Note return to page 1 1Much ado about nothing. Act. 2. Enter Prince Leonato, Claudio, and Jack Wilson, instead of Balthasar. And in Act 4. Cowley, and Kemp, constantly thro' a whole Scene. Edit. Fol. of 1623, and 1632.

Note return to page 2 *See his Letters to me.

Note return to page 3 1The highest date of any I can yet find, is Romeo and Juliet in 1597, when the Author was 33 years old; and Richard the 2d, and 3d, in the next year, viz. the 34th of his age.

Note return to page 4 2See the Epilogue to Henry IVth.

Note return to page 5 [a] (a) Lord Falkland, Lord C. J. Vaughan, and Mr. Selden.

Note return to page 6 Of this Play the first known Edition is that of 1623, when it was published with the other Works of Shakespeare by Hemings and Condel, in Folio.

Note return to page 7 *The Tempest.] These two first Plays, the Tempest and the Midsummer-night's Dream, are the noblest Efforts of that sublime and amazing Imagination, peculiar to Shakespeare, which soars above the Bounds of Nature without forsaking Sense: or, more properly, carries Nature along with him beyond her established Limits. Fletcher seems particularly to have admired these two Plays, and hath wrote two in Imitation of them, the Sea-Voyage and the Faithful Shepherdess But when he presumes to break a Lance with Shakespeare, and write in emulation of him, as he does in the False one, which is the Rival of Anthony and Cleopatra, he is not so successful. After him, Sir John Suckling and Milton catched the brightest Fire of their Imagination from these two Plays; which shines fantastically indeed, in the Goblins, but much more nobly and serenely in The Mask at Ludlow-Castle. Warburton.6Q0001

Note return to page 8 1In this Naval Dialogue, perhaps the first Example of Sailor's Language exhibited on the Stage, there are, as I have been told by a skilful Navigator, some Inaccuracies and contradictory Orders.

Note return to page 9 2Perhaps it might be read, Blow till thou burst, wind, if room enough.

Note return to page 10 3It may be observed of Gonzalo, that, being the only good Man that appears with the King, he is the only Man that preserves his Cheerfulness in the Wreck, and his Hope on the Island.

Note return to page 11 4The Courses are the Main-sail and fore-sail. This Term is used by Raleigh in his Discourse on Shipping.

Note return to page 12 5&lblank; to glut him.] Shakespeare probably wrote, t'englut him, to swallow him; for which I know not that glut is ever used by him. In this Signification englut, from engloutir, French, occurs frequently, as in Henry VI. &lblank; Thou art so near the Gulf Thou needs must be englutted. And again in Timon, and Othello. Yet Milton, writes glutted Offal for swallowed, and therefore perhaps the present Text may stand.

Note return to page 13 6Brother, farewel!] As Gonzalo had no Brother in the Ship, this Line should, I think, be given to Alonso the King, taking leave of his Brother Sebastian, to which the next Lines make the natural Answer. Gonzalo had indeed no Wife and Children there, but that Exclamation is the general cry in wrecks. Brother is useless, unless some Brother had been afterwards mentioned.

Note return to page 14 7&lblank; long heath,] This is the common name for the erica baccifera. Warburton.

Note return to page 15 8Prosp. No harm.] I know not whether Shakespeare did not make Miranda speak thus, O wo the Day! no harm? To which Prospero properly answers, I have done nothing but in care of thee. Miranda when she speaks the Words, O wo the Day, supposes, not that the Crew had escaped, but that her Father thought differently from her, and counted their Destruction no harm.

Note return to page 16 9&lblank; virtue of Compassion.] Virtue: The most efficacious Part, the energetick Quality; in a like Sense we say, the Virtue of a Plant is in the Extract.

Note return to page 17 1&lblank; that there is no Soul.] Thus the old Editions read, but this is apparently defective. Mr. Rowe, and after him Dr. Warburton, read that there is no Soul lost, without any Notice of the Variation. Mr. Theobald substitutes no foil, and Mr. Pope follows him. To come so near the Right, and yet to miss it is unlucky; the Authour probably wrote no Soil, no Stain, no Spot: For so Ariel tells, Not a Hair perish'd; On their sustaining Garments not a Blemish, But fresher than before. And Gonzalo, The Rarity of it is, that our Garments being drench'd in the Sea, keep notwithstanding their Freshness and Glosses. Of this Emendation I find that the Authour of Notes on the Tempest had a Glimpse, but could not keep it.

Note return to page 18 2Perhaps—and thou his only heir.

Note return to page 19 2Key in this Place seems to signify the Key of a musical Instrument, by which he set Hearts to tune.6Q0002

Note return to page 20 3Alluding to the Observation, that a Father above the common rate of Men has commonly a Son below it. Heroum filii noxæ.

Note return to page 21 4&lblank; like one Who having into Truth by telling of it, Made such a Sinner of his Memory, To credit his own lie.] The corrupted reading of the Second line has rendered this beautiful Similitude quite unintelligible. For what is [having into truth]? or what doth [it] refer to? not to [truth], because if he told truth he could never credit a lie. And yet there is no other correlative to which [it] can belong. I read and point it thus, &lblank; like one Who having, unto truth, by telling OFT, Made such a Sinner of his mem'ry, To credit his own lie. i. e. by often repeating the same Story, made his Memory such a Sinner unto truth as to give credit to his own lie. A miserable Delusion to which Story-tellers are frequently subject. The Oxford Editor having, by this Correction, been let into the Sense of the Passage, gives us this Sense in his own Words, Who loving an untruth, and telling't oft, Makes &lblank; Warburton.

Note return to page 22 5&lblank; deck'd the Sea.] To deck the Sea, if explained, to honour, adorn, or dignify, is indeed ridiculous, but the original import of the Verb deck is, to cover; so in some Parts they yet say deck the Table: This Sense may be born, but perhaps the Poet wrote fieck'd, which I think is still used of Drops falling upon Water. Dr. Warburton reads mock'd, the Oxford Edition brack'd.

Note return to page 23 6Dr. Warburton rightly observes, that this Sleepiness which Prospero by his Art had brought upon Miranda, and of which he knew not how soon the Effect would begin, makes him question her so often whether she is attentive to his Story.

Note return to page 24 7The Beak was a strong pointed Body at the Head of the ancient Gallies; it is used here for the forecastle, or the bolt-sprit.

Note return to page 25 8The Part between the Quarter deck and the Forecastle.

Note return to page 26 9In all the later Editions this is changed to a Fever of the Mind, without Reason or Authority, nor is any Notice given of an Alteration.

Note return to page 27 1From the still-vext Bermoothes,] Theobald says Bermoothes is printed by Mistake for Bermudas. No. That was the name by which the Islands then went, as we may see by the Voyages of that Time; and by our Author's contemporary Poets: Fletcher, in his Woman pleased, says, The Devil should think of purchasing that Eggshell to victual out a Witch for the Bermoothes. Smith, in his Account of these Islands p. 172. says, that the Bermudas were so fearful to the World, that many call'd them the Isle of Devils.—p. 174.—to all Seamen no less terrible than an inchanted Den of Furies. And no wonder, for the Clime was extremely subject to Storms and Hurricanes; and the Islands were surrounded with scattered Rocks lying shallowly hid under the Surface of the Water. Warburton.

Note return to page 28 2This Passage needs not be disturbed, it being common to ask a Question which the next Moment enables us to answer; he that thinks it faulty may easily adjust it thus: Prosp. What is the time o'th' day? Past the mid season? Ari. At least two glasses. Prosp. The time 'twixt six and now—

Note return to page 29 3That the Character and Conduct of Prospero may be understood, something must be known of the System of Enchantment, which supplied all the Marvellous found in the Romances of the middle Ages. This System seems to be founded on the Opinion that the fallen Spirits, having different Degrees of Guilt, had different Habitations alloted them at their Expulsion, some being confined in Hell, some, as Hooker, who delivers the Opinion of our Poet's Age, expresses it, dispersed in Air, some on Earth, some in Water, others in Caves, Dens or Minerals under the Earth. Of these some were more malignant and mischievous than others. The earthy Spirits seem to have been thought the most depraved, and the aerial the least vitiated. Thus Prospero observes of Ariel, &lblank; Thou wast a Spirit too delicate To act her earthy and abhorred Commands. Over these Spirits a Power might be obtained by certain Rites performed or Charms learned. This Power was called the Black Art, or Knowledge of Enchantment. The Enchanter being, as King James observes in his Demonology, one who commands the Devil, whereas the Witch serves him. Those who thought best of this Art, the Existence of which was, I am afraid, believed very seriously, held that certain Sounds and Characters had a physical Power over Spirits, and compelled their Agency; others who condemned the Practice, which in reality was surely never practised, were of Opinion, with more Reason, that the Power of Charms arose only from compact, and was no more than the Spirits voluntary allowed them for the Seduction of Man. The Art was held by all, though not equally criminal yet unlawful, and therefore Causabon, speaking of one who had Commerce with Spirits, blames him, though he imagines him one of the best Kind who dealt with them by Way of Command. Thus Prospero repents of his Art in the last Scene. The Spirits were always considered as in some Measure enslaved to the Enchanter, at least for a Time, and as serving with Unwillingness, therefore Ariel so often begs for Liberty; and Caliban observes that the Spirits serve Prospero with no good Will, but hate him rootedly. —Of these Trifles enough.

Note return to page 30 4The strangeness] Why should a wonderful Story produce Sleep? I believe Experience will prove that any violent Agitation of the Mind easily subsides in Slumber, especially when, as in Prospero's Relation, the last Images are pleasing.

Note return to page 31 5Cal. As wicked dew, as e'er my mother brush'd With raven's feather from unwholsom fen, Drop on you both.] Shakespear hath very artificially given the air of the antique to the language of Caliban, in order to heighten the grotesque of his character. As here he uses wicked for unwholsome. So Sir John Moundevil, in his travels p. 334. Edit. Lond. 1725. &lblank; at aile tymes brennethe a Vesselle of Cristalle fulle of Bawme for to zeven gode smalle and odour to the Emperour, and to voyden all WYKKEDE Eyres and Corrupciouns. It was a tradition, it seems, that Lord Falkland, Lord C. J. Vaughan, and Mr Seldon concurred in observing, that Shakespear had not only found out a new character in his Caliban, but had also devised and adapted a new manner of language for that character. What they meant by it, without doubt, was, that Shakespear gave his language a certain grotesque air of the Savage and Antique; which it certainly has. But Dr. Bentley took this, of a new language, literally; for speaking of a phrase in Milton, which he supposed altogether absurd and unmeaning, he says, Satan had not the privilege as Caliban in Shakespear, to use new phrase and diction unknown to all others &lblank; and again &lblank; to practise distances is still a Caliban flile. Note on Milton's paradise lost, l. 4. v. 945. But I know of no such Caliban stile in Shakespear, that hath new phrase and diction unknown to all others. Warburton. Whence these criticks derived the notion of a new language appropriated to Caliban I cannot find: They certainly mistook brutality of sentiment for uncouthness of words. Caliban had learned to speak of Prospero and his daughter, he had no names for the sun and moon before their arrival, and could not have invented a language of his own without more understanding than Shakespear has thought it proper to bestow upon him. His diction is indeed somewhat clouded by the gloominess of his temper and the malignity of his purposes; but let any other being entertain the same thoughts and he will find them easily issue in the same expressions. As wicked dew] Wicked; having baneful qualities. So Spenser says wicked weed, so, in opposition, we say herbs or medicines have virtues. Bacon mentions virtuous Bezoar, and Dryden virtuous herbs.

Note return to page 32 6This speech which the former Edition give to Miranda, is very judiciously bestowed by Mr. Theobald on Prospero.6Q0003

Note return to page 33 7When thou didst not, Savage, Know thy own meaning, but wouldst gabble like A thing most brutish, I endow'd thy purposes With words to make them known. The benefit which Prospero here upbraids Caliban with having bestowed, was teaching him language. He shews the greatness of this benefit by marking the inconvenience Caliban lay under for want of it. What was the inconvenience? This, that he did not know his own meaning. But sure a brute, to which he is compared, doth know its own meaning, that is, knows what it would be at. This, indeed, it cannot do, it cannot shew its meaning to others. And this certainly is what Prospero would say, &lblank; When thou couldst not, Savage, Show thy own meaning, &lblank; The following words makes it evident, &lblank; but wouldst gabble like A thing most brutish. &lblank; And when once [show] was corrupted to [know] the transcribers would of course change [couldst] into [didst] to make it agree with the other false reading. There is indeed a sense in which Know thy own meaning &lblank; may be well applied to a brute. For it may signify the not having any reflex knowledge of the operations of its own mind, which, it would seem, a Brute hath not Tho' this, I say, may be applied to a brute, and consequently to Caliban, and tho' to remedy this brutality be a nobler benefit than even the teaching language; yet such a sense would be impertinent and absurd in this place, where only the benefit of language is talked of by an exact and learned Speaker. Besides, Prospero expresly says, that Caliban had purposes; which, in other words, is that he did know his own meaning. Warburton.

Note return to page 34 8Red Plague.] I suppose from the Redness of the Body universally inflamed.

Note return to page 35 9Full fathom five thy father lies, &c.] Gildon, who has pretended to criticise our Author, would give this up as an insufferable and senseless piece of trifling. And I believe this is the general opinion concerning it. But a very unjust one. Let us consider the business Ariel is here upon, and his manner of executing it. The Commission Prospero had intrusted to him, in a whisper, was plainly this; to conduct Ferdinand to the sight of Miranda, and to dispose him to the quick sentiments of love, while he, on the other hand, prepared his daughter for the same impressions. Ariel sets about his business by acquainting Ferdinand, in an extraordinary manner, with the afflictive news of his father's death. A very odd Apparatus, one would think, for a love-fit. And yet as odd as it appears, the Poet has shewn in it the finest conduct for carrying on his plot. Prospero had said, I find my Zenith doth depend upon A most auspicious star; whose influence If now I court not, but omit, my Fortunes Will ever after droop. &lblank; In consequence of this his prescience, he takes advantage of every favourable circumstance that the occasion offers. The principal affair is the Marriage of his daughter with young Ferdinand. But to secure this point it was necessary they should be contracted before the affair came to Alonzo the Father's knowledge. For Prospero was ignorant how this storm and shipwreck, caused by him, would work upon Alonzo's temper. It might either soften him, or increase his aversion for Prospero as the Author. On the other hand, to engage Ferdinand, without the consent of his Father, was difficult. For not to speak of his Quality, where such engagements are not made without the consent of the Sovereign, Ferdinand is represented (to shew it a Match worth the seeking) of a most pious temper and disposition, which would prevent his contracting himself without his Father's knowledge, The Poet therefore, with the utmost address, has made Ariel persuade him of his Father's death to remove this Remora. Warburton. I know not whether Dr. Warburton has very successfully defended these Songs from Gildon's accusation. Ariel's lays, however seasonable and efficacious, must be allowed to be of no supernatural dignity or elegance, they express nothing great, nor reveal any thing above mortal discovery. The reason for which Ariel is introduced thus trifling is, that he and his companions are evidently of the fairy kind, an order of Beings to which tradition has always ascribed a sort of diminutive agency, powerful but ludicrous, a humorous and frolick controlment of nature, well expressed by the Songs of Ariel.

Note return to page 36 1&lblank; certainly a maid.] Nothing could be more prettily imagined to illustrate the singularity of her character, than this pleasant mistake. She had been bred up in the rough and plain-dealing documents of moral philosophy, which teaches us the knowledge of our selves: And was an utter stranger to the flattery invented by vicious and designing Men to corrupt the other Sex. So that it could not enter into her imagination, that complaisance and a desire of appearing amiable, qualities of humanity which she had been instructed, in her moral lessons, to cultivate, could even degenerate into such excess, as that any one should be willing to have his fellow-creature believe that he thought her a Goddess or an immortal. Warburton. Dr. Warburton has here found a beauty which I think the Authour never intended. Ferdinand asks her not whether she was a created being, a question which, if he meant it, he has ill expressed, but whether she was unmarried; for after the dialogue which Prospero's interruption produces, he goes on persuing his former question. O, if a Virgin, I'll make you Queen of Naples.

Note return to page 37 2This is a slight forgetfulness. Nobody was left in the wreck, yet we find no such character as the son of the Duke of Milan. Theobald.

Note return to page 38 3&lblank; control thee.] Confute thee, unanswerably contradict thee.

Note return to page 39 4Desist from any hope of awing me by that posture of defence.

Note return to page 40 5Hint is that which recals to the memory. The cause that fills our minds with grief is common. Dr. Warburton reads stint of woe.

Note return to page 41 6Alon. Pr'ythee, peace.] All that follows from hence to this speech of the King's, You cram these Words into my Ears against The Stomach of my Sense. seems to Mr. Pope to have been an Interpolation by the Players. For my part, tho' I allow the Matter of the Dialogue to be very poor, I cannot be of Opinion, that it is interpolated. For should we take out this intermediate Part, what would become of these Words of the King? &lblank; Would I had never Married my Daughter there! What Daughter? and where married? For it is in this intermediate Part of the Scene only, that we are told, the King had a Daughter nam'd Claribel, whom he had married into Tunis. 'Tis true, in a subsequent Scene, betwixt Antonio and Sebastian, we again hear her and Tunis mention'd: but in such a manner, that it would be obscure and unintelligible without this previous Information. Theobald.

Note return to page 42 7The Visitor.] Why Dr. Warburton should change Visitor to 'Viser for Adviser I cannot discover. Gonzalo gives not only advice but comfort, and is therefore properly called the Visitor, like others who visit the sick or distressed to give them consolation. In some of the Protestant Churches there is a kind of officers termed Consolators for the Sick.

Note return to page 43 8The name of a widow brings to their minds their own shipwreck, which they consider as having made many widows in Naples.

Note return to page 44 9It does not clearly appear whether the King and these lords thought the ship lost. This passage seems to imply that they were themselves confident of returning, but imagined part of the fleet destroyed. Why, indeed, should Sebastian plot against his brother in the following Scene unless he knew how to find the kingdom which he was to inherit?

Note return to page 45 1The latter end of his commonwealth forgets the beginning.] All this Dialogue is a fine Satire on the Utopian Treatises of Government, and the impracticable inconsistent Schemes therein recommended. Warburton.

Note return to page 46 2This lord who being now in his dotage has outlived his faculty of remembring, and who once laid in the Ground shall be as little remembred himself as he can now remember other things.

Note return to page 47 3For he's a spirit of persuasion.] Of this entangled sentence I can draw no sense from the present reading, and therefore imagine that the Authour gave it thus: For he, a Spirit of persuasion, only Professes to persuade. Of which the meaning may be either that he alone who is a Spirit of persuasion, professes to persuade the King; or that, He only professes to persuade, that is, without being so persuaded himself he makes a show of persuading the King.

Note return to page 48 4That this is the utmost extent of the prospect of ambition, the point where the eye can pass no further, and where objects lose their distinctness, so that what is there discovered, is faint, obscure, and doubtful.

Note return to page 49 5These lines stand in the old Edition thus: &lblank; though some cast again And by that destiny, to perform an act, Whereof what's past is prologue, what to come In your and my discharge. The reading in the later Editions is without authority. The old text may very well stand, except that in the last line in should be is, and perhaps we might better say—and that by destiny. It being a common plea of wickedness to call temptation destiny.

Note return to page 50 6&lblank; Keep in Tunis.] There is in this passage a propriety lost which a slight alteration will restore. &lblank; Sleep in Tunis, And let Sebastian wake.

Note return to page 51 7In the first Edition these lines are otherwise arranged. Ay, Sir, where lyes that? if 'twere a kybe, 'Twould put me to my slipper, but I feel not This Deity in my bosom. Twenty consciences That stand 'twixt me and Milan, candy'd be they, And melt ere they molest. Here lies your brother. The present reading is quite arbitrary, as appears by the necessity of changing twenty to ten, but the change being for the better, it is sufficient barely to note it. I think we may safely read, Candied be they or melt, That is, let my conscience be dried up and lie unactive, or melt and run quite away.

Note return to page 52 8For Morsel Dr. Warburton reads antient Moral, very elegantly and judiciously, yet I know not whether the Authour might not write Morsel, as we say a piece of a Man.

Note return to page 53 9&lblank; to keep them living.] i. e. Alonzo and Antonio; for it was on their lives that his project depended. Yet the Oxford Editor alters them, to you, because in the verse before, it is said—you his friend; as if, because Ariel was sent forth to save his friend, he could not have another purpose in sending him, viz. to save his project too. Warburton. I think Dr. Warburton and the Oxford Editor both mistaken. The sense of the passage as it now stands is this: He sees your danger and will therefore save them. Dr. Warburton has mistaken Antonio for Gonzalo. Ariel would certainly not tell Gonzalo that his master saved him only for his project. He speaks to himself as he approaches, My master through his art foresees the danger, That these his friends are in. These written with a y according to the old practice, did not much differ from you.

Note return to page 54 1&lblank; drawn] Having your Swords drawn. So in Romeo and Juliet, What art thou drawn among these heartless hinds?

Note return to page 55 2Wound] Enwrapped by adders wound or twisted about me.

Note return to page 56 3Looks like a foul bumbard] This Term again occurs in the first part of Henry IV.—that swoln Parcel of Dropsies, that huge Bumbard of Sack—and again in Henry VIII. And here you lie baiting of Bumbards, when Ye should do Service. By these several Passages, tis plain, the Word meant a large Vessel for holding Drink, as well as the Piece of Ordnance so called. Theobald.

Note return to page 57 4That is, Make a Man's Fortune. So in Midsummer-Night's Dream—we are all made Men.

Note return to page 58 5I afraid of him? a very shallow monster, &c.] It is to be observed that Trinculo the speaker is not charged with being afraid: but it was his Consciousness that he was so that drew this brag from him. This is Nature. Warburton.

Note return to page 59 6Kiss thy foot.] A Sneer upon the Papists for kissing the Pope's pantofle. Gray.

Note return to page 60 7Scamels.] This word has puzzled the Commentators: Dr. Warburton reads Shamois, Mr. Theobald would read any thing rather than Scamels. Mr. Holt, who wrote Notes upon this play, observes that limpets are in some places called Scams, therefore I have suffered Scamels to stand.6Q0005

Note return to page 61 8The two first Folio's read: Most busy least, when I do it. 'Tis true this Reading is corrupt; but the Corruption is so very little remov'd from the Truth of the Text, that I can't afford to think well of my own Sagacity for having discovered it. Theobald.

Note return to page 62 9Of every creature's best.] Alluding to the picture of Venus by Apelles.

Note return to page 63 1What a pied ninny's this.] This line should certainly be given to Stephano. Pied ninny alludes to the striped coat worn by fools, of which Caliban could have no knowledge. Trinculo had before been reprimanded and threatened by Stephano for giving Caliban the lie, he is now supposed to repeat his offence. Upon which Stephano cries out, What a pied ninny's this?—thou scurvy patch! Caliban now seeing his master in the mood that he wished, instigates him to vengeance. I do beseech thy greatness give him blows.

Note return to page 64 2This passage alluding to a forgotten custom is very obscure; the putter out must be a traveller, else how could he give this account? the five for one is money to be received by him at his return. Mr. Theobald has well illustrated this passage by a quotation from Johnson.

Note return to page 65 3&lblank; clear life.] Pure, blameless, innocent.

Note return to page 66 4&lblank; with good life.] This seems a corruption. I know not in what sense life can here be used, unless for alacrity, liveliness, vigour, and in this sense the expression is harsh. Perhaps we may read, &lblank; with good list, with good will, with sincere zeal for my service. I should have proposed, &lblank; with good lief, in the same sense, but that I cannot find lief to be a Substantive.

Note return to page 67 5&lblank; bass my trespass.] The deep pipe told it me in a rough bass sound.

Note return to page 68 6Thus all the Impressions in general; but why is She only a Third of his own Life? He had no wife living, nor any other Child, to rob her of a Share in his Affection: So that we may reckon her at least half of himself. Nor could he intend, that he loved himself twice as much as he did her; for he immediately subjoins, that it was She for whom he liv'd. In Othello, when Iago alarms the Senator with the loss of his Daughter, he tells him, Your Heart is burst, you have lost half your Soul. And Dimidium animæ meæ was the current Language with the Latines on such Occasions. Theobald. In consequence of this ratiocination Mr. Theobald printed the text a thread of my own life. I have restored the ancient reading. Prospero, in his reason subjoined why he calls her the third of his life, seems to allude to some logical distinction of causes, making her the final cause.

Note return to page 69 7&lblank; strangely stood the test.] Strangely is used by way of commendation, merveilleusement, to a wonder; the sense is the same in the foregoing scene, with observation strange.

Note return to page 70 *My Guest. first Fol.

Note return to page 71 8The Rabble.] The crew of meaner Spirits.

Note return to page 72 9No Tongue.] Those who are present at incantations are obliged to be strictly silent, else, as we are afterwards told, the Spell is marred.

Note return to page 73 0With thatch'd stover, Oxford Edit. Stover seems to be hay laid up.

Note return to page 74 1The old Edition reads pionied and twilled brims, which I do not understand.

Note return to page 75 2Earth's Increase.] All the Editions, that I have ever seen, concur in placing this whole Sonnet to Juno: but very absurdly, in my Opinion. I believe every accurate Reader, who is acquainted with poetical History, and the distinct Offices of these two Goddesses, and who then seriously reads over our Author's Lines, will agree with Me, that Ceres's Name ought to have been placed where I have now prefix'd it. Theobald.

Note return to page 76 3&lblank; Sir, I am vext, Bear with my weakness, my old brain is troubled:] Prospero here discovers a great emotion of anger on his sudden recollection of Caliban's plot. This appears from the admirable reflection he makes on the insignificancy of human things. For thinking men are never under greater depression of mind than when they moralize in this manner; and yet, if we turn to the occasion of his disorder, it does not appear, at first view, to be a thing capable of moving one in Prospero's circumstances. The Plot of a contemptible. Savage and two drunken Sailors, all of whom he had absolutely in his power. There was then no apprehension of danger. But if we look more nearly into the case, we shall have reason to admire our Author's wonderful knowledge of nature. There was something in it with which great minds are most deeply affected, and that is the Sense of Ingratitude. He recalled to mind the Obligations this Caliban lay under for the Instructions he had given him, and the conveniencies of life he had taught him to use. But these reflexions on Caliban's Ingratitude would naturally recal to mind his brother's: And then these two working together were very capable of producing all the disorder of passion here represented.—That these two, who had received, at his hands, the two best Gifts mortals are capable of, when rightly employed, Regal power and the Use of reason; that these, in return, should conspire against the life of the Donor, would surely afflict a generous mind to its utmost bearing. Warburton.

Note return to page 77 4Meet with Caliban.] To meet with is to counteract,—to play Stratagem against Stratagem.— The Parson knows the temper of every one in his house, and accordingly either meets with their vices, or advances their virtues. Herbert's Country Parson.

Note return to page 78 5Thus Drayton in his Court of Fairie of Hobgoblin caught in a Spell. But once the circle got within The Charms to work do straight begin, And he was caught as in a gin;   For as he thus was busy A pain he in his head piece feels, Against a stubbed tree he reels, And up went poor Hobgoblin's hee's:   Alas his brain was dizzy. At length upon his feet he gets, Hobgoblin fumes, Hobgoblin frets; And as again he forward sets,   And through the bushes scrambles, A stump doth hit him in his pace, Down comes poor Hob upon his face, And lamentably tore his case   Among the briers and brambles.

