishmen! Then, indeed, we might say—_præteriit
gloria mundi!_ For the spirit of patriotic reminiscence is the
all-permeating soul of this noble work. It is, perhaps, the most purely
historical of Shakespeare’s dramas. There are not in it, as in the others,
characters introduced merely for the purpose of giving a greater
individuality and realness, as in the comic parts of _Henry IV._, by
presenting as it were our very selves. Shakespeare avails himself of every
opportunity to effect the great object of the historic drama,—that,
namely, of familiarising the people to the great names of their country,
and thereby of exciting a steady patriotism, a love of just liberty, and a
respect for all those fundamental institutions of social life, which bind
men together:—
“This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise;
This fortress, built by nature for herself,
Against infection, and the hand of war;
This happy breed of men, this little world;
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a home,
Against the envy of less happier lands;
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England,
This nurse, this teeming womb of royal kings,
Fear’d by their breed, and famous by their birth,” &c.