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 LIBRARY 
 
 THE SONNETS OF WILLIAM SHAKSPERE : 
 
 A CRITICAL DISQUISITION SUGGESTED BY A RECENT 
 
 DISCOVERY. 
 
 Mea. rnihi conscientia pluris est quara oraniam sermo." M. T. CICERO. 
 
 BY BOLTON CORNET, M.R.S.L. 
 
 ADVERTISEMENT. 
 
 In the Athenceum of the 25 January we have an epistolary 
 communication from M. Philarete Chasles, Conservateur de 
 la Bibliotheque Mazarine, on the Sonnets of Shakspere. 
 
 a fervent admirer of our poet, the mysterious inscrip- 
 tion prefixed to the sonnets, and printed in an ensuing note, 
 had excited his curiosity. Observing the discordances of the 
 current editions, he procured a fac-simile of the inscription 
 inted in 1609, from a copy of that very rare edition pre- 
 served in the British Museum. The result of an attentive 
 examination of it was a new interpretation, which he thus 
 explains in a series of conclusions : 
 
 " 1 . That we have here no dedication, properly so called, at all, but a 
 kind of monumental inscription. 2. That this inscription has not one 
 continuous sense, but is broken up into two distinct sentences. 3. That 
 the former sentence contains the real inscription, which is addressed by 
 and not to W. H. 4. That the person to whom the inscription is 
 addressed is, for some reasons, not directly named, but described by what 
 the learned call an Autonomasia (the only begetter of these ensuing 
 sonnets). 5. That the latter sentence is only an appendage to the real 
 inscription. 6. That the publisher, in the latter sentence, is allowed to 
 express his own good wishes, not for an eternity of fame to the begetter 
 of the sonnets, which would be an impertinence on his part, but for the 
 success of the undertaking in which he, the adventurer, has embarked 
 his capital." 
 
 To decide on the theory of M. Chasles required no serious 
 
effort : it spoke for itself. I described the impression which 
 it made on me in the Notes and Queries of the 1 February; 
 returned to the subject on the 1 March ; and shall now, in 
 justice to M. Chasles, repeat the first note verbatim, and 
 produce the second in a more extended form in justice to 
 the argument. The repetitions arising out of this plan 
 must be excused in consideration of the motives. 
 
 It is neither as a lover of sonnets, nor as a memorial of my 
 attachment to poetic criticism, that I print this disquisition. 
 The question at issue has various aspects, and I have chosen to 
 consider it with relation to the rules of evidence, and of biogra- 
 phic justice. 
 
 The pamphlet aspires to no other distinction. It is a plain 
 attempt to rectify some grave errors in the history of English 
 literature, and a vindication of the moral character of one of its 
 most ADMIRED ORNAMENTS the prince of psychologists the 
 herald of noble sentiments the microscopic observer of social 
 life the consummate master of the world of words. 
 
 THE TERRACE, BARNES, S.W. 30 June, 1862. 
 
 THE SONNETS OF SHAKSPERE : M. PHILARETE CHASLES. 
 
 "C'est la bibliographic qui fournit a 1'histoire litteraire les elements 
 les plus positifs, et qui pent lui donner une exactitude rigoureuse." 
 
 P. C. F. DAUNOU. 
 
 We owe to M. Philarete Chasles, Conservateur de la 
 Bibliotheque Mazarine, the solution of a Shakspere problem 
 which has resisted all the efforts of our "homely wits." 
 What was visible to every one had been seen by no one ! 
 
 It was formerly a national boast that Samuel Johnson had 
 " beat forty French " but here is a Frenchman who has 
 routed a whole army of English editors, annotators, pam- 
 phleteers, etc. 
 
 The discovery relates to the inscription which precedes 
 the Sonnets of our dramatist in the authoritative edition of 
 1609, entitled 
 
 " SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. Neuer before Imprinted. At London 
 by G. Eld for T. T. [Thomas Thorpe] and are to be solde by William 
 Aspley. 1609." 4 40 leaves. In some copies, for William Aspley we 
 have lohn Wright, dwelling at Christ-church gate. 1609. 
 
 The mysterious inscription, which occupies the recto of 
 
the second leaf, was given by Mr. Steevens with commend- 
 able exactness in 1 766, and is thus printed : 
 
 TO . THE . ONLIE . BEGETTER . OF . 
 
 THESE . INSVING . SONNETS . 
 
 M r . W . H . ALL . HAPPINESSE . 
 
 AND . THAT . ETERNITIE . 
 
 PROMISED . 
 
 BY . 
 OVR . EVER-LIVING . POET . 
 
