Shakespeare's Insomnia, and the Causes Thereof Part 3

These things do overmuch grieve Anne, who hath been to you a loyal wife and a true, and she desires that you do forthwith renounce your evil ways and return to the new house at Stratford, and in ashes and sackcloth repent of your wanderings from the straight and narrow way.

Thus far have I spoken to you as the mouthpiece and vicegerent of Anne, your wife, who is in sore affliction and deep grief by reason of your transgressions. But, beloved lamb of my flock, I should be unworthy my high and sacred calling did I not lift up also my rebuking voice as a pelican in the wilderness, and adjure you to beware of concupiscence and fleshly l.u.s.t, which unceasingly do war upon the human soul. Thinkest thou to touch pitch and remain undefiled?

The next letter is from the firm of c.o.ke & Dogberry, lawyers in London.

INNER TEMPLE, March 8, 1609.

To WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE:

We have been retained by Mistress Anne Page as her solicitors to bring against you an action, for that you have not fulfilled and in sooth cannot fulfil with her a contract of marriage, and to seek against you under the laws of this realm heavy damages and an imprisonment of the body, in that you have in unholy ways trifled with her affections, contrary to the statute in such cases provided.

She especially avers that you did, two days before Michaelmas, swear to her on a parcel gilt goblet that you did love her alone, and did then give to her a bracelet of price. But yesterday, as she was bargaining with a yeoman named Christopher Sly, from Stratford, for the purchase of a spotted pig of his own fattening, the said Sly did reveal to her that you were his friend, and that you had wife and children in your native town where he dwelt. We beg you to straightway name to us your solicitors, that we may confer with them and attend to the issuance of the writs.

I have aimed to select from the letters sent me only those bearing on some trouble tending to cause sleeplessness on the part of the poet, but make an exception in case of a letter of Sir Walter Raleigh, next in chronological order, which refers to matters of general interest.

The Mermaid, March 20, 1609.

To WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE:

Full well do I know, my dearest Will, that often hast thou wondered of the fate of thy 50, which, with a hundred times as much of mine own, was adventured to found an empire in America. Great were our hopes, both of glory and of gold, in the kingdom of Powhatan. But it grieves me much to say that all hath resulted in infelicity, misfortune, and an unhappy end. Our ships were wrecked, or captured by the knavish Spaniards. Our brave sailors are perished. As I was blameworthy for thy risk, I send by the messenger your 50, which you shall not lose by my over-hopeful vision. For its usance I send a package of a new herb from the Chesapeake, called by the natives tobacco. Make it not into tea, as did one of my kinsmen, but kindle and smoke it in the little tube the messenger will bestow. Be not deterred if thy gorge at first rises against it, for, when thou art wonted, it is a balm for all sorrows and griefs, and as a dream of Paradise. And now, my sweet Will, whom my soul loveth, why comest thou not as of yore to the "Mermaid," that I may have speech with thee? Thou knowest that from my youth up I have adventured all for the welfare and glory of our Queen Elizabeth. On sea and on land and in many climes have I fought the accursed Spaniards, and am honored recognize thy supreme merit, for daily and hourly are sung to her the praises of this loveliness until the story is as a tale that is told and a weariness to the understanding; but thy commendations of her wisdom will be as fresh and fragrant incense, nor will their truthfulness be too closely scanned.

Thou knowest that I have taken all knowledge to be my province, and therefore have I oft and longingly gazed into the flowery fields of that divine art where to-day in our much-loved England thou art disporting thyself supremely and alone. But when I consider thy tragedies, throughout which is diffused the inmost soul of poesy, my crude yet labored metres seem to me as the body of a maiden, not indeed devoid of a certain comeliness and grace, yet into whose waiting bosom hath not yet been breathed the spirit of life.

In thy tragedies thou hast the majestic grace which in the Attic ages belonged to Sophocles alone; thou hast the stately march and music of Aeschylus, without in thy themes his ceaseless iteration of predestined woe which ranks his heroes outside humanity; yet the sombre hand of fate hath not more inflexibly driven the gentle Iphigenia to her doom than it hath followed Macbeth to his foreshadowed crime and end. But in thy canticles it is not an o'ershadowing, mysterious, and tragic fate, but a gracious and loving Providence which, as thyself hath phrased it,

"Holds in His hands the shears of destiny, And has commandment on the pulse of life."

In comedy, Aristophanes is not thy master, yet must I greatly choose thy tragedies as monuments of thy abiding fame. Funeral dolors rather than bridal carols inspire even the harp of David, beloved of the Lord; and the pencil of the Holy Ghost toucheth ever the shadowed phases of our earthly lives.

I am minded to now advert to another topic from the tale told me by Southampton that thou wert presently to publish a volume of thy sugared sonnets. May I pray thee that this collection compa.s.s not the two sonnets written by thee for me in laud of our Queen Elizabeth, and the one of this morning? As thou knowest, these first were presented to our gracious Sovereign as mine own, and did so pleasure her as to chiefly prosper my advancement. Were the true author now known it might sadly mar my fortunes. In the vastness of thy riches, the absence of these gems shall not be noted. The loss of a star dims not the splendor of the constellations. The glorious sun seeks not to reclaim the l.u.s.tre his rays have given to the tiny dewdrop. Withal I have rendered to thee somewhat of recompense as I have spoken at sundry times to her gracious Majesty and to our present anointed Sovereign of thy dramas, and fostered as best I might thy interests when they crossed not mine own. So I trust this boon may be awarded me, and that my borrowed splendors may not be stripped away. Thy immeasurable superiority, as again evidenced in the sonnet to the Lady Mary, has fixed anew my resolve as to my predestined field of labor. Not for my brow shall be woven the Poet's garland of bays. Yet abundant self-confidence is mine, and I augur that in the great work for which I would fain believe the ages are waiting, will be made clear my award to be the high priest of Nature. Exact sciences not yet born shall be my servitors and the augmenters of my fame. By the methods I have discerned shall mankind discover and apply those beneficent innovations which are the chiefest births of time. Yet even this hope hath its flavor of bitterness, as thus guided my pupils may far overpa.s.s me and my memory be lost. But the love of beauty and melody in poesy is of perennial life, and thy memory shall survive the mutations of time, and shall be the Nation's heritage while fancy and imagination dwell in the souls of men.

