Therefore, by this hypothesis of Mr. Greenwood, [220c] the Great Unknown was Bacon,—just the hypothesis of the common Baconian.
Is my reasoning erroneous? Is the “supposing” suggested by Mr. Greenwood [220d] any other than that of Miss Delia Bacon, and Judge Webb? True, Mr. Greenwood’s Baconian “supposing” is only a working hypothesis: not a confirmed belief. But it is useful to his argument (see “Ben Jonson and Shakespeare”) when he wants to explain away Ben’s evidence, in his verses in the Folio, to the Stratford actor as the Author.
Mr. Greenwood writes, in the first page of his Preface: “It is no part of my plan or intention to defend that theory,” “the Baconian theory.” Apparently it pops out contrary to the intention of Mr. Greenwood. But pop out it does: at least I can find no flaw in the reasoning of my detection of Bacon: I see no way out of it except this: after recapitulating what is said about Ben as one of Bacon’s “good pens” with other details, Mr. Greenwood says, “But no doubt that way madness lies!” [221a] Ah no! not madness, no, but Baconism “lies that way.” However, “let it be granted” (as Euclid says in his sportsmanlike way) that Mr. Greenwood by no means thinks that his “concealed poet” is Bacon—only some one similar and similarly situated and still active in 1623, and occupied with other business than supervising a collected edition of plays written under his “nom de plume” of Shakespeare. Bacon, too, was busy, with supervising, or toiling at the Latin translation of his scientific works, and Ben (according to Judge Webb) was busy in turning the Advancement of Learning into Latin prose. Mr. Greenwood quotes, without reference, Archbishop Tenison as saying that Ben helped Bacon in doing his works into Latin. [221b] Tenison is a very late witness. The prophetic soul of Bacon did not quite trust English to last as long as Latin, or he thought Latin, the lingua franca of Europe in his day, more easily accessible to foreign students, as, of course, it was. Thus Bacon was very busy; so was Ben. The sad consequence of Ben’s business, perhaps, is that the editing of the Folio is notoriously bad; whether Ben were the Editor or not, it is infamously bad.
Conceivably Mr. Greenwood is of the same opinion. He says, “It stands admitted that a very large part of that volume” (the Folio) “consists of work that is not ‘Shakespeare’s’ at all.”
How strange, if Ben edited it for the Great Unknown—who knew, if any human being knew, what work was “Shakespeare’s”! On Mr. Greenwood’s hypothesis, [222a] or “supposing,” the Unknown Author “may well have conceived the idea of publishing a collected edition of the plays which had been written” (not “published,” written) “under the name of Shakespeare, and, being himself busy with other matters, he may have entrusted the business to” some “good pen,” “and why not to”—Ben. Nevertheless “a very large part of that volume consists of work that is not ‘Shakespeare’s’ at all.” [222b] How did this occur? The book [222c] is “that very doubtful ‘canon.’” How, if “Shakespeare’s” man edited it for “Shakespeare”? Did “Shakespeare” not care what stuff was placed under his immortal “nom de plume”?