 WISHETH . 
 
 THE . WELL-WISHING . 
 
 ADVENTVRER . IN . 
 
 SETTING . 
 
 FORTH . 
 
 T.T. 
 
 This inscription should be considered with reference to its 
 peculiarities. A point after each word is no punctuation, 
 and the bare words must therefore decide the sense. It has 
 hitherto passed as one inscription. Now M. Chasles sug- 
 gests that the real inscription ends with the word wisheth, 
 and that the rest was added by Mr. Thorpe. 
 
 I have described the explanation of M. Chasles as a sug- 
 gestion, but it is almost a demonstration. Acting on that 
 conviction, I shall briefly report my own inferences, and 
 proceed to justify them by admitted facts and probable cir- 
 cumstances. 
 
 I now firmly believe that the begetter of the sonnets was the 
 earl of Southampton that William Herbert, afterwards 
 earl of Pembroke, wrote the real inscription and that Mr. 
 Thorpe did no more than express his wishes for the success 
 of the publication. 
 
 In 15.93 Shakspere dedicated his Venus and Adonis to the 
 earl of Southampton as " the first heir of his invention." In 
 1594 he chose the same patron for his Lucrece, and made 
 this declaration : " What I have done is yours, what I have 
 to do is yours." Did he forget his promise ? I must either 
 tax him with ingratitude, or assume that he wrote the son- 
 nets as the fulfilment of that promise. The existence of 
 " his sugred Sonnets among his priuate friends " was an- 
 nounced by Meres in 1598, and they may have closely 
 followed Lucrece. At a later date he had other cares, and 
 other occupations. 
 
 William Herbert was born at Wilton in 1 580, and sue- 
 
ceecled to the earldom of Pembroke in 1601. As he had 
 been educated >at Oxford, and was of a lively turn, we may 
 account for his adoption of the classical form of inscription, 
 of which no doubt there were examples at Wilton. If it 
 was written in the life-time of his father, his own designation 
 was correct; and if written about the year 1600, there was 
 much reason to conceal the name of the earl of South- 
 ampton. 
 
 I now come to Mr. Thorpe. How did he obtain the MS? 
 There is no evidence on that point, hut the expression 
 Never before imprinted seems to prove ttiM he was aware of 
 the date of their composition. He may have had sufficient 
 reasons for avoiding an advertisement. 
 
 One word more. Thorpe was a humorist, as his dedi- 
 cation of a certain poetical volume to Edward Blount 
 testifies, but his epigraphic humor, and the injudicious punc- 
 tuation of Malone in successive editions, have led wiser men 
 astray. 
 
 NOTE. The inscription, of which the perpendicular lines indicate the 
 arrangement, was thus pointed by Mr. Malone in 1780: 
 
 To the only begetter | of these ensuing sonnets, | Mr. W. H. | all 
 happiness | and that eternity promised | by our ever-living poet | 
 wisheth the | well-wishing adventurer | in setting forth, | T. T. 
 
 He repeated this in 1790, with the addition of a comma after happiness 
 and after poet which Boswell adopted in 1821. 
 
 THE SONNETS OF SHAKSPERE : A CRITICAL INQUIRY. 
 
 " Oh sure I am the wits of former dales 
 
 To subiects worse haue giuen admiring praise." 
 
 W. S. 
 
 No one of the separate works of our renowned Shakspere 
 was doomed to experience so small a share of popular favor 
 as the volume of Sonnets. 
 
 Of Venus and Adonis, first published in 1593, he lived to 
 witness five editions; of Lucrece, first published in 1594, he 
 lived to witness four editions; and of some of the undisputed 
 plays which came out in his life-time there were two or 
 more editions in the same year ! Now of the volume of 
 Sonnets, first published in 1 609, there was no second edition 
 till 16-10; no exact re-impression till 1766. A separate re- 
 impression is even at this time a DESIDERATUM. 
 
Aii examination of the earlier writers on Shakspere 
 with the reservation of Francis Meres is productive of the 
 same evidence as the bibliographic circumstances. 
 
 Fuller, the often-quoted recorder of facts and fancies, 
 adverts to his tragedies, comedies, poems, and wit-combats, 
 without specifying any one of his works. Philips calls him 
 " the glory of the English stage," and commends the style 
 of " his .-. his Rape of Lucrece and other 
 
 various poems." By various poems he must mean the decep- 
 tive collection of 1640- Langbaine, who gives a somewhat 
 extended account of his plays, and even of the spurious 
 plays, assures us that he also wrote " TWO small poems, viz. 
 Venus and Adonis and the Rape of Lucrece." He omits 
 the sonnets, but states the precise number of those contained 
 in the Delia of Samuel Daniel ! One instance more. Sir 
 Thomas Pope Blount gives a character and censure of our 
 poet, in four quarto pages, without a word on the sonnets. 
 
