Into the fatal bowels of the deep.”
Such is the state of man, as Shakspeare’s Hastings feels it. And this is the state of man, as Shakspeare’s Wolsey finds it: to-day he puts forth the tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms, and next day comes a frost, a killing frost, and,—when he thinks, good easy man, full surely his goodness is a ripening,—nips his root, and then he falls. Shakspeare’s Belarius again, will furnish us with another text, of practical application:—
“... Then was I as a tree,
Whose boughs did bend with fruit: but in one night,
A storm, or robbery, call it what you will,
Shook down my yellow hangings, nay, my leaves,
And left me bare to weather.”
And as with the pride and pomp and circumstance of life, so with life itself. Typical for all time is the fate of Lycidas:—
“Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind)