We may also infer something of a man’s character from the tone and sentiments of others towards him.  Glass of a certain color casts on surrounding objects a reflection of its own hue, and so the tint of a man’s character returns upon us in the habitual manner in which he is spoken of by those around him.  The common mode of speaking of Shakspeare always savored of endearment.  “Gentle Will” is an expression that seemed oftenest repeated.  Ben Jonson inscribed his funeral verses “To the Memory of my beloved Mr. William Shakspeare;” he calls him the “sweet swan of Avon.”  Again, in his lines under a bust of Shakspeare, he says,—­

  “The figure that thou seest put,
  It was for gentle Shakspeare cut.”

In later times Milton, who could have known him only by tradition, calls him “my Shakspeare,” “dear son of memory,” and “sweetest Shakspeare.”  Now, nobody ever wrote of sweet John Milton, or gentle John Milton, or gentle Martin Luther, or even sweet Ben Jonson.

Rowe says of Shakspeare, “The latter part of his life was spent, as all men of good sense would wish theirs may be, in ease, retirement, and the conversation of his friends.  His pleasurable wit and good nature engaged him in the acquaintance, and entitled him to the friendship, of the gentlemen of the neighborhood.”  And Dr. Drake says, “He was high in reputation as a poet, favored by the great and the accomplished, and beloved by all who knew him.”

That Shakspeare had religious principle, I infer not merely from the indications of his will and tombstone, but from those strong evidences of the working of the religious element which are scattered through his plays.  No man could have a clearer perception of God’s authority and man’s duty; no one has expressed more forcibly the strength of God’s government, the spirituality of his requirements, or shown with more fearful power the struggles of the “law in the members warring against the law of the mind.”

These evidences, scattered through his plays, of deep religious struggles, make probable the idea that, in the latter, thoughtful, and tranquil years of his life, devotional impulses might have settled into habits, and that the solemn language of his will, in which he professes his faith, in Christ, was not a mere form.  Probably he had all his life, even in his gayest hours, more real religious principle than the hilarity of his manner would give reason to suppose.  I always fancy he was thinking of himself when he wrote this character:  “For the man doth fear God, howsoever it seem not in him by reason of some large jests he doth make.”