 Fuller died in 1661 ; Philips sent forth his criticism in 
 1675; Langbaine, in 1691; and Blount, in 1694. As the 
 latter date almost carries us on to the interminable series of 
 the avowed editors of our dramatist, the information which 
 they afford must be the next point of inquiry. 
 
 In 1 709 Rowe became the editor of the plays of Shak- 
 spere the first editor in form. He ascribes to him " Venus 
 and Adonis and Tarquin and Lucrece, in stanzas," as printed 
 in a late collection of poems ! In 1 725 to Howe succeeded 
 Pope. He notices the poems " dedicated to the earl of 
 Southampton" a phrase which excludes the sonnets. In 
 1 7-33 came forth Theobald. He merely refers, as evidence 
 that our poet was a lover of music, to the " great number of 
 Sonnets which are sprinkled through the plays." In the 
 prefaces to the editions of Hanmer in 1744, Warburton in 
 1747, Johnson in 1765, and Capell in 1768, we have not one 
 word on the sonnets. Such is the amount of my gleanings in 
 the fields of the learned editors ! 
 
 I must revert to 1766. In that year Steevens edited 
 Twenty of the plays of Shakespeare, being the ichole number 
 printed in quarto ; and therewith we find, what no one would 
 expect to find, Shake-speares Sonnet* but without a line 
 of critical illustration! The edition of 1765 was re- 
 printed with the notes of Steevens and others in 1 77-3, and 
 : and in 1 7^0 Malone added to the latter edition a 
 Xitpj-'k.'t'cnt, which contains the doubtful Pericles, the spurious 
 plays, and the aenuine poems, with numerous notes. 
 
We now reach the period at which the sonnets emerge 
 from a state of comparative obscurity, and become the objects 
 of earnest inquiry and animated discussion. 
 
 The principal writers in this controversy, as far as my 
 information extends, are Edmond Malone and George Stee- 
 vens, 1780; George Chalmers, 1797; Nathan Drake, 1817; 
 James Boswell, 1821; Alexander Dyce, 1832; B. H. 
 Bright, 1832; James Boaden, 1832; D. L. Richardson, 
 1836; C. A. Brown, 1838; J. W. Burgon, 18; and 
 Joseph Hunter, 1845. 
 
 The more important questions for examination seem to 
 be : When were the sonnets written ? Under what circum- 
 stances were they written? Do they contain biographic 
 particulars, or are they mere invention ? By whose autho- 
 rity were they published ? 
 
 In the absence of positive evidence, here are my convic- 
 tions. I believe, 1. That the sonnets, as we now have them, 
 were written soon after 1594; 2. That they were written in 
 fulfilment of a promise made to the earl of Southampton; 
 3. That they are, with very slight exceptions, mere poetical 
 exercises; and 4. That they were published without the 
 sanction of the author or of his patrons. 
 
 It is the deficiency of evidence on the questions at issue, 
 and the novelty of the theory now advanced, which compel 
 me to have recourse to my private convictions ; and I must 
 be permitted to express those convictions rather decidedly, in 
 order to avoid the frequent use of apolegetic phrases. 
 
 1. The sonnets, as we now have them, were written soon after 
 1594. 
 
 The technical account of the volume of Sonnets must now 
 be repeated, and its contents described : 
 
 " SHAKE-SPEARES SONNETS. Neuer before Imprinted. At London 
 by G. Eld for T. T. and are to be solde by William Aspley. 1609." 
 4. Collation. Title, one leaf; Inscription, one leaf; the Sonnets, etc. 
 B to K in fours, and L 2 leaves = 40 leaves. In some copies, for 
 William Aspley we have John Wright, dwelling at Christ-church gate. 
 1609. The sonnets commence on B 1 recto and end on K 1 recto, with 
 FINIS. Then comes, without any advertisement, A Loners complaint. By 
 William Shake-speare . It extends from K 1 verso to L 2 verso, with a 
 second FINIS. The sonnets are numbered 1 154, but have neither ad- 
 dresses nor any indication of the subjects. The Loners complaint is a 
 poem in 47 seven-line stanzas. 
 