Note return to page 79 *He has plaid Jack with a lantern, has led us about like an ignis fatuus, by which travellers are decoyed into the mire.

Note return to page 80 6Trin. O King Stephano! O Peer! O worthy Stephano! Look what a wardrobe here is for thee!] The Humour of these lines consists in their being an allusion to an old celebrated Ballad, which begins thus, King Stephen was a worthy Peer— and celebrates that King's parsimony with regard to his wardrobe, —There are two Stanzas of this ballad in Othello. Warburton.

Note return to page 81 *First Edit. let's alone.

Note return to page 82 †That is Birdlime.

Note return to page 83 7After Summer, merrily.] This is the reading of all the Editions. Yet Mr. Theobald has substituted Sun-set, because Ariel talks of riding on the Bat in this expedition. An idle fancy. That circumstance is given only to design the time of night in which fairies travel. One would think the consideration of the circumstances should have set him right. Ariel was a spirit of great delicacy, bound by the charms of Prospero, to a constant attendance on his occasions. So that he was confined to the Island Winter and Summer. But the roughness of Winter is represented by Shakespear as disagreeable to fairies, and such like delicate spirits, who on this account constantly follow Summer. Was not this then the most agreeable circumstance of Ariel's new recover'd liberty, that he could now avoid Winter, and follow Summer quite round the Globe. But to put the matter out of question, let us consider the meaning of this line. There I couch, when Owls do cry. Where? in the Cowslip's bell, and where the Bee sucks, he tells us: this must needs be in Summer. When? when Owls cry, and this is in Winter. When blood is nipt, and ways be foul, Then nightly sings the staring owl. The Song of Winter in Love's Labour Lost. The consequence is, that Ariel flies after-Summer. Yet the Oxford Editor has adopted this judicious emendation of Mr. Theobald. Warburton.

Note return to page 84 8To drink the air is an expression of swiftness of the same kind as to devour the way in Henry IV.

Note return to page 85 9As great to me, as late;] My loss is as great as yours, and has as lately hapened to me.

Note return to page 86 1Yes, for a score of kingdoms.] I take the sense to be only this: Ferdinand would not, he says, play her false for the world; yes, answers she, I would allow you to do it for something less than the world, for twenty kingdoms, and I wish you well enough to allow you, after a little wrangle, that your play was fair. So likewise Dr. Gray.

Note return to page 87 *For when should perhaps be read where.

Note return to page 88 2Which to you shall seem probable.] These words seem, at the first view, to have no use; some lines are perhaps lost with which they were connected. Or we may explain them thus: I will resolve you by yourself, which method, when you hear the story, [of Antonio's and Sebastian's plot] shall seem probable, that is, shall deserve your approbation.

Note return to page 89 3&lblank; true.] That is, honest. A true man is, in the language of that time, opposed to a Thief. The sense is, Mark what these men wear, and say if they are honest.

Note return to page 90 4And Trinculo is reeling ripe; where should they Find this grand liquor, that hath gilded 'em.] Shakespear, to be sure, wrote—grand 'lixir, alluding to the grand Elixir of the alchymists, which they pretend would restore youth, and confer immortality. This, as they said, being a preparation of Gold, they called Aurum potabile; which Shakespear alluded to in the word gilded; as he does again in Anthony and Cleopatra. How much art thou unlike Mark Anthony? Yet coming from him, that great med'cine hath, With his Tinct, gilded thee. But the joke here is to insinuate that, notwithstanding all the boasts of the Chymists, Sack was the only restorer of youth, and bestower of immortality. So Ben Johnson in his Every man out of his humour—Canarie the very Elixar and spirit of wine—This seems to have been the Cant name for Sack, of which the English were, at that time, immoderately fond. Randolf in his Jealous Lovers, speaking of it, says,—A Pottle of Elixar at the Pegasus bravely caroused. So again in Fletcher's Monsieur Thomas, Act III. &lblank; Old reverend Sack, which, for ought that I can read yet, Was that Philosopher's stone the wise King Ptolomeus Did all his wonders by. &lblank; The phrase too of being gilded was a trite one on this occasion. Fletcher in his Chances—Duke Is she not drunk too? Whore. A little gilded o'er, Sir; Old Sack, Old Sack, Boys! Warburton.

Note return to page 91 5&lblank; And my ending is despair, Unless I be reliev'd by prayer;] This alludes to the old Stories told of the despair of Necromancers in their last moments; and of the efficacy of the prayers of their friends for them. Warburton.

Note return to page 92 The various Readings of this Play, I. A Quarto printed for James Roberts, 160c. II. The Folio of 1623. III. The Folio of 1632. IV. The Folio of 1664.

Note return to page 93 1Long withering out a young Man's revenue.] Long withering out is, certainly, not good English. I rather think Shakespear wrote, Long wintering on a young man's revenue. Warburt. That the common reading is not good English, I cannot perceive, and therefore find in myself no temptation to change it.

Note return to page 94 *I. II. III. bewitch'd.

Note return to page 95 2Or to her death, according to our Law,] By a Law of Solon's, Parents had the absolute power of life and death over their children. So it suited the poet's purpose well enough to suppose the Athenians had it before.— Or perhaps he neither thought nor knew any thing of the matter. Warburton.

Note return to page 96 3To you your father should be as a God, One, who compos'd your beauties; yea, and one, To whom you are but as a form in wax By him imprinted; and within his power To leave the figure or disfigure it.] We should read, To 'leve the figure, &c. i. e. releve, to heighten or add to the beauty of the figure, which is said to be imprinted by him. 'Tis from the French, relever. Thus they say, Tapisseries relevées d'or. In the same sense they use enlever, which Maundevile makes English of in this Manner—And alle the walles withinne ben covered with gold and sylver, in fyn Plates: and in the Plates ben Stories and Batayles of Knyghtes enleved. p. 228. Rablais, with a strain of buffoon humour, that equals the sober elegance of this passage in our Poet, calls the small gentry of France, Gentilhommes de bas relief. Warburton. I know not why so harsh a word should be admitted with so little need, a word that, spoken, could not be understood, and of which no example can be shown. The sense is plain, you owe to your father a being which he may at pleasure continue or destroy.

Note return to page 97 3Thus all the copies, yet earthlier is so harsh a word, and earthlier happy for happier earthly a mode of speech so unusual, that I wonder none of the Editors have proposed earlier happy.

Note return to page 98 *I. II. Lordship, whose unwished yoke.

Note return to page 99 4Beteem them]&lblank; give them, bestow upon them. The word is used by Spenser.6Q0008

Note return to page 100 *I. II. Eigh me For Ah me. II.—For aught. Hermia was inserted in the Folio 1632, but is now changed for the first reading.

Note return to page 101 5Too high, to be enthrall'd to Love.] This Reading possesses all the Editions, but carries no just meaning in it. Nor was Hermia displeas'd at being in Love; but regrets the Inconveniencies, that generally attend the Passion: Either, the Parties are disproportion'd, in degree of Blood and Quality; or unequal, in respect of Years; or brought together by the Appointment of Friends, and not by their own Choice These are the Complaints represented by Lysander; and Hermia, to answer to the first, as she has done to the other two, must necessarily say; O cross!—too high to be enthrall'd to low! So the Antithesis is kept up in the Terms; and so she is made to condole the Disproportion of Blood and Quality in Lovers. Theobald.

Note return to page 102 †I. Momentary. Which is the old and proper word.

Note return to page 103 6Brief as the light'ning in the collied Night, That, in a Spleen, unfolds both Heaven and Earth, And ere a man hath power to say, Behold! The jaw, of darkness do devour it up.] Tho' the word Spleen be here employed odly enough, yet I believe it right. Shakespear always hurried on by the grandeur and multitude of his Ideas assumes, every now and then, an uncommon licence in the use of his words. Particularly in complex moral modes it is usual with him to employ one, only to express a very few ideas of that number of which it is composed. Thus wanting here to express the ideas—of a sudden, or—in a trice, he uses the word Spleen; which, partially considered, signifying a hasty sudden fit, is enough for him, and he never troubles himself about the further or fuller signification of the word. Here, he uses the word Spleen for a sudden hasty fit; so just the contrary, in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, he uses sudden for spleenatic—sudden quips. And it must be owned this sort of conversation adds a force to the diction. Warburton.

Note return to page 104 7I have a widow aunt, &c.] These lines perhaps might more properly be regulated thus: I have a Widow Aunt, a Dowager Of great revenue, and she hath no child, And she respects me as her only son; Her house from Athens is remov'd seven league, There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee, And to that place &lblank;

Note return to page 105 8Lys. &lblank; If thou lov'st me, then Steal forth thy father's house, &c. Her My good Lysander, I swear to thee by Cupid's strongest bow, By, &c. &c. In that same place thou hast appointed me To morrow truly will I meet with thee.] Lysander does but just propose her running away from her Father at midnight, and straight she is at her oaths that she will meet him at the place of Rendezvous. Not one doubt or hesitation, not one condition of assurance for Lysander's constancy. Either she was nauseously coming; or she had before jilted him; and he could not believe her without a thousand Oaths. But Shakespear observed nature at another rate.—The speeches are divided wrong, and must be thus rectified; when Lysander had proposed her running away with him, she replies, Her. My good Lysander &lblank; and is going on, to ask security for his fidelity. This he perceives, and interrupts her with the grant of what she demands, Lys. I swear to thee by Cupid's strongest bow, &c. By all the vows that ever men have broke, In number more than ever woman spoke— Here she interrupts him in her turn; declares herself satisfied, and consents to meet him, in the following words, Her. &lblank; In that same place thou hast appointed me, To morrow truly will I meet with thee. This division of the lines, besides preserving the character, gives the dialogue infinitely more force and spirit. Warburton. This emendation is judicious, but not necessary. I have therefore given the note without altering the text. The censure of men, as oftner perjured than women, seems to make that line more proper for the Lady.

Note return to page 106 *I. Your fair.

Note return to page 107 9Your eyes are lode stars.] This was compliment not unfrequent among the old poets. The lode star is the leading or guiding star, that is, the pole star. The Magnet is for the same reason called the lode-stone, either because it leads iron, or because it guides the Sailor. Milton has the same thought in L'Allegro. Tow'rs and Battlements it sees Bosom'd high in tufted trees, Where perhaps some beauty lies, The Cynosure of neighb'ring eyes.

Note return to page 108 1This emendation is taken from the Oxford Edition. The common reading is, Your words I'd catch.

Note return to page 109 *I. II. III. IV. His folly, Helena, is none of mine.

Note return to page 110 2Perhaps every reader may not discover the propriety of these lines. Hermia is willing to comfort Helena, and to avoid all appearance of triumph over her. She therefore bids her not to consider the power of pleasing, as an advantage to be much envied or much desired, since Hermia, whom she considers as possessing it in the supreme degree, has found no other effect of it than the loss of happiness.

Note return to page 111 3Emptying our Bosoms of their Counsels swell'd; There my Lysander and myself shall meet; And thence from Athens turn away our Eyes, To seek new Friends, and strange Companions. This whole Scene is strictly in Rhyme; and that it deviates in these two Couplets, I am persuaded, is owing to the Ignorance of the first, and the Inaccuracy of the later Editors: I have therefore ventur'd to restore the Rhymes, as I make no doubt but the Poet first gave them. Sweet was easily corrupted into swell'd, because that made an Antithesis to Emptying: and strange Companions our Editors thought was plain English; but stranger Companies, a little quaint and unintelligible. Our Author very often uses the Substantive Stranger adjectively; and Companies, to signify Companions: As Rich. II. Act I. To tread the stranger paths of Banishment. And Hen. V. His Companies unletter'd, rude and shallow. Theobald.

Note return to page 112 4In game] Game here signifies not contentious play, but sport, jest. So Spenser, Twixt earnest and twixt game.

Note return to page 113 5In this Scene Shakespeare takes advantage of his knowledge of the theatre, to ridicule the prejudices and competitions of the Players. Bottom, who is generally acknowledged the principal Actor, declares his inclination to be for a tyrant, for a part of fury, tumult, and noise, such as every young man pants to perform when he first steps upon the Stage. The same Bottom, who seems bred in a tiring-room, has another histrionical passion. He is for engrossing every part, and would exclude his inferiors from all possibility of distinction. He is therefore desirous to play Pyramus, Thisbe and the Lyon at the same time.

Note return to page 114 *I. Grow to a point.

Note return to page 115 6I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to tear a cat in.] We should read, A part to tear a cap in. for as a ranting whore was called a tear-sheet, [2d part of Hen. IV.] so a ranting bully was called a tear-cap. For this reason it is, the Poet makes bully Bottom, as he is called afterwards, wish for a part to tear a cap in. And in the ancient plays, the bombast and the rant held the place of the sublime and pathetic: And indeed constituted the very essence of their tragical Farces. Thus Bale in his Acts of English votaries, part 2d, says—grennyng like Termagauntes in a play. Warburton.

Note return to page 116 7This passage shews how the want of women on the old Stage was supplied. If they had not a young man who could perform the part with a face that might pass for feminine, the character was acted in a mask, which was at that time a part of a Lady's dress so much in use that it did give any unusual appearance to the Scene; and he that could modulate his voice in a female tone might play the woman very successfully. It is observed in Downes's Memoirs of the Play-house, that one of these counterfeit heroines moved the passions more strongly than the women that have since been brought upon the stage. Some of the catastrophes of the old comedies, which make Lovers marry the wrong women, are, by recollection of the common use of masks, brought nearer to probability.

Note return to page 117 8&lblank; you must play Thisby's Mother.] There seems a double forgetfulness of our Poet, in relation to the Characters of this Interlude. The Father and Mother of Thisby, and the Father of Pyramus, are here mention'd, who do not appear at all in the Interlude; but Wall and Moonshine are both employed in it, of whom there is not the least Notice taken here. Theobald.

Note return to page 118 9Here Bottom again discovers a true genius for the Stage by his solicitude for prosperity of dress, and his deliberation which beard to chuse among may beards, all unnatural.

Note return to page 119 1That is, a head from which the hair has fallen in the lues venerea. Theobald.

Note return to page 120 2At the Duke's Oak we meet &lblank; hold, or cut bowstrings.] This proverbial phrase came originally from the Camp. When a Rendezvous was appointed, the militia Soldiers would frequently make excuse for not keeping word that their bowstrings were broke, i. e. their arms unserviceable. Hence when one would give another absolute assurance of meeting him, he would say proverbially—hold or cut bowstrings —i. e. whether the bowstring held or broke. For cut is used as a neuter, like the verb frets. As when we say, the string frets—the silk frets, for the passive, it is cut or fretted. Warburton.

Note return to page 121 3So Drayton in his court of Fairy, Thorough brake, thorough brier, Thorough muck, thorough mire, Thorough water, thorough fire.

Note return to page 122 4To dew her orbs upon the green.] For orbs Dr. Gray is inclined to substitute herbs. The orbs here mentioned are the circles supposed to be made by the Fairies on the ground, whose verdure proceeds from the Fairy's care to water them. They in their courses make that round, In meadows and in marshes found, Of them so called the fairy ground. Drayton.

Note return to page 123 5The cowslip was a favourite among the fairies. There is a hint in Drayton of their attention to May morning. &lblank; For the Queen a fitting tow'r, Quoth he, is that fair cowslip flow'r. &lblank; In all your train there's not a fay That even went to gather May, But she hath made it in her way, The tallest there that groweth.

Note return to page 124 6&lblank; Lob of spirits.] Lob, lubber, lobby, lobcock, all denote both inactivity of body and dulness of mind.

Note return to page 125 7&lblank; Changeling.] Changeling is commonly used for the child supposed to be left by the fairies, but here for the child taken away.

Note return to page 126 8&lblank; Sheen.] Shining, bright, gay.

Note return to page 127 9But they do square.] To square here is to quarrel. And are you now such fools to square for this. Gray. The French word contrecarrer has the same import.

Note return to page 128 *I. II. III. IV. Either.

Note return to page 129 1Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern, And bootless make the breathless huswife chern. The sense of these lines is confused. Are not you he, says the fairy, that fright the country girls, that skim milk, work in the handmil, and make the tired dairy woman churn without effect? The mention of the mill is here useless; I would regulate the lines thus: And sometimes make the breathless housewife chern Skim milk, and bootless labour in the quern. Or by a simple transposition of the lines, And bootless, make the breathless housewife churn Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern.

Note return to page 130 2Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck, You do their work. &lblank; To these traditionary opinions Milton has reference in L'Allegro, Then to the spicy nut brown ale,— With stories told of many a feat, How Fairy Mab the junkers eat; She was pinch'd and pull'd she said, And he by Frier's lanthorn led; Tells how the drudging Goblin sweat To earn his cream-bowl duly set, When in one night ere glimpse of morn His shadowy flail had thresh'd the corn Which ten day-labourers could not end, Then lies him down the lubber fiend. A like account of Puck is given by Drayton, He meeteth Puck, which most men call, Hobgoblin, and on him doth fall. &lblank; This Puck seems but a dreaming dolt, Sull walking like a ragged colt, And oft out of a bush doth bolt,   Of purpose to deceive us; And leading us makes us to stray, Long winter's nights out of the way, And when we stick in mire and clay, He doth with laughter leave us. It will be apparent to him that shall compare Drayton's Poem with this play, that either one of the poets copied the other, or, as I rather believe, that there was then some system of the fairy empire generally received, which they both represented as accurately as they could. Whether Drayton or Shakespeare wrote first, I cannot discover.

Note return to page 131 3Puck. &lblank; Thou speak'st aright.] I have filled up the verse which I suppose the authour left complete. It seems that in the Fairy mythology. Puck, or Hobgoblin, was the trusty servant of Oberon, and always employed to watch or detect the intrigues of Queen Mab, called by Shakespeare Titania. For in Drayton's Nymphidia the same fairies are engaged in the same business. Mab has an amour with Pigwiggen, Oberon being jealous sends Hobgoblin to catch them, and one of Mab's Nymphs opposes him by a spell.

Note return to page 132 4And tailor cries.] The custom of crying tailor at a sudden fall backwards, I think I remember to have observed. He that slips beside his chair falls as a taylor squats upon his board. The Oxford Editor and Dr. Warburton after him, read and rails, or cries, plausibly, but I believe not rightly. Besides, the trick of the fairy is represented as producing rather merriment than anger.

Note return to page 133 5And waxen] And encrease, as the moon waxes.

Note return to page 134 *I. II. III. IV. But room Fairy. The word Fairy or Faery, was sometimes of three syllables, as often in Spenser.

Note return to page 135 6Didst thou not lead him through the glimmering night.] We should read, Didst thou not lead him glimmering, through the night. The meaning is, She conducted him in the appearance of fire through the dark night. Warb.

Note return to page 136 7From Perigenia, whom he ravish'd:] Thus all the Editors, but our Author, who diligently perus'd Plutarch, and glean'd from him, where his subject would admit, knew, from the Life of Theseus, that her Name was Perigyne; (or Perigune) by whom Theseus had his Son Melanippus. She was the Daughter of Sinnis, a cruel Robber, and Tormentor of Passengers in the Isthmus. Plutarch and Athenæus are both express in the Circumstance of Theseus ravishing her. Theobald.

Note return to page 137 8And never since the middle Summer's spring, &c.] There are not many passages in Shakespear which one can be certain he has borrowed from the Ancients; but this is one of the few that, I think, will admit of no dispute. Our Author's admirable description of the miseries of the Country being plainly an imitation of that which Ovid draws, as consequent on the grief of Ceres, for the loss of her daughter. Nescit adhuc ubi sit: terras tamen increpat omnes: Ingratasque vocat, nec frugum munere dignas. &lblank; Ergo illic sæva vertentia glebas Fregit aratra manu parilique irata colonos Ruricolosque boves letho dedit: arvaque jussit Fallere depositum vitiataque semina fecit. Fertilitas terræ latum vulgata per orbem Sparsa jacet. Primis segetes moriuntur in herbis. Et modo sol nimius, nimius modo corripit imber: Sideraque ventique nocent. The middle summer's spring.] We should read that. For it appears to have been some years since the quarrel first began. Warburton.

Note return to page 138 9Paved Fountain. A Fountain laid round the edge with stone.

Note return to page 139 1The Winds piping. So Milton, While rocking winds are piping loud.

Note return to page 140 *II. III. IV. Petty.

Note return to page 141 2Pelting river. Shakespeare has in Lear the same word, low pelting farms. The meaning is plainly, despicable, mean, sorry, wretched; but as it is a word without any reasonable etymology, I should be glad to dismiss it for petty, yet it is undoubtedly right. We have petty pelting Officer in Measure for Measure.

Note return to page 142 3Overborn their continents.] Born down the banks that contained them. So in Lear, Close pent guilts Rive their concealing continents.

Note return to page 143 4The nine-mens morris.] This was some kind of rural game played in a marked ground. But what it was more I have not found.

Note return to page 144 5The human mortals want their winter here.] But sure it was not one of the circumstances of misery, here recapitulated, that the Sufferers wanted their Winter. On the contrary, in the poetical descriptions of the golden Age, it was always one circumstance of their happiness that they wanted Winter. This is an idle blunder of the Editor's. Shakespear without question wrote, The human mortals want their winter heryed, i. e. praised, celebrated. The word is obsolete: But used both by Chaucer and Spencer in this signification, Tho' wouldest thou learne to caroll of of love, And hery with hymnes thy Lasse's glove. Spenc. Cal. Feb. The following line confirms the emendation. No night is now with Hymn or Carol blest; and the propriety of the sentiment is evident. For the winter is the season of rural rejoicing, as the gloominess of it and its vacancy from country labours give them the inclination and opportunity for mirth; and the fruits, now gathered in, the means. Well therefore might she say, when she had described the dearths of the seasons and fruitless toil of the husbandmen, that The human mortals want their winter heryed. But, principally, since the coming of Christianity this season, in commemoration of the birth of Christ, has been particularly devoted to festivity. And to this custom, notwithstanding the impropriety, Hymn or Carol blest certainly alludes. Mr. Theobald says, he should undoubtedly have advanced this conjecture unto the text, but that Shakespear seems rather fond of hallow'd. Rather than what? hallowed is not synonymous to heryed but to blest. What was he thinking of? The ambiguity of the English word blest confounded him, which signifies either prais'd or sanctified. Warburton. After all the endeavours of the Editors this passage still remains to me unintelligible. I cannot see why Winter is, in the general confusion of the year now described, more wanted than any other season. Dr. Warburton observes that he alludes to our practice of singing carols in December; but though Shakespear is no great chronologer in his dramas, I think he has never so mingled true and false religion, as to give us reason for believing that he would make the moon incensed for the omission of our carols. I therefore imagine him to have meant heathen rites of adoration. This is not all the difficulty. Titania's account of this calamity is not sufficiently consequential. Men find no winter, therefore they sing no hymns, the moon provoked by this omission alters the seasons: That is, the alteration of the seasons produces the alteration of the seasons. I am far from supposing that Shakespear might not sometimes think confusedly, and therefore am not sure that the passage is corrupted. If we should read, And human mortals want their wonted year, Yet will not this licence of alteration much mend the narrative; the cause and the effect are still confounded. Let us carry critical temerity a little further. Scaliger transposed the lines of Virgil's Gallus. Why may not the same experiment be ventured upon Shakespear. The human mortals, want their wonted year, The seasons alter; hoary-headed frosts Fall in the fresh lap of the crimson rose; And on old Hyems' chin, and icy crown, An od'rous chaplet of sweet summer buds Is, as in mock'ry set. The spring, the summer, The childing autumn, angry winter, change Their wonted liveries; and the 'mazed world, By their increase, now knows not which is which. No night is now with hymn or carol blest; Therefore the moon, the governess of floods, Pale in her anger, washes all the air; And thorough this distemperature, we see That rheumatick diseases do abound. And this same progeny of evil comes From our debate, from our dissension. I know not what credit the reader will give to this emendation, which I do not much credit myself.

Note return to page 145 6By their increase. That is, By their produce.

Note return to page 146 7Henchman. Page of Honour. This office was abolished by Queen Elizabeth. Gray.

Note return to page 147 8Which she with pretty and with swimming gate following (her womb then rich with my young squire) Would imitate &lblank;] Following what? she did not follow the ship, whose motion she imitated: for that sailed on the water, she on the land. If by following we are to understand imitating, it will be a mere pleonasm—imitating would imitate. From the Poet's description of the actions it plainly appears we should read follying &lblank; Would imitate. i. e. wantoning in Sport and Gaiety. Thus the old English writers—and they beleeven folyly and falsly—says Sir J. Maundeville, from and in the sense of folâtrer, to play the wanton. This exactly agrees to the action described—full often has she gossipt by my side—and —when we have laugh'd to see. Warburton. The foregoing Note is very ingenious, but since follying is a word of which I know not any example, and the Fairy's favourite might, without much licentiousness of language, be said to follow a ship that sailed in the direction of the coast, I think there is no sufficient reason for adopting it. The coinage of new words is a violent remedy, not to be used but in the last necessity.

Note return to page 148 *I. II. III. and IV. Fairies.

Note return to page 149 9&lblank; Thou remember'st Since once I sat upon a promontory, And heard a mermaid on a dolphin's back, Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath, That the rude sea grew civil at her song; And certain stars shot madly from their spheres To hear the sea maid's musick &lblank;] The first thing observable on these words is, that this action of the Mermaid is laid in the same time and place with Cupid's attack upon the Vestal. By the Vestal every one knows is meant Queen Elizabeth. It is very natural and reasonable then to think that the Mermaid stands for some eminent personage of her time. And if so, the allegorical covering, in which there is a mixture of satire and panegyric, will lead us to conclude that this person was one of whom it had been inconvenient for the author to speak openly, either in praise or dispraise. All this agrees with Mary Queen of Scots, and with no other. Queen Elizabeth could not bear to hear her commended; and her successor would not forgive her satyrist. But the poet has so well marked out every distinguished circumstance of her life and character in this beautiful allegory, as will leave no room to doubt about his secret meaning. She is called a Mermaid, 1. to denote her reign over a kingdom situate in the sea, and 2. her beauty and intemperate lust, &lblank; Ut turpiter atrum Desinat in piscem mulier formosa superne. for as Elizabeth for her chastity is called a Vestal, this unfortunate lady on a contrary account is called a Mermaid. 3. An antient story may be supposed to be here alluded to. The emperor Julian tells us, Epistle 41. that the Sirens (which, with all the modern poets, are Mermaids) contended with precedency with the Muses, who overcoming them, took away their wings. The quarrels between Mary and Elizabeth had the same cause, and the same issue. &lblank; On a Dolphin's back.] This evidently marks out that distinguishing circumstance of Mary's fortune, her marriage with the dauphin of France, son of Henry II. Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath.] This alludes to her great abilities of genius and learning, which rendered her the most accomplished princess of her age. The French writers tell us, that, while she was in that court, she pronounced a Latin oration in the great hall of the L'ouvre, with so much grace and eloquence, as filled the whole court with admiration. That the rude sea grew civil at her song,] By the rude sea is meant Scotland encircled with the ocean; which rose up in arms against the regent, while she was in France. But her return home presently quieted those disorders: And had not her strange ill conduct afterwards more violently inflamed them, she might have passed her whole life in peace. There is the greater justness and beauty in this image, as the vulgar opinion is, that the mermaid always sings in storms. And certain stars shot madly from their spheres, To bear the sea maid's musick.] Thus concludes the description, with that remarkable circumstance of this unhappy lady's fate, the destruction she brought upon several of the English nobility, whom she drew in to support her cause. This, in the boldest expression of the sublime, the poet images by certain stars shooting madly from their spheres: By which he meant the earls of Northumberland and Westmorland, who fell in her quarrel; and principally the great duke of Norfolk, whose projected marriage with her was attended with such fatal consequences. Here again the reader may observe a peculiar justness in the imag'ry. The vulgar opinion being that the mermaid allured men to destruction by her songs. To which opinion Shakespear alludes in his Comedy of Errors, O train me not, sweet mermaid, with thy note, To drown me in thy sister's flood of tears. On the whole, it is the noblest and justest allegory that was ever written. The laying it in fairy land, and out of nature, is in the character of the speaker. And on these occasions Shakespear always excels himself. He is born away by the magic of his enthusiasm, and hurries his reader along with him into these ancient regions of poetry, by that power of Verse, which we may well fancy to be like what, &lblank; Olim Fauni Vatesque canebant. Warburton.

