MUCH ingenuity has been expended in trying to prove that SHAKSPEARE was
a lawyer, and, amongst other passages in his writings, the two first
lines of the Sonnet which commences--
"When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,"
may be thought to indicate that he possessed legal acquirements. Has it,
however, occurred to the editors and commentators, that these lines are
capable of another interpretation, and may be considered to add a new
item to our scanty knowledge of SHAKSPEARE'S personal history, if we
take the more probable view, that when he penned them he had in his
mind's eye those familiar Tribunals--the Quarter Sessions--to which, it
may be whilst residing in the Metropolis, but most undoubtedly after his
retirement to Stratford, he would be summoned in the capacity of Grand
Juryman?
* * * * *