We owe to Francis Meres, Maister of Artes of both Uni- 
 versities, the earliest intimation of the existence of the 
 Sonnets. As the volume in which it appears is of rare occur- 
 rence, the paragraph shall now be reprinted : 
 
 " As the soule of Euphorbus was thought to liue in Pythagoras : so 
 the sweete wittie soule of Quid Hues in mellifluous & hony-tongued 
 Shakespeare, vvitnes his Venus and Adonis, his Lucrece, his sugred 
 Sonnets among his priuate friends, &c." Palladis Tamia, London, 1598. 
 Small 8. folio 281 verso. 
 
 There is no more evidence of that date than as above, and 
 the argument must therefore rest on probability. Shakspere 
 was extremely careless of fame, and it seems to me improb- 
 able that he should have handed about fugitive sonnets or 
 that Meres should have heard of the circumstance or that 
 so notable a lover of brevity should have felt himself called 
 on to report it. He could afford no more than sixteen pages 
 to a comparative discourse of our English poets, with the Greek, 
 Latin, and Italian poets ! 
 
 I therefore believe that the Sonnets recorded in 1598 
 formed the work which was promised in 1594, and reached 
 the press in 1 609. The volume itself is not without evidence 
 in favor of this conviction. Its familiar title intimates a 
 work which was then known to exist in manuscript, and the 
 phrase never before imprinted must surely mean that it had 
 been written at a much earlier date. 
 
 2. The sonnets were written in fulfilment of a promise made 
 to the earl of Southampton in 1 594. 
 
 The inscription prefixed to the Sonnets is the only mark of 
 editorship which the volume contains, and must therefore be 
 the first object of scrutiny. I shall repeat it verbatim, but 
 with my own punctuation : 
 
 TO THE ONLIE BEGETTER OF THESE INSVING SONNETS, MR. W. H. ALL 
 HAPPINESSE AND THAT ETERNITIE PROMISED BY OVR EVER-LIVING POET 
 WISHETH. 
 
 THE WELL-WISHING ADVENTVRER IN SETTING FORTH, 
 
 T. T. 
 
 I assume that the initials W. H. denote William lord 
 Herbert, afterwards earl of Pembroke. This discovery was 
 made by Mr. Bright about the year 1818, was announced by 
 Mr. Boaden in 1832, has been almost universally adopted as 
 a fact, and seems to me decisive but I follow the discoverer 
 no further. The initials T. T. indicate Thomas Thorpe. 
 
Now this inscription and subscription, as printed in 1609, 
 are imitations of the lapidary style. The capitals, the pecu- 
 liar points, and the arrangement, prove it. The inversion of 
 the real inscription accords therewith. We must read To the 
 etc. W. H. wisheth all happinesse etc. Had it been one in- 
 scription, we should not have had wisheth and well-wisher in 
 such close contiguity. It was an oversight on the part of 
 Thorpe. As witnesses that W. H. had acquired a competent 
 share of scholarship, and might thence be led to adopt the 
 classical form of inscription, Clarendon and Wood must be 
 deemed sufficient ; but I shall add that Samuel Daniel, when 
 addressing his lordship in Defence of Rhym?, enforced the ar- 
 gument by more than twenty Latin quotations ! One word 
 on Mr. Thorpe. As a sagacious man, and a humorist withal, 
 he adhered to the Wilton model. Here is another specimen 
 of his subscriptions 
 
 " Thine in all rites of perfect friendship, 
 THOM. THORPE." 
 
 Now comes an enigma, and much depends on its solution. 
 It may confirm the opinion which has hitherto prevailed,, or 
 may serve to refute it, and give rise to new theories. 
 
 The word begetter is equivocal. Did the nameless person 
 whom W. H. addresses obtain the MS. ? Or did he cause 
 the sonnets to be written ? Chalmers advocates the former 
 interpretation ; and so does Drake. In fact, it has been 
 current for more than sixty years. I reserve my own notion 
 till more competent witnesses shall have been heard: 
 
 " Vouchsafe to grace what here to light is brought, 
 Begot by thy sweet hand, born of my thought-" 
 
 Michael Drayton, 1596. 
 To Lucy countess of Bedford. 
 
 " Here, what your sacred influence begat, 
 
 (Most lov'd, and most respected Majesty) 
 With humble heart and hand I consecrate 
 Unto the glory of your memory." 
 
 Samuel Daniel, 1614. 
 To Anne of Denmark. 
 
 In unison with this obsolete expression, and as its correla- 
 tive, Philips calls William Bosworth "the bringer-forth of a 
 small poem/' 
 
 The inscription thus exhibited in its true aspect, and the 
 
of the equivocal word firmly established, in conformity 
 with my own previous notion, we have to inquire Who was 
 this patron of Shakspere? Who caused the sonnets to be 
 written ? Who was it that had so much influence over our 
 poet? So much influence over the man who, with all the 
 world before him, kept himself aloof from the world! I 
 admit the generosity of the Sidneys and the Herberts to- 
 wards the poets of those times, which Meres and others 
 record, but W. H. disclaims the honor thrust on him by 
 certain critics and- by such disclaimer points out the true 
 conclusion on the question now at issue. 
 