Note return to page 150 1Cupid all-arm'd;] Surely, this presents us with a very unclassical Image. Where do we read or see, in ancient Books, or Monuments, Cupid arm'd more than with his Bow and Arrow; and with these we for ever see him arm'd. And these are all the Arms he had Occasion for in this present Action; a more illustrious One, than any, his Friends, the Classicks, ever brought him upon.—The Change I make is so small, but the Beauty of the Thought so great, which this Alteration carries with it, that, I think, we are not to hesitate upon it. For what an Addition is this to the Compliment made upon this Virgin Queen's Celibacy, that it alarm'd the Power of Love? as if his Empire was in Danger, when this Imperial Votress had declared herself for a single Life: so powerful would her great Example be in the World.— Queen Elizabeth could not but be pleased with our Author's Address upon this Head. Warburton. All-armed, does not signify dressed in panoply, but only enforces the word armed, as we might say all-booted. I am afraid that the general sense of alarmed, by which it is used for put into fear or care by whatever cause, is later than our Authour.

Note return to page 151 2And maidens call it Love in idleness.] This is as fine a metamorphosis as any in Ovid: With a much better moral, intimating that irregular love has only power when people are idle, or not well employed. Warburton.

Note return to page 152 3&lblank; I am invisible.] I thought proper here to observe, that, as Oberon and Puck his Attendant, may be frequently observed to speak, when there is no mention of their Entering; they are designed by the Poet to be suppos'd on the Stage during the greatest Part of the Remainder of the Play; and to mix, as they please, as Spirits, with the other Actors; and embroil the Plot, by their Interposition, without being seen, or heard, but when to their own Purpose. Theobald.

Note return to page 153 4The one I'll stay, the other stayeth me.] Thus it has been in all the Editions hitherto: but Dr. Thirlby ingeniously saw, it must be, as I have corrected in the Text. Theobald.

Note return to page 154 5Wood, or mad, wild, raving. Pope.

Note return to page 155 6This passage is paraphrased from two lines of an ancient Poet.6Q0011

Note return to page 156 *All the old Editions have, Quite overcanopied with luscious woodbine. On the margin of one of my Folio's an unknown hand has written lush Woodbine, which I think is right.

Note return to page 157 7A Roundel is a Dance in a ring. Gray.6Q0012

Note return to page 158 8Then for the third Part of a Minute hence.] So the old Copies. But the Queen sets them Work, that is to keep them employ'd for the Remainder of the Night; the Poet, undoubtedly, intended her to say, Dance your Round, and sing your Song, and then instantly (before the third Part of a Minuet) begone to your respective Duties. Theob. Dr. Warburton reads for the third part of the Midnight.

Note return to page 159 *Quaint Spirits. For this Dr. Warburton reads against all authority quaint-sports. But Prospero in the Tempest applies quaint to Ariel.

Note return to page 160 9O take the sense, sweet, of my innocence; Love takes the meaning in love's conference.] Here, by some mischance or other, Innocence and Conference have been jumbled into one another's places, and thereby deprived a very sensible reply of all kind of meaning. Restore each to its right place and the sense will be this;—when she had interpreted his words to an evil meaning, he replies, O take the sense, sweet, of my conference; i. e. judge of my meaning by the drift of my whole speech, and do not pervert the sense of an ambiguous word to a meaning quite foreign to the discourse. Besides, says he, Love takes the meaning in love's innocence. i. e. The innocence of your love may teach you to discover the innocence of mine These are the sentiments, which were quite lost in this aukward transposition. Warburton. I am by no means convinced of the necessity of this alteration. Lysander in the language of love professes that as they have one heart they shall have one bed; this Hermia thinks rather too much, and entreats him to lye further off. Lysander answers, O! take the sense, sweet, of my innocence. understand the meaning of my innocence, or my innocent meaning. Let no suspicion of ill enter thy mind. Love takes the meaning in love's conference. In the conversation of those who are assured of each other's kindness not suspicion but Love takes the meaning. No malevolent interpretation is to be made, but all is to be received in the sense which love can find and which love can dictate.

Note return to page 161 1Reason becomes the marshal to my will. That is, My Will now follows Reason.

Note return to page 162 *In the time of Shakespear there were many companies of players, sometimes five at the same time, contending for the favour of the publick. Of these some were undoubtedly very unskilful and very poor, and it is probable that the design of this Scene was to ridicule their ignorance, and the odd expedients to which they might be driven by the want of proper decorations. Bottom was perhaps the head of a rival house, and is therefore honoured with an Ass's head.

Note return to page 163 2In the old Editions, &lblank; stay thou here a while;] The Verses should be alternately in Rhyme: but sweet in the Close of the first Line, and while in the third, will not do for this purpose. The Author, doubtless, gave it; &lblank; stay thou but here a whit; i. e. a little while: for so it signifies, as also any thing of no Price, or Consideration; a trifle: in which Sense it is very frequent with our Author. Theobald.

Note return to page 164 3Here are two syllables wanting. Perhaps it was written, through bag, through mire.

Note return to page 165 1It is plain by Bottom's answer that Snout mentioned an Ass's Head. Therefore we should read, Snout. O Bottom, thou art changed, what do I see on thee? An Ass's Head?

Note return to page 166 4These lines are in one quarto of 1600, the first folio of 1623, the second of 1632, and the third of 1664, &c. ranged in the following order: Mine ear is much enamour'd of thy note, On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee; So is mine eye enthralled to thy shape, And thy fair virtue's force (perforce) doth move me. This reading I have inserted not that it can suggest any thing better than the order to which the lines have been restored by Mr. Theobald from another 4to, but to shew that some liberty of conjecture must be allowed in the revisal of works so inaccurately printed and so long neglected.

Note return to page 167 5&lblank; gleek.] Joke or scoff. Pope.

Note return to page 168 6&lblank; the fiery glow-worm's eyes.] I know not how Shakespeare, who commonly derived his knowledge of nature from his own observation, happened to place the glow-worm's light in his eyes, which is only in his tail.

Note return to page 169 7&lblank; patience.] The Oxford Edition reads, I know your parentage well. I believe the correction is right.

Note return to page 170 8&lblank; patches.] Patch was in old language used as a term of opprobry; perhaps with much the same import as we use raggamuffin, or tatterdemalion.

Note return to page 171 9&lblank; nowl.] A head. Saxon.

Note return to page 172 *II. Mimick, so III. and IV.

Note return to page 173 1&lblank; minnock.] This is the reading of the old quarto, and I believe right. Minneken, now minx, is a nice trifling girl. Minnock is apparently a word of contempt.

Note return to page 174 2&lblank; sort.] Company. So above, that barren sort; and in Waller. A sort of lusty shepherds strove.

Note return to page 175 3And at our stamp.] This seems to be a vicious reading. Fairies are never represented stamping, or of a size that should give force to a stamp, nor could they have distinguished the stamps of Puck from those of their own companions. I read, And at a stump here o'er and o'er one falls. So Drayton, A pain be in his head-piece feels, Against a stubbed tree he reels, And up went poor Hobgoblin's hee's;   Alas his brain was dizzy.— At length upon his feet he gets, Hobgoblin fumes, Hobgoblin frets, And as again he forward sets,   And through the bushes scrambles, A stump doth trip him in his pace, Down fell poor Hob upon his face, And lamentably tore his case   Among the briers and brambles.6Q0015

Note return to page 176 4Some sleeves, some hats.] There is the like image in Drayton of Queen Mab and her Fairies flying from Hobgoblin. Some tore a ruff, and some a gown,   'Gainst one another justling; They flew about like chaff i'th' wind, For haste some left their masks behind, Some could not stay their gloves to find,   There never was such bustling.

Note return to page 177 5—latch'd, or letch'd, lick't over, lecher, to lick, French. Hanmer.

Note return to page 178 6Being o'er shoes in blood.] An allusion to the Proverb, Over shoes, over boots.

Note return to page 179 *I. II. III. IV. all read so dead, in my copy of III. some reader has altered dead to dread.

Note return to page 180 7&lblank; O brave touch.] Touch in Shakespeare's time was the same with our exploit, or rather stroke. A brave touch, a noble stroke, un grand coup. Mason was very merry; pleasantly playing both with the shrewd touches of many curst boys, and the small discretion of many lewd schoolmasters. Ascham.

Note return to page 181 8&lblank; mispris'd.] Mistaken; so below misprision is mistake.

Note return to page 182 9&lblank; Taurus' snow.] Taurus is the name of a range of mountains in Asia.

Note return to page 183 1&lblank; seal of bliss.] He has elsewhere the same image, But my kisses bring again Seals of love, but seal'd in vain.

Note return to page 184 2&lblank; join in souls.] This is surely wrong. We may read, Join in scorns, or join in scoffs.

Note return to page 185 3Extort a poor soul's patience.] Harrass, torment.

Note return to page 186 4My heart to her.] We should read, My heart with her but, as guest-wise, sojourn'd. So Prior. No matter what beauties I saw in my way, They were but my visits, but then not my home.

Note return to page 187 5&lblank; all yon fiery O's.] I would willingly believe that the poet wrote fiery Orbs.

Note return to page 188 6&lblank; in spite of me.] I read, in spite to me.

Note return to page 189 7Two of the first Life, coats in Heraldry, Due but to One, and crowned with one Crest.] The true Correction of this Passage I owe to the Friendship and Communication of the ingenious Martin Folks, Esq;—Two of the first, second, &c. are Terms peculiar in Heraldry to distinguish the different Quarterings of Coats. Theobald.

Note return to page 190 8&lblank; such an argument.] Such a subject of light merriment.

Note return to page 191 9You Minimus, &lblank;] Shakespeare might have given it, You Minim, you, &lblank; i. e. You Diminutive of the Creation, you Reptile, as in Milton. Theobald.

Note return to page 192 1&lblank; so sort.] So happen in the issue.

Note return to page 193 2&lblank; virtuous property.] Salutiferous. So he calls, in the Tempest, Poisonous dew, wicked dew.

Note return to page 194 3&lblank; buy this dear; that is, thou shalt pay dearly for this. Though this is sense, and may well enough stand, yet the poet perhaps wrote thou shalt 'by it dear. So in another place, thou shalt abuy6Q0016 it. So Milton, How dearly I abide that beast so vain.

Note return to page 195 *I see no good reason why the fourth act should begin here when there seems no interruption of the action. In the old quartos of 1600 there is no division of acts, which seems to have been afterwards arbitrarily made in the first folio, and may therefore be altered at pleasure.

Note return to page 196 3&lblank; do coy.] To coy is to sooth. Skinner.

Note return to page 197 4In the former Editions, &lblank; and he always away.] What! was She giving her Attendants an everlasting Dismission? No such Thing; they were to be still upon Duty. I am convinc'd, the Poet meant; &lblank; and be all ways away. i. e. disperse your selves, and scout out severally, in your Watch that danger approach us from no Quarter. Theobald. Mr. Upton reads, And be away—away.

Note return to page 198 5So doth the woodbine the sweet honey-suckle, Gently entwist; the female Ivy so Enrings the barky fingers of the Elm.] What does the woodbine entwist? The honey-suckle. But the woodbine and honey-suckle were, till now, but two names for one and the same plant. Florio, in his Italian Dictionary, interprets Madre Selva by woodbinde or honnie-suckle. We must therefore find a support for the woodbine as well as for the Ivy. Which is done by reading the lines thus, So doth woodbine, the sweet honey-suckle, Gently entwist the maple; Ivy so 'Enrings the barky fingers of the Elm. The corruption might happen by the first blunderer dropping the p in writing the word maple, which word thence became male. A following transcriber, for the sake of a little sense and measure, thought fit to change this male into female; and then tacked it as an epithet to Ivy. Warburton. Mr. Upton reads, So doth the woodrine the sweet honey-suckle, for bark of the wood. Shakespeare perhaps only meant so, the leaves involve the flower, using woodbine for the plant and honey-suckle for the flower; or perhaps Shakespeare made a blunder.

Note return to page 199 *I. Favours.

Note return to page 200 6Dian's Bud, or Cupid's flow'r.] Thus all the Editions. The ingenious Dr. Thirlby gave me the Correction, which I have inserted in the Text. Theobald.

Note return to page 201 7Titania, Musick call, and strike more dead Than common Sleep. Of all these fine the Sense.] This most certainly, is both corrupt in the Text, and Pointing. My Emendation needs no Justification. The five, that lay asleep on the Stage, were, Demetrius, Lysander, Hermia, Helena and Bottom. &lblank; Dr. Thirlby likewise communicated this very Correction. Theobald.

Note return to page 202 *I. Prosperity.

Note return to page 203 8Dance in Duke Theseus' house triumphantly, And bless it to all fair posterity;] We should read, &lblank; to all far posterity. i. e. to the remotest posterity. Warburton.

Note return to page 204 9Then, my Queen, in silence sad; Trip we after the night's shade.] Mr. Theobald says, why sad? Fairies are pleased to follow night. He will have it fade; and so, to mend the rhime, spoils both the sense and grammar. But he mistakes the meaning of sad; it signifies only grave, sober; and is opposed to their dances and revels, which were now ended at the singing of the morning lark.—So Winter's Tale, Act 4. My father and the gentleman are in sad talk. For grave or serious. Warburton.

Note return to page 205 1Our observation is performed.] The honours due to the morning of May. I know not why Shakespear calls this play a Midsummer-Night's Dream, when he so carefully informs us that it happened on the night preceding May day.

Note return to page 206 *So flewed. That is, so mouthed. Flews are the large Chaps of a deep mouthed Hound. Hanmer.

Note return to page 207 †So sanded. So marked with small spots.

Note return to page 208 2Fair Helena in fancy following me.] Fancy is here taken for love or affection, and is opposed to fury, as before. Sighs and tears poor Fancy's followers. Some now call that which a man takes particular delight in his Fancy. Flower fancier, for a florist, and Bird fancier, for a lover and feeder of birds, are colloquial words.

Note return to page 209 3And I have found Demetrius like a jewel, Mine own, and not mine own.] Hermia had observed that things appeared double to her. Helena replies, so methinks; and then subjoins, that Demetrius was like a jewel, her own and not her own. He is here, then, compared to some thing which had the property of appearing to be one thing when it was another. Not the property sure of a Jewel: or, if you will, of none but a false one. We should read, And I have found Demetrius like a gemell, Mine own, and not mine own. &lblank; From Gemellus a Twin. For Demetrius had that night acted two such different parts, that she could hardly think them both played by one and the same Demetrius; but that there were twin Demetrius's like the two Sofia's in the Farce.—From Gemellus comes the French, Gemeau or Jumeau, and in the feminine, Gemelle or Jumelle: So in Maçon's translation of the Decameron of Bocace &lblank; Il avoit trois filles plus aage'es que les masles, des quellos les deux qui estoîent jumelles avoient quinze ans. Quatrieme Jour. Nov. 3. Warburton. This emendation is ingenious enough to deserve to be true.

Note return to page 210 4Patch'd fool. That is, a fool in a particoloured coat.

Note return to page 211 5In former Editions: Peradventure, to make it the more gracious, I shall sing it at her Death.] At whose Death? In Bottom's Speech there is no mention of any She-Creature, to whom this Relative can be coupled. I make not the least Scruple, but Bottom, for the sake of a Jest, and to render his Voluntary, as we may call it, the more gracious and extraordinary, said;—I shall sing it after Death. He, as Pyramus, is kill'd upon the Scene; and so might promise to rise again at the Conclusion of the Interlude, and give the Duke his Dream by way of Song.—The Source of the Corruption of the Text is very obvious. The f in after being sunk by the vulgar Pronunciation, the Copyist might write it from the Sound,— a'ter: which the wise Editors not understanding, concluded, two Words were erroneously got together; so, splitting them, and clapping in an h, produced the present Reading &lblank; at her. Theobald.

Note return to page 212 6A thing of nought, which Mr. Theobald changes with great pomp to a thing of naught, is, a good for nothing Thing.

Note return to page 213 7In the same sense as in the Tempest, any monster in England makes a man.

Note return to page 214 8These beautiful lines are in all the old Editions thrown out of metre. They are very well restored by the later Editors.

Note return to page 215 9Constancy. Consistency; Stability; Certainty.

Note return to page 216 *One of the quartos has ripe, the other, with II. III. IV. rise.

Note return to page 217 †This is printed as Mr. Theobald gave it from both the old quartos. In the first folio, and all the following Editions, Lysander reads the catalogue, and Theseus makes the remarks.

Note return to page 218 1Merry and tragical? tedious and brief That is hot Ice, and wondrous strange snow.] The nonsense of the last line should be corrected thus, That is, hot Ice, a wondrous strange show! Warburton. Mr. Upton reads, not improbably, And wondrous strange black snow.

Note return to page 219 2Unless you can find sport in their intents. Thus all the copies. But as I know not what it is to stretch and con an intent, I suspect a line to be lost.

Note return to page 220 3And what poor duty cannot do, Noble respect takes it in might, not merit. The sense of this passage, as it now stands, if it has any sense, is this. What the inability of duty cannot perform, regardful generosity receives as an act of ability though not of merit. The contrary is rather true: What dutifulness tries to perform without ability, regardful generosity receives as having the merit, though not the power, of complete performance. We should therefore read, And what poor duty cannot do, Noble respect takes not in might, but merit.

Note return to page 221 4&lblank; which Lion hight by name.] As all the other Parts of this Speech are in alternate Rhyme, excepting that it closes with a Couplet; and as no Rhyme is left to, name; we must conclude, either a Verse is slipt out, which cannot now be retriev'd: or, by a Transposition of the Words, as I have placed them, the Poet intended a Triplet. Theobald.

Note return to page 222 5Mr. Upton rightly observes that, Shakespear in this line ridicules the affectation of beginning many words with the same letter. He might have remarked the same of The raging Rocks And shivering Shocks. Gascoigne, contemporary with our poet, remarks and blames the same affectation.

Note return to page 223 6Limander and Helen, are spoken by the blundering player, for Leander and Hero. Shafalus and Procrus, for Cephalus and Procris.

Note return to page 224 7Thes. Now is the Mural down between the two neighbours. Dem. No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hear without warning.] Shakespear could never write this nonsense: we should read &lblank; to rear without warning. i. e. It is no wonder that walls should be suddenly down, when they were as suddenly up;—rear'd without warning. Warburton.

Note return to page 225 8Here come two noble Beasts in a Man and a Lion.] I don't think the Jest here is either compleat, or right. It is differently pointed in several of the Old Copies, which, I suspect, may lead us to the true Reading, viz. Here come two noble Beasts—in a Man and a Lion. immediately upon Theseus saying this, enter Lion and Moonshine, It seems very probable therefore, that our Author wrote. &lblank; in a Moon and a Lion. the one having a Crescent and a Lanthorn before him, and representing the Man in the Moon; the other in a Lion's hide. Theobald.

Note return to page 226 *An Equivocation. Snuff signifies both the cinder of a candle, and hasty anger.

Note return to page 227 *I. Makes this speech a little longer but not better.

Note return to page 228 9And thus she means &lblank;] Thus all the Editions have it. It should be, thus she moans; i. e. laments over her dead Pyramus. Theobald.

Note return to page 229 1These lilly Lips, this cherry Nose.] All Thisby's Lamentation, till now, runs in regular Rhyme and Metre. But both, by some Accident, are in this single Instance interrupted. I suspect the Poet wrote; These lilly Brows, This cherry Nose, Now black Brows being a Beauty, lilly Brows are as ridiculous as a cherry Nose, green Eyes, or Cowslip Cheeks. Theobald

Note return to page 230 2In the old copies: And the Wolf beholds the moon:] As 'tis the Design of these Lines to characterize the Animals, as they present themselves at the Hour of Midnight; and as the Wolf is not justly characteriz'd by saying he beholds the Moon; which all other Beasts of Prey, then awake, do: and as the Sounds these Animals make at that Season, seem also intended to be represented; I make no Question but the Poet wrote; And the Wolf behowls the Moon. For so the Wolf is exactly characteriz'd, it being his peculiar Property to howl at the Moon. (Behowl, as bemoan, beseem, and an hundred others.) Warburton.

Note return to page 231 3I am sent with broom before, To sweep the dust behind the door. Cleanliness was always necessary to invite the residence and the favour of Fairies. These make our Girls their slutt'ry rue By pinching them both black and blue, And put a penny in their shoe   The house for cleanly sweeping. Drayton.

Note return to page 232 4Through this house give glimmering light. Milton perhaps had this picture in his thought. Glowing embers through the room Teach light to counterfeit a gloom. Il Penseroso. So Drayton. Hence shadows seeming idle shapes Of little frisking Elves and Apes, To earth do make their wanton scapes,   As hope of pastime hastes them. I think it should be read, Through this House in glimmering Light.

Note return to page 233 5This speech, which both the old quartos give to Oberon, is in the Edition of 1623, and in all the following, printed as the song. I have restored it to Oberon, as it apparently contains not the blessing which he intends to bestow on the bed, but his declaration that he will bless it, and his orders to the Fairies how to perform the necessary rites. But where then is the song?—I am afraid it is gone after many other things of greater value. The truth is that two songs are lost. The series of the Scene is this; after the speech of Puck, Oberon enters, and calls his Fairies to a song, which song is apparently wanting in all the copies. Next Titania leads another song which is indeed lost like the former, though the Editors have endeavoured to find it. Then Oberon dismisses his Fairies to the despatch of the ceremonies. The songs, I suppose, were lost, because they were not inserted in the players parts, from which the drama was printed.

Note return to page 234 6Now to 'scape the serpent's tongue. That is, If we be dismiss'd without hisses.

Note return to page 235 7Give me your hands. That is, Clap your hands. Give us your applause.

Note return to page 236 *Of this play there are two editions in quarto, one printed for Thomas Fisher, the other for James Roberts, both in 1600. I have used the copy of Roberts, very carefully collated, as it seems, with that of Fisher. Neither of the editions approach to exactness. Fisher is sometimes preferable, but Roberts was followed, though not without some variations, by Hemings and Condel, and they by all the folios that succeeded them.6Q0020

Note return to page 237 Of this play we have no edition more early than that of 1623 in Folio.

Note return to page 238 1It is observable (I know not for what cause) that the stile of this comedy is less figurative, and more natural and unaffected than the greater part of this Author's, tho' supposed to be one of the first he wrote. Pope. It may very well be doubted, whether Shakespear had any other hand in this play than the enlivening it with some speeches and lines thrown in here and there, which are easily distinguished as being of a different stamp from the rest. Hanmer. To this observation of Mr. Pope, which is very just, Mr. Theobald has added, that this is one of Shakspeare's worst plays, and is less corrupted than any other. Mr. Upton peremptorily determines, that if any proof can be drawn from manner and style, this play must be sent packing and seek for its parent elsewhere. How otherwise, says he, do painters distinguish copies from originals, and have not authours their peculiar style and manner from which a true critick can form as unerring a judgment as a Painter? I am afraid this illustration of a critick's science will not prove what is desired. A Painter knows a copy from an original by rules somewhat resembling these by which criticks know a translation, which if it be literal, and literal it must be to resemble the copy of a picture, will be easily distinguished. Copies are known from originals even when the painter copies his own picture; so if an authour should literally translate his work he would lose the manner of an original. Mr. Upton confounds the copy of a picture with the imitation of a painter's manner. Copies are easily known, but good imitations are not detected with equal certainty, and are, by the best judges, often mistaken. Nor is it true that the writer has always peculiarities equally distinguishable with those of the painter. The peculiar manner of each arises from the desire, natural to every performer, of facilitating his subsequent works by recurrence to his former ideas; this recurrence produces that repetition which is called habit. The painter, whose work is partly intellectual and partly manual, has habits of the mind, the eye and the hand, the writer has only habits of the mind. Yet, some painters have differed as much from themselves as from any other; and I have been told, that there is little resemblance between the first works of Raphael and the last. The same variation may be expected in writers; and if it be true, as it seems, that they are less subject to habit, the difference between their works may be yet greater. But by the internal marks of a composition we may discover the authour with probability, though seldom with certainty. When I read this play I cannot but think that I discover both in the serious and ludicrous scenes, the language and sentiments of Shakespear. It is not indeed one of his most powerful effusions, it has neither many diversities of character, nor striking delineations of life, but it abounds in &grg;&grn;&grw;&grm;&grag;&gri; beyond most of his plays, and few have more lines or passages which, singly considered, are eminently beautiful. I am yet inclined to believe that it was not very successful, and suspect that it has escaped corruption, only because being seldom played it was less exposed to the hazards of transcription.

Note return to page 239 2&lblank;shapeless idleness.] The expression is fine, as implying that idleness prevents the giving any form or character to the manners. Warburton.

Note return to page 240 3&lblank; nay, give me not the Boots.] A proverbial Expression, tho' now disused, signifying, don't make a laughing Stock of me; don't play upon me. The French have a Phrase, Bailler foin en Corne; which Cotgrave thus interprets, To give one the Boots; to sell him a Bargain. Theobald.

Note return to page 241 4However, but a folly.] This love will end in a foolish action, to produce which you are long to spend your wit, or it will end in the loss of your wit, which will be over-powered by the folly of love.

Note return to page 242 5Made wit with musing weak.] For made read make. Thou, Julia, hast made me war with good counsel, and make wit weak with musing.

Note return to page 243 6This whole Scene, like many others in these plays (some of which I believe were written by Shakespear, and others interpolated by the players) is composed of the lowest and most trifling conceits, to be accounted for only from the gross taste of the age he lived in; Populo ut placerent. I wish I had authority to leave them out; but I have done all I could, set a mark of reprobation upon them throughout this edition. Pope. That this, like many other Scenes, is mean and vulgar, will be universally allowed; but that it was interpolated by the players seems advanced without any proof, only to give a greater licence to criticism.

Note return to page 244 7I, a lost Mutton, gave your letter to her, a lac'd Mutton;] Speed calls himself a lost Mutton, because he had lost his Master, and because Protheus had been proving him a Sheep. But why does he call the Lady a lac'd Mutton? Wenchers are to this Day called Mutton-mongers: and consequently the Object of their Passion must, by the Metaphor, be the Mutton. And Cotgrave, in his English-French Dictionary, explains Lac'd Mutton, Une Garse, putain, fille de Joye. And Mr. Motteux has rendered this Passage of Rabelais, in the Prologue of his fourth Book, Cailles coiphees mignonnement chantans, in this manner; Coated Quails and laced Mutton waggishly singing. So that lac'd Mutton has been a sort of Standard Phrase for Girls of Pleasure. Theobald.

