World better, and justice is a virtue independent on time or place. This fault the barbarity of hisĪge cannot extenuate for it is always a writer's duty to make the Wrong and at the close dismisses them without further care and leaves The wicked he carries his persons indifferently through right and He that thinks reasonably must think morally but his precepts andĪxioms drop casually from him he makes no just distribution of good orĮvil, nor is always careful to show in the virtuous a disapproval of He sacrifices virtue to convenience and is so much more careful to please than to instruct that he seems to write without any moral purpose." As Johnson continues, he specifies precisely the issue we must consider regarding the relation between literature (or the arts in general) and morality:įrom his writings indeed a system of social duty may be selected, for In the preface to his 1765 edition of The Plays of William Shakespeare, Samuel Johnson complains, "His first defect is that to which may be imputed most of the evil in books or in men. (1) Nevertheless, not every commentator of conservative or Christian disposition has bestowed unqualified praise on Shakespeare, especially as a moralist. In an age that offers Breaking Bad as an evening's casual entertainment, welcomes Lady Gaga to the White House as a moral consultant, and allows displays on the Internet that ought to be inconceivable among civilized men and women, the plays of Shakespeare would seem to be a paragon of moral edification.
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