Anew do I now discern that the meditation of Nature and her laws, mysterious yet exact, consorteth not with the airy fancies of the Poet's vision, and that our paths are diverse, yet each guiding to what is useful and divine.

Farewell! and until the dolors of death are mine shall I remember thy sweet, loving kindness, and admire thy shining genius where wit and wisdom guide the flight of a sovereign imagination.

Ever thy friend, FRANCIS BACON.

One special point is notable in this letter from Bacon. His ordinary correspondence is thickly sprinkled with quotations in the ancient tongues. As he was well acquainted with Shakespeare, this omission of his customary Latin phrases would indicate that he recognized Shakespeare's lack of a thorough cla.s.sical education.

The next, and the last letter in the collection which seems to have a bearing upon the sleeplessness of Shakespeare, is also from Rev. Walter Blaise.

STRATFORD, April 3, 1609.

TO WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE:

Sir Thomas Lucy, who is in her Majesty's commission as a Justice of the Peace in this bailiwick, yesterday did inform me that he had been questioned from London if you were a married man, and if yes, when and to whom you were wedded. As the parish records are in my keeping, I could but bestow the information sought, although with great sinking of heart, as a well-wisher to you, who, though given overmuch to worldly frivolities and revels, yet are a worthy citizen, and a charitable and a just. Greatly did I fear this knowledge was sought to thy injury. Hast thou led a blameless life, the gates of h.e.l.l shall not prevail against thee; but the wicked stand on slippery ways. Anne, thy wife, to whom I did unbosom my fears, is in much tribulation lest thou art unfaithful to thy marriage vows, and again beseeches me to urge thee to come forth from wicked Babylon and dwell in thy pleasant home in Stratford.

Thou art become a man of substance; and hast moneys at usury. I have read of thy verses and plays, which, albeit somewhat given to lewdness, and addressed to gain the favor of the baser sort, yet reveal thee to be a man of understanding. I cannot, as it is rumored do some of thy town a.s.sociates, award thee the t.i.tle of poet, which t.i.tle is reserved for the shining ones; but thou hast parts. There are many parish clerks, and even some curates in this realm, scarcely more liberally endowed in mind than thou. But greatly do I fear that thou art little better than one of the wicked. How hast thou put to use this talent entrusted thee by the Master of the vineyard? In the maintenance of the things which profit not; in seeking the applause of the unworthy; in the writing of vain plays, which, if of the follies of youth, may be forgiven and remembered not against thee, provided in riper years you put behind you these frivolities, and atone for the mischief thou hast wrought by rendering acceptable service to the Master; by coming to the help of the Lord against the mighty. Gladly would I take thy training in charge, and guide thy tottering feet along the flowery paths of Homiletics. Who knoweth into what vessels the All-seeing One may elect to pour his spirit? Perchance in mercy I may be spared to behold thee a faithful though humble preacher of the Word. Anne, thy wife, often hath likened me to a great light upon a high hill-top, shining in the darkness far away. I would not magnify my powers, but not to all is it given to be mighty captains of a host. Yet, according to thy gifts might thy work be, and a little candle shining in a darkened valley hath its place.

In the light of these letters, some pa.s.sages in "Richard III." and the "Comedy of Errors," written in the same year (1609), have an added significance. In "Richard III.," Gloster says to Anne:--

"Your beauty was the cause of that effect: Your beauty, that did haunt me in my sleep, To undertake the death of all the world, So I might live one hour in thy sweet bosom."

In the "Comedy of Errors," the Abbess says to Adriana:--

"The venom clamors of a jealous woman Poison more deadly than a mud dog's tooth.

It seems his sleep was hindered by thy railing.

In food, in sport, and life-preserving rest To be disturbed, would mad or man or beast.

The consequence is, then, thy jealous fits Have scared thy husband from the use of wits."

Note, too, the kindred thought:--

"Love hath chased sleep from my enthralled eyes."

And again this pa.s.sage, called forth possibly by the letters of the Rev. Walter Blaise:--

"Slander, Whose edge is sharper than the sword; whose tongue Outvenoms all the worms of Nile; whose breath Rides on the posting winds and doth belie All corners of the world."

As also this:--

"Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, Show me the steep and th.o.r.n.y way to heaven, Whiles, like a puffed and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, And recks not his own rede."

From these several letters sufficiently appear the causes for the insomnia of Shakespeare, which are some of the same causes resulting in its prevalence to-day. They ill.u.s.trate anew that history repeats itself forever; that humanity is always the same; that like temptations and errors come to men with like results in all the centuries; that the sleeplessness of Shakespeare came, because, merely as a matter of form, he had indorsed for a friend,--because he had bought more stocks than he could pay for, and when his margins were absorbed, came forth a shorn and shivering lamb,--because of the turbulence of labor,--because, alas!

he too had been dazzled and bewildered by

"The light that lies In woman's eyes."

Marvellous as were the endowments of the master, yet was he human and as one of us.

CHICAGO, 1886.