Every now and then, too,
this Richard sees things which no Englishman has been capable of seeing,
except Shakespeare himself. The whole of Plato's "Gorgias" is comprised
in the two lines:
"Conscience is but a word that cowards use,
Devised at first to keep the strong in awe."
The declaration of the second murderer that conscience "makes a man a
coward ... it beggars any man that keeps it; it is turned out of all
towns and cities for a dangerous thing; and every man that means to live
well endeavours to trust to himself and to live without it," should be
regarded as the complement of what Falstaff says of honour; in both the
humour of Shakespeare's characteristic irony is not to be mistaken.
The whole play, I think, must be ascribed to Shakespeare; all the
memorable words in it are indubitably his, and I cannot believe that any
other hand drew for us that marvellous, masterful courtship of Anne
which Coleridge, naturally enough, was unwilling to appreciate. The
structure of the play, however, shows all the weakness of Marlowe's
method: the interest is concentrated on the protagonist; there is not
humour enough to relieve the gloomy intensity, and the scenes in which
Richard does not figure are unattractive and feeble.
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