then, as it is with us all. No man works save under conditions. The

sculptor cannot set his own free Thought before us; but his Thought as he
could translate it into the stone that was given, with the tools that were

given. _Disjecta membra_ are all that we find of any Poet, or of any man.
Whoever looks intelligently at this Shakspeare may recognize that he too

was a _Prophet_, in his way; of an insight analogous to the Prophetic,
though he took it up in another strain. Nature seemed to this man also

divine; unspeakable, deep as Tophet, high as Heaven; "We are such stuff as
Dreams are made of!" That scroll in Westminster Abbey, which few read with

understanding, is of the depth of any seer. But the man sang; did not
preach, except musically. We called Dante the melodious Priest of

Middle-Age Catholicism. May we not call Shakspeare the still more
melodious Priest of a _true_ Catholicism, the "Universal Church" of the

Future and of all times? No narrow superstition, harsh asceticism,
intolerance, fanatical fierceness" target="_blank" title="n.凶恶，残忍">fierceness or perversion: a Revelation, so far as

it goes, that such a thousand-fold hidden beauty and divineness dwells in
all Nature; which let all men worship as they can! We may say without

offence, that there rises a kind of universal Psalm out of this Shakspeare
too; not unfit to make itself heard among the still more sacred Psalms.

Not in disharmony with these, if we understood them, but in harmony!--I
cannot call this Shakspeare a "Sceptic," as some do; his indifference to

the creeds and theological quarrels of his time misleading them. No:
neither unpatriotic, though he says little about his Patriotism; nor

sceptic, though he says little about his Faith. Such "indifference" was
the fruit of his greatnesswithal: his whole heart was in his own grand

sphere of worship (we may call it such); these other controversies, vitally
important to other men, were not vital to him.

But call it worship, call it what you will, is it not a right glorious
thing, and set of things, this that Shakspeare has brought us? For myself,

I feel that there is actually a kind of sacredness in the fact of such a
man being sent into this Earth. Is he not an eye to us all; a blessed

heaven-sent Bringer of Light?--And, at bottom, was it not perhaps far
better that this Shakspeare, every way an unconscious man, was _conscious_

of no Heavenly message? He did not feel, like Mahomet, because he saw into
those internal Splendors, that he specially was the "Prophet of God:" and

was he not greater than Mahomet in that? Greater; and also, if we compute
strictly, as we did in Dante's case, more successful. It was intrinsically

an error that notion of Mahomet's, of his supreme Prophethood; and has come
down to us inextricably involved in error to this day; dragging along with

it such a coil of fables, impurities, intolerances, as makes it a
questionable step for me here and now to say, as I have done, that Mahomet

was a true Speaker at all, and not rather an ambitious charlatan,
perversity and simulacrum; no Speaker, but a Babbler! Even in Arabia, as I

compute, Mahomet will have exhausted himself and become obsolete, while
this Shakspeare, this Dante may still be young;--while this Shakspeare may

still pretend to be a Priest of Mankind, of Arabia as of other places, for
unlimited periods to come!

Compared with any speaker or singer one knows, even with Aeschylus or
Homer, why should he not, for veracity and universality, last like them?

He is _sincere_ as they; reaches deep down like them, to the universal and
perennial. But as for Mahomet, I think it had been better for him _not_ to

be so conscious! Alas, poor Mahomet; all that he was _conscious_ of was a
mere error; a futility and triviality,--as indeed such ever is. The truly

great in him too was the unconscious: that he was a wild Arab lion of the
desert, and did speak out with that great thunder-voice of his, not by

words which he _thought_ to be great, but by actions, by feelings, by a
history which _were_ great! His Koran has become a stupid piece of prolix

absurdity; we do not believe, like him, that God wrote that! The Great Man
here too, as always, is a Force of Nature. whatsoever is truly great in

him springs up from the _in_articulate deeps.
Well: this is our poor Warwickshire Peasant, who rose to be Manager of a

Playhouse, so that he could live without begging; whom the Earl of
Southampton cast some kind glances on; whom Sir Thomas Lucy, many thanks to

him, was for sending to the Treadmill! We did not account him a god, like
Odin, while he dwelt with us;--on which point there were much to be said.

But I will say rather, or repeat: In spite of the sad state Hero-worship
now lies in, consider what this Shakspeare has actually become among us.

