What Was the Religion of Shakespeare

Excerpt from What Was the Religion of Shakespeare?: A Lecture Delivered Before the Independent Religious Society, Orchestra Hall, Michigan Avenue and Adams St., Chicago, Illinois, Sunday, at 11 A. M

It is by observing the frequency and emphasis with which certain views and expressions occur and reoccur in an author, and the consistency with which they are given the preference, that we may be able to generalize as to his philosophy or religion. As Shakespeare's works are neither a treatise on theology nor a manual of philosophy, our only means of discovering his attitude toward the problems of life and destiny is by reading, as it were, between the lines.

A great mind can neither sophisticate nor suppress its earnest convictions. This does not mean that anyone with earnest convictions must necessarily be a propagandist. To think and to let think, represents a state of mind which is entirely consistent, both with enthusiasm and toleration, if not with proselytism. We believe that Shakespeare has unmistakably expressed himself on the subject of religion, as he has on that of patriotism, for instance, but without any missionary zeal, which fact has led not a few students of his works to the conclusion that of all the great poets Shakespeare is the only one without a religion.

Green, in his Short History of England, writes, that "It is difficult to say whether Shakespeare had any religious faith or no." But this is not a fair way of stating the problem. If by "religious faith" Green means the Anglican, the Presbyterian, or the Unitarian faith, then it is true that we do not know to which of these he nominally belonged, and it does not much matter.

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