It is not my fault if I think that Mr. Greenwood’s hypotheses [222d]—the genuine “Shakespeare” either revised his own works, or put Ben on the editorial task—are absolutely contradicted by his statements in another part of his book. [222e] For the genuine “Shakespeare” knew what plays he had written, knew what he could honestly put forth as his own, as “Shakespeare’s.” Or, if he placed the task of editing in Ben’s hands, he must have told Ben what plays were of his own making. In either case the Folio would contain these, and no others. But—“the plat contraire,”—the very reverse,—is stated by Mr. Greenwood. “It stands admitted that a very large portion of that volume” (the Folio) “consists of work that is not ‘Shakespeare’s’” (is not Bacon’s, or the other man’s) “at all.” [223a] Then away fly the hypotheses [223b] that the auto-Shakespeare, or that Ben, employed by the auto-Shakespeare (apparently Bacon) revised, edited, and prepared for publication the auto-Shakespearean plays. For Mr. Greenwood “has already dealt with Titus (Andronicus) and Henry VI,” [223c] and proved them not to be auto-Shakespearean—and he adds “there are many other plays in that very doubtful ‘canon’” (the Folio) “which, by universal admission, contain much non-Shakespearean composition.” [223d] Perhaps! but if so the two hypotheses, [223e] that either the genuine Shakespeare [223f] revised (“is it not a more natural solution that ‘Shakespeare’ himself revised his works for publication, and that some part, at any rate, of this revision [223g] was done after 1616 and before 1623?”), or [223h] that he gave Ben (who was working, by the conjecture, for Bacon) the task of editing the Folio,—are annihilated. For neither the auto-Shakespeare (if honest), nor Ben (if sober), could have stuffed the Folio full of non-Shakespearean work,—including four “non-Shakespearean” plays,—nor could the Folio be “that very doubtful canon.” [224a] Again, if either the auto-Shakespeare or Ben following his instructions, were Editor, neither could have, as the Folio Editor had “evidently no little doubt about” Troilus and Cressida. [224b]
Neither Ben, nor the actual Simon Pure, the author, the auto-Shakespeare, could fail to know the truth about Trodus and Cressida. But the Editor [224c] did not know the truth, the whole canon is “doubtful.” Therefore the hypothesis, the “supposing,” that the actual author did the revising, [224d] and the other hypothesis that he gave Ben the work, [224e] seem to me wholly impossible. But Mr. Greenwood needs the “supposings” of pp. 290, 293; and as he rejects Titus Andronicus and Henry VI (both in the Folio), he also needs the contradictory views of pp. 351, 358. On which set of supposings and averments does he stand to win?
Perhaps he thinks to find a way out of what appears to me to be a dilemma in the following fashion: He will not accept Titus Andronicus and Henry VI, though both are in the Folio, as the work of his “Shakespeare,” his Unknown, the Bacon of the Baconians. Well, we ask, if your Unknown, or Bacon, or Ben,—instructed by Bacon, or by the Unknown,—edited the Folio, how could any one of the three insert Titus, and Henry VI, and be “in no little doubt about” Troilus and Cressida? Bacon, or the Unknown, or the Editor employed by either, knew perfectly well which plays either man could honestly claim as his own work, done under the “nom de plume” of “William Shakespeare” (with or without the hyphen). Yet the Editor of the Folio does not know—and Mr. Greenwood does know—Henry VI and Titus are “wrong ones.”
Mr. Greenwood’s way out, if I follow him, is this: [225a] “Judge Stotsenburg asks, ‘Who wrote The Taming of a Shrew printed in 1594, and who wrote Titus Andronicus, Henry VI, or King Lear referred to in the Diary?’” (Henslowe’s). The Judge continues: “Neither Collier nor any of the Shaxper commentators make (sic) any claim to their authorship in behalf of William Shaxper. Since these plays have the same names as those included in the Folio of 1623 the presumption is that they are the same plays until the contrary is shown. Of course it may be shown, either that those in the Folio are entirely different except in name, or that these plays were revised, improved, and dressed by some one whom they” (who?) “called Shakespeare.”
Mr. Greenwood says, “My own conviction is that . . . these plays were ‘revised, improved, and dressed by some one whom they called Shakespeare.’” [226a] (Whom who called Shakespeare?) In that case these plays,—say Titus Andronicus and Henry VI, Part 1,—which Mr. Greenwood denies to his “Shakespeare” were just as much his Shakespeare’s plays as any other plays (and there are several), which his Shakespeare “revised, improved, and dressed.” Yet his Shakespeare is not author of Henry VI, [226b] not the author of Titus Andronicus. [226c] “Mr. Anders,” writes Mr. Greenwood, “makes what I think to be a great error in citing Henry VI and Titus as genuine plays of Shakespeare.” [226d]