The thoughts that Hamlet voices had passed through Shakspere’s brain, and the wonderful powers manifested by Prospero had been apprehended by his own prophetic vision. Hamlet might have moved along on the lower plane successfully, but the law of spiritual growth, the divine force upheaving and uplifting his soul against the barriers of his sub-conscious mentality and his environment, finally ended in the sad tragedy. Yet in the defeat was a victory, for it was merely the turn of the spiral downward for a higher rise in evolution.
Prospero is first revealed to us at about the age of Hamlet when the curtain falls and hides him from our tear-dimmed eyes. Shakspere loved Hamlet. He was dearest to his heart of all his children, and he felt that he must not die, but must come into the full fruition of the immortals. The soul so nobly struggling from its swaddling clothes must become a freed spirit of godlike power. Therefore he presents to us an ideal world where Hamlet sits upon the throne as Prospero, “transported and rapt in secret studies,” “neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated to closeness and the bettering of his mind with that which o’erprized all popular rate.” Prospero was born a higher type, therefore the divine in him had freer action. His soul opened to the over-soul like a flower to the sunlight.
The divine force in man is his will—his true will—and this force in its perfect exercise has no human limitation. It is only the seeming will that is limited. This power, manifested in thought, is represented by Ariel.
The statement of Prospero that his studies bettered his mind to such high degree is proof that they were those not of the magician, but of the philosopher and true psychologist, for the study of magic darkens the soul and degrades the intellect. Prospero’s power was not magical, and Shakspere used the word magician only to bring the drama within touch of his audience, knowing full well that the wise would understand, for “wisdom is justified of her children.”
In the manifestation of soul-power we first perceive the true greatness of Prospero and the heights to which Shakspere’s own soul had risen, for “the stream cannot rise higher than its source.” The greatness of Julius Cæsar is “weighed in the balance and found wanting,” for every truly great nature must be the rounded out and harmonious development of the intellectual, moral, and spiritual. This is the measure of Prospero, and in his unfolding, unseen realms and previously unknown powers had opened, according to eternal law, to his demanding soul.
“The Tempest” is philosophical, psychological, and occult—philosophical because thought is the motor power. Le Conte says: “That deepest of all questions—the nature and origin of natural forces—is a question for philosophy and not for science.” Thought is a natural force; yes, a dynamic force of the most intense power. It may be a search-light of the universe, a thunderbolt of destruction, or a messenger of light and love with healing in its wings. The mantle of Prospero is simply an emblem of power, and the word is so understood among the Orientals. In Scripture, when Elijah ascended in his fiery chariot, his mantle fell upon Elisha, who immediately caused the waters to retreat from its stroke and continued clothed with his master’s power. So Prospero, robing himself in his mantle or laying it aside, means his exercise or non-exercise of what are termed supernatural powers.
Victor Hugo says that Shakspere “did not question the invisible world, he rehabilitated it. He did not deny man’s supernatural power, he consecrated it.” There is no reason why man in his higher estate should not have free intercourse with a world invisible to him in his lower conditions. Can the grub have the same companionship as the butterfly?
Victor Hugo also says that the “‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’ depicts the action of the invisible world on man, but ‘The Tempest’ symbolizes the action of man on the invisible world. In the poet’s youth, man obeys the spirits. In the poet’s ripe age, the spirits obey man.” This shows a fine apprehension of the interior revealings of the supreme poetic genius. Every great and true poet is also a prophet and seer. Then why should not Shakspere—the supremest in all the “tide of time”—not have the widest and most far-reaching vision of the wonderful attainments and powers of the perfected man. He undoubtedly saw and felt the grandeur of the ages to come, and knew, with divine prescience, that only the hem of the garment of knowledge had been as yet touched. There is but one power in the universe, and as Emerson says, “Every man is an inlet to the whole.” Then where is his limitation?
Did not nature obey the Nazarene, and the winds and mountainous waves lie gently down at His bidding? And did He not say that His disciples should do greater works than He had done? Then why should not Prospero, as a typical man, have control over all the forces of nature?
It is interesting to note that Shakspere has given to him almost the identical powers of the Man of Nazareth! This is not strange, as it is an absolute truth that when man rises to the royalty of spirit every element will be his obedient servant. Thought will be the agent of his ministries; which the poet has so marvellously portrayed in its personification as Ariel. Ariel says: “Thy thoughts I cleave to;” and Prospero, in calling him, “Come with a thought.” It is now claimed by the most advanced and best psychologists, that a forceful, living thought does become a real embodiment which may be perceived by the finer senses. Ariel was what the mind of his master made him, sometimes a sprite, sometimes a sea-nymph, again a harpy, anything and everything the master directed.