Which Englishman we ever made, in this land of ours, which million of
Englishmen, would we not give up rather than the Stratford Peasant? There

is no regiment of highest Dignitaries that we would sell him for. He is
the grandest thing we have yet done. For our honor among foreign nations,

as an ornament to our English Household, what item is there that we would
not surrender rather than him? Consider now, if they asked us, Will you

give up your Indian Empire or your Shakspeare, you English; never have had
any Indian Empire, or never have had any Shakspeare? Really it were a

grave question. Official persons would answer doubtless in official
language; but we, for our part too, should not we be forced to answer:

Indian Empire, or no Indian Empire; we cannot do without Shakspeare!
Indian Empire will go, at any rate, some day; but this Shakspeare does not

go, he lasts forever with us; we cannot give up our Shakspeare!
Nay, apart from spiritualities; and considering him merely as a real,

marketable, tangibly useful possession. England, before long, this Island
of ours, will hold but a small fraction of the English: in America, in New

Holland, east and west to the very Antipodes, there will be a Saxondom
covering great spaces of the Globe. And now, what is it that can keep all

these together into virtually one Nation, so that they do not fall out and
fight, but live at peace, in brotherlike intercourse, helping one another?

This is justly regarded as the greatest practical problem, the thing all
manner of sovereignties and governments are here to accomplish: what is it

that will accomplish this? Acts of Parliament, administrative
prime-ministers cannot. America is parted from us, so far as Parliament

could part it. Call it not fantastic, for there is much reality in it:
Here, I say, is an English King, whom no time or chance, Parliament or

combination of Parliaments, can dethrone! This King Shakspeare, does not
he shine, in crowned sovereignty, over us all, as the noblest, gentlest,

yet strongest of rallying-signs; indestructible; really more valuable in
that point of view than any other means or appliancewhatsoever? We can

fancy him as radiant aloft over all the Nations of Englishmen, a thousand
years hence. From Paramatta, from New York, wheresoever, under what sort

of Parish-Constable soever, English men and women are, they will say to one
another: "Yes, this Shakspeare is ours; we produced him, we speak and

think by him; we are of one blood and kind with him." The most
common-sense politician, too, if he pleases, may think of that.

Yes, truly, it is a great thing for a Nation that it get an articulate
voice; that it produce a man who will speak forth melodiously what the

heart of it means! Italy, for example, poor Italy lies dismembered,
scattered asunder, not appearing in any protocol or treaty as a unity at

all; yet the noble Italy is actually _one_: Italy produced its Dante;
Italy can speak! The Czar of all the Russias, he is strong with so many

bayonets, Cossacks and cannons; and does a great feat in keeping such a
tract of Earth politically together; but he cannot yet speak. Something

great in him, but it is a dumb greatness. He has had no voice of genius,
to be heard of all men and times. He must learn to speak. He is a great

dumb monsterhitherto. His cannons and Cossacks will all have rusted into
nonentity, while that Dante's voice is still audible. The Nation that has

a Dante is bound together as no dumb Russia can be.--We must here end what
we had to say of the _Hero-Poet_.

[May 15, 1840.]
LECTURE IV.

THE HERO AS PRIEST. LUTHER; REFORMATION: KNOX; PURITANISM.
Our present discourse is to be of the Great Man as Priest. We have

repeatedly endeavored to explain that all sorts of Heroes are intrinsically
of the same material; that given a great soul, open to the Divine

Significance of Life, then there is given a man fit to speak of this, to
sing of this, to fight and work for this, in a great, victorious, enduring

manner; there is given a Hero,--the outward shape of whom will depend on
the time and the environment he finds himself in. The Priest too, as I

understand it, is a kind of Prophet; in him too there is required to be a
light of inspiration, as we must name it. He presides over the worship of

the people; is the Uniter of them with the Unseen Holy. He is the
spiritual Captain of the people; as the Prophet is their spiritual King

with many captains: he guides them heavenward, by wise guidance through
this Earth and its work. The ideal of him is, that he too be what we can

call a voice from the unseen Heaven; interpreting, even as the Prophet did,
and in a more familiar manner unfolding the same to men. The unseen

Heaven,--the "open secret of the Universe,"--which so few have an eye for!
He is the Prophet shorn of his more awful splendor; burning with mild

equable radiance, as the enlightener of daily life. This, I say, is the
ideal of a Priest. So in old times; so in these, and in all times. One

knows very well that, in reducing ideals to practice, great latitude of