are the petty cavils of petty minds." "That it [mixing tragedy and comedy] is a practice contrary to the rules of criticism will be readily allowed; but there is always an appeal open from criticism to nature." "To the unities of time and place he has shewn no regard, and perhaps a nearer view of the principles on which they stand will diminish their value, and withdraw from them the veneration which, from the time of Corneille, they have very generally received by discovering that they have given more trouble to the poet, than pleasure to the auditor." "Perhaps it would not be easy to find any author, except Homer, who invented so much as Shakespeare, who so much advanced the studies which he cultivated, or effused so much novelty upon his age or country. The form, the characters, the language, and the shows of the English drama are his." "The work of a correct and regular writer is a garden accurately formed and diligently planted, varied with shades, and scented with flowers; the composition of Shakespeare is a forest, in which oaks extend their branches, and pines tower in the air, interspersed sometimes with weeds and brambles, and sometimes giving shelter to myrtles and to roses; filling the eye with awful pomp, and gratifying the mind with endless diversity. Other poets display cabinets of precious rarities, minutely finished, wrought into shape, and polished unto brightness. Shakespeare opens a mine which contains gold and diamonds in unexhaustible plenty, though clouded by incrustations, debased by impurities, and mingled with a mass of meaner minerals." Johann Wolfgang Goethe, 1795–1796 Wilhelm Meister's Apprenticeship (book IV, chap. 3 and 13): "Prince Hamlet is suddenly facing the need for a great action imposed upon your soul that is unable to do it." / "He [the character] is a beautiful being that succumbs under the load he can't distance itself without it." J. W. Goethe, Writings on literature: "Much has been said about Shakespeare that does not seem anything left to say, but the spirit has features to stimulate the spirit forever..." "Shakespeare make effect with vitality of the word, and this is what becomes apparent in reading aloud, when the listener is distracted, not by a flawed or right presentation. There is no pleasure greater and purer than, with closed eyes, accompanied a Shakespeare's play, not declaimed, but recited by a safe and natural voice.