Note return to page 245 8Nay, in that you are astray.] For the Reason Protheus gives, Dr. Thirlby advises that we should read, a Stray, i. e. a stray Sheep; which continues Protheus's Banter upon Speed. Theobald.

Note return to page 246 9&lblank; you have testern'd me.] You have gratified me with a tester, testern, or testen, that is, with a sixpence.

Note return to page 247 1&lblank; a goodly broker.] A broker was used for matchmaker, sometimes for a procuress.

Note return to page 248 2&lblank; stomach on your meat.] Stomach was used for passion or obstinacy.

Note return to page 249 3Indeed I bid the base for Protheus.] The speaker here turns the allusion (which her mistress employed) from the base in musick to a country exercise Bid-the Base: In which some pursue, and others are made prisoners. So that Lucetta would intend, by this, to say, indeed I take pains to make you a captive to Protheus's passion.—He uses the same allusion in his Venus and Adonis, To bid the winds a base he now prepares. and in his Cymbaline he mentions the game, &lblank; Lads more like To run the country Base. Warb.6Q0021

Note return to page 250 4&lblank; what sad talk.] Sad is the same as grave or serious.

Note return to page 251 5Some to discover islands far away.] In Shakespear's time, voyages for the discovery of the islands of America were much in vogue. And we find, in the journals of the travellers of that time, that the sons of noblemen, and of others of the best families in England, went very frequently on these adventures. Such as the Fortescues, Collitons, Thorn-hills, Farmers, Pickerings, Littletons, Willoughbys, Chesters, Hawleys, Bromleys, and others. To this prevailing fashion, our poet frequently alludes, and not without high commendations of it. Warburton.

Note return to page 252 6Attends the Emperor in his Royal Court.] The Emperor's Royal Court is properly at Vienna, but Valentine, 'tis plain, is at Milan; where, in most other Passages, 'tis said he is attending the Duke, who makes one of the Characters in the Drama. This seems to convict the Author of a Forgetfulness and Contradiction; but, perhaps, it may be solved thus, and Milan be called the Emperor's Court; as, since the Reign of Charlemaigne, this Dukedom and its Territories have belong'd to the Emperors. I wish, I could as easily solve another Absurdity, which encounters us; of Valentine's going from Verona to Milan, both Inland Places, by Sea. Theobald. Mr. Theobald discovers not any great skill in history. Vienna is not the court of the Emperour as Emperour, nor has Milan been always without its princes since the days of Charlemaigne; but the note has its use.

Note return to page 253 7&lblank; in good time.] In good time was the old expression when something happened which suited the thing in hand, as the French say, a propos.

Note return to page 254 8At the end of this verse there is wanting a syllable, for the speech apparently ends in a quatrain. I find nothing that will rhyme to sun, and therefore shall leave it to some happier critick. But I suspect that the Authour might write thus, Oh, how this spring of love resembleth right, Th' uncertain glory of an April day; Which now shows all the glory of the light, And, by and by, a cloud takes all away. Light was either by negligence or affectation changed to sun, which, considered without the rhyme, is indeed better. The next transcriber finding that the word right did not rhyme to sun, supposed it erroneously written, and left it out.

Note return to page 255 9Hallowmas.] That is, about the feast of All-Saints, when winter begins, and the life of a vagrant becomes less comfortable.

Note return to page 256 1None else would] None else would be so simple.

Note return to page 257 *That is, discoursing, talking. An Italianism.

Note return to page 258 2I am the dog, &c.] This passage is much confused, and of confusion the present reading makes no end. Sir J. Hanmer reads, I am the dog, no, the dog is himself and I am me, the dog is the dog, and I am myself. This certainly is more reasonable, but I know not how much reason the Authour intended to bestow on Launce's soliloquy.

Note return to page 259 3Like a wood Woman!] The first Folio's agree in would-woman; for which, because it was a Mystery to Mr. Pope, he has unmeaningly substituted ould Woman. But it must be writ, or at least understood, wood Woman. i. e. crazy, frantick with Grief; or distracted, from any other Cause. The Word is very frequently used in Chaucer; and sometimes writ, wood, sometimes, wode. Theobald.

Note return to page 260 4Not without desert.] And not dignified with so much reputation without proportionate merit.

Note return to page 261 5No. That you are worthless.] I have inserted the particle no to fill up the measure.

Note return to page 262 6Thur. Madam, my Lord your Father.] This Speech in all the Editions is assigned improperly to Thurio; but he has been all along upon the Stage, and could not know that the Duke wanted his Daughter. Besides, the first Line and half of Silvia's Answer is evidently address'd to two Persons. A Servant, therefore, must come in and deliver the Message; and then Silvia goes out with Thurio. Theobald.

Note return to page 263 7Whose high imperious.] For whose I read those. I have contemned love and am punish'd. Those high thoughts by which I exalted myself above human passions or frailties, have brought upon me fasts and groans.

Note return to page 264 8No woe to his correction.] No misery that can be compared to the punishment inflicted by love. Herbert called for the prayers of the Liturgy a little before his death, saying, None to them, none to them.

Note return to page 265 9A principality.] The first of principal of women. So the old writers use state. She is a lady, a great state. Latymer. This look is called in states warlie, in others otherwise. Sir T. More.

Note return to page 266 *She is alone.] She stands by herself. There is none to be compared to her.

Note return to page 267 1It is mine then, or Valentino's Prase,] Here Protheus questions with himself, whether it is his own praise, or Valentine's, that makes him fall in love with Valentine's mistress. But not to insist on the absurdity of falling in love through his own praises, he had not indeed praised her any farther than giving his opinion of her in three words, when his friend asked it of him. In all the old editions, we find the line printed thus, Is it mine, or Valentino's praise? A word is wanting. The line was originally thus, Is it mine eye, or Valentino's praise? Protheus had just seen Valentine's mistress, whom her lover had been lavishly-praising. His encomiums therefore heightening Protheus's idea of her at the interview, it was the less wonder he should be uncertain which had made the strongest impression, Valentine's praises, or his own view of her. Warburton.

Note return to page 268 2With more advice.] With more prudence, with more discretion.

Note return to page 269 3'Tis but her picture.] This is evidently a slip of attention, for he had seen her in the last scene, and in high terms offered her his service.

Note return to page 270 *&lblank; It is Padua in the former editions. See the note on Act 3. Pope.

Note return to page 271 5This equivocation, miserable as it is, has been admitted by Milton in his great Poem. B. VI. —The terms we sent were terms of weight, Such as we may perceive, amaz'd them all And stagger'd many; who receives them right Had need from head to foot well understand, Not understood, this gift they have besides To shew us when our foes stand not upright.

Note return to page 272 *It is to observed that in the first folio edition, the only Edition of authority, there are no directions concerning the scenes; they have been added by the later Editors, and may therefore be changed by any reader that can give more consistency or regularity to the drama by such alterations. I make this remark in this place, because I know not whether the following soliloquy of Protheus is so proper in the street.

Note return to page 273 6O sweet-suggesting love.] To suggest is to tempt in our Authour's language. So again, Knowing that tender youth is soon suggested. The sense is. O tempting love, if thou hast influenced me to sin, teach me to excuse it. Dr Warburton reads, if I have sinn'd; but, I think, not only without necessity, but with less elegance.

Note return to page 274 1Myself, who am his competitor or rival, being admitted to his counsel.

Note return to page 275 2Pretended flight.] We may read intended flight

Note return to page 276 3I suspect that the authour concluded the act with this couplet, and that the next scene should begin the third act; but the change, as it will add nothing to the probability of the action, is of no great importance.

Note return to page 277 *Of infinite. Old Edit.

Note return to page 278 7Be not aimed at.] Be not guessed.

Note return to page 279 8Of this pretence.] Of this claim made to your daughter.

Note return to page 280 8Sir, in Milan here.] It ought to be thus, instead of &lblank; in Verona here &lblank; for the Scene apparently is in Milan, as is clear from several passages in the first Act, and in the beginning of the first Scene of the fourth Act. A like mistake has crept into the eighth Scene of Act II. where Speed bids his fellow servant Launce, welcome to Padua. Pope.

Note return to page 281 9The fashion of the time.] The modes of courtship, the acts by which men recommended themselves to ladies.

Note return to page 282 1&lblank; for they are sent by me.] For is the same as for that, since.

Note return to page 283 2Merops' son.] Thou art Phaëton in thy rashness, but without his pretensions; thou art not the son of a Divinity, but a terræ filius, a lowborn wretch; Merops is thy true father, with whom Phaëton was falsely reproached.

Note return to page 284 3I fly not death, to fly his deadly doom.] To fly his doom, used for by flying, or in flying, is a gallicism. The sense is, By avoiding the execution of his sentence I shall not escape death. If I stay here, I suffer myself to be destroyed; if I go away, I destroy myself.

Note return to page 285 4Laun. I am but a fool, look you, and yet I have the wit to think my master is a kind of knave: but that's all one, if he be but one knave.] Where is the sense, or, if you won't allow the Speaker that, where is the humour of this speech? Nothing had given the fool occasion to suspect that his master was become double, like Antipholis in the Comedy of Errors. The last word is corrupt. We should read, &lblank; if he be but one kind. He thought his master was a kind of knave; however, he keeps himself in countenance with this reflexion, that if he was a knave but of one kind, he might pass well enough amongst his neighbours. This is truly humourous. Warburton. This alteration is acute and specious, yet I know not whether, in Shakespeare's language, one knave may not signify a knave on only one occasion, a single knave. We still use a double villain for a villain beyond the common rate of guilt.

Note return to page 286 5A team of horse shall not pluck &lblank;] I see how Valentine suffers for telling his love secrets, therefore I will keep mine close.

Note return to page 287 6In former editions it is, With my Mastership? why, it is at Sea] For how does Launce mistake the Word? Speed asks him about his Mastership, and he replies to it litteratim. But then how was his Mastership at Sea, and on Shore too? The Addition of a Letter and a Note of Apostrophe make Launce both mistake the Word, and sets the Pun right: It restores, indeed, but a mean Joke; but, without it, there is no Sense in the Passage. Besides, it is in Character with the rest of the Scene; and, I dare be confident, the Poet's own Conceit. Theobald.

Note return to page 288 7&lblank; St. Nicholas be thy speed.] St. Nicholas presided over Scholars, who were therefore called St. Nicholas's Clerks. Hence, by a quibble between Nicholas and Old Nick, Highway-men, in the first part of Henry the fourth, are called Nicholas's Clerks. Warburton.6Q0025

Note return to page 289 8&lblank; sweet mouth.] This I take to be the same with what is now vulgarly called a sweet tooth, a luxurious desire of dainties and sweetmeats.

Note return to page 290 *&lblank; praise her liquor.] That is, shew how well she likes it by drinking often.

Note return to page 291 9&lblank; she is too liberal.] Liberal, is licentious and gross in language. So in Othello, Is he not a profane and very liberal counsellor.

Note return to page 292 1Trenched in ice] Cut, carved in ice. Trencher, to cut, French.

Note return to page 293 2&lblank; with circumstance.] With the addition of such incidental particulars as may induce belief.

Note return to page 294 3&lblank; as you unwind her love.] As you wind off her love from him, make me the bottom on which you wind it. The housewife's term for a ball of thread wound upon a central body, is a bottom of thread.

Note return to page 295 *That is, birdlime.

Note return to page 296 4For Orpheus' lute was strung with poet's sinews.] This shews Shakespear's knowledge of antiquity. He here assigns Orpheus his true character of legislator. For under that of a poet only, or lover, the quality given to his lute is unintelligible. But, considered as a lawgiver, the thought is noble, and the imag'ry exquisitely beautiful. For by his lute is to be understood his system of laws: and by the poet's sinews, the power of numbers, which Orpheus actually employed in those laws to make them received by a fierce and barbarous people. Warburton.

Note return to page 297 5&lblank; I will pardon you.] I will excuse you from waiting.

Note return to page 298 6&lblank; we'll make you, Sir, and rifle you.] The meaning of this as it stands, is, If you do not deliver we'll make you deliver, and then plunder you. This is not the language of a very cunning robber. We may better read, If not, we'll take you, Sir, and rifle you.

Note return to page 299 *Robin Hood was captain of a band of Robbers, and was much inclined to rob Churchmen.

Note return to page 300 7&lblank; awful men.] Reverend, worshipful, such as Magistrates, and other principal members of civil communities.6Q0026

Note return to page 301 8All the Impressions, from the first downwards, An Heir and Niece ally'd unto the Duke. But our Poet would never have expressed himself so stupidly, as to tell us, this Lady was the Duke's Niece, and ally'd to him: For her Alliance was certainly, sufficiently included in the first Term. Our Author meant to say, she was an Heiress, and near ally'd to the Duke; an Expression the most natural that can be for the Purpose, and very frequently used by the Stage-Poets. Theobald.

Note return to page 302 9&lblank; sudden quip.] That is, hasty passionate reproaches and scoffs. So Macbeth is in a kindred sense said to be sudden, that is, irascible and impetuous.

Note return to page 303 1Beauty lives with kindness.] Beauty without kindness dies unenjoyed, and undelighting.

Note return to page 304 2Out of all nick.] Beyond all reckoning or count. Reckonings are kept upon nicked or notched sticks or tallies. Warburton.

Note return to page 305 3You have your wish.] The word will is here ambiguous. He wishes to gain her will: she tells him, if he wants her will he has it.

Note return to page 306 *This is hardly sense. We may read, with very little alteration, But since you're false, it shall become you well.

Note return to page 307 *Grievances.] Sorrows, sorrowful affections.

Note return to page 308 †I believe we should read, I would have, &c. one that takes upon him to be a dog, to be a dog indeed, to be, &c.

Note return to page 309 4It seems you lov'd her not to leave her token. Protheus does not properly leave his Lady's token, he gives it away. The old Edition has it, It seems you lov'd her not, not leave her token. I should correct it thus, It seems you lov'd her not, nor love her token.

Note return to page 310 5To carry that which I would have refus'd.] The sense is, To go and present that which I wish to be not accepted, to praise him whom I wish to be dispraised.

Note return to page 311 6But since she did neglect her looking-glass, And threw her sun-expelling mask away; The air hath starv'd the roses in her cheeks, And pinch'd the lilly tincture of her face, That now she is become as black as I.] To starve the Roses is certainly a very proper expression: but what is pinching a tincture? However starved, in the third line, made the blundering Editors write pinch'd in the fourth: tho' they might have seen that it was a tanning scorching, not a freezing air that was spoken of. For how could this letter quality in the air so affect the whiteness of the skin as to turn it black. We should read, And pitch'd the lilly-tincture of her face. i. e. turned the white tincture black, as the following line has it, That now she is become as black as I. and we say, in common speech, as black as pitch.—By the roses being starv'd, is only meant their being withered, and losing their colour. Warburton. This is no emendation,—none ever heard of a face being pitched by the weather. The colour of a part pinched, is livid, as it is commonly termed, black and blue. The weather may therefore be justly said to pinch when it produces the same visible effect. I believe this is the reason why the cold is said to pinch.

Note return to page 312 7Her forehead's low.] A high forehead was in our Authour's time, accounted a feature eminently beautiful. So in the History of Guy of Warwick, Felice his Lady is said to have the same high forehead as Venus.

Note return to page 313 8 My substance should be statue in thy stead. It is evident this noun should be a participle statued, i. e. placed on a pedestal, or fixed in a shrine to be adored. Warburton. Statued is, I am afraid, a new word, and that it should be received, is not quite evident.

Note return to page 314 9Sure is safe, out of danger.

Note return to page 315 1The private wound, &c.] I have a little mended the measure. The old edition, and all but Sir T. Hanmer, read, The private wound is deepest, oh time most accurst.

Note return to page 316 2It is (I think) very odd to give up his mistress thus at once, without any reason alleg'd. But our author probably followed the stories just as he found them in his novels as well as histories. Pope. This passage either hath been much sophisticated, or is one great proof that the main parts of this play did not proceed from Shakespear; for it is impossible he could make Valentine act and speak so much out of character, or give to Silvia so unnatural a behaviour as to take no notice of this strange concession if it had been made. Hanmer.

Note return to page 317 3How oft hast thou with perjury cleft the root.] Sir T. Hanmer reads, cleft the root o'n't.

Note return to page 318 *That is, if it be any shame to wear a disguise for the purposes of love.

Note return to page 319 4The measure, the length of my sword, the reach of my anger.

Note return to page 320 5All the Editions, Verona shall not hold thee. But, whether thro' the Mistake of the first Editors, or the Poet's own Carelessness, this Reading is absurdly faulty. For the Threat here is to Thurio, who is a Milanese; and has no Concern, as it appears, with Verona. Besides, the Scene is betwixt the Confines of Milan, and Mantua, to which Silvia follows Valentine, having heard that he had retreated thither. And, upon these Circumstances, I ventur'd to adjust the Text, as, I imagine, the Poet must have intended: i. e. Milan, thy Country shall never see thee again: thou shalt never live to go back thither. Theobald.

Note return to page 321 *Sir Tho. Hanmer reads conclude.

Note return to page 322 5In this play there is a strange mixture of knowledge and ignorance, of care and negligence. The versification is often excellent, the allusions are learned and just; but the authour conveys his heroes by sea from one inland town to another in the same country; he places the Emperour at Milan and sends his young men to attend him, but never mentions him more; he makes Protheus, after an interview with Silvia, say he has only seen her picture, and, if we may credit the old copies, he has by mistaking places, left his scenery inextricable. The reason of all this confusion seems to be, that he took his story from a novel which he sometimes followed, and sometimes forsook, sometimes remembred, and sometimes forgot.

Note return to page 323 *Varrius might be omitted, for he is only once spoken to, and says nothing.

Note return to page 324 Of this Play the first known Edition is in the Folio of 1623. Editions from which the various Readings are collected. I. Folio 1623. II. Folio 1632. III. Folio 1664.

Note return to page 325 *There is perhaps not one of Shakespear's plays more darkened than this by the peculiarities of its Authour, and the unskilfulness of its Editors, by distortions of phrase, or negligence of transcription.

Note return to page 326 1The story is taken from Cinthio's Novels, Decad 8. Novel 5. Pope.

Note return to page 327 †I. II. III. put to know. Perhaps rightly.

Note return to page 328 2Lifts.] Bounds, Limits:

Note return to page 329 3&lblank; Then no more remains, &c. This is a passage which has exercised the sagacity of the Editors, and is now to employ mine. &lblank; Then no more remains: Put that to your Sufficiency as your Worth is able, And let them work.] I doubt not, but this Passage, either from the Impertinence of the Actors, or the Negligence of the Copyists, has come maim'd to us. In the first Place, what an unmeasurable, inharmonious, Verse have we here; and, then, how lame is the Sense! What was Esculus to put to his Sufficiency? Why, his Science. But his Science and his Sufficiency were but One and the same Thing. On what then does the Relative, them, depend? The old Editions read thus. &lblank; Then no more remains. But that to your Sufficiency, as your Worth is able, And let them work. Here, again, the Sense is manifestly lame and defective, and as the Versification is so too, they concur to make me think, a Line has accidentally been left out. Perhaps, something like This might supply our Author's Meaning. &lblank; Then no more remains, But that to your Sufficiency you add Due Diligency, as your Worth is able; And let them work. By some such Supplement both the Sense and Measure would be cur'd. But as the Conjecture is unsupported by any Authorities, I have not pretended to thrust it into the Text; but submit it to Judgment. They, who are acquainted with Books, know, that, where two Words of a similar Length and Termination happen to lie under one another, nothing is more common than for Transcribers to glance their Eye at once from the first to the undermost Word, and so leave out the intermediate part of the Sentence. Theobald. Since I am not to know, that your own Science Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice My strength can give you: then no more remains: Put that to your sufficiency, as your worth is able, And let them work. To the integrity of this reading Mr. Theobald objects, and says, What was Escalus to put to his sufficiency! why his science: But his science and sufficiency were but one and the same thing. On what then does the relative them depend? He will have it, therefore, that a line has been accidentally dropt, which he attempts to restore by due diligence. Nodum in scirpo quærit. And all for want of knowing, that by sufficiency is meant authority, the power delegated by the Duke to Escalus. The plain meaning of the word being this: Put your skill in governing (says the Duke) to the power which I give you to exercise it, and let them work together. Warburton. Sir Tho. Hanmer having caught from Mr. Theobald a hint that a line was lost, endeavours to supply it thus. &lblank; Then no more remains, But that to your sufficiency you join A will to serve us, as your worth is able. He has by this bold conjecture undoubtedly obtained a meaning, but, perhaps not, even in his own opinion, the meaning of Shakespear. That the passage is more or less corrupt, I believe every reader will agree with the Editors. I am not convinced that a line is lost, as Mr. Theobald conjectures, nor that the change of but to put, which Dr. Warburton has admitted after some other Editor, will amend the fault. There was probably some original obscurity in the expression, which gave occasion to mistake in repetition or transcription. I therefore suspect that the Authour wrote thus, &lblank; Then no more remains, But that to your sufficiencies your worth is abled, And let them work. Then nothing remains more than to tell you that your Virtue is now invested with power equal to your knowledge and wisdom. Let therefore your knowledge and your virtue now work together. It may easily be conceived how sufficiencies was, by an inarticulate speaker, or inattentive hearer, confounded with sufficiency as, and how abled, a word very unusual, was changed into able. For abled, however, an authority is not wanting. Lear uses it in the same sense, or nearly the same, with the Duke. As for sufficiencies, D. Hamilton, in his dying speech, prays that Charles II. may exceed both the virtues and sufficiencies of his father.

Note return to page 330 4&lblank; The terms For common justice you're as pregnant in.] The later Editions all give it, without authority, the terms of justice, and Dr. Warburton makes terms signify bounds or limits. I rather think the Duke meant to say, that Escalus was pregnant, that is, ready and knowing in all the forms of law, and, among other things, in the terms or times set apart for its administration.

Note return to page 331 5For you must know we have with special soul Elected him our absence to supply.] This nonsense must be corrected thus, &lblank; with special roll i. e. by a special commission. For it appears, from this scene, that Escalus had one commission, and Angelo another. The Duke had before delivered Escalus his commission. He now declares that designed for Angelo: and he says, afterwards, to both, To th' hopeful execution do I leave you Of your commissions. Why Angelo's was called the special roll was, because he was in authority superior to Escalus. &lblank; old Escalus, Tho' first in question, is thy secondary. Warburton. This Editor is, I think, right in supposing a corruption, but less happy in his emendation. I read, We have with special seal Elected him our absence to supply. A special seal is a very natural Metonymy for a special commission.

Note return to page 332 6There is a kind of character in thy life, That to th' observer, &c.] Either this introduction has more solemnity than meaning, or it has a meaning which I cannot discover. What is there peculiar in this, that a man's life informs the observer of his history? Might it be supposed that Shakespear wrote this? There is a kind of character in thy look.

Note return to page 333 7 &lblank; for if our virtues, &c. Paulum sepultæ distat inertiæ Celata virtus. &lblank; Hor. Warburton.

Note return to page 334 8To fine issues.] To great consequences. For high purposes.

Note return to page 335 9&lblank; I do bend my speech To One that can my part in him advertise.] This is obscure. The meaning is, I direct my speech to one who is able to teach me how to govern: my part in him, signifying my office, which I have delegated to him. My part in him advertise; i. e. who knows what appertains to the character of deputy or viceroy. Can advertise my part in him; that is, his representation of my person. But all these quaintnesses of expression, the Oxford Editor seems sworn to extirpate; that is, to take away one of Shakespear's characteristic marks; which, if not one of the comliest, is yet one of the strongest. So he alters this to To one that can, in my part, we advertise. A better expression indeed, but, for all that, none of Shakespear's. Warburton. I know not whether we may not better read, One that can my part to him advertise. One that can inform himself of that which it would be otherwise my part to tell him.

Note return to page 336 1Hold therefore Angelo.] That is, continue to be Angelo, hold as thou art.

Note return to page 337 2First in question.] That is, first called for; first appointed.

Note return to page 338 3We have with a leaven'd and prepared choice.] Leaven'd has no sense in this place: we should read level'd choice. The allusion is to archery, when a man has fixed upon his object, after taking good aim. Warburton. No emendation is necessary. Leaven'd choice is one of Shakespear's harsh metaphors. His train of ideas seems to be this. I have proceeded to you with choice mature, concocted, fermented, leavened. When Bread is leavened, it is left to ferment: a leavened choice is therefore a choice not hasty, but considerate, not declared as soon as it fell into the imagination, but suffered to work long in the mind. Thus explained it suits better with prepared than levelled.

Note return to page 339 4&lblank; Your scope is as mine own.] That is, Your amplitude of power.

Note return to page 340 *In the primers, there are metrical graces, such as, I suppose, were used in Shakespear's time.

Note return to page 341 5In any proportion, &c.] The Oxford Editor gives us a dialogue of his own, instead of this: And all for want of knowing the meaning of the word proportion, which signifies measure: and refers to the question, What, in meeter? Warburton.

Note return to page 342 6Despight of all controversie.] Satirically insinuating that the controversies about grace were so intricate and endless, that the disputants unsettled every thing but this, that grace was grace; which, however, in spite of controversy, still remained certain. Warburton. I am in doubt whether Shakespear's thoughts reached so far into ecclesiastical disputes. Every Commentator is warped a little by the tract of his own profession. The question is whether the second Gentleman has ever heard grace. The first Gentleman limits the question to Grace in meeter. Lucio enlarges it to Grace in any form or language. The first Gentleman, to go beyond him, says, or in any religion, which Lucio allows, because the nature of things is unalterable; Grace is as immutably Grace, as his merry antagonist is a wicked villain. Difference of religion cannot make a Grace not to be Grace, a Prayer not to be holy; as nothing can make a villain not to be a villain. This seems to be the meaning, such as it is.

Note return to page 343 7There went but a pair of sheers between us.] We are both of the same piece.

Note return to page 344 8Piled, as thou art piled, for a French velvet.] The jest about the pile of a French velvet, alludes to the loss of hair in the French disease, a very frequent topick of our authour's jocularity. Lucio finding that the gentleman understands the distemper so well, and mentions it so feelingly, promises, to remember to drink his health, but to forget to drink after him. It was the opinion of Shakespear's time, that the cup of an infected person was contagious.

Note return to page 345 9A quibble intended between dollars and dolours. Hanmer. The same jest occurred before in the Tempest.

Note return to page 346 1A French Crown more.] Lucio means here not the piece of money so call'd, but that Venereal Scab which among the Surgeons is stil'd Corona Veneris. To this, I think, our Author likewise makes Quince allude in Midsummer-Night's Dream. Some of your French Crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare-faced. For where these Eruptions are, the Skull is carious, and the Party becomes bald. Theobald.

Note return to page 347 2What with the sweat.] This may allude to the Sweating sickness, of which the memory was very fresh in the time of Shakespear: but more probably to the method of cure then used for the diseases contracted in Brothels.

Note return to page 348 3Thus can the Demi-god, Authority, Make us pay down, for our offence, by weight The words of heaven; on whom it will; it will; On whom it will not, so; yet still 'tis just.] The wrong pointing of the second line hath made the passage unintelligible. There ought to be a full stop at weight. And the sense of the whole is this: The Demi-god, Authority, makes us pay the full penalty of our offence, and its decrees are as little to be questioned as the words of heaven, which pronounces its pleasure thus,—I punish and remit punishment according to my own uncontroulable will; and yet who can say what dost thou.—Make us pay down, for our offence, by weight, is a fine expression, to signify paying the full penalty. The metaphor is taken from paying money by weight, which is always exact; not so by tale, on account of the practice of diminishing the species. Warburt. I suspect that a line is lost.