 This patron of Shakspere could be no other than Henry 
 Wriothesly earl of Southampton a dere loner and cherisher 
 of poets, as Tho, Xashe attests the only person whom our 
 poet ever addressed in a dedication the patron also of 
 John Florio the brave and bounteous peer who "infused 
 light and life into many more " 
 
 " The height of armes and artes in one aspiring, 
 Valor with grace, with valor grace attiring." 
 
 A review of the connection between the peer and the 
 poet, as far as we have it in evidence, is sufficient to justify 
 the above assertion. Xow, if we reject the phantasms of 
 tradition, the evidence is limited to two dedications which 
 claim peculiar attention as the entire autobiographic remains 
 of William Shakspere. 
 
 VEXVS AXD ADONIS. 
 
 Yilia. miretur vulgus : mihi flauus Apollo 
 Pocula Cast alia plena minis tret aqua. 
 
 LONDON Imprinted by Richard Field, and are to be sold at the signe 
 of the white Greyhound in Paules Church-yard. 1593. 4to. 
 
 TO THE RIGHT HONORABLE HENRIE WRIOTHESLEY, 
 EARLE OF SOUTHAMPTON, AND BARON OF TITCHFIELD. 
 
 Right honourable, I know not how I shall offend in dedicating my 
 vnpolisht lines to your lordship, nor how the worlde will censure mee for 
 choosing so strong a proppe to support so weake a burthen, onelye if your 
 honour seeme but pleased, I account my selfe highly praised, and vowe 
 to take aduantage of all idle houres, till I haue honoured you with some 
 grauer labour. But if the first heire of my inuention proue deformed, 
 I shall be sorie it had so noble a^god-father : and neuer after eare so 
 barren a land, for feare it yeeld me still so bad a haruest, I leaue it to 
 
10 
 
 your honourable surucy, and your honor to your hearts content, which 
 I wish may alwayes answere your owne wish, and the worlds hopefull 
 expectation. 
 
 Your honors in all dutie, 
 
 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 LVCRECE. 
 
 LONDON. Printed by Richard Field, for John Harrison, and are to be. 
 sold at the signe of the white Greyhound in Paules Church-yard. 
 1594. 4to. 
 
 TO THE RIGHT HONOVRABLE, HENRY WRIOTHESLEY, 
 EARLE OF SOUTHHAMPTON, AND BARON OF TITCHF1ELD. 
 
 The loue I dedicate to your lordship is without end : wherof this 
 pamphlet without beginning is but a superfluous moity. The warrant I 
 haue of your honourable disposition, not the worth of my vntutord lines 
 makes it assured of acceptance. What I haue done is yours, what I 
 haue to doe is yours, being part in all I haue, deuoted yours. Were my 
 worth greater, my duety would shew greater, meane time, as it is, it is 
 bound to your lordship ; to whom I wish long life still lengthned with 
 all happinesse. 
 
 Your lordships in all duety. 
 
 WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. 
 
 The above dedications, which are printed literatim from 
 the Malone and Grenville copies, form the substantial basis 
 of this part of my fourfold argument. 
 
 We must revert to 1593. Shakspere chooses the earl of 
 Southampton as a patron ; addresses his lordship with due 
 humility ; presents him with Venus and Adonis as the first 
 heir of his invention ; and promises some graver labor. We 
 now advance to 1594. He produces Lucrece, a poem of 
 more than 1800 lines; dedicates it to the same noble patron 
 with much confidence ; and, in terms of ardent devotedness, 
 promises his lordship some future doings. 
 
 Thorpe asserts that one special virtue of the patrons of 
 those days was to give nothing. The censure, as Florio tes- 
 tifies, was inapplicable to the earl of Southampton; but 
 whether Shakspere was favored with a purse of nobles or of 
 angels or of half-angels, or to what amount, are particulars 
 on which we have no evidence. 
 
 I rely on facts and admissible inferences. As he had ful- 
 filled the promise of 1593 within a year, and had promised 
 his patron some further doings, expressing his grateful feel- 
 
11 
 
 ings in words of superlative force, it is more than probable 
 that he carried out his second promise with proportionate 
 expedition or about the year 1596. 
 
