Volume 2 — CLASSIFICATION ATTEMPTED, 1810.
Reading edition
Shakspeare's earliest dramas I take to be,
Love's Labour's Lost. All's Well That Ends Well. Comedy of Errors. Romeo and Juliet.
In the second class I reckon
Midsummer Night's Dream. As You Like It. Tempest. Twelfth Night.
In the third, as indicating a greater energy—not merely of poetry, but—of all the world of thought, yet still with some of the growing pains, and the awkwardness of growth, I place
Troilus and Cressida. Cymbeline. Merchant of Venice. Much Ado About Nothing. Taming of the Shrew.
In the fourth, I place the plays containing the greatest characters;
Macbeth. Lear. Hamlet. Othello.
And lastly, the historic dramas, in order to be able to show my reasons for rejecting some whole plays, and very many scenes in others.