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beauty, loaded with literary distinctions, and glowing with patriotic hopes, such it continued to be, when, after having experienced every calamity which is incident to our nature, old, poor, sightless and disgraced, he retired to his hovel to die.

"Hence it was, that though he wrote the Paradise Lost at a time of life when images of beauty and tenderness are in general beginning to fade, even in those minds from which they have not been effaced by anxiety and disappointment, he adorned it with all that is most lovely and delightful in the physical and moral world. Neither Theocritus nor Ariosto had a finer, nor a more healthful sense of the pleasantness of external objects, or loved better to luxuriate amidst sunbeams and flowers, the songs of nightingales, and the coolness of shady fountains. His conception of love unites all the voluptuousness of the Oriental harem, and all the gallantry of the chivalric tourna ments, with all the pure and quiet affection of an English fireside. His poetry reminds us of the miracles of Alpine scenery. Nooks and dells, beautiful as fairy land, are embosomed in its most rugged and gigantic elevations. The roses and the myrtles bloom unchilled on the verge of the avalanche.

"His public conduct was such as was to be expected from a man of a spirit so high and an intellect so powerful. He lived at one of the most memorable eras in the history of mankind-at the very height of the great conflict between liberty and despotism, reason and prejudice. That great battle was fought for no single generation, for no single land. The destinies of the human race were staked on the same

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cast with the freedom of the English people. Then were first proclaimed those mighty principles, which have since worked their way into the depths of the American forests, which have roused Greece from the slavery and degradation of two thousand years, and which, from one end of Europe to the other, have kindled an unquenchable fire in the hearts of the oppressed, and loosed the knees of the oppressors with a strange and unwonted fear. Of those principles, then struggling for their infant existence, Milton was, the most devoted and eloquent champion. We need not say how much we admire his public conduct."

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SHAKSPERE.*

WILLIAM SHAKSPERE, the greatest of dramatic poets, was born at Stratford-upon-Avon, April 23, 1564. When he was but three months old, his birth-place was visited by pestilence, and one seventh part of the inhabitants were swept away; but it did not enter the dwelling of his parents. His father, John Shakspere, was a man of respectable standing, and for several years high bailiff, or chief magistrate of Stratford. He appears to have been a landed proprietor, and of the rank of a gentleman, though he doubtless engaged in some kinds of business. It has been said that he was a butcher; but this is a mistake, occasioned by the fact, that another John Shakspere, who was of this trade, lived in Stratford. The name of Shakspere was common in that town, and some confusion has arisen in the obscurity which shrouds the history of the great poet, from that circumstance. His mother, Mary Arden, of Wellingcote, in the

* The name is usually spelt Shakspeare, but it appears, on good authority, that the poet spells it as above. This orthography is, therefore, adopted by the best authorities.

county of Warwick, was of an ancient family, and inherited some property. At the time of his mar riage, John Shakspere was in easy circumstances; but there is reason to believe that he was afterwards embarrassed.

It is supposed that John Shakspere was, to some extent, a dealer in wool; but however this may have been, we have reason to believe that he and his wife were well educated, pious people, and that their son William was carefully brought up, and duly instructed at the Latin school of Stratford, which was a highly respectable institution.

The fine old town of Stratford is about ninety-four miles north-west from London. The country around is beautiful, and within a few miles are many objects of deep interest, calculated to attract the attention of a youth such as Shakspere must have been. Within eight miles is the noble castle of Warwick, linked with many remembrances of ancient days and heroic deeds.

At the distance of about a dozen miles is Kenilworth, and in Shakspere's time its castle was in all the pomp and pride of its best days. It had been bestowed by Elizabeth upon her favorite, the Earl of Leicester, and he had expended upon it immense sums of money. The walls of the castle included seven acres of ground, and the whole manor, park and chase embraced a space of twenty miles in circuit. It was at this place that Leicester entertained Queen Elizabeth for seventeen days, with extraordinary magnificence, at the time that Shakspere was eleven years old From what we know of the man

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