Smith College - Smith College Yearbook (Northampton, MA)

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Yet even the tragedies have joy interwoven with the pain. There is the love of zl Juliet answering back to the love of a Romeo, a love misplaced, not sinful. The story of the star-crossed lovers is not really sad; there is nothing gloomy in their death. It was not even premature. Their love for each other had risen to its highest point. True, in after years there might have been added to it the peace and quiet that comes at even-tide. As it was, pure, innocent, chaste, romantic, it could not have grown in height. It had already reached its climax. It was strong enough, deep enough, to change the child Juliet, timid, obedient, dependent, into the active, inde- pendent woman. It was a love powerful enough to transform Romeo ' s impulse into purpose. The lesson of the tragedy was not designed to be learnt by the lovers, nor, do I think, was it meant for the heads of the houses Capulet and Montague. Friar Laurence was its victim. To do a great right, do a little wrong, Bassanio begged of Portia. It must not be, it cannot be, she answered. Friar Laurence was an old man but he had to learn over again the lesson so frequently repeated in childhood. Do not play with evil, it is deceptive, cunning as a serpent, more fatal in its sting. Removed from this tragedy in years as well as in depth is the story of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark. In it we read of a life that might have been an active force to purify and uplift the rotten State of Denmark, ruined because, instead of doing deeds, he dreamed them all day long. Nothing can be more sad than the failure of such a life, stunted as it was from the beginning by its very inactivity.

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farther. He has divided the elements into molecules, the molecules into atoms. He has given them names, has classified them ; beyond this he cannot go. He cannot fathom the mystery of space. Books then, the records of this compound life, are of value only, can exist only we might almost say, to the degree in which they treat of the elements that go to make up this life. Let life be treated superficially and they are of value only to the child, whose limited power of vision will not allow him to understand things invis- ible. With the man it is different. Living in a visible world he craves for things unseen. Turning from the struggles of men to the struggles of the soul he longs for rest — the rest of the deep waters of the ocean, he would stagnate in the pool. Thus men of this century read Browning. Thus men of all ages have read Shakspere. Writing of Shakspere, Emerson has said : We have his recorded convictions on those questions which knock for answer at every heart — on life, and death, on love, on wealth and poverty, on the prizes of life and the ways whereby we come at them, on the characters of men, and the influences, occult and open, which effect their fortunes ; and on those mysterious and demoniacal powers which defy our science and yet interweave their malice and their gift in our brightest hours. To study Shakspere ' s views of retribution and confine ourselves to his tragedies is to strive to see the workings of the law through dark glasses. For tragedy in its very name suggests bloodshed and sorrow. It is to his comedies and histories that we should turn for rewards of joy and happiness.

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' ' The time is out of joint — O cursed spite ! That ever I was born to set it right ! was the key-note of Hamlet ' s being. Pondering over life and over the sins of his fellow-men each day Hamlet becomes more desolate. He seeks for the cause of the evil, for some evil must lie at the bottom of the State ' s upheaval. Finally his father comes and reveals to him the guilt of the king, his uncle. And what does Hamlet do? Seek for revenge at once? No; ponders, philosophizes, curses fate, cries aloud in his horror of the sin : Use every man after his desert and who should ' scape whipping. Then in his despondency: How weary, stale, flat and unprofitable Seems to me all the uses of the world ! Cries but does not act. If Brutus had been Hamlet how great a change there would have been ! One of Hamlet ' s chief failings, a direct result probably of his inactivity, was his lack of power to see things in their true perspective. He had no power of insight. He could not read character, could not understand men. Because of this lack of knowledge he put everything in a false position. Ophelia, he exalted, thought that the poor, innocent child, perhaps on account of her very innocence, must have a strength on which he might lean, and when he tried to test her and found that the staff of her slender trust would break, he cast her away as useless. Poor child, she needed the support of a strong will to guide her. No wonder that innocent and weak as 8