 Venus and Adonis is in six-line stanzas, and Lucrece in 
 seven-line stanzas. For the fulfilment of his second promise 
 he produced a volume of Sonnets a species of composition 
 then much in vogue, as master Slender intimates, and 
 therefore adapted to the object in view. The Delia of 
 Samuel Daniel, published in 1592, and the Ideas mirrour of 
 Dray ton, published in 1594, may have had some influence on 
 his choice. 
 
 If he had not written the sonnets in pursuance of that 
 second promise, he must have felt every new edition of his 
 former poetical volumes as a reproach as a bitter reproach. 
 It must have seemed so to his private friends, to his fellows, 
 and to the world of readers. Of one who composed with 
 such marvellous facility of so worthy a friend and fellow of 
 Heminge and Condell it is incredible. 
 
 I have now to declare my persuasion, arising out of the 
 above evidence, and harmonising with the inscription, that 
 the sonnets recorded by Meres were written in fulfilment 
 of a promise made to the earl of Southampton in 1594. 
 
 3. The sonnets are, with very slight exceptions, mere poetical 
 exercises. 
 
 The writers who treat the sonnets as biographic materials 
 either contradict the inscription as interpreted by them- 
 selves, or require our assent to improbabilities, or cast asper- 
 sions on the moral character of our admired poet on the 
 sole evidence of a theory. It seems as if the thirst of dis- 
 covery had overcome all other feelings. 
 
 I contend that obscure allusions should never be applied 
 to the purposes of biography ; that invention should never 
 be allowed to usurp the place of reality. It is scarcely 
 possible to avoid conjectures such is the paucity of informa- 
 tion on many subjects of interest but it is safer to remain 
 in the dark than trust to a faint and wavering light. 
 
 It has been said of Petrarch, the model of sonnet-writers, 
 that " a thousand strappadoes could not compel him to 
 confess what some interpreters will make him say he meant;" 
 and the sarcasm, without much abatement of its sharpness, 
 iv applicable to some of the adventurers on the sonnets 
 of Shakspere. 
 
 I am no admirer of the despotic style in controversial 
 writings, but must now give a spice of it. 
 
12 
 
 Whether we owe the sonnets to the influence of the earl 
 of Southampton, or of the earl of Pembroke, or of some un- 
 discovered W. H. I protest against the theory that they 
 relate to transactions between the poet and his patron ; 1. Be- 
 cause, as an abstract question, the promise to write a poem 
 cannot imply any such object. 2. Because in the instance 
 of Lucrece no such object could have been designed. 3. Be- 
 cause, in the absence of evidence, it is incredible that the 
 man of whom diners of worship had reported his vprightness of 
 dealing should have lavished so much wit in order to pro- 
 claim the grievous errors of his PATRON and of himself ! 
 
 Prompted by the latter consideration, I must denounce the 
 vaunted discovery as an unjustifiable theory a mischievous 
 fallacy. 
 
 What may be the quantum of reality in the sonnets of 
 Sidney, or of Daniel, or of Spenser, and what the admixture 
 of invention, are particulars which shall be left to the in- 
 quiries of others. On those of Drayton, however, I shall 
 offer some remarks in a final paragraph. As to Shakspere 
 I have only to repeat my conviction that the sonnets are, 
 with very slight exceptions, mere poetical exercises. 
 
 4. The sonnets were published without the sanction of the 
 author, or of his patrons. 
 
 As the registers of the Company of Stationers contain 
 important information on our early literature, I shall trans- 
 cribe the items which relate to the above-noticed rarities. 
 
 "xvm Aprilis [1593] Richard Feild. Entred for his copie vnder 
 thandes of the archbisshop of Cant [VVhitgift] and m r warden Stirrop a 
 booke intuled [sic] Venus and Adonis vi d . 9 May [1594] M 1 Har- 
 rison Sen. Entred for his copie vnder thand of M r Cawood warden, 
 
 a booke intituled the Ravyshement of Lucrece vi d . 20 May [1609] 
 
 Tho. Thorpe. Entred for his copie under the hande of M r Wilford and 
 M r Lownes warden a booke called Shakespeares sonnetts vi d ." 
 
 With the entries in the registers, which are limited to 
 official particulars, we must compare the contents of the res- 
 pective publications. 
 
 Venus and A donis has a dedication and a motto ; Lucrece 
 has a dedication and an argument ; the volume of Sonnets has 
 neither, nor has it any commendatory verses. I thence infer 
 that it was published without the sanction of the author. 
 
