ADVERTISEMENT.

"LESSONS of a noble kind may be extracted from some works which promise nothing better than mere entertainment, and which will not, to ordinary readers, appear susceptible of any higher purpose. In the hands of a judicious preceptor, many of SHAKSPEARE's Tragedies, especially of his historical pieces, and still more such as are rendered peculiarly interesting by local circumstances, by British manners, and Royal characters who once filled the English throne, will furnish themes on which to ground much appropriate and instructive conversation. The remorse of the timorous Thane, the conflicting passions of the capricious Lear, the beautiful and touching reflections of Henry IV, the pathetic soliloquies of the repentant Wolsey,— these and a thousand other instances may, when properly selected, and judiciously animadverted upon, not only delight the imagination and gratify the feelings, but carry instruction to the heart."

HANNAH MORE's Hints toward forming

the character of a young Princess.

CONTENTS.

xili 51 67

79

Memoir of Shakspeare
INTRODUCTION
Seven Ages
Infancy
School-Boy
Lover.
Soldier
Justice
Pantaloon
Second Childishness
CONCLUSION

99 133 161 197 219 247 283

MEMOIR

OF

SHAKSPEARE.

Thus while I wond'ring pause o'er SHAKSPEARE's page,
I mark in visions of delight the Sage

High o'er the wrecks of man, who stands sublime,
A column in the melancholy waste;

Its cities humbled, and its glories past,
Majestic mid the solitude of TIME!

WOLCOTT.

SUMMARY CHARACTER OF SHAKSPEARE.

“SHAKSPEARE was an eminent instance of the truth of
that rule-Poeta non fit sed masitur-One is not made,
but born a poet. Indeed his learning was but very little;
so that as Cornish diamonds are not polished by any
lapidary, but are pointed and smoothed even as they are
taken out of the earth, so Nature itself was all the art
which was used upon him! Many were the wit-combats
betwixt him and Ben JONSON, which two I behold like
a Spanish great Galleon, and an English Man of War!
Master Jonson, like the former, was built far higher in
learning ; solid, but slow in his performances. SHAK-
SPEARE, the English Man of War, lesser in bulk, but
lighter in sailing, could turn with ALL TIDES, and take ad-
vantage of ALL WINDS, by the sickness of his wit and in-
vention !"

FULLER.

BRIEF MEMOIR

OF

Shakspeare and his Writings.

Peerless Shakspeare brightly shone
With a splendour not his own,
While, with eloquence divine,
Nature speaks through every line !

LADY MANNERS.

It is almost incredible how little is known of The BRITISH BARD. "By a strange kind of fatality," says Miss Aikin in her interesting Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth, "which excites at once our surprise and our unavailing regrets, the domestic and literary history of this GREAT LUMINARY of his age are almost equally enveloped in doubt and obscurity.” Tho account of his career, therefore, is dark and imperfect throughout the whole of its progress. Gleanings alone may be said to constitute his scanty biography.

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE was born April 23, 1564, at Stratford-upon-Avon, in Warwickshire. His father, a pious Catholic, was a respectable woolstapler, and a member of the Corporation;