Note return to page 349 4&lblank; the fault and glimpse of newness.] Fault and glimpse have so little relation to each other, that both can scarcely be right; we may read flash for fault.

Note return to page 350 5So long that nineteen Zodiacks have gone round.] The Duke in the Scene immediately following, says, Which for these fourteen Years we have let slip. The Author could not so disagree with himself. 'Tis necessary to make the two Accounts correspond. Theobald.

Note return to page 351 6&lblank; prone and speechless dialect.] I can scarcely tell what signification to give to the word prone. Its primitive and translated senses are well known. The author may, by a prone dialect, mean a dialect which men are prone to regard, or a dialect natural and unforced, as those actions seem to which we are prone. Either of these interpretations is sufficiently strained; but such distortion of words is not uncommon in our authour. For the sake of an easier sense we may read, In her zenith6Q0027 There is a pow'r, and speechless dialect, Such as moves men. Or thus, There is a prompt and speechless dialect.

Note return to page 352 7&lblank; under grievous imposition.] I once thought it should be inquisition, but the present reading is probably right. The crime would be under grievous penalties imposed.

Note return to page 353 8Believe not that the dribbling dart of love Can pierce a compleat bosom. &lblank;] Think not that a breast compleatly armed can be pierced by the dart of love that comes fluttering without force.

Note return to page 354 9A man of stricture and firm abstinence.] Stricture makes no sense in this place. We should read, A man of stricture and firm abstinence. i. e. a man of the exactest conduct, and practised in the subdual of his passions. Ure an old word for use, practice, so enur'd, habituated to. Warburton. Stricture may easily be used for strictness; ure is indeed an old word, but, I think, always applied to things, never to persons.

Note return to page 355 1In the copies, The needful Bits and Curbs for headstrong Weeds:] There is no matter of Analogy or Consonance, in the Metaphors here: and, tho' the Copies agree, I do not think, the Author would have talk'd of Bits and Curbs for Weeds. On the other hand, nothing can be more proper, than to compare Persons of unbridled Licentiousness to head strong Seeds: and, in this View, bridling the Passions has been a Phrase adopted by our best Poets. Theobald.

Note return to page 356 [2] In former editions, Which for these fourteen years we have let slip,] For fourteen I have made no Scruple to replace nineteen. I have alter'd the odd Phrase of letting the Laws slip: for how does it sort with the Comparison that follows, of a Lion in his Cave that went not out to prey? But letting the Laws sleep, adds a particular Propriety to the thing represented, and accords exactly too with the Simile. It is the Metaphor too, that our Author seems fond of using upon this Occasion, in several other Passages of this Play. The Law hath not been dead, tho' at hath slept; &lblank; 'Tis now awake. And so, again, &lblank; but this new Governor Awakes me all th' enrolled Penalties; &lblank; and for a Name Now puts the drowsy and neglected Act Freshly on me. Theobald.

Note return to page 357 [3] The text stood, So do in slander.] Sir Thomas Hanmer has very well corrected it thus, To do it slander.

Note return to page 358 4Stands at a guard.] Stands on terms of defiance.

Note return to page 359 5&lblank; make me not your story.] Do not, by deceiving me, make me a subject for a tale.

Note return to page 360 6&lblank; 'tis my familiar sin With maids to seem the lapwing, &lblank;] The Oxford Editor's note, on this passage, is in these words. The lapwings fly with seeming fright and anxiety far from their nests, to deceive those who seek their young. And do not all other birds do the same? But what has this to do with the infidelity of a general lover, to whom this bird is compared. It is another quality of the lapwing, that is here alluded to, viz. its perpetually flying so low and so near the passenger, that he thinks he has it, and then is suddenly gone again. This made it a proverbial expression to signify a lover's falshood: and it seems to be a very old one; for Chaucer, in his Plowman's Tale, says—And lapwings that well comith lie. Warburton.

Note return to page 361 7&lblank; as blossoming time, That from the seedness the bare fallow brings To teeming foyson; so &lblank;] As the sentence now stands it is apparently ungrammatical, I read, At blossoming time, &c. That is, As they that feed grow full, to her womb now at blossoming time, at that time through which the seed time proceeds to the harvest, her womb shows what has been doing. Lucio ludicrously calls pregnancy blossoming time, the time when fruit is promised, though not yet ripe.

Note return to page 362 [8] Bore many gentlemen &lblank; In hand and hope of action; &lblank;] To bear in hand is a common phrase for to keep in expectation and dependance, but we should read, With hope of action.

Note return to page 363 [9] &lblank; with full line.] With full extent, with the whole length.

Note return to page 364 *&lblank; give fear to use.] To intimidate use, that is, practices long countenanced by custom.

Note return to page 365 [1] Unless you have the grace &lblank;] That is, the acceptableness, the power of gaining favour.

Note return to page 366 [2] &lblank; pith of business.] The inmost part, the main of my message.

Note return to page 367 [3] &lblank; the mother.] The abbess, or prioress.

Note return to page 368 [4] Than fall and bruise to death.] I should rather read fell, i. e. strike down. So in Timon of Athens, All, save thee, I fell with curses. Warburton.

Note return to page 369 [5] Let your honour know] To know is here to examine, to take cognisance. So in Midsummer-Night's Dream, Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires, Know of your youth, examine well your blood.

Note return to page 370 [6] &lblank; 'tis very pregnant.] 'Tis plain that we must not act with bad as with good; we punish the faults, as we take the advantages, that lie in our way, and what we do not see we cannot note.

Note return to page 371 [7] For I have had.] That is, because, by reason that I have had faults.

Note return to page 372 [8] Some rise, &c.] This line is in the first folio printed in Italicks as a quotation. All the folios read in the next line, Some run from brakes of ice, and answer none.

Note return to page 373 *This comes off well.] This is nimbly spoken; this is volubly uttered.

Note return to page 374 9she professes a hot-house.] A hot-house is the English name for a bagnio. Where lately harbour'd many a famous whore, A purging bill now fix'd upon the door, Tells you it is a hot house, so it may, And still be a whore-house. Johnson.

Note return to page 375 *Here seems to have been some mention made of Froth, who was to be accused, and some words therefore may have been lost, unless the irregularity of the narrative may be better imputed to the ignorance of the constable.

Note return to page 376 1Justice or Iniquity] These were, I suppose, two personages well known to the audience by their frequent appearance in the old moralities. The words therefore at that time produced a combination of ideas, which they have now lost.

Note return to page 377 2Hannibal.] Mistaken by the constable for Cannibal.

Note return to page 378 3&lblank; they will draw you.] Draw has here a cluster of senses. As it refers to the tapster, it signifies to drain, to empty; as it is related to hang, it means to embowel or extenterate. In Froth's answer it is the same as to bring along by some motive or power.

Note return to page 379 4I'll rent the fairest house in it, for three pence a bay:] Mr. Theobald found that this was the reading of the old books, and he follows it out of pure reverence for antiquity; for he knows nothing of the meaning of it. He supposes Bay to be that projection called a Bay-window; as if the way of rating houses was by the number of their Bay-windows. But it is quite another thing, and signifies the squared frame of a timber house; each of which divisions or squares is called a Bay. Hence a building of so many bays. Warburton. A Bay of building is in many parts of England a common term, of which the best conception that I could ever attain, is, that it is the space between the main beams of the roof; so that a barn crossed twice with beams is a barn of three bays.

Note return to page 380 *It is not clear why the Provost is bidden to stay, nor when he goes out.

Note return to page 381 5For which I must not plead, but that I am At war, 'twixt will, and will not.] This is obscure, perhaps it may be mended by reading, For which I must now plead, but yet I am At war, 'twixt will, and will not. Yet and yt are almost undistinguishable in a manuscript.

Note return to page 382 6&lblank; all the souls that were.] This is false divinity. We should read, are. Warburton.

Note return to page 383 7And mercy then will breathe within your lips, Like man new made.] This is a fine thought, and finely expressed: The meaning is, that mercy will add such grace to your person, that you will appear as amiable as man come fresh out of the hands of his creator. Warburton.

Note return to page 384 8&lblank; like a prophet, Looks in a glass.] This alludes to the fopperies of the Berril, much used at that time by cheats and fortune-tellers to predict by. Warburton.

Note return to page 385 9But ere they live to end.] This is very sagaciously substituted by Sir Thomas Hanmer for, but here they live.

Note return to page 386 1&lblank; shew some pity. Ang. I knew it most of all, when I knew justice; For then I pity those I do not know:] This was one of Hale's memorials. When I find myself swayed to mercy, let me remember, that there is a mercy likewise due to the Country.

Note return to page 387 2As makes the angels weep;] The notion of angels weeping for the sins of men is rabbinical. —Ob peccatum flentes angelos inducunt Hebræorum magistri— Grotius ad Lucam. Warburton.

Note return to page 388 3&lblank; who, with our spleens, Would all themselves laugh mortal.] Mr. Theobald says the meaning of this is, that if they were endowed with our spleens and perishable organs, they would laugh themselves out of immortality: Which amounts to this, that if they were mortal they would not be immortal. Shakespear meant no such nonsense. By spleens, he meant that peculiar turn of the human mind, that always inclines it to spiteful, unseasonable mirth. Had the angel that, says Shakespear, they would laugh themselves out of their immortality, by indulging a passion which does not deserve that prerogative. The ancients thought, that immoderate laughter was caused by the bigness of the spleen. Warburton.

Note return to page 389 4In former Editions: We cannot weigh our Brother with ourself.] Why not? Tho' this should be the Reading of all the Copies, 'tis as plain as Light, it is not the Author's meaning. Isabella would say, there is so great a Disproportion in Quality betwixt Lord Angelo and her Brother, that their Actions can bear no Comparison, or Equality, together: but her Brother's Crimes would be aggravated, Angelo's Frailties extenuated, from the Difference of their Degrees and State of Life. Warburton.

Note return to page 390 5That my sense breeds with it.] Thus all the folios. Some later Editor has changed breeds to bleeds, and Dr. Warburton blames poor Mr. Theobald for recalling the old word, which yet is certainly right. My sense breeds with her sense, that is, new thoughts are stirring in my mind, new conceptions are hatched in my imagination. So we say to brood over thought.

Note return to page 391 6&lblank; tested gold,] i. e. attested, or marked with the standard stamp. Warburton. Rather copelled, brought to the test, refined.

Note return to page 392 7&lblank; preserved souls,] i. e. preserved from the corruption of the world. The metaphor is taken from fruits preserved in sugar. Warburton.

Note return to page 393 8I am that way going to temptation, Where prayers cross.] Which way Angelo is going to temptation, we begin to perceive, but how prayers cross that way, or cross each other, at that way, more than any other, I do not understand. Isabella prays that his honour may be safe, meaning only to give him his title: his imagination is caught by the word honour: he feels that his honour is in danger, and therefore, I believe, answers thus: I am that way going to temptation, Which your prayers cross. That is, I am tempted to lose that honour of which thou implorest the preservation. The temptation under which I labour is that which thou hast unknowingly thwarted with thy prayer. He uses the same mode of language a few lines lower. Isabella, parting, says, Save your honour. Angelo catches the word—Save it! From what? From thee, even from thy virtue.

Note return to page 394 9&lblank; it is I, That lying by the violet in the sun, &c.] I am not corrupted by her, but by my own heart, which excites foul desires under the same benign influences that exalt her purity; as the carrion grows putrid by those beams which encrease the fragrance of the violet.

Note return to page 395 1I smil'd, and wonder'd how.] As a day must now intervene between this conference of Isabella with Angelo; and the next, the act might more properly end here, and here, in my opinion, it was ended by the poet.

Note return to page 396 2Who falling in the flaws of her own youth, Hath blister'd her report:] Who doth not see that the integrity of the metaphor requires we should read flames of her own youth. Warburton. Who does not see that upon such principles there is no end of correction.

Note return to page 397 3There rest] Keep yourself in this temper.

Note return to page 398 4&lblank; oh, injurious love,] Her execution was respited on account of her pregnancy, the effects of her love: therefore she calls it injurious; not that it brought her to shame, but that it hindered her freeing herself from it. Is not this all very natural? yet the Oxford Editor changes it to injurious law.

Note return to page 399 5Whilst my intention,] Nothing can be either plainer or exacter than this expression. But the old blundering Folio having it, invention, this was enough for Mr. Theobald to prefer authority to sense. Warburton.

Note return to page 400 6Grown fear'd and tedious;] We should read sear'd: i. e. old. So Shakespear uses, in the sear, to signify old age. Warburton. I think fear'd may stand, what we go to with reluctance may be said to be fear'd.

Note return to page 401 *Case.] For outside; garb; external shew.

Note return to page 402 7Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming?] Here Shakespear judiciously distinguishes the different operations of high place upon different minds. Fools are frighted, and wise men are allured. Those who cannot judge but by the eye, are easily awed by splendour, those who consider men as well as conditions, are easily persuaded to love the appearance of virtue dignified with power.

Note return to page 403 8Let's write good angel on the devil's horn; 'Tis not the devil's crest.] i. e. Let the most wicked thing have but a virtuous pretence, and it shall pass for innocent. This was his conclusion from his preceding words, &lblank; oh form! How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit, Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming? &lblank; But the Oxford Editor makes him conclude just counter to his own premises; by altering it to, Is't not the devil's crest. So that, according to this alteration, the reasoning stands thus. —False seeming wrenches awe from fools, and deceives the wise: Therefore, Let us but write good angel on the devil's horn; (i. e. give him the appearance of an angel;) and what then? Is't not the devil's crest? (i. e. he shall be esteem'd a devil.) Warb. I am still inclined to the opinion of the Oxford Editor. Angelo, reflecting on the difference, between his seeming character, and his real disposition, observes that he could change his gravity for a plume. He then digresses into an apostrophe, O Dignity, how dost thou impose upon the world! then returning to himself, Blood, says he, thou art but blood, however concealed with appearances and decorations. Title and character do not alter nature, which is still corrupt, however dignified. Let's write good Angel on the devil's horn; Is't not?—or rather—'Tis yet—the Devil's crest.

Note return to page 404 9The gen'ral subjects to a well-wish'd King.] So the later Editions: but the old copies read, the General subject to a well-wish'd King. The general subject seems a harsh expression, but general subjects has no sense at all; and general was in our Authour's time a word for people, so that the general is the people or multitude subject to a King. So in Hamlet, the play pleased not the million, 'twas caviare to the General.

Note return to page 405 1&lblank; 'tis all as easie,] Easy is here put for light or trifling. 'Tis, says he, as light or trifling a crime to do so, as so, &c. Which the Oxford Editor not apprehending, has alter'd it to just; for 'tis much easier to conceive what Shakespear should say, than what he does say. So just before, the poet said, with his usual licence, their sawcy sweetness, for sawcy indulgence of the appetite. And this, forsooth, must be changed to sawcy lewdness, tho' the epithet confines us, as it were, to the poet's word. Warburton.

Note return to page 406 2Falsely is the same with dishonesty, illegally, so false in the next lines is illegal, illegitimate.

Note return to page 407 3In restrained means.] In forbidded moulds. I suspect means not to be the right word, but I cannot find another.

Note return to page 408 4Pleas'd you to do't on peril, &c.] The reasoning is thus: Angelo asks, whether there might not be a charity in sin to save this brother. Isabella answers, that if Angelo will save him, she would stake her soul that it were charity not sin. Angelo replies, that if Isabella would save him at the hazard of her soul, it would be not indeed no sin, but a sin to which the charity would be equivalent.

Note return to page 409 5And nothing of your answer.] I think it should be read, And nothing of yours answer. You and whatever is yours be exempt from penalty.

Note return to page 410 6Accountant to the law upon that pain.] Pain is here for penalty, punishment.

Note return to page 411 7But in the loss of question.] The loss of question I do not well understand, and should rather read, But in the toss of question. In the agitation, in the discussion of the question. To toss an argument is a common phrase.

Note return to page 412 *The old editions read all-building law, from which the Editors have made all-holding; yet Mr. Theobald has binding in one of his copies.

Note return to page 413 8A brother dy'd at once.] Perhaps we should read. Better it were a brother dy'd for once, Than that a sister, by redeeming him, Should die for ever.

Note return to page 414 9If not a feodary, but only he, &c.] This is so obscure, but the allusion so fine, that it deserves to be explain'd. A feodary was one, that in the times of vassalage held lands of the chief lord, under the tenure of paying rent and service: which tenures were call'd seuda amongst the Goths. Now, says Angelo, “we are all frail; yes, replies Isabella; if all mankind were not feodaries, who owe what they are to this tenure of imbecillity, and who succeed each other by the same tenure, as well as my brother, I would give him up.” The comparing mankind, lying under the weight of original sin, to a feodary, who owes suit and service to his lord, is, I think, not ill imagined. Warburton.

Note return to page 415 *To owe is in this place, to own, to hold, to have possession.

Note return to page 416 1&lblank; Glasses &lblank; Which are as easy broke, as they make forms.] Would it not be better to read, take forms?

Note return to page 417 2In profiting by them.] In imitating them, in taking them for examples.

Note return to page 418 3And credulous to false prints.] i. e. take any impression. Warb.

Note return to page 419 4&lblank; speak the former language.] We should read formal, which he here uses for plain, direct. Warburton. Isabella answers to his circumlocutory courtship, that she has but one tongue, she does not understand this new phrase, and desires him to talk his former language, that is, to talk as he talked before.

Note return to page 420 5I know your virtue hath a licence in't,] Alluding to the licences given by Ministers to their Spies, to go into all suspected companies and join in the language of Malecontents. Warburton.

Note return to page 421 6&lblank; seeming, seeming! &lblank;] Hypocrisy, hypocrisy; counterfeit virtue.

Note return to page 422 7My vouch against you,] The calling his denial of her charge, his vouch, has something fine. Vouch is the testimony one man bears for another. So that, by this, he insinuates his authority was so great, that his denial would have the same credit that a vouch or testimony has in ordinary cases. Warburton. I believe this beauty is merely imaginary, and that vouch against means no more than denial.

Note return to page 423 8&lblank; die the death,] This seems to be a solemn phrase for death inflicted by law. So in Midsummer-Night's Dream. Prepare to die the death.

Note return to page 424 9&lblank; prompture.] Suggestion, temptation, instigation.

Note return to page 425 9Be absolute for death.] Be determined to die, without any hope of life. Horace,— The hour which exceeds expectation will be welcome.

Note return to page 426 1That none but fools would keep.] But this reading is not only contrary to all Sense and Reason; but to the Drift of this moral Discourse. The Duke, in his assum'd Character of a Friar, is endeavouring to instil into the condemn'd Prisoner a Resignation of Mind to his Sentence; but the Sense of the Lines, in this Reading, is a direct Persuasive to Suicide: I make no Doubt, but the Poet wrote, That none but Fools would reck. i. e. care for, be anxious about, regret the loss of. So in the Tragedy of Tancred and Gismunda, Act 4. Scene 3. &lblank; Not that she recks this life &lblank; And Shakespeare in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, Recking as little what betideth me &lblank; Warburton. The meaning seems plainly this, that none but fools would wish to keep life; or, none but fools would keep it, if choice were allowed. A sense, which, whether true or not, is certainly innocent.

Note return to page 427 2That do this habitation.] This reading is substituted by Sir Thomas Hanmer, for that dost.

Note return to page 428 3&lblank; meerly thou art Death's Fool; For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun, And yet runn'st tow'rd him still.] In those old Farces called moralities, the Fool of the piece, in order to shew the inevitable approaches of Death, is made to employ all his stratagems to avoid him: which, as the matter is ordered, bring the Fool, at every turn, into his very jaws. So that the representations of these scenes would afford a great deal of good mirth and morals mixed together. And from such circumstances, in the genius of our ancestors publick diversions, I suppose it was, that the old proverb arose, of being merry and wise. Warburton.

Note return to page 429 4Are nurs'd by baseness.] Dr. Warburton is undoubtedly mistaken in supposing that by baseness is meant self-love here assigned as the motive of all human actions. Shakespear meant only to observe, that a minute analysis of life at once destroys that splendour which dazzles the imagination. Whatever grandeur can display, or luxury enjoy, is procured by baseness, by offices of which the mind shrinks from the contemplation. All the delicacies of the table may be traced back to the shambles and the dunghill, all magnificence of building was hewn from the quarry, and all the pomp of ornaments, dug from among the damps and darkness of the mine.

Note return to page 430 5&lblank; the soft and tender fork Of a poor worm. &lblank;] Worm is put for any creeping thing or serpent. Shakespear supposes falsely, but according to the vulgar notion, that a serpent wounds with his tongue, and that his tongue is forked. He confounds reality and fiction, a serpent's tongue is soft but not forked nor hurtful. If it could hurt, it could not be soft. In Midsummer-Night's Dream he has the same notion. &lblank; With doubler tongue Than thine, O serpent, never adder stung.

Note return to page 431 6&lblank; thy best of rest is sleep, And that thou oft provok'st; yet grosly fear'st Thy death which is no more. &lblank;] Evidently from the following passage of Cicero: Habes somnum imaginem Mortis, eamque quotidie induis, & dubitas quin sensus in morte nullus fit, cum in ejus simulacro videas esse nullum sensum. But the Epicurean insinuation is, with great judgment, omitted in the imitation. Warburton. Here Dr. Warburton might have found a sentiment worthy of his animadversion. I cannot without indignation find Shakespear saying, that death is only sleep, lengthening out his exhortation by a sentence which in the Friar is impious, in the reasoner is foolish, and in the poet trite and vulgar.

Note return to page 432 7&lblank; Thou'rt not thyself.] Thou art perpetually repaired and renovated by external assistance, thou subsistest upon foreign matter, and hast no power of producing or continuing thy own being.

Note return to page 433 8&lblank; strange effects.] For effects read affects; that is, affections, passions of mind, or disorders of body variously affected. So in Othello, The young affects.

Note return to page 434 9&lblank; Thou hast nor youth, nor age; But as it were an after-dinner's sleep, Dreaming on both.] This is exquisitely imagined. When we are young we busy ourselves in forming schemes for succeeding time, and miss the gratifications that are before us; when we are old we amuse the languour of age with the recollection of youthful pleasures or performances; so that our life, of which no part is filled with the business of the present time, resembles our dreams after dinner, when the events of the morning are mingled with the designs of the evening.

Note return to page 435 1&lblank; For all thy blessed youth Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms Of palsied Eld; and when thou'rt old and rich, Thou hast neither heat, &c. &lblank;] The drift of this period is to prove, that neither youth nor age can be said to be really enjoyed, which, in poetical language, is, —We have neither youth nor age. But how is this made out? That Age is not enjoyed he proves, by recapitulating the infirmities of it, which deprive that period of life of all sense of pleasure. To prove that Youth is not enjoyed, he uses these words, For all thy blessed youth becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms of palsied Eld. Out of which, he that can deduce the conclusion, has a better knack at logic than I have. I suppose the Poet wrote, &lblank; for pall'd, thy blazed youth Becomes assuaged; and doth beg the alm: Of palsied Eld; &lblank; i. e. when thy youthful appetite becomes palled, as it will be in the very enjoyment, the blaze of youth is at once assuaged, and thou immediately contractest the infirmities of old age; as, particularly, the palsie and other nervous disorders, consequent on the inordinate use of sensual pleasures. This is to the purpose; and proves Youth is not enjoyed by shewing the short duration of it. Warburton. Here again I think Dr. Warburton totally mistaken. Shakespeare declares that Man has neither youth nor age, for in youth, which is the happiest time, or which might be the happiest, he commonly wants means to obtain what he could enjoy; he is dependant on palsied eld; must beg alms from the coffers of hoary avarice; and being very niggardly supplied becomes as aged, looks, like an old man, on happiness, which is beyond his reach. And when he is old and rich, when he has wealth enough for the purchase of all that formerly excited his desires, he has no longer the powers of enjoyment. &lblank; has neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty To make his riches pleasant. I have explained this passage according to the present reading, which may stand without much inconvenience; yet I am willing to persuade my reader, because I have almost persuaded myself, that our authour wrote, &lblank; for all thy blasted youth Becomes as aged &lblank;

Note return to page 436 2&lblank; heat, affection, limb, nor beauty.] But how does beauty make riches pleasant? We should read bounty, which compleats the sense, and is this; Thou hast neither the pleasure of enjoying riches thy self, for thou wantest vigour: nor of seeing it enjoyed by others, for thou wantest bounty. Where the making the want of bounty as inseparable from old age as the want of health, is extremely satyrical tho' not altogether just. Warburton. I am inclined to believe that neither man nor woman will have much difficulty to tell how beauty makes riches pleasant. Surely this emendation, though it is elegant and ingenious, is not such as that an opportunity of inserting it should be purchased by declaring ignorance of what every one knows, by confessing insensibility of what every one feels.

Note return to page 437 3&lblank; more thousand deaths.] For this Sir T. Hanmer reads, a thousand deaths: the meaning is not only a thousand deaths, but a thousand deaths besides what have been mentioned.

Note return to page 438 4&lblank; as all comforts are; most good in deed.] If this reading be right, Isabella must mean that she brings something better than words of comfort, she brings an assurance of deeds. This is harsh and constrained, but I know not what better to offer. Sir Tho. Hanmer reads, in speed.

Note return to page 439 5&lblank; an everlasting leiger. Therefore your best appointment.] Leiger is the same with resident. Appointment; preparation; act of fitting, or state of being fitted for any thing. So in old books, we have a Knight well appointed; that is, well armed and mounted; or fitted at all points.

Note return to page 440 6&lblank; a restraint, &lblank; To a determin'd scope.] A confinement of your mind to one painful idea; to ignominy, of which the remembrance can be neither suppressed nor escaped.

Note return to page 441 7The poor Beetle, &c.] The Reasoning is, that death is no more than every being must suffer, though the dread of it is peculiar to man, or perhaps, that we are inconsistent with ourselves when we so much dread that which we carelesly inflict on other creatures, that feel the pain as acutely as we.

Note return to page 442 8&lblank; follies doth emmew.] Forces follies to lie in cover without daring to show themselves.

Note return to page 443 9His filth within being cast.] To cast a pond, is to empty it of mud. Mr. Upton reads; His pond within being cast he would appear A filth as deep as bell.

Note return to page 444 1The princely Angelo? &lblank; princely guards.] The stupid Editors mistaking guards for satellites, (whereas it here signifies lace) altered priestly, in both places, to princely. Whereas Shakespear wrote it priestly, as appears from the words themselves, &lblank; 'tis the cunning livery of bell, The damned'st body to invest and cover With priestly guards.— In the the first place we see that guards here signifies lace, as referring to livery, and as having no sense in the signification of satellites. Now priestly guards means sanctity, which is the sense required. But princely guards means nothing but rich lace, which is a sense the passage will not bear. Angelo, indeed, as Deputy, might be called the princely Angelo: but not in this place, where the immediately preceding words of, This outward-sainted Deputy, demand the reading I have here restored. Warburton. The first Folio has, in both places, prenzie, from which the other folios made princely, and every editor may make what he can.

Note return to page 445 *For Hanmer. In other editions, from.

Note return to page 446 2When he would force it.] Put it in force. Warburton.