 The allusions to the presumed patrons of our poet are 
 without date, and can be no' proofs that they gave their 
 
13 
 
 sanction to the publication ; nor does the inscription, exclu- 
 sive of the words added by Mr. Thorpe, seem to have been 
 written with a view to publication. It carries with it the 
 marks of a private envoi. 
 
 Nevertheless, the volume of ] 609 was no clandestine im- 
 pression ; nor was Thorpe an obscure man. He edited one 
 of the posthumous works of Christopher Marlow, and pub- 
 lished some of the plays of Ben. Jonson, Chapman, Marston, 
 etc. 
 
 In this comment on the four points enumerated I have 
 introduced some pertinent and curious facts, and hope the 
 studious inquirer will accompany me to the end of the 
 argument even if it should lead me into the field of 
 conjectures, 
 
 The discovery of the channel through which the manu- 
 script of the sonnets reached the press is now hopeless. A 
 mystery was no doubt designed, and a mystery it remains. 
 We must have recourse to the balance of probabilities, and I 
 submit a new theory. 
 
 Be it assumed that the volume of sonnets was a transcript 
 made by order of William Herbert, afterwards earl of Pem- 
 broke that it was then inscribed by him to the earl of 
 Southampton as a gift-book and that it afterwards came 
 into the possession of the publisher in a manner which re- 
 quired concealment. With this theory, which the inscrip- 
 tion and the other peculiarities of the volume seem to 
 justify, the perplexities of the question vanish! 
 
 I anticipate one objection. As copies of the sonnets 
 were in the hands of the private friends of our poet, a copy 
 was surely in the hands of his patron ! How then could 
 W. H. offer the noble earl so superfluous a gift ? It might 
 have been a substitute for a lost copy, or a revised text, or a 
 specimen of pen m a nsh ip . 
 
 This was a caliprraphic age, and specimens of the art were 
 frequently offered as gift-books. Esther Inglis, for ex- 
 ample, presented one of her specimens to the earl of Essex, 
 and another to Elizabeth. Other instances occur in the 
 royal Progresses. W. H. himself, at a later period of his 
 career, was a munificent donor of manuscripts as Oxford 
 witnesses. In short, the unceremonious title of the volume 
 seems to have been copied from a private memorandum and 
 the arrangement of the inscription almost reveals the imi- 
 tation of an, ornamented manuscript. 
 
 The united consideration of these circumstances must 
 
14 
 
 remove, it is believed, the only objection that can be made 
 to my new theory. 
 
 While naming the writers in this controversy I had no 
 design to notice their pleadings otherwise than very briefly, 
 and must even now compress a part of what I had written. 
 
 This summary, however, may interest those who propose 
 to examine the question at issue with the attention which it 
 undoubtedly requires, and may also have its utility as an 
 exemplification of the diversity and uncertainty of critical 
 opinions. 
 
 MALONE considers the Sonnets to be those mentioned by Meres. lie 
 remarks that one hundred and twenty-six are addressed to W. H. and 
 twenty-eight to a lady. STEEVENS gives no opinion as to the period at 
 which the sonnets were written, but asserts that one hundred and twenty- 
 six are inscribed to a friend, and twenty-eight devoted to a mistress. 
 CHALMERS believes that the Sonnets of 1609 are those of 1598, and that 
 they were all addressed to one person to wit, ELIZABETH ! DRAKE 
 believes that the sonnets, with few exceptions, were written during the 
 ten years which preceded their publication ; infers that W. H. obtained 
 the manuscript from the poet ; fixes on the earl of Southampton, on very 
 equivocal evidence, as the subject of the first one hundred and twenty- 
 six sonnets ; and expresses his conviction that the others were never di- 
 rected to a REAL object. BOSWELL thinks it probable that W. H. was 
 one of the friends to whom the sonnets were communicated, and 
 that he furnished the printer with his copy. As to the character of the 
 sonnets he says : " Upon the whole, I am satisfied that these compositions 
 had neither the poet himself nor any individual in view ; but were merely 
 the effusions of his fancy, written upon various topics for the amusement 
 of a private circle, as indeed the words of Meres point out : Witnes his 
 sugred Sonnets among his private friends." Mr. DYCE, with whom I 
 am always happy to coincide, has expressed similar opinions, but as he 
 has now the pen in hand we shall have his more matured decision. Mr. 
 BRIGHT hit on the idea that W. H. denotes William Herbert, afterwards 
 earl of Pembroke. This was about the year 1818. He formed a capital 
 collection of books in illustration of this idea cherished it for twice 
 seven years and was anticipated by Mr. Boaden ! Mr. Bo AD EN an- 
 nounced his discovery in 1832, and produced it as a pamphlet in 1837. 
 He contends, after some sharp comments on his precursors, that W. H. 
 indicates the said William Herbert that he was the object of the sonnets 
 and that Thorpe inscribed them to him in that sense. His arguments 
 chiefly rest on the inscription as read by himself. Mr. RICHARDSON un- 
 seats both the noble earls, and thus states his conclusions : " The sonnets 
 were incorrectly arranged by an ignorant bookseller they were ad- 
 
