. . "
There follows the passage about none of us seeing salvation, already
cited, and theological in origin.
Whether Shakespeare could or could not have written these
reflections, without having read Seneca's De Clementia, whether, if
he could not conceive the ideas "out of his own head," he might not
hear Seneca's words translated in a sermon, or in conversation, or
read them cited in an English book, each reader must decide for
himself. Nor do I doubt that Shakespeare could pick out what he
wanted from the Latin if he cast his eye over the essay of the tutor
of Nero.
My view of Shakespeare's Latinity is much like that of Sir Walter
Raleigh. {64a} As far as I am aware, it is the opinion usually held
by people who approach the subject, and who have had a classical
education. An exception was the late Mr. Churton Collins, whose
ideas are discussed in the following chapter.
In his youth, and in the country, Will could do what Hogg and Burns
did (and Hogg had no education at all; he was self-taught, even in
writing). Will could pick up traditional, oral, popular literature.
"His plays," says Sir Walter Raleigh, "are extraordinarily rich in
the floating debris of popular literature,--scraps and tags and
broken ends of songs and ballads and romances and proverbs. In this
respect he is notable even among his contemporaries. . . . Edgar and
Iago, Petruchio and Benedick, Sir Toby and Pistol, the Fool in Lear
and the Grave-digger in Hamlet, even Ophelia and Desdemona, are all
alike singers of old songs.
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