NORTH.
You know, Talboys, that Scholars were actual Conjurors, in the mediæval belief, which has tales enow about Scholars in that capacity. Horatio comes, then, possessed with an especial Power; he knows how to deal with Ghosts—he could lay one, if need were. He is not merely a man of superior and cultivated intellect, whom intellectual inferiors engage to assist them in an emergency above their grasp—but he is the very man for the work.
TALBOYS.
Have not the Commentators said as much, sir?
NORTH.
Perhaps—probably—who? If they have in plenitude, I say it again—because I once did not know it—or think of it—and I suppose that a great many persons die believing that the Two resort in the way of general dependence merely on Horatio.
TALBOYS.
I believed, but I shall not die believing so.
NORTH.
Therefore, the scholarship of Horatio, and the non-scholarship of Bernardo and Marcellus, strikes into the life, soul, essence, ground, foundation, fabric, and organisation of this First Ghost Scene—sustain and build the whole Play.