Note return to page 447 3If it were damnable, &c.] Shakespear shows his knowledge of human nature in the conduct of Claudio. When Isabella first tells him of Angelo's proposal he answers with honest indignation, agreeably to his settled principles, thou shalt not do't. But the love of life being permitted to operate, soon furnishes him with sophistical arguments, he believes it cannot be very dangerous to the soul, since Angelo, who is so wise, will venture it.

Note return to page 448 4&lblank; delighted spirit.] i. e. the spirit accustomed here to ease and delights. This was properly urged as an aggravation to the sharpness of the torments spoken of. The Oxford Editor not apprehending this, alters it to dilated. As if, because the spirit in the body is said to be imprisoned, it was crowded together likewise; and so, by death, not only set free, but expanded too; which, if true, would make it the less sensible of pain. Warburton. This reading may perhaps stand, but many attempts have been made to correct it. The most plausible is that which substitutes the benighted spirit, alluding to the darkness always supposed in the place of future punishment. Perhaps we may read the delinquent spirit, a word easily changed to delighted by a bad copier, or unskilful reader.

Note return to page 449 *&lblank; lawless and uncertain thoughts.] Conjecture sent out to wander without any certain direction, and ranging through all possibilities of pain.

Note return to page 450 5Is't not a kind of incest, &lblank;] In Isabella's declamation there is something harsh, and something forced and far-fetched. But her indignation cannot be thought violent when we consider her not only as a virgin but as a nun.

Note return to page 451 *&lblank; but a trade.] A custom; a practice; an established habit. So we say of a man much addicted to any thing, he makes a trade of it.

Note return to page 452 6Do not satisfie your resolution with hopes that are fallible;] A condemned man, whom his confessor had brought to bear death with decency and resolution, began anew to entertain hopes of life. This occasioned the advice in the words above. But how did these hopes satisfie his resolution? or what harm was there, if they did? We must certainly read, Do not falsifie your resolution with hopes that are fallible. And then it becomes a reasonable admonition. For hopes of life, by drawing him back into the world, would naturally elude or weaken the virtue of that resolution, which was raised only on motives of religion. And this his confessor had reason to warn him of. The term falsifie is taken from fencing, and signifies the pretending to aim a stroke in order to draw the adversary off his guard. So Fairfax, Now strikes he out, and now be falsifieth. Warburton.

Note return to page 453 7Hold you there.] Continue in that resolution.

Note return to page 454 8Only refer yourself to this advantage.] This is scarcely to be reconciled with any established mode of speech. We may read, Only reserve yourself to, or only reserve to yourself this advantage.

Note return to page 455 9&lblank; the corrupt Deputy scaled.] To scale the Deputy may be, to reach him notwithstanding the elevation of his place; or it may be, to strip him and discover his nakedness, though armed and concealed by the investments of authority.

Note return to page 456 1&lblank; bastard.] A kind of sweet wine then much in vogue. From the Italian, Bastardo. Warb.

Note return to page 457 2&lblank; since of two usuries, &c.] Here a satire on usury turn abruptly to a satire on the person of the usurer, without any kind of preparation. We may be assured then, that a line or two, at least, have been lost. The subject of which we may easily discover, a comparison between the two usurers; as, before, between the two usuries. So that for the future the passage should be read with asterisks thus— by order of law. * * * a furr'd gown, &c. Warburton. Sir Thomas Hanmer corrected this with less pomp, then since of two Usurers the merriest was put down, and the worser allowed, by order of law, a furr'd gown, &c. His punctuation is right, but the alteration, small as it is, appears more than was wanted. Usury may be used by an easy licence for the Professors of Usury.

Note return to page 458 *&lblank; father.] This word should be expunged.

Note return to page 459 3The old editions have, I drink, I eat away myself, and live.] This is one very excellent Instance of the Sagacity of our Editors, and it were to be wished heartily, they would have obliged us with their physical Solution, how a Man can eat away himself and live. Mr. Bishop gave me that most certain Emendation, which I have substituted in the Room of the former foolish Reading; by the Help whereof, we have this easy Sense; that the Clown fed himself, and put cloaths on his Back, by exercising the vile Trade of a Bawd. Theobald.

Note return to page 460 4That we were all, as some would seem to be, Free from all faults, as faults from seeming free!] i. e. as faults are destitute of all comeliness or seeming. The first of these lines refers to the Deputy's sanctified hypocrisy; the second, to the Clown's beastly occupation. But the latter part is thus ill expressed for the sake of the rhime. Warburton. Sir T. Hanmer reads, Free from all faults, as from faults seeming free. The interpretation of Dr. Warburton is destitute of authority; though seemly is decent or comely, I know not that seeming is ever used for comeliness. The sense is likewise trifling, and the expression harsh. To wish that men were as free from faults, as faults are free from comeliness [instead of void of comeliness] is a very poor conceit. I once thought it should be read, O that all were, as all would seem to be, Free from all faults, or from false seeming free. So in this play, O place, O power—how dost thou Wrench awe from fools and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming. But I now believe that a less alteration will serve the turn. Free from all faults, or faults from seeming free; that men were really good, or that their faults were known, that men were free from faults, or faults from hypocrisy. So Isabella calls Angelo's hypocrisy, seeming, seeming.

Note return to page 461 5His neck will come to your waist, a cord, Sir.] That is, his neck will be tied like your waist with a rope. The Friers of the Franciscan order, perhaps of others, wear a hempen cord for a girdle. Thus Buchanan, &lblank; Fac gemant suis Variata terga funibus.

Note return to page 462 6Pigmalion's images, newly made woman,] i. e. come out cured from a salivation. Warb.

Note return to page 463 7&lblank; what say'st thou to this tune, matter and method? is't not drown'd in the last rain?] This strange nonsense should be thus corrected, It's not down i'th' last reign, i. e. these are severities unknown to the old Duke's time. And this is to the purpose. Warburton. Dr. Warburton's emendation is ingenious, but I know not whether the sense may not be restored with less change. Let us consider it. Lucio, a prating fop, meets his old friend going to prison, and pours out upon him his impertinent interrogatories, to which, when the poor fellow makes no answer, he adds, What reply? ha? what say'st thou to this? tune, matter, and method,— is't not? drowned i'th' last rain? ha? what say'st thou, trot? &c.] It is a common phrase used in low raillery of a man crest-fallen and dejected, that he looks like a drown'd puppy. Lucio, therefore, asks him whether he was drowned in the last rain, and therefore cannot speak.

Note return to page 464 *&lblank; which is the way?] What is the mode now?

Note return to page 465 8&lblank; in the tub.] The method of cure for venereal complaints is grosly called the powdering-tub.

Note return to page 466 9&lblank; go, say, I sent thee thither. For debt Pompey? or how?] It should be pointed thus, Go, say, I sent thee thither for debt, Pompey; or how—i. e. to hide the ignominy of thy case, say, I sent thee to prison for debt, or whatever other pretence thou fanciest better. The other humourously replies, For being a bawd, for being a bawd, i. e. the true cause is the most honourable. This is in character. Warburton.

Note return to page 467 1It is too general a vice,] The occasion of the observation was Lucio's saying, that it ought to be treated with a little more lenity; and his answer to it is,— The vice is of great kindness. Nothing can be more absurd than all this. From the occasion, and the answer, therefore, it appear, that Shakespear wrote, It is too gentle a vice, which signifying both indulgent and well bred, Lucio humourously takes it in the latter sense. Warburton.

Note return to page 468 2In the former editions. &lblank; and he is a Motion generative; that's infallible.] This may be Sense; and Lucio, perhaps, may mean, that tho' Angelo have the Organs of Generation, yet that he makes no more Use of them than if he were an inanimate Puppet. But I rather think, our Author wrote;—and he is a Motion ungenerative, because Lucio again in this very Scene says; —this ungenitured Agent will unpeople the Province with Continency. Theobald.

Note return to page 469 *&lblank; clack-dish.] This word I do not understand.6Q0031

Note return to page 470 3&lblank; the greater file of the subject] The larger list, the greater number.

Note return to page 471 4eat mutton on Fridays.] A wench was called a laced mutton. Theobald.

Note return to page 472 5He is not past it.] Sir Tho. Hanmer. In other Editions, he is now past it, yet.

Note return to page 473 6mercy swear.] We should read swerve, i. e. deviate from her nature. The common reading gives us the idea of a ranting whore. Warburton.

Note return to page 474 *All the folios, from the Sea.

Note return to page 475 7Pattern in himself to know, Grace to stand, and virtue go.] These lines I cannot understand, but believe that they should be read thus: Patterning himself to know, In Grace to stand, in Virtue go. To pattern is to work after a pattern, and, perhaps, in Shakespear's licentious diction, simply to work. The sense is, he that bears the sword of heaven should be holy as well as severe; one that after good examples labours to know himself, to live with innocence, and to act with virtue.

Note return to page 476 8How may likeness made in crimes, Making practice on the times. To draw with idle spiders' strings Most pondrous and substantial things] Thus all the Editions read corruptly: and so have made an obscure passage in itself, quite unintelligible. Shakespear wrote it thus, How may that likeness, made in crimes, Making practice on the times, Draw— The sense is this, How much wickedness may a man hide within, tho' he appear an angel without. How may that likeness made in crimes, i. e. by Hypocrisy; [a pretty paradoxical expression, an angel made in crimes] by imposing upon the world [thus emphatically expressed, making practice on the times] draw with its false and feeble pretences [finely called spiders strings] the most pondrous and substantial matters of the world, as Riches, Honour, Power, Reputation, &c. Warburton.6Q0032

Note return to page 477 9So disguise shall by th' disguis'd] So disguise shall by means of a person disguised, return an injurious demand with a counterfeit person.

Note return to page 478 1Take, oh, take, &c.] This is part of a little song of Shakespear's own writing, consisting of two Stanzas, and so extremely sweet, that the reader won't be displeased to have the other. Hide, oh, hide those hills of snow, Which thy frozen bosom bears, On whose tops, the pinks that grow, Are of those that April wears. But my poor heart first set free, Bound in those icy chains by thee. Warburton. This song is entire in Beaumont's Bloody Brother, and in Shakespear's poems. The latter Stanza is omitted by Mariana, as not suiting a female character. Theobald.

Note return to page 479 2My mirth it much displeas'd, but pleas'd my woe.] Though the musick soothed my sorrows, it had no tendency to produce light merriment.

Note return to page 480 3Constantly.] Certainly; without fluctuation of mind.

Note return to page 481 4Circummur'd with brick.] Circummared, walled round. He caused the doors to be mured and cased up. Painter's Palace of Pleasure.

Note return to page 482 5In action all of precept, &lblank;] i.e. shewing the several turnings of the way with his hand; which action contained so many precepts, being given for my direction. Warburton. I rather think we should read, in precept all of action; that is, in direction given not by words but by mute signs.

Note return to page 483 6I have possest him.] I have made him clearly and strongly comprehend.

Note return to page 484 7O place and greatness! &lblank;] It plainly appears that this fine speech belongs to that which concludes the preceding Scene, between the Duke and Lucio. For they are absolutely foreign to the subject of this, and are the natural reflections arising from that. Besides, the very words, Run with these false and most contrarious quests, evidently refer to Lucio's scandals just preceding: which the Oxford Editor, in his usual way, has emended, by altering these to their.—But that some time might be given to the two women to confer together, the players, I suppose, took part of the speech, beginning at No might nor greatness, &c. and put it here, without troubling themselves about its pertinency. However, we are obliged to them for not giving us their own impertinency, as they have frequently done in other places. Warb. I cannot agree that these lines are placed here by the players. The sentiments are common, and such as a Prince, given to reflection, must have often present. There was a necessity to fill up the time in which the Ladies converse apart, and they must have quick tongues and ready apprehensions, if they understood each other while this speech was uttered.

Note return to page 485 *False eyes.] That is, Eyes infidious and trayterous.

Note return to page 486 †Contrarious quests.] Different reports run counter to each other.

Note return to page 487 8Doth flourish the deceit.] A metaphor taken from embroidery, where a coarse ground is filled up and covered with figures of rich materials and elegant workmanship. Warburton.

Note return to page 488 9&lblank; for yet our tythe's to sow] As before, the blundering Editors have made a prince of the priestly Angelo, so here they have made a priest of the prince. We should read tilth, i.e. our tillage is yet to make. The grain, from which we expect our harvest, is not yet put into the ground. Warburton. The reader is here attempted with a petty sophism. We should read tilth, i. e. our tillage is to make. But in the text it is to sow; and who has ever said that his tillage was to sow? I believe tithe is right, and that the expression is proverbial, in which tithe is taken, by an easy metonymy, for harvest.

Note return to page 489 1discredit our mystery.] I think it just worth while to observe, that the word mystery, when used to signify a trade or manual profession, should be spelt with an i, and not a y; because it comes not from the Greek &grM;&gru;&grs;&grt;&grha;&grr;&gri;&gra;, but from the French, Mestier. Warburton.

Note return to page 490 2what mystery there should be in hanging, if I should be hang'd, I cannot imagine. Abhor. Sir, it is a mystery. Clown. Proof.— Abhor. Every true man's apparel fits your thief. Clown. If it be too little for your thief, your true man thinks it big enough: if it be too big for your thief, your thief thinks it little enough: so every true man's apparel fits your thief.] Thus it stood in all the editions till Mr. Theobald's, and was methinks not very difficult to be understood. The plain and humourous sense of the speech is this, Every true man's apparel which the thief robs him of, fits the thief. Why? because if it be too little for the thief, the true man thinks it big enough: i.e. a purchase too good for him. So that this fits the thief in the opinion of the true man. But if it be too big for the thief, yet the thief thinks it little enough; i. e. of value little enough. So that this fits the thief in his own opinion. Where we see that the pleasantry of the joke consists in the equivocal sense of big enough and little enough. Yet Mr. Theobald says, he can see no sense in all this, and therefore alters the whole thus.—Abhor. Every true man's apparel fits your thief. Clown. If it be too little for your true man, your thief thinks it big enough: if it be too big for your true man, your thief thinks it little enough.—And for his alteration gives this extraordinary reason.—I am satisfied the poet intended a regular syllogism; and I submit it to judgment, whether my regulation has not restor'd that wit and humour which was quite lost in the depravation.—But the place is corrupt, tho' Mr. Theobald could not find it out. Let us consider it a little. The Hangman calls his trade a mistery: the Clown cannot conceive it. The Hangman undertakes to prove it in these words, Every true man's apparel, &c. but this proves the thief's made a mistery, not the hangman's. Hence it appears that the speech, in which the hangman prov'd his trade a mistery, is lost. The very words it is impossible to retrieve, but one may easily understand what medium he employed in proving it: without doubt the very same the Clown employed to prove the thief's trade a mistery, namely, that all sorts of clothes fitted the hangman. The Clown, on hearing this argument, replied, I suppose, to this effect; Why, by the same kind of reasoning, I can prove the thief's trade too to be a mistery. The other asks how, and the Clown goes on as above, Every true man's apparel fits your thief; if it be too little, &c. The jocular conclusion from the whole being an insinuation that thief and hangman were rogues alike. This conjecture gives a spirit and integrity to the dialogue, which, in its present mangled condition, is altogether wanting: and shews why the argument of every true man's apparel, &c. was in all the editions given to the Clown, to whom indeed it belongs; and likewise that the present reading of that argument is the true. The lost speeches came in at the place marked by the asterisks. Warburton.6Q0033

Note return to page 491 3starkly.] Stifly. These two lines afford a very pleasing image.

Note return to page 492 *Stroke is here put for the stroke of a pen or a line.

Note return to page 493 4To qualify] To temper, to moderate, as we say wine is qualified with water.

Note return to page 494 5Were he meal'd.] Were he sprinkled; were he defiled. A figure of the same kind our Authour uses in Macbeth, the blood-bolter'd Banquo.

Note return to page 495 6&lblank; that spirit's possest with haste That wounds the unresisting postern with these strokes.] The line is irregular, and the unresisting postern so strange an expression, that want of measure, and want of sense might justly raise suspicion of an errour, yet none of the later Editors seem to have supposed the place faulty except Sir Tho. Hanmer, who reads th' unresting postern. The three folios have it unsisting postern, out of which Mr. Rowe made unresisting, and the rest followed him. Sir Tho. Hanmer seems to have supposed unresisting the word in the copies, from which he plausibly enough extracted unresting, but he grounded his emendation on the very syllable that wants authority. What can be made of unsisting I know not; the best that occurs to me is unfeeling.6Q0034

Note return to page 496 7desperately mortal.] This expression is obscure. Sir Thomas Hanmer reads mortally desperate. Mortally is in low conversation used in this sense, but I know not whether it was ever written. I am inclined to believe that desperately mortal means desperately mischievous.

Note return to page 497 8nothing of what is writ.] We should read—here writ.—the Duke pointing to the letter in his hand. Warburton.

Note return to page 498 9First here's young Mr. Rash, &c.] This enumeration of the inhabitants of the prison affords a very striking view of the practices predominant in Shakespear's age. Besides those whose follies are common to all times, we have four fighting men and a traveller. It is not unlikely that the originals of these pictures were then known.

Note return to page 499 1in for the Lord's sake.] i. e. to beg for the rest of their lives. Warburton. I rather think this expression intended to ridicule the puritans, whose turbulence and indecency often brought them to prison, and who considered themselves as suffering for religion. It is not unlikely that men imprisoned for other crimes, might represent themselves to casual enquirers, as suffering for puritanism, and that this might be the common cant of the prisons. In Donne's time every prisoner was brought to jail by suretiship.

Note return to page 500 *Here is a line given to the Duke which belongs to the Provost. The Provost, while the Duke is lamenting the obduracy of the prisoner, cries out, After him, fellows, &c. and, when they are gone out, turns again to the Duke.

Note return to page 501 2&lblank; to transport him.] To remove him from one world to another. The French trépas affords a kindred sense.

Note return to page 502 3To th' under generation.] So Sir Tho. Hanmer with true judgment. It was in all the former editions to yonder: ye un 'er and yonder were confounded.

Note return to page 503 *A better reason might have been given. It was necessary to keep Isabella in ignorance, that she might with more keenness accuse the Deputy.

Note return to page 504 4&lblank; your bosom] Your wish; your heart's desire.

Note return to page 505 5I am combined by a sacred vow.] I once thought this should be confined, but Shakespear uses combine for to bind by a pact or agreement, so he calls Angelo the combinate husband of Mariana.

Note return to page 506 6If the old, &c.] Sir Thomas Hanmer reads, the odd fantastical Duke, but old is a common word in ludicrous language, as, there was old revelling.

Note return to page 507 7woodman.] That is, Huntsman, here taken for a hunter of girls.

Note return to page 508 8&lblank; sort and suit.] Figure and rank.

Note return to page 509 9&lblank; yet reason dares her:] The old Folio impressions read, &lblank; yet reason dares her No. And this is right. The meaning is, the circumstances of our case are such, that she will never venture to contradict me: dares her to reply No to me, whatever I say. Warburton. Mr. Theobald reads, yet reason dares her note. Sir Th. Hanmer, yet reason dares her: No. Mr. Upton, yet reason dares her—No, which he explains thus: yet, says Angelo, reason will give her courage— No, that is, it will not. I am afraid dare has no such signification. I have nothing to offer worth insertion.

Note return to page 510 1&lblank; my authority bears a credent bulk; Which no particular slander, &c.] Credent is creditable, inforcing credit, not questionable. The old English writers often confound the active and passive adjectives. So Shakespear, and Milton after him, use inexpressive from inexpressible. Particular is private, a French sense. No scandal from any private mouth can reach a man in my authority.

Note return to page 511 2we would, and we would not.] Here undoubtedly the act should end, and was ended by the poet; for here is properly a cessation of action, and a night intervenes, and the place is changed, between the passages of this scene and those of the next. The next act beginning with the following scene, proceeds without any interruption of time or change of place.

Note return to page 512 *Peter never delivers the letters, but tells his story without any credentials. The poet forgot the plot which he had formed.

Note return to page 513 3He says to vail full purpose.] Thus the old Copies, I don't know, what Idea our Editors form'd to themselves, of vailing full purpose; but, I'm persuaded, the Poet meant, as I have restor'd; viz. to a Purpose that will stand us in stead, that will profit us. Theobald. He says, to vail full purpose.] Mr. Theobald alters it to, He says, t'availful t'availful purpose; because he has no idea of the common reading. A good reason! Yet the common reading is right. Full is used for beneficial; and the meaning is, He says, it is to hide a beneficial purpose, that must not yet be revealed. Warburton. To vail full purpose, may, with very little force on the words, mean to hide the whole extent of our design, and therefore the reading may stand; yet I cannot but think Mr. Theobald's alteration either lucky or ingenious. To interpret words with such laxity as to make full the same with beneficial, is to put an end, at once, to all necessity of emendation, for any word may then stand in the place of another.

Note return to page 514 4Enter Peter.] This play has two Friars, either of whom might singly have served. I should therefore imagine that Friar Thomas, in the first act, might be changed, without any harm, to Friar Peter; for why should the Duke unnecessarily trust two in an affair which required only one. The name of Friar Thomas is never mentioned in the dialogue, and therefore seems arbitrarily placed at the head of the scene.

Note return to page 515 5Have bent the gates.] Have taken possession of the gates.

Note return to page 516 *Vail your regard.] That is, withdraw your thoughts from higher things; let your notice descend upon a wronged woman. To vail, is to lower.

Note return to page 517 6&lblank; truth is truth To th' end of reckoning] That is, Truth has no gradations; nothing which admits of encrease can be so much what it is, as truth is truth. There may be a a strange thing, and a thing more strange, but if a proposition be true there can be none more true.

Note return to page 518 7&lblank; as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute.] As shy; as reserved, as abstracted: as just; as nice, as exact: as absolute; as complete in all the round of duty.

Note return to page 519 8In all his dressings, &c.] In all his semblance of virtue, in all his habiliments of office.

Note return to page 520 9&lblank; do not banish reason For inequality; &lblank;] Let not the high quality of my adversary prejudice you against me.

Note return to page 521 1And hide the false, seems true.] We should read Not hide. Warb.

Note return to page 522 2Oh, that it were as like, as it is true!] Like is not here used for probable, but for seemly. She catches at the Duke's word, and turns it to another sense; of which there are a great many examples in Shakespear, and the writers of that time. Warb. I do not see why like may not stand here for probable, or why the Lady should not wish that since her tale is true it may obtain belief. If Dr. Warburton's explication be right, we should read, O! that it were as likely as 'tis true. Like I have never found for seemly.

Note return to page 523 3In hateful practice.] Practice was used by the old writers for any unlawful or insidious stratagem. So again, this must needs be practice; and again, let me have way to find this practice out.

Note return to page 524 4In countenance.] i. e. in partial favour. Warburton.

Note return to page 525 5&lblank; nor a temporary medler.] It is hard to know what is meant by a temporary medler. In its usual sense, as opposed to perpetual, it cannot be used here. It may stand for temporal: the sense will then be, I know him for a holy man, one that meddles not with secular affairs: It may mean temporising: I know him to be a holy man, one who would not temporise, or take the opportunity of your absence to defame you. Or we may read, Not scurvy, nor a tamperer and medler; not one who would have tampered with this woman to make her a false evidence against your Deputy.

Note return to page 526 6Whenever he's conven'd.] The first Folio reads convented, and this is right: for to convene signifies to assemble; but convent, to cite, or summons. Yet, because convented hurts the measure, the Oxford Editor sticks to conven'd, tho' it be nonsense, and signifies, Whenever he is assembled together. But thus it will be, when the author is thinking of one thing and his critic of another. The poet was attentive to his sense, and the Editor, quite throughout his performance, to nothing but the measure: which Shakespear having entirely neglected, like all the dramatic writers of that age, he has spruced him up with all the exactness of a modern measurer of Syllables. This being here taken notice of once for all, shall, for the future, be forgot, as if it had never been. Warburton.

Note return to page 527 7So vulgarly.] Meaning either, so grosly, with such indecency of invective, or so mean and inadequate witnesses.

Note return to page 528 8In former Editions: &lblank; come, cousin Angelo, In this I'll be impartial: be you judge Of your own Cause.] Surely, this Duke had odd Notions of Impartiality; to commit the Decision of a Cause to the Person accus'd. He talks much more rationally in the Character of the Friar. &lblank; The Duke's unjust, Thus to retort your manifest Appeal; And put your Trial in the Villain's mouth, Which here you come t'accuse. &lblank; I think, there needs no stronger Authority to convince, that the Poet must have wrote as I have corrected; In this I will be partial. &lblank; Theobald.

Note return to page 529 *Abuse stands in this place for deception or puzzle. So in Macbeth, this strange and self abuse, means this strange deception of himself.

Note return to page 530 9&lblank; her promised proportions Came short of composition; &lblank;] Her fortune which was promised proportionate to mine, fell short of the composition, that is, contract or bargain.

Note return to page 531 1These poor informal women.] i. e. women who have ill concerted their story. Formal signifies frequently, in our authour, a thing put into form or method: so informal, out of method, ill concerted. How easy is it to say, that Shakespear might better have wrote informing, i. e. accusing. But he who (as the Oxford Editor) thinks he did write so knows nothing of the character of his stile. Warburton. I believe informal has no other or deeper signification than informing, accusing. The scope of justice, is the full extent.6Q0036

Note return to page 532 2That's seal'd in approbation.] When any thing subject to counterfeits is tried by the proper officers and approved, a stamp or seal is put upon it, as among us on plate, weights and measures. So the Duke says that Angelo's faith has been tried, approved and seal'd in testimony of that approbation, and, like other things so sealed, is no more to be called in question.

Note return to page 533 3&lblank; to hear this matter forth.] To hear it to the end; to search it to the bottom.

Note return to page 534 4&lblank; to retort your manifest appeal.] To refer back to Angelo the cause in which you appealed from Angelo to the Duke.

Note return to page 535 5Nor here provincial.] Nor here accountable. The meaning seems to be, I am not one of his natural subjects, nor of any dependent province.

Note return to page 536 6Stands like the forfeits in a barber's shop.] Barbers shops were, at all times, the resort of idle people. Tonstrina erat quadam: hîc solebomas ferè Plerumque eam opperiri &lblank; Which Donatus calls apta sedes otiosis. Formerly, with us, the better sort of people went to the Barber's shop to be trimm'd; who then practised the under parts of Surgery: so that he had occasion for numerous instruments, which lay there ready for use; and the idle people, with whom his shop was generally crowded, would be perpetually handling and misusing them. To remedy which, I suppose, there was placed up against the wall a table of forfeitures, adapted to every offence of this kind; which, it is not likely, would long preserve its authority. Warburt. This explanation may serve till a better is discovered. But whoever has seen the instruments of a chirurgeon, knows that they may be very easily kept out of improper hands in a very small box, or in his pocket.

Note return to page 537 7&lblank; and a coward.] So again afterwards, You, Sirrah, that know me for a fool, a coward, One of all luxury &lblank; But Lucio had not, in the former conversation, mentioned cowardice among the faults of the Duke.—Such failures of memory are incident to writers more diligent than this poet.

Note return to page 538 8Show your sheep-biting face, and be hang'd an hour: will't not off?] This is intended to be the common language of vulgar indignation. Our phrase on such occasions is simply; show your sheep-biting face and be hanged. The words an hour have no particular use here, nor are authorised by custom. I suppose it was written thus, show your sheep-biting face and be hanged—an' how? wilt not off. In the midland counties, upon any unexpected obstruction or resistance, it is common to exclaim an' how?

