Somewhat later, he saw "Macbeth" performed, and was immediately seized
with the ambition to become an actor,--a profession for which few
persons could be less qualified. The impression produced by this
tragedy, combined with the strict religious training which he appears to
have received, undoubtedly fixed the character and manner of his
subsequent literary efforts.
There are but few other facts of his life which we can state with
certainty. His chances of education were evidently very scanty, for he
must have left school while yet a boy, in order to learn his
trade,--that of a machinist. He had thenceforth little time and less
opportunity for literary culture. His reading was desultory, and the
poetic faculty, expending itself on whatever subjects came to hand,
produced great quantities of manuscripts, which were destroyed almost as
soon as written. The idea of publishing them does not seem to have
presented itself to his mind. Either his life must have been devoid of
every form of intellectual sympathy, or there was some external
impediment formidable enough to keep down that ambition which always
co-exists with the creative power.
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