due, lest otherwise they be unprovided for: lastly, I make this vow, that mine eyes desire you above all things.-Farewell !* She also wrote another letter to the ambassador, desiring that he would remind the king of her dying request, and urge him to do her this last right. The What the historian relates, Shakspeare realizes. On the wonderful beauty of Katharine's closing scene we need not dwell, for that requires no illustration; in transferring the sentiments of her letters to her lips, Shakspeare has given them added grace, and pathos, and tenderness, without injuring their truth and simplicity; the feelings, and almost the manner of expression, are Katharine's own. severe justice with which she draws the character of Wolsey is extremely characteristic; the benign candour with which she listens to the praise of him "whom living she most hated," is not less so. How beautiful her religious enthusiasm!-the slumber which visits her pillow, as she listens to that sad music she called her knell! her awakening from the vision of celestial joy to find herself on earth * The king is said to have wept on reading this letter, and her body being interred at Peterbro', in the monastery, for honour of her memory it was preserved at the dissolution, and erected into a bishop's see.-Herbert's Life of Henry VIII. Spirits of peace! where are ye? are ye gone, And leave me here in wretchedness behind ye? how unspeakably beautiful! And to consummate all in one final touch of truth and nature, we see that consciousness of her own worth and integrity which had sustained her through all her trials of heart, and that pride of station for which she had contended through long years,-which had become more dear by opposition, and by the perseverance with which she had asserted it,-remaining the last strong feeling upon her mind, to the very last hour of existence. When I am dead, good wench, Let me be used with honour-strew me over With maiden flowers, that all the world may know I was a chaste wife to my grave: embalm me, I can no more In the epilogue to this play,* it is recommended To the merciful construction of good women, For such a one we show'd them : alluding to the character of Queen Katharine. Shak * Written, (as the commentators suppose,) not by Shakspeare, but by Ben Jonson. speare has, in fact, placed before us a queen and a heroine, who in the first place, and above all, is a good woman; and I repeat, that in doing so, and in trusting for all his effect to truth and virtue, he has given a sublime proof of his genius and his wisdom, for which, among many other obligations, we women remain his debtors. 244 LADY MACBETH. I DOUBT Whether the epithet historical can properly apply to the character of Lady Macbeth; for though the subject of the play be taken from history, we never think of her with any reference to historical associations, as we do with regard to Constance, Volumnia, Katharine of Arragon, and others. I remember reading some critique, in which Lady Macbeth was styled the "Scottish queen," and methought the title, as applied to her sounded like a vulgarism. It appears that the real wife of Macbeth-she, who lives only in the obscure record of an obscure age, bore the very unmusical appellation of Graoch, and was instigated to the murder of Duncan, not only by ambition, but by motives of vengeance. She was the grand-daughter of Kenith the Fourth, killed in 1003, fighting against Malcolm the Second, the father of Duncan. Macbeth reigned over Scotland from the year 1039 to 1056-but what is all this to the purpose? The sternly magnificent creation of the poet stands before us independent of all these aids to fancy-she is Lady Macbeth: as such she lives, she reigns, and is immortal in the world of imagination. What earthly title could add to her grandeur? what human record or attestation strengthen our impression of her reality? * The character of Macbeth is considered as one of the most complex in the whole range of Shakspeare's dramatic creations. He is represented in the course of the action under such a variety of aspects; the good and evil qualities of his mind are so poised and blended, and instead of being gradually and successively developed, evolve themselves so like shifting lights and shadows playing over the "unstable waters," that his character has afforded a continual and interesting subject of analysis and contemplation. None of Shakspeare's personages have been treated of more at large; none have been more minutely criticised and profoundly examined. A single feature in his character—the question, for instance, as to whether his courage be personal and constitutional, or excited by mere desperation-has been canvassed, asserted, and refuted, in two masterly essays. On the other hand, the character of Lady Macbeth resolves itself into few and simple elements. The grand features of her character are so distinctly |