Note return to page 539 9Advertising and holy.] Attentive and faithful.

Note return to page 540 1&lblank; be you as free to us.] Be as generous to us, pardon us as we have pardoned you.

Note return to page 541 2That brain'd my purpose.] We now use in conversation a like phrase. This it was that knocked my design on the head. Dr. Warburton reads, &lblank; baned my purpose.

Note return to page 542 3&lblank; even from his proper tongue.] Even from Angelo's own tongue. So above, In the witness of his proper ear To call him villain.

Note return to page 543 4&lblank; deny thee vantage.] Take from thee all opportunity, all expedient of denial. Warburton.

Note return to page 544 5Against all sense you do importune her.] The meaning required is, against all reason and natural affection; Shakespear, therefore, judiciously uses a single word that implies both; Sense signifying both reason and affection.

Note return to page 545 6'Till he did look on me.] The Duke has justly observed that Isabel is importuned against all sense to solicit for Angelo, yet here against all sense she solicits for him. Her argument is extraordinary. A due sincerity govern'd his deeds, 'Till he did look on me; since it is so, Let him not die. That Angelo had committed all the crimes charged against him, as far as he could commit them, is evident. The only intent which his act did not overtake, was the defilement of Isabel. Of this Angelo was only intentionally guilty. Angelo's crimes were such, as must sufficiently justify punishment, whether its end be to secure the innocent from wrong, or to deter guilt by example; and I believe every reader feels some indignation when he finds him spared. From what extenuation of his crime can Isabel, who yet supposes her brother dead, form any plea in his favour. Since he was good 'till he locked on me, let him not die. I am afraid our Varlet Poet intended to inculcate, that women think ill of nothing that raises the credit of their beauty, and are ready, however virtuous, to pardon any act which they think incited by their own charms.

Note return to page 546 7&lblank; for those earthly faults.] Thy faults, so far as they are punishable on earth, so far as they are cognisable by temporal power, I forgive.

Note return to page 547 *It is somewhat strange, that Isabel is not made to express either gratitude, wonder or joy at the sight of her brother.

Note return to page 548 8&lblank; your evil quits you well.] Quits you, recompenses, requites you.

Note return to page 549 9&lblank; her worth, worth yours.] Sir T. Hanmer reads, Her worth works yours. This reading is adopted by Dr. Warburton, but for what reason? How does her worth work Angelo's worth, it has only contributed to work his pardon. The words are, as they are too frequently, an affected gingle, but the sense is plain. Her worth worth yours; that is, her value is equal to your value, the match is not unworthy of you.

Note return to page 550 1&lblank; here's one in place I cannot pardon.] After the pardon of two murderers Lucio might be treated by the good Duke with less harshness; but perhaps the Poet intended to show, what is too often seen, that men easily forgive wrongs which are not committed against themselves.

Note return to page 551 2&lblank; according to the trick.] To my custom, my habitual practice.

Note return to page 552 3&lblank; thy other forfeits.] Thy other punishments

Note return to page 553 4Thanks, good friend Escalus, for thy much goodness.] I have always thought that there is great confusion in this concluding speech. If my criticism would not be censured as too licentious, I should regulate it thus, Thanks, good friend Escalus, for thy much goodness. Thanks, Provost, for thy care and secrecy; We shall employ thee in a worthier place. Forgive him, Angelo, that brought you home The head of Ragozine for Claudio's. Ang. Th' offence pardons itself. Duke. There's more behind That is more gratulate. Dear Isabel, I have a motion, &c.

Note return to page 554 5I cannot help taking notice with how much judgment Shakspear has given turns to this story from what he found it in Cinthio Giraldo's novel. In the first place, the brother is there actually executed, and the governour sends his head in a bravado to the sister, after he had debauched her on promise of marriage. A circumstance of too much horror and villainy for the stage. And, in the next place, the sister afterwards is, to solder up her disgrace, married to the governour, and begs his life of the Emperour, though he had unjustly been the death of her brother. Both which absurdities the Poet has avoided by the Episode of Mariana, a creature purely of his own invention. The Duke's remaining incognito at home to supervise the conduct of his deputy, is also entirely our Authour's fiction. This story was attempted for the scene before our authour was fourteen years old, by one George Whetstone, in Two Comical Discourses, as they are called, containing the right excellent and famous history of Promos and Cassandra. Printed with the black letter 1578. The Authour going that year with Sir Humphry Gilbert to Norimbega, left them with his friends to publish. Theobald. The novel of Cynthio Giraldi, from which Shakespear is supposed to have borrowed this fable, may be read in Shakespear illustrated, elegantly translated, with remarks which will assist the enquirer to discover how much absurdity Shakespear has admitted or avoided. I cannot but suspect that some other had new modelled the novel of Cynthio, or written a story which in some particulars resembled it, and that Cinthio was not the authour whom Shakespear immediately followed. The Emperour in Cinthio is named Maximine, the Duke, in Shakespear's enumeration of the persons of the drama, is called Vincentio. This appears a very slight remark; but since the Duke has no name in the play, nor is ever mentioned but by his title, why should he be called Vincentio among the Persons, but because the name was copied from the story, and placed superfluously at the head of the list by the mere habit of transcription? It is therefore likely that there was then a story of Vincentio Duke of Vienna, different from that of Maximine Emperour of the Romans. Of this play the light or comick part is very natural and pleasing, but the grave scenes, if a few passages be excepted, have more labour than elegance. The plot is rather intricate than artful. The time of the action is indefinite; some time, we know not how much, must have elapsed between the recess of the Duke and the imprisonment of Claudio; for he must have learned the story of Mariana in his disguise, or he delegated his power to a man already known to be corrupted. The unities of action and place are sufficiently preserved.

Note return to page 555 *In the old Editions in 4to for J. Roberts 1600, and in the old folio 1623, 1632, or 1664, there is no enumeration of the persons. The Variations are selected from I. The excellent History of the Merchant of Venice, with the extreme cruelty of Shylock the Jew in cutting a just pound of his flesh, and the obtaining of Portia by the choice of three caskets. Written by W. Shakespear. Printed by J. Roberts 1600. 4to. II. Folio 1623. III. Folio 1632. IV. Folio 1664.

Note return to page 556 1Argosie, a ship from Argo. Pope. Whether it be derived from Argo I am in doubt. It was a name given in our Authour's time to ships of great burthen, probably Galleons, such as the Spaniards now use in their West-India trade.

Note return to page 557 2Plucking the grass, &c.] By holding up the grass, or any light body that will bend by a gentle blast, the direction of the wind is found. This way I used in shooting. Betwixt the markes was an open place, there I toke a fethere, or a lytle lighte grasse, and so learned how the wind stood. Ascham.

Note return to page 558 *The name of the ship.

Note return to page 559 3&lblank; Now by two-headed Janus,] Here Shakespear shews his knowledge in the antique. By two-headed Janus is meant those antique bifrontine heads, which generally represent a young and smiling face, together with an old and wrinkled one, being of Pan and Bacchus; of Saturn and Apollo, &c. These are not uncommon in collections of antiques; and in the books of the antiquaries, as Montfaucon, Spanheim, &c. Warburton.

Note return to page 560 4&lblank; peep through their eyes,] This gives us a very picturesque image of the countenance in laughing, when the eyes appear half shut. Warburton.

Note return to page 561 5&lblank; their teeth in a way of smile,] Because such are apt enough to shew their teeth in anger. Warburton.

Note return to page 562 6Let me play the Fool;] Alluding to the common comparison of human life to a stage play. So that he desires his may be the fool's or buffoon's part, which was a constant character in the old farces: From whence came the phrase, to play the Fool. Warburton.

Note return to page 563 7&lblank; would almost damn those Ears,] Several old Editions have it, dam, damme, and daunt. Some more correct Copies, damn. The Author's Meaning is this; That some People are thought wise, whilst they keep Silence; who, when they open their mouths, are such stupid Praters, that their Hearers cannot help calling them Fools, and so incur the Judgment denounc'd in the Gospel. Theobald.

Note return to page 564 8I'll end my exhortation after dinner.] The humour of this consists in its being an allusion to the practice of the puritan preachers of those times; who being generally very long and tedious, were often forced to put off that part of their sermon called the exhortation till after dinner. Warburton.

Note return to page 565 9Is that any thing now?] All the old copies read, it is that any thing now? I suppose we should read, is that any thing new?

Note return to page 566 1&lblank; like a wilful youth,] This does not at all agree with what he just before promised, that, what follow'd, should be pure innocence. For wilfulness is not quite so pure. We should read witless, i. e. heedless; and this agrees exactly to that to which he compares his case, of a school-boy, who, for want of advised watch, lost his first arrow, and sent another after it with more attention. But wilful agrees not at all with it. Warburton. Dr. Warburton confounds the time past and present. He has formerly lost his money like a wilful youth, he now borrows more in pure innocence, without disguising his former fault, or his present designs.

Note return to page 567 2&lblank; sometimes from her Eyes] So all the Editions; but it certainly ought to be, sometime, i. e. formerly, some time ago, at a certain time: and it appears by the subsequent Scene, that Bassanio was at Belmont with the Marquis de Montferrat, and saw Portia in her Father's life-time. Theboald.

Note return to page 568 3Ay that's a Colt, indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of his horse;] Tho' all the Editions agree in this Reading, I can perceive neither Humour, nor Reasoning in it. How does talking of Horses, or knowing how to shoe them, make a Man e'er the more a Colt? Or, if a Smith and a Lady of Figure were to have an Affair together, would a Colt be the Issue of their Caresses? The Word, Dolt, which I have substituted, signifies one of the most stupid and blockish of the Vulgar. Theobald. Mr. Theobald says, he can perceive neither humour nor reasoning in this reading, and therefore alters Colt to Dolt; but what ever humour or reasoning there is in the one there is in the other: for the signification is the same in both. Hen. IV. 1st part, Falstaff says, What a plague mean you to colt me thus? And Fletcher constantly uses Colt for Dolt. Warburton. Colt is used for a witless, heady, gay youngster, whence the phrase used of an old man too juvenile, that he still retains his colt's tooth. See Hen. VIII.

Note return to page 569 4&lblank; there is the Count Palatine.] I am always inclined to believe, that Shakespear has more allusions to particular facts and persons than his readers commonly suppose. The Count here mentioned was, perhaps, Albertus a Lasco, a Polish Palatine, who visited England in our Authour's time, was eagerly caressed, and splendidly entertained, but running in debt, at last stole away, and endeavoured to repair his fortune by enchantment.6Q0037

Note return to page 570 5&lblank; he hath neither Latin, French, nor Italian;] A Satire on the ignorance of the young English Travellers in our Author's time. Warburton.

Note return to page 571 6&lblank; Scottish lord,] Scottish, which is in the quarto, was omitted in the first folio, for fear of giving offence to king James's countrymen. Theobald.

Note return to page 572 7I think, the Frenchman became his surety,] Alluding to the constant assistance, or rather constant promises of assistance, that the French gave the Scots in their quarrels with the English. This Alliance is here humourously satirized. Warburton.

Note return to page 573 8How like you the young German,] In Shakespear's time the Duke of Bavaria visited London, and was made Knight of the Garter. Perhaps in this enumeration of Portia's suitors, there may be some covert allusion to those of Queen Elizabeth.

Note return to page 574 9&lblank; catch him once upon the hip,] A phrase taken from the practice of wrestlers.

Note return to page 575 1&lblank; the ripe wants of my friend,] Ripe wants are wants come to the height, wants that can have no longer delay. Perhaps we might read, rife wants, wants that come thick upon him.

Note return to page 576 2&lblank; can cite scripture for his purpose. &lblank; O, what a goodly outside falshood hath!] But this is not true, that falshood hath always a goodly outside. Nor does this take in the force of the speaker's sentiment; who would observe that that falshood which quotes scripture for its purpose has a goodly outside. We should therefore read, O, what a goodly outside's falshood hath! i. e. his falshood, Shylock's. Warb. I wish any copy would give me authority to range and read the lines thus: O, what a godly outside a falshood hath! An evil soul producing holy witness, Is like a villain with a smiling cheek; Or goodly apple rotten at the heart.

Note return to page 577 3A breed of barren metal of his friend?] A breed that is interest money bred from the principal. By the epithet barren the author would instruct us in the argument on which the advocates against usury went, which is this, that money is a barren thing, and cannot like corn and cattle multiply itself. And to set off the absurdity of this kind of usury, he put breed and barren in opposition. Warburton.

Note return to page 578 *To dwell seems in this place to mean the same as to continue. To abide has both the senses of habitation and continuance.

Note return to page 579 4&lblank; left in the fearful guard, &c.] But surely fearful was the most trusty guard for a house-keeper in a populous city; where houses are not carried by storm like fortresses. For fear would keep them on their watch, which was all that was necessary for the owner's security. I suppose therefore Shakespear wrote fearless guard. i. e. Careless; and this, indeed, would expose his house to the only danger he had to apprehend in the day-time, which was clandestine pilfering. This reading is much confirmed by the character he gives this guard, of an unthrifty knave, and by what he says of him afterwards, that he was, &lblank; a huge feeder; Snail-slow in profit, but he sleeps by day More than the wild-cat &lblank; Warburton. Dr. Warburton has forgotten that fearful is not only that which fears, but that which is feared or causes fear. Fearful guard, is a guard that is not to be trusted, but gives cause of fear. To fear was anciently to give as well as feel terrours. I tell thee, Lady, this aspect of mine hath fear'd the valiant.

Note return to page 580 5I like not fair terms.] Kind words, good language.

Note return to page 581 6To prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine.] To understand how the tawney Prince, whose savage dignity is very well supported, means to recommend himself by this challenge, it must be remembered that red blood is a traditionary sign of courage: Thus Macbeth calls one of his frighted soldiers, a lilly liver'd Lown; again in this play, Cowards are said to have livers white as milk; and an effeminate and timorous man is termed a milk-sop.

Note return to page 582 7And hedg'd me by his wit &lblank;] I suppose we may safely read, and hedg'd me by his will. Confined me by his will.

Note return to page 583 8That, slew the Sophy, &c] Shakespear seldom escapes well when he is entangled with Geography. The Prince of Morocco must have travelled far to kill the Sophy of Persia.

Note return to page 584 9So is Alcides beaten by his Rage] Though the whole Set of Editions concur in this Reading, it is corrupt at Bottom. Let us look into the Poet's Drift, and the History of the Persons mentioned in the Context. If Hercules (says he) and Lichas were to play at Dice for the Decision of their Superiority, Lichas, the weaker Man, might have the better Cast of the Two. But how then is Alcides beaten by his rage? The Poet means no more, than, if Lichas had the better Throw, so might Hercules himself be beaten by Lichas. And who was He, but a poor unfortunate Servant of Hercules, that unknowingly brought his Master the envenomed Shirt, dipt in the blood of the Centaur Nessus, and was thrown headlong into the Sea for his pains? This one Circumstance of Lichas's Quality known, sufficiently ascertains the Emendation, I have substituted page instead of rage. Theobald.

Note return to page 585 1Therefore be advis'd.] Therefore be not precipitant; consider well what we are to do. Advis'd is the word opposite to rash.

Note return to page 586 2Try conclusions.] So the old Quarto. The first Folio, by a mere blunder, reads, try confusions, which, because it makes a kind of paltry jest, has been copied by all the Editors.6Q0038

Note return to page 587 3Turn up, on your right hand, &c.] This arch and perplexed direction, to puzzle the enquirer, seems to imitate that of Syrus to Demea in the Brothers of Terence &lblank; ubi eas præterieris, Ad sinistram hac rectâ plateâ: ubi ad Dianæ veneris, Ito ad dextram: prius quam ad portam venias, &c. Warburton.

Note return to page 588 4Your child that shall be.] The distinction between boy and son is obvious, but child seems to have had some meaning which is now lost.6Q0039

Note return to page 589 5Well, if any man in Italy have a fairer table, which doth offer to swear upon a book.] The Position of the Words makes the Sentence somewhat obscure: Their natural Order should be This. Well, if any Man in Italy, which doth offer to swear upon a Book, have a fairer Table, I shall have good Luck. And the Humour of the Passage seems This. Launcelot, a Joaker, and designedly a Blunderer, says the very Reverse of what he should do: which is, That if no Man in Italy, who would offer to take his Oath upon it, hath a fairer Table than He, he shall have good Fortune. The Banter may, partly, be on Chiromancy in general: but it is very much in character for Launcelot, who is a hungry Serving man, to consider his Table before his Line of Life, or any other Points of Fortune. Theobald. Fairer table.] The chiromantic term for the lines of the hand. So Ben Johnson in his Mask of Gipsies to the lady Elizabeth Hatton; Mistress of a fairer table, Hath not history nor fable. Which doth offer to swear upon a book, &c.] This nonsense seems to have taken its rise from the accident of a lost line in transcribing the play for the press; so that the passage, for the future, should be printed thus,— Well, if any man in Italy have a fairer table, which doth ****** offer to swear upon a book I shall have good fortune. It is impossible to find, again, the lost line; but the lost sense is easy enough &lblank; if any man in Italy have a fairer table, which doth [promise good luck, I am mistaken. I durst almost] offer to swear upon a book, I shall have good fortune. Warburton. Mr. Theobald's note is as obscure as the passage. It may be read more than once before the complication of ignorance can be completely disentangled. Table is the palm expanded. What Mr. Theobald conceives it to be cannot easily be discovered, but he thinks it somewhat that promises a full belly. Dr. Warburton understood the word, but puzzles himself with no great success in pursuit of the meaning. The whole matter is this: Launcelot congratulates himself upon his dexterity and good fortune, and, in the height of his rapture, inspects his hand; and congratulates himself upon the felicities in his table. The act of expounding his hand puts him in mind of the action in which the palm is shewn, by raising it to lay it on the book, in judicial attestations. Well, says he, if any man in Italy have a fairer table, that doth offer to swear upon a book—Here he stops with an abruptness very common, and proceeds to particulars.

Note return to page 590 6In peril of my life with the edge of a feather bed.] A cant phrase to signify the danger of marrying.—A certain French writer uses the same kind of figure, O mon Ami, j'aimerois mieux être tombée sur la pointe d'un Oreller, & m' être rempu le Cou.— Warburton.

Note return to page 591 7Something too liberal.] Liberal I have already shewn to mean, gross, coarse, licentious.

Note return to page 592 8&lblank; sad ostent.] Grave appearance; shew of staid and serious behaviour.

Note return to page 593 9O, ten times faster Venus' Pidgeons fly.] This is a very odd image, of Venus's Pigeons flying to seal the bonds of Love. The sense is obvious, and we know the dignity due to Venus's Pigeons. There was certainly a joke intended here, which the ignorance or boldness of the first transcribers has murder'd: I doubt not, but Shakespear wrote the line thus: O, ten times faster Venus' Widgeons fly To seal, &c. For Widgeon signified metaphorically, a silly fellow, as Goose, or Gudgeon, does now. The calling love's votaries, Venus's Widgeons, is in high humour. Butler uses the same joke in speaking of the presbyterians. Th' apostles of this fierce religion, Like Mahomet's, were ass and Widgeon. Mahomet's ass or rather mule was famous: and the monks in their fabulous accounts of him said, he taught a pigeon to pick peas out of his ears to carry on the ends of his imposture. Warb. I believe the Poet wrote as the Editors have printed. How it is so very high humour to call Lovers Widgeons rather than Pigeons I cannot find. Lovers have in poetry been alway called Turtles, or Doves, which in lower language may be Pigeon.

Note return to page 594 *A jest rising from the ambiguity of Gentile, which signifies both a Heathen, and One well born.

Note return to page 595 *As blunt.] That is, as gross as the dull metal.

Note return to page 596 1Gilded wood may worms infold.] In all the old Editions this line is written thus: Gilded timber do worms infold. From which Mr. Rowe and all the following Editors have made Gilded wood may worms infold. A line not bad in itself, but not so applicable to the occasion as that which, I believe, Shakespear wrote. Gilded tombs do worms infold. A tomb is the proper repository of a death's head.

Note return to page 597 2Your answer had not been inscrol'd;] Since there is an answer inscrol'd or written in every casket, I believe for your we should read this. When the words were written yr and ys the mistake was easy.

Note return to page 598 3Chuse me so.] The old quarto Edition of 1600 has no distribution of acts, but proceeds from the beginning to the end in an unbroken tenour. This play therefore having been probably divided without authority by the publishers of the first folio, lies open to a new regulation if any more commodious division can be proposed. The story is itself so wildly incredible, and the changes of the scene so frequent and capricious, that the probability of action does not deserve much care; yet it may be proper to observe, that, by concluding the second act here, time is given for Bassanio's passage to Belmont.

Note return to page 599 *&lblank; your mind of love.] So all the copies, but I suspect some corruption.6Q0041

Note return to page 600 4&lblank; embraced heaviness.] This unmeaning epithet would make me choose rather to read, enraced heaviness, from the French enraciner, accrescere, inveterascere. So in Much ado about nothing, I could not have owed her a more rooted love. And again in Othello, With one of an ingraft infirmity. Warburton. Of Dr. Warburton's correction it is only necessary to observe, that it has produced a new word which cannot be received without necessity. When I thought the passage corrupted, it seemed to me not improbable that Shakespear had written entranced heaviness, musing, abstracted, moping melancholy. But I know not why any great efforts should be made to change a word which has no uncommodious or unusual sense. We say of a man now, that he hugs his sorrows, and why might not Anthonio embrace heaviness.

Note return to page 601 5How much low peasantry would then be glean'd From the true seed of honour?] The meaning is, How much meanness would be found among the great, and how much greatness among the mean. But since men are always said to glean corn though they may pick chaff, the sentence had been more agreeable to the common manner of speech if it had been written thus, How much low peasantly would then be pick'd From the true seed of honour? how much honour Glean'd from the chaff?

Note return to page 602 6&lblank; how much honour Pickt from the chaff and ruin of the times, To be new varnish'd?—], This confusion and mixture of the metaphors, makes me think that Shakespear wrote, To be new vanned.— i. e. winnow'd, purged: from the French word, vanner; which is derived from the Latin Vannus, ventilabrum, the fann used for winnowing the chaff from the corn. This alteration restores the metaphor to its integrity: and our poet frequently uses the same thought. So in the 2d part of Henry IV. We shall be winnow'd with so rough a wind, That even our corn shall seem as light as chaff. Warburton.

Note return to page 603 7Take what wife you will to bed,] Perhaps the poet had forgotten that he who missed Portia was never to marry any woman.

Note return to page 604 8&lblank; lest the Devil cross my Prayer.] But the Prayer was Salanio's. The other only, as Clerk, says Amen to it. We must therefore read—thy Prayer. Warburton.

Note return to page 605 9&lblank; A bankrupt, a prodigal.] This is spoke of Antonio. But why a prodigal? his friend Bassanio indeed had been too liberal; and with this name the Jew honours him when he is going to sup with him. —I'll go in hate to feed upon The prodigal christian— But Antonio was a plain, reserved, parsimonious merchant, be assured therefore we should read, —A bankrupt for a prodigal, i. e. he is become bankrupt by supplying the extravagancies of his friend Bassanio. Warburton. There is no need of alteration. There could be, in Shylock's opinion, no prodigality more culpable than such liberality as that by which a man exposes himself to ruin for his friend.

Note return to page 606 1And so though yours, not yours. Prove it so.] It may be more grammatically read, And so though yours I'm not yours.

Note return to page 607 2Let fortune go to hell for it. not I.] This line is very obscure. The form of the expression alludes to what she had said of being forsworn. After some struggle, she resolves to keep her oath: And then says, Let fortune go to hell for it. For what! not for telling or favouring Bassanio, which was the temptation she then lay under: for fortune had taken no oath. And, surely, for the more favouring a man of merit, fortune did not deserve (considering how rarely she transgresses this way) so severe a sentence. Much less could the speaker, who favour'd Bassanio, think so. The meaning then must be, Let fortune rather go to hell for not favouring Bassanio, than I for favouring him. So loosely does our author sometimes use his pronouns.—not I does not signify, Let not I go to hell; for then it should be Let not me. But it is a distinct sentence of itself. And is a very common proverbial speech, signifying, I will have nothing to do with it. Which if the Oxford Editor had considered, he might have spared his pains in changing I into me. Warburton.

Note return to page 608 3With no less presence.] With the same Dignity of Mien.

Note return to page 609 4Live thou, I live.—With much, much more dismay I view the sight, than thou, that mak'st the fray. I. Live then, I live with much more dismay To view the fight, than, &c. II. Live thou, I live with much more dismay I view the fight, than, &c. III. and IV. give the present reading.

Note return to page 610 5Reply.] These words, reply, reply, were in all the late editions, except Sir T. Hanmer's, put as a verse in the song, but in all the old copies stand as a marginal direction.

Note return to page 611 6So may the outward show.] He begins abruptly, the first part of the argument has passed in his mind.

Note return to page 612 7&lblank; gracious voice] Pleasing; winning favour.

Note return to page 613 8&lblank; Indian beauty.] Sir Tho. Hanmer reads, &lblank; Indian dowdy.

Note return to page 614 9Thy paleness moves me more than eloquence;] Bassanio is displeas'd at the golden casket for its gawdiness, and the silver one for its paleness; but, what! is he charm'd with the leaden one for having the very same quality that displeas'd him in the silver? The poet certainly wrote, Thy Plainness moves me more than eloquence: This characterizes the lead from the silver, which paleness does not, they being both pale. Besides, there is a beauty in the antithesis between plainness and eloquence; between paleness and eloquence none. So it is said before of the leaden-casket. This third dull lead, with warning all as blunt. Warburton.

Note return to page 615 1In measure rain thy joy, &lblank;] I. reads, In measure range thy joy. II. and III. In measure raine thy joy. IV. In measure rain. I believe Shakespear meant, In measure rein thy joy. The words rain and rein were not in these times distinguished by regular orthography.

Note return to page 616 2Methinks it should have pow'r to steal both his, And leave itself unfurnish'd: &lblank;] I know not how unfinish'd has intruded without notice into the later editions, as I. II. III. IV. have unfurnish'd, which Sir Tho. Hanmer has received. Perhaps it might be, And leave himself unfurnish'd.

Note return to page 617 *I. Pearles of praise.

Note return to page 618 3Is sum of something, &lblank;] We should read, some of something, i. e. only a piece or part only of an imperfect account. Which she explains in the following line. Warburton.

Note return to page 619 *That is, none away from me; none that I shall lose, if you gain it.

Note return to page 620 4The best condition'd and unweary'd spirit In doing courtesies; &lblank;] To be read and pointed thus, The best condition'd: an unweary'd spirit. Warb.

Note return to page 621 5The Duke cannot deny, &c. &lblank;] As the reason here given seems a little perplexed, it may be proper to explain it. If, says he, the Duke stop the course of law it will be attended with this inconvenience, that stranger merchants, by whom the wealth and power of this city is supported, will cry out of injustice. For the known stated law being their guide and security, they will never bear to have the current of it stoped on any pretence of equity whatsoever. Warburton.

Note return to page 622 6Of lineaments, of manners, &c. &lblank;] The wrong pointing has made this fine sentiment nonsense. As implying that friendship could not only make a similitude of manners, but of faces. The true sense is, lineaments of manners, i. e. form of the manners, which, says the speaker, must need be proportionate. Warb.

