[MA-176]
SHAKESPEARE AS MORALIST
Shakespeare reflected a great deal on the passions and from his temperament probably had very intimate access to many of them (dramatists are in general somewhat wicked men). But, unlike Montaigne, he was incapable of discoursing on them; instead of which he placed observations about the passions into the mouths of impassioned characters: a practice which, though counter to nature, makes his plays so full of ideas they make all others seem empty and can easily arouse in us a repugnance to them.— The maxims of Schiller (which are almost always based on ideas either false or trite) are designed purely for the theater, and as such they are extremely effective: while Shakespeare’s do honor to his model, Montaigne, and contain entirely serious ideas in a polished form, but are for that reason too remote and subtle for the theater public and thus ineffective.