In touching on another Part of his Learning, as it related to the Knowledge of History and Books, I shall advance something, that, at first sight, will very much wear the Appearance of a Paradox.  For I shall find it no hard Matter to prove, that from the grossest Blunders in History, we are not to infer his real Ignorance of it:  Nor from a greater Use of Latin Words, than ever any other English Author used, must we infer his Knowledge of that Language.

A Reader of Taste may easily observe, that tho’ Shakespeare, almost in every Scene of his historical Plays, commits the grossest Offences against Chronology, History, and Antient Politicks; yet This was not thro’ Ignorance, as is generally supposed, but thro’ the too powerful Blaze of his Imagination; which, when once raised, made all acquired Knowledge vanish and disappear before it.  For Instance, in his Timon, he turns Athens, which was a perfect Democracy, into an Aristocracy; while he ridiculously gives a Senator the Power of banishing Alcibiades.  On the contrary, in Coriolanus, he makes Rome, which at that time was a perfect Aristocracy, a Democracy full as ridiculously, by making the People choose Coriolanus Consul:  Whereas, in Fact, it was not till the Time of Manlius Torquatus, that the People had a Right of choosing one Consul.  But this Licence in him, as I have said, must not be imputed to Ignorance:  since as often we may find him, when Occasion serves, reasoning up to the Truth of History; and throwing out Sentiments as justly adapted to the Circumstances of his Subject, as to the Dignity of his Characters, or Dictates of Nature in general.

Then, to come to his Knowledge of the Latin Tongue, ’tis certain, there is a surprising Effusion of Latin Words made English, far more than in any one English Author I have seen; but we must be cautious to imagine, this was of his own doing.  For the English Tongue, in his Age, began extremely to suffer by an Inundation of Latin; and to be overlaid, as it were, by its Nurse, when it had just began to speak by her before-prudent Care and Assistance.  And this, to be sure, was occasion’d by the Pedantry of those two Monarchs, Elizabeth and James, Both great Latinists.  For it is not to be wonder’d at, if both the Court and Schools, equal Flatterers of Power, should adapt themselves to the Royal Taste.  This, then, was the Condition of the English Tongue when Shakespeare took it up:  like a Beggar in a rich Wardrobe.  He found the pure native English too cold and poor to second the Heat and Abundance of his Imagination:  and therefore was forc’d to dress it up in the Robes, he saw provided for it:  rich in themselves, but ill-shaped; cut out to an air of Magnificence, but disproportion’d and cumbersome.  To the Costliness of Ornament, he added all the Graces