15 
 
 dressed to several individuals, male and female, in some cases real and in 
 others imaginary," etc. Mr. BROWN considers the Sonnets as autobio- 
 graphical poems ; forms them into six distinct poems ; and describes the 
 object of each. He assumes that our poet, with a wife at Stratford, had 
 also a mistress in London ; and that he recorded the circumstance for 
 the instruction of posterity ! The man who defames another, without a 
 jot of evidence, defames himself. So much for Charles Armitage Brown. 
 Mr. BURGON is named by Mr. Hunter as one of the writers on this 
 question, but I cannot state where his opinions are recorded. Mr. 
 HUNTER vaunts the discovery of Mr. Bright; sets aside the claims of the 
 earl of Southampton as " too improbable to deserve examination ;" sub- 
 stitutes for the noble earl the W. H. of the inscription ; asserts an inti- 
 macy between the parties on " the most abundant evidence ;" and states 
 as a fact that " the greater part of the sonnets relate to transactions 
 between Shakespeare and lord Herbert." Now there is no more evidence 
 that the earl of Pembroke was the patron of Shakspere than that which 
 also applies to the earl of Montgomery ; and as to the proofs of the inti- 
 macy, and of the fact, they are points which remain to be proved. The 
 love of historic truth is my apology for this sharp censure on so eminent 
 an antiquary. 
 
 The proposed subject of the final paragraph has been stated 
 above, and it gives me pleasure to approach it because it 
 cannot require a word of censure. 
 
 As I have expressed my opinion on the object and cha- 
 racter of the sonnets of Shakspere very unreservedly, it may 
 be fit to state any further circumstances which tend to 
 confirm it. With this view I shall have recourse to the 
 declarations made on a similar occasion by one of the most 
 eminent poets of that brilliant period, the estimable Michael 
 Drayton. He had a mistresse the mistress of his heart. 
 He names her birthplace, her birthday, her residence, etc. 
 After eulogising an elder sister, he thus describes his 
 favorite : 
 
 " The younger, than her sister not less good, 
 Bred where the other lastly doth abide, 
 
 Modest Idea, flower of womanhood, 
 That Rowland hath so highly deified." 
 
 Now Drayton, otherwise Rowland, printed some sixty 
 sonnets, to which he gave the poetical name Idea ; and to 
 that portion of his works, as if to prevent misinterpretation, 
 or to shield himself from the impertinencies of criticism, he 
 prefixed two addresses To the reader. In the first address, 
 the poet forewarns him to look elsewhere for passion, and 
 declares that he writes fantastically writes sportively. As 
 
16 
 
 to the second address, which is omitted in the editions of 
 1619 and 1753, and misplaced in the modern collection of 
 onr English poets by Alexander Chalmers, I shall give it 
 entire from the edition of 1605 : 
 
 " Sonnet 2. 
 
 " Many there be excelling in this kind, 
 
 Whose well-trick'd rhymes with ALL INVENTION swell ; 
 Let each commend as best shall like his mind ; 
 
 Some Sidney, Constable, some Daniel. 
 That thus their names familiarly I sing 
 
 Let none think them disparaged to be ; 
 Poor men with reverence may speak of a king 
 
 And so may these be spoken of by me. 
 My wanton verse ne'er keeps one certain stay, 
 
 But now at hand, then seeks invention far, 
 And with each little motion runs astray 
 
 Wild, madding, jocund, and irregular. 
 Like me that list, my honest merry rhymes 
 Nor care for critic, nor regard the times." 
 
 He adds to the sixty sonnets, after a typographic blank, 
 " Certain other sonnets to great and worthy personages" to 
 James, king of Scots to Lucy, countess of Bedford to sir 
 Anthony Cooke, etc. Here is a clear distinction between 
 invention and reality between the artificial fabrications of 
 wit and the genuine effusions of the heart. With regard to 
 the specimens before me, I much prefer those of the latter 
 class. They interest as portraiture. They have more 
 touches of nature than the majority of sonnets. In fact, 
 Drayton taxes the sonnet-writers of his time with filching 
 from Petrarch and Desportes. 
 
 FINIS. 
 
 F. SHOBERI-, PRINTER, 37, DEAN STREET, SOHO, W