over all others who have philosophized in motley)
Although called a boy, his great knowledge of the heart indicates his age to have been at least adult. So far from being in any degree imbecile, his native powers of intellect are of the finest order. His wayward rambling of thought may be partly natural, partly the result of his professed office, an office then held in no light esteem. In physique he is small and weak. His suffering from exposure to the inclement night excites Lear's tender compassion, even in his wildest mood, and it does in effect extinguish his frail life. A waif of wayward un muscular intellect in an age of iron.
An admirable union
of faithful affection with daring universal cynicism; he also illustrates the truth of the opinion, that the scoffer and the hater are different beings. (The “comic sublime" of this
character forms a grotesque counterpart and contrast to that of the king, and heightens the effect while it relieves the
pain of the tragic development.) Ulrici has some excellent remarks on the supreme art of this contrast :
“Nowhere has Shakespeare pushed the comic into so close and direct proximity with the tragic, and with no one else has the great hazard of doing so, succeeded as with him. Instead of thereby for one moment injuring the tragic effect, he has known how, by this means, wonderfully to exalt and strengthen it; not only does the wisdom of the Fool make, by contrast, the folly of the king and its tragic meaning more conspicuous; not only does he thus, on all occasions, hold up a mirror to the thoughts and acts of others, and through its reflex greatly strengthen the light of truth; but yet more, in the profound humour of the Fool a depth of intelligence conceals itself, upon which the tragic view of the world (Weltanschauung) generally rests. To this humour, the tragic art, as it were, allies itself, in order to place her deepest innermost centre nearer to the light. This genuine humour of the Fool plays,
as it were, with the tragic; to him pleasure and pain, fortune and misfortune are synonymous; he jeers on the griping