Note return to page 623 7In former Editions: This comes too near the praising of myself; Therefore no more of it; here other things, Lorenzo, I commit, &c.] Portia finding the reflections she had made came too near Self-praise, begins to chide herself for it: says, She'll say no more of that sort; but call a new Subject. The Regulation I have made in the Text was likewise prescrib'd by Dr. Thirlby. Theobald.

Note return to page 624 8In speed to Mantua;] Thus all the old Copies; and thus all the Modern Editors implicitly after them. But 'tis evident to any diligent Reader, that we must restore, as I have done, In speed to Padua: For it was there, and not at Mantua, Bellario liv'd. So afterwards;—A Messenger, with Letters from the Doctor, Now come from Padua—And again, Come you from Padua, from Bellario?—And again, It comes from Padua, from Bellario. —Besides, Padua, not Mantua, is the Place of Education for the Civil Law in Italy. Theobald.

Note return to page 625 *How his words are suited.] I believe the meaning is: What a series or suite of words he has independent of meaning; how one word draws on another without relation to the matter.

Note return to page 626 9Apparent.] That is, seeming; not real.

Note return to page 627 1Where for whereas.

Note return to page 628 2Enough to press a royal merchant down.] We are not to imagine the word royal to be only a ranting sounding Epithet. It is used with great propriety, and shews the Poet well acquainted with the history of the People whom he here brings upon the stage. For when the French and the Venetians, in the beginning of the thirteenth century, had won Constantinople; the French, under the emperor Henry, endeavoured to extend their conquests into the provinces of the Grecian empire on the Terra firma; while the Venetians, who were masters of the sea, gave liberty to any subject of the Republic, who would fit out vessels, to make themselves masters of the isles of the Archipelago, and other maritime places; and to enjoy their conquests in sovereignty; only doing homage to the Republic for their several principalities. By virtue of this licence, the Sanudo's, the Justiniani, the Grimaldi, the Summaripo's, and others, all Venetian merchants, erected principalities in several places of the Archipelago, (which their descendants enjoyed for many generations) and thereby became truly and properly royal merchants Which indeed was the title generally given them all over Europe. Hence, the most eminent of our own merchants (while public spirit resided amongst them, and before it was aped by faction) were called royal merchants. Warburton. This Epithet was in our Poet's time more striking and better understood, because Gresham was then commonly dignified with the title of the royal merchant.

Note return to page 629 3&lblank; I'll not answer that. But say, it is my humour. &lblank;] This Jew is the strangest Fellow. He is asked a question; says he will not answer it; in the very next line says, he has answered it, and then spends the 19 following lines to justify and explain his answer. Who can doubt then, but we should read. &lblank; I'll now answer that, By saying 'tis my humour &lblank; Warburton. Dr. Warburton has mistaken the sense. The Jew being asked a question which the law does not require him to answer, stands upon his right, and refuses; but afterwards gratifies his own malignity by such answers as he knows will aggravate the pain of the enquirer. I will not answer, says he, as to a legal or serious question, but since you want an answer, will this serve you?

Note return to page 630 4Mr. Rowe reads, Cannot contain their Urine for Affection. Masterless passion sways it to the Mood Of what it likes, or loaths.] Masterless Passion Mr. Pope has since copied. I don't know what Word there is to which this Relative it is to be referr'd. Dr. Thirlby would thus adjust the passage. Cannot contain their Urine; for Affection, Master of Passion, sways it, &c. And then it is govern'd of Passion: and the two old Quarto's and Folio's read—Masters of Passion, &c. It may be objected, that Affection and Passion mean the same Thing. But I observe, the Writers of our Author's Age made a Distinction: as Johnson in Sejanus: &lblank; He hath studied Affection's passions, knows their springs and ends. And then, in this place, Affection will stand for that Sympathy or Antipathy of Soul, by which we are provok'd to shew a Liking or Disgust in the working of our Passions. Theobald. Masterless passion sways it to the mood] The two old Quarto's and Folio read, Masters of passion. And this is certainly right. He is speaking of the power of sound over the human affections, and concludes, very naturally, that the masters of passion (for so he finely calls the musicians) sway the passions or affections as they please. Alluding to what the ancients tell us of the seats that Timotheus and other musicians worked by the power of music. Can any thing be more natural! Warburton.6Q0043

Note return to page 631 5Why he, a woollen bag-pipe.] This incident Shakespear seems to have taken from J. C. Scaliger's Exot. Exercit. against Cardan. A book that our author was well read in, and much indebted to for a great deal of his physics: it being then much in vogue, and indeed is excellent, tho' now long since forgot. In his 344 Exercit. Sect. 6. he has these words, Narrabo nunc tibi jocosam Sympathiam Reguli Vasconis Equitis. Is dum viveret audito phormingis sono, urinam illico facere cogebatur.—And to make this jocular story still more ridiculous, Shakespear, I suppose, translated phorminx by bag-pipes. But what I would chiefly observe from hence is this, that as Scaliger uses the word Sympathiam which signifies, and so he interprets it, communem affectionem duabus rebus, so Shakespear translates it by affection; Cannot contain their urine for affection. Which shews the truth of the preceding emendation of the text according to the old copies; which have a full stop at affection, and read, Masters of passion. Warburton. Woollen bag-pipe.] As all the Editors agree with complete uniformity in this reading, I can hardly forbear to imagine that they understood it. But I never saw a woollen bag-pipe, nor can well conceive it. I suppose the authour wrote wooden bag-pipe, meaning that the bag was of leather, and the pipe of wood.6Q0044

Note return to page 632 6Many a purchas'd slave.] This argument considered as used to the particular persons, seems conclusive. I see not how Venetians or Englishmen, while they practise the purchase and sale of slaves, can much enforce or demand the law of doing to others as we would that they should do to us.

Note return to page 633 7&lblank; Bellario, a learned Doctor, Whom I have sent for &lblank;] The Doctor and Court are here somewhat unskilfully brought together. That the Duke would, on such an occasion, consult a Doctor of great reputation, is not unlikely, but how should this be foreknown by Portia?

Note return to page 634 8Not on thy soal, but on thy soul, harsh Jew.] This lost jingle Mr. Theobald found again; but knew not what to make of it when he had it, as appears by his paraphrase, Tho' thou thinkest that thou art whetting thy knife on the soale of thy shoe, yet it is upon thy soul, thy immortal part. Absurd! the conceit is, that his soul was so hard that it had given an edge to his knife. Warb.

Note return to page 635 9Malice bears down truth] Malice oppresses honesty, a true man in old language is an honest man. We now call the jury good men and true.

Note return to page 636 *I am content, &c.] The terms proposed have been misunderstood. Antonio declares, that as the Duke quits one half of the forfeiture, he is likewise content to abate his claim, and desires not the property but the use or produce only of the half, and that only for the Jew's life, unless we read, as perhaps is right, upon my death.

Note return to page 637 1&lblank; thou shouldst have had ten more,] i. e. a Jury of Twelve Men, to condemn thee to be hang'd. Theobald.

Note return to page 638 1None but a holy hermit.] I do not perceive the use of this hermit, of whom nothing is seen or heard afterwards. The Poet had first planned his fable some other way, and inadvertently, when he changed his scheme, retained something of the original design.

Note return to page 639 2&lblank; with patterns of bright gold;] We should read patens: a round broad plate of gold born in heraldry. Warburton. Pattens is the reading of the first folio, and pattents of the quarto. Patterns is printed first in the fol. 1632.

Note return to page 640 3Such harmony is in immortal souls;] But the harmony here described is that of the spheres, so much celebrated by the antients. He says, the smallest orb sings like an angel; and then subjoins, such harmony is in immortal souls: But the harmony of angels is not here meant, but of the orbs. Nor are we to think, that here the poet alludes to the notion, that each orb has its intelligence or angel to direct it; for then with no propriety could he say, the orb sung like an angel: he should rather have said, the angel in the orb sung. We must therefore correct the lines thus; Such harmony is in immortal sounds: i. e. in the musick of the spheres. Warburton. This passage is obscure. Immortal sounds is a harsh combination of words, yet Milton uses a parallel expression. Spiritus et rapidos qui circinat igneus orbes, Nunc quoque fidereis intercinit ipse choreis Immortale melos, et inenarrabile carmen. It is proper to exhibit the lines as they stand in the copies, I. II. III. IV. without any variation, for a change has been silently made, by Rowe, and adopted by all the succeeding editors. Such harmony is in immortal souls, But while this muddy vesture of decay Doth grosly close in it, we cannot bear it. That the third is corrupt must be allowed, but it gives reason to suspect that the original was, Doth grosly close it in. Yet I know not whether from this any thing better can be produced than the received reading. Perhaps harmony is the power of perceiving harmony, as afterwards, Musick in the soul is the quality of being moved with concord of sweet sounds. This will somewhat explain the old copies, but the sentence is still imperfect.

Note return to page 641 4&lblank; wake Diana with a hymn;] Diana is the Moon, who is in the next scene represented as sleeping.

Note return to page 642 5The man that hath no musick in himself, Nor is not mov'd with concord of sweet sounds,] The thought here is extremely fine: As if the being affected with musick was only the harmony between the internal [musick in himself] and the external musick [concord of sweet sounds;] which were mutually affected like unison strings. This whole speech could not chuse but please an English audience, whose great passion, as well then as now, was love of musick. Jam verò video naturam (says Erasmus in praise of Folly) ut singulis nation bus, ac pene civitatibus, communem quandam insevisse Philautiam: Atque hinc fieri, ut britanni præter alia, Formam, musicam, & lautas Mensas propriè sibi vindicent. Warburton.

Note return to page 643 6&lblank; without respect.] Not absolutely good, but relatively, good as it is modified by circumstances.

Note return to page 644 *There is scarcely any word with which Shakespear so much delights to trifle as with light, in its various significations.

Note return to page 645 *I. II. III. IV. contain.

Note return to page 646 7What man—wanted the modesty To urge the thing held as a ceremony?] This is very licentiously expressed. The sense is, What man could have so little modesty, or wanted modesty so much as to urge the demand of a thing kept on an account in some sort religious.

Note return to page 647 8for his wealth.] For his advantage; to obtain his happiness. Wealth was, at time, the term opposite to adversity, or calamity.

Note return to page 648 9&lblank; you drop Manna in the way Of starved people.] Shakespear is not more exact in any thing, than in adapting his images with propriety to his speakers; of which he has here given an instance in making the young Jewess call good fortune, Manna. Warburton. The commentator should have remarked, that this speech is not, even in his own edition, the speech of the Jewess.

Note return to page 649 1It has been lately discovered, that this Fable is taken from a story in the Pecorone of Ser Giovanni Fiorentino, a Novelist, who wrote in 1378. The story has been published in English, and I have epitomised the translation. The translator of this novel is of opinion, that the choice of the caskets is borrowed from a tale of Boccace, which I have likewise abridged, though I believe that Shakespear must have had some other novel in view. There lived at Florence, a merchant whose name was Bindo. He was rich, and had three sons. Being near his end, he called for the two eldest, and left them heirs: to the youngest he left nothing. This youngest, whose name was Giannetto, went to his father, and said, What has my father done? The father replied, Dear Giannetto, there is none to whom I wish better than to you. Go to Venice to your godfather, whose name is Ansaldo; he has no child, and has wrote to me often to send you thither to him. He is the richest merchant amongst the christians: if you behave well, you will be certainly a rich man. The son answered, I am ready to do whatever my dear father shall command: upon which he gave him his benediction, and in a few days died. Giannetto went to Ansaldo, and presented the letter given by the father before his death. Ansaldo reading the letter, cried out, My dearest godson is welcome to my arms. He then ask'd news of his father. Giannetto replied, He is dead. I am much grieved, replied Ansaldo, to hear of the death of Bindo; but the joy I feel, in seeing you, mitigates my sorrow. He conducted him to his house, and gave orders to his servants, that Giannetto should be obeyed, and served with more attention than had been paid to himself. He then delivered him the keys of his ready money; and told him, Son, spend this money, keep a table, and make yourself known: remember, that the more you gain the good will of every body, the more you will be dear to me. Giannetto now began to give entertainments. He was more obedient and courteous to Ansaldo, than if he had been an hundred times his father. Every body in Venice was fond of him. Ansaldo could think of nothing but him; so much was he pleased with his good manners and behaviour. It happened, that two of his most intimate acquaintance designed to go with two ships to Alexandria, and told Giannetto, he would do well to take a voyage and see the world. I would go willingly, said he, if my father Ansaldo will give leave. His companions go to Ansaldo, and beg his permission for Giannetto, to go in the spring with them to Alexandria; and desire him to provide him a ship. Ansaldo immediately procured a very fine ship, loaded it with merchandize, adorned it with streamers, and furnished it with arms; and, as soon as it was ready, he gave orders to the captain and sailors to do every thing that Giannetto commanded. It happened one morning early, that Giannetto saw a gulph, with a fine port, and asked the captain how the port was called? He replied, That place belongs to a widow lady, who has ruined many gentlemen. In what manner? says Giannetto. He answered, This lady is a fine and beautiful woman, and has made a law, that whoever arrives here is obliged to go to bed with her, and if he can have the enjoyment of her, he must take her for his wife, and be lord of all the country; but if he cannot enjoy her, he loses every thing he has brought with him. Giannetto, after a little reflection, tells the captain to get into the port. He was obeyed; and in an instant they slide into the port so easily, that the other ships perceived nothing. The lady was soon informed of it, and sent for Giannetto, who waited on her immediately. She, taking him by the hand, asked him who he was? whence he came? and if he knew the custom of the country? He answered, That the knowledge of that custom was his only reason for coming. The lady paid him great honours, and sent for barons, counts, and knights in great number, who were her subjects, to keep Giannetto company. These nobles were highly delighted with the good breeding and manners of Giannetto; and all would have rejoiced to have him for their lord. The night being come, the lady said, it seems to be time to go to bed. Giannetto told the lady, he was entirely devoted to her service; and immediately two damsels enter with wine and sweet meats. The lady entreats him to taste the wine: he takes the sweet meats, and drinks some of the wine, which was prepared with ingredients to cause sleep. He then goes into the bed, where he instantly falls asleep, and never wakes till late in the morning; but the lady rose with the sun, and gave orders to unload the vessel, which she found full of rich merchandize. After nine o'clock, the women servants go to the bedside, order Giannetto to rise and be gone, for he had lost the ship. The lady gave him a horse and money, and he leaves the place very melancholy, and goes to Venice. When he arrives, he dares not return home for shame; but at night goes to the house of a friend, who is surprised to see him, and inquires of him the cause of his return? He answers, his ship had struck on a rock in the night, and was broke in pieces. This friend, going one day to make a visit to Ansaldo, found him very disconsolate. I fear, says Ansaldo, so much, that this son of mine is dead, that I have no rest. His friend told him, that he had been shipwreckt, and had lost his all, but that he himself was safe. Ansaldo instantly gets up, and runs to find him. My dear son, says he, you need not fear my displeasure; it is a common accident; trouble yourself no further. He takes him home, all the way telling him to be chearful and easy. The news was soon known all over Venice, and every one was concerned for Giannetto. Some time after, his companions arriving from Alexandria very rich, demanded what was become of their friend, and having heard the story, ran to see him, and rejoiced with him for his safety; telling him that next spring he might gain as much as he had lost the last. But Giannetto had no other thoughts than of his return to the lady; and was resolved to marry her, or die. Ansaldo told him frequently, not to be cast down. Giannetto said, he should never be happy, till he was at liberty to make another voyage. Ansaldo provided another ship of more value than the first. He again entered the port of Belmonte, and the lady looking on the port from her bedchamber, and seeing the ship, asked her maid, if she knew the streamers? the maid said, it was the ship of the young man who arrived the last year. You are in the right, answered the lady; he must surely have a great regard for me, for never any one came a second time: the maid said, she had never seen a more agreeable man. He went to the castle, and presented himself to the lady; who, as soon as she saw him, embraced him, and the day was passed in joy and revels. Bed-time being come, the lady entreated him to go to rest: when they were seated in the chamber, the two damsels enter with wine and sweet-meats; and having eat and drank of them, they go to bed, and immediately Giannetto falls asleep, the lady undressed, and lay down by his side; but he waked not the whole night. In the morning, the lady rises, and gives orders to strip the ship. He has a horse and money given to him, and away he goes, and never stops till he gets to Venice; and at night goes to the same friend, who with astonishment asked him, what was the matter? I am undone, says Giannetto. His friend answered, You are the cause of the ruin of Ansaldo, and your shame ought to be greater than the loss you have suffered. Giannetto lived privately many days. At last he took a resolution of seeing Ansaldo, who rose from his chair, and running to embrace him, told him he was welcome: Giannetto with tears returned his embraces. Ansaldo heard his tale: Do not grieve, my dear son, says he, we have still enough: the sea enriches some men, others it ruins. Poor Giannetto's head was day and night full of the thoughts of his bad success. When Ansaldo enquired what was the matter, he confessed, he could never be contented till he should be in a condition to regain all that he lost. When Ansaldo found him resolved, he began to sell every thing he had, to furnish this other fine ship with merchandize: but, as he wanted still ten thousand ducats, he applied himself to a Jew at Mestri, and borrowed them on condition, that if they were not paid on the feast of St. John in the next month of June, that the Jew might take a pound of flesh from any part of his body he pleased. Ansaldo agreed, and the Jew had an obligation drawn, and witnessed, with all the form and ceremony necessary: and then counted him the ten thousand ducats of gold; with which Ansaldo bought what was still wanting for the vessel. This last ship was finer and better freighted than the other two, and his companions made ready for the voyage, with a design that whatever they gained should be for their friend. When it was time to depart, Ansaldo told Giannetto, that since he well knew of the obligation to the Jew, he entreated, that if any misfortune happened, he would return to Venice, that he might see him before he died; and then he could leave the world with satisfaction: Giannetto promised to do every thing that he conceived might give him pleasure. Ansaldo gave him his blessing, they took their leave, and the ships set out. Giannetto had nothing in his head but to steal into Belmonte; and he prevailed with one of the sailors in the night to sail the vessel into the port. It was told the lady, that Giannetto was arrived in port. She saw from the window the vessel, and immediately sent for him. Giannetto goes to the castle, the day is spent in joy and feasting; and to honour him, a tournament is ordered, and many barons and knights tilted that day. Giannetto did wonders, so well did he understand the lance, and was so graceful a figure on horseback: he pleased so much, that all were desirous to have him for their lord. The lady, when it was the usual time, catching him by the hand begged him to take his rest. When he passed the door of the chamber, one of the damsels in a whisper said to him, Make a pretence to drink the liquor, but touch not one drop. The lady said, I know you must be thirsty, I must have you drink before you go to bed: immediately two damsels entered the room, and presented the wine. Who can refuse wine from such beautiful hands? cries Giannetto: at which the lady smiled. Giannetto takes the cup, and making as if he had drank, pours the wine into his bosom. The lady thinking he had drank, says aside to herself with great joy, You must go, young man, and bring another ship, for this is condemned. Giannetto went to bed, and began to snore as if he slept soundly. The lady perceiving this, laid herself down by his side. Giannetto loses no time, but turning to the lady, embraces her, saying, Now am I in possession of my utmost wishes. When Giannetto came out of his chamber, he was knighted, and placed in the chair of state; had the scepter put into his hand, and was proclaimed sovereign of the country, with great pomp and splendour; and when the lords and ladies were come to the castle, he married the lady in great ceremony. Giannetto governed excellently, and caused justice to be administered impartially. He continued some time in this happy state, and never entertained a thought of poor Ansaldo, who had given his bond to the Jew for ten thousand ducats. But one day, as he stood at the window of the palace with his bride, he saw a number of people pass along the piazza, with lighted torches in their hands. What is the meaning of this? says he. The lady answered, They are artificers going to make their offerings at the church of St. John, this day being his festival. Giannetto instantly recollected Ansaldo, gave a great sigh, and turned pale. His lady enquired the cause of his sudden change. He said, he felt nothing. She continued to press with great earnestness, till he was obliged to confess the cause of his uneasiness, that Ansaldo was engaged for the money, that the term was expired; and the grief he was in was lest his father should lose his life for him: that if the ten thousand ducats were not paid that day, he must lose a pound of his flesh. The lady told him to mount on horseback, and go by land the nearest way, to take some attendants, and an hundred thousand ducats; and not to stop, till he arrived at Venice: and if he was not dead, to endeavour to bring Ansaldo to her. Giannetto takes horse with twenty attendants, and makes the best of his way to Venice. The time being expired, the Jew had seized Ansaldo, and insisted on having a pound of his flesh. He entreated him only to wait some days, that if his dear Giannetto arrived, he might have the pleasure of embracing him: the Jew replied he was willing to wait, but, says he, I will cut off the pound of flesh, according to the words of the obligation: Ansaldo answered, that he was content. Several merchants would have jointly paid the money; the Jew would not hearken to the proposal, but insisted that he might have the satisfaction of saying, that he had put to death the greatest of the Christian merchants. Giannetto making all possible haste to Venice, his lady soon followed him in a lawyer's habit, with two servants attending her. Giannetto, when he came to Venice, goes to the Jew, and (after embracing Ansaldo) tells him, he is ready to pay the money, and as much more as he should demand. The Jew said, he would take no money, since it was not paid at the time due; but that he would have the pound of flesh. Every one blamed the Jew: but as Venice was a place where justice was strictly administered, and the Jew had his pretensions grounded on publick and received forms, their only resource was entreaty; and when the merchants of Venice applied to him, he was inflexible. Giannetto offered him twenty thousand, then thirty thousand, afterwards forty, fifty, and at last an hundred thousand ducats. The Jew told him, if he would give him as much gold as Venice was worth, he would not accept it; and says he, you know little of me, if you think I will desist from my demand. The lady now arrives at Venice, in her lawyer's dress; and alighting at an inn, the landlord asks of one of the servants who his master was? The servant answered, that he was a young lawyer who had finished his studies at Bologna. The landlord upon this shews his guest great civility: and when he attended at dinner, the lawyer inquiring how justice was administered in that city; he answered, justice in this place is too severe, and related the case of Ansaldo. Says the lawyer, this question may be easily answered. If you can answer it, says the landlord, and save this worthy man from death, you will get the love and esteem of all the best men of this city. The lawyer caused a proclamation to be made, that whoever had any law matters to determine, they should have recourse to him: so it was told to Giannetto, that a famous lawyer was come from Bologna, who could decide all cases in law. Giannetto proposed to the Jew to apply to this lawyer. With all my heart, says the Jew; but let who will come, I will stick to my bond. They came to this judge, and saluted him. Giannetto did not remember him: for he had disguised his face with the juice of certain herbs. Giannetto, and the Jew, each told the merits of the cause to the judge; who, when he had taken the bond and read it, said to the Jew, I must have you take the hundred thousand ducats, and release this honest man, who will always have a grateful sense of the favour done to him. The Jew replied, I will do no such thing. The judge answered, it will be better for you. The Jew was positive to yield nothing. Upon this they go to the tribunal appointed for such judgments; and our judge says to the Jew, Do you cut a pound of this man's flesh where you chuse. The Jew ordered him to be stripped naked; and takes in his hand a razor, which had been made on purpose. Giannetto seeing this, turning to the Judge, this, says he, is not the favour I asked of you. Be quiet, says he, the pound of flesh is not yet cut off. As soon as the Jew was going to begin, Take care what you do, says the judge, if you take more or less than a pound, I will order your head to be struck off: and beside, if you shed one drop of blood you shall be put to death. Your paper makes no mention of the shedding of blood; but says expresly, that you may take a pound of flesh, neither more nor less. He immediately sent for the executioner to bring the block and ax; and now, says he, if I see one drop of blood, off goes your head. At length the Jew, after much wrangling, told him, Give me the hundred thousand ducats, and I am content. No, says the judge, cut off your pound of flesh according to your bond: why did not you take the money when it was offered? The Jew came down to ninety, and then to eighty thousand; but the judge was still resolute. Giannetto told the judge to give what he required, that Ansaldo might have his liberty: but he replied, let me manage him. Then the Jew would have taken fifty thousand: he said, I will not give you a penny. Give me at least, says the Jew, my own ten thousand ducats, and a curse confound you all. The judge replies, I will give you nothing: if you will have the pound of flesh, take it; if not, I will order your bond to be protested and annulled. The Jew seeing he could gain nothing, tore in pieces the bond in a great rage. Ansaldo was released, and conducted home with great joy by Giannetto, who carried the hundred thousand ducats to the inn to the lawyer. The lawyer said, I do not want money; carry it back to your lady, that she may not say, that you have squandered it away idly. Says Giannetto, my lady is so kind, that I might spend four times as much, without incurring her displeasure. How are you pleased with the lady? says the lawyer. I love her better than any earthly thing, answers Giannetto: Nature seems to have done her utmost in forming her. If you will come and see her, you will be surprised at the honours she will shew you. I cannot go with you, says the lawyer; but since you speak so much good of her, I must desire you to present my respects to her. I will not fail, Giannetto answered; and now, let me entreat you to accept of some of the money. While he was speaking, the lawyer observed a ring on his finger, and said, if you will give me this ring, I shall seek no other reward. Willingly, says Giannetto; but as it is a ring given me by my lady, to wear for her sake, I have some reluctance to part with it, and she, not seeing it on my finger, will believe, that I have given it to a woman. Says the lawyer, she esteems you sufficiently to credit what you tell her, and you may say you made a present of it to me; but I rather think you want to give it to some former mistress here in Venice. So great, says Giannetto, is the love and reverence I bear to her, that I would not change her for any woman in the world. After this he takes the ring from his finger, and presents it to him. I have still a favour to ask, says the lawyer. It shall be granted, says Giannetto. It is, replied he, that you do not stay any time here, but go as soon as possible to your lady. It appears to me a thousand years till I see her, answered Giannetto: and immediately they take leave of each other. The lawyer embarked, and left Venice. Giannetto took leave of his Venetian friends, and carried Ansaldo with him, and some of his old acquaintance accompanied them. The lady arrived some days before; and having resumed her female habit, pretended to have spent the time at the baths; and now gave orders to have the streets lined with tapestry: and when Giannetto and Ansaldo were landed, all the court went out to meet them. When they arrived at the palace, the lady ran to embrace Ansaldo, but feigned anger against Giannetto, tho' she loved him excessively: yet the feastings, tilts and diversions went on as usual, at which all the lords and ladies were present. Giannetto seeing that his wife did not receive him with her accustomed good countenance, called her, and would have saluted her. She told him, she wanted not his caresses: I am sure, says she, you have been lavish of them to some of your former mistresses. Giannetto began to make excuses. She asked him where was the ring she had given him? It is no more than what I expected, cries Giannetto, and I was in the right to say you would be angry with me; but, I swear by all that is sacred, and by your dear self, that I gave the ring to the lawyer who gained our cause. And I can swear, says the lady, with as much solemnity, that you gave the ring to a woman: therefore swear no more. Giannetto protested that what he had told her was true, and that he said all this to the lawyer, when he asked for the ring. The lady replied, you would have done much better to stay at Venice with your mistresses, for I fear they all wept when you came away. Giannetto's tears began to fall, and in great sorrow he assured her, that what she supposed could not be true. The lady seeing his tears, which were daggers in her bosom, ran to embrace him, and in a fit of laughter shewed the ring, and told him, that she was herself the lawyer, and how she obtained the ring. Giannetto was greatly astonished, finding it all true, and told the story to the nobles and to his companions; and this heightened greatly the love between him and his lady. He then called the damsel who had given him the good advice in the evening not to drink the liquor, and gave her to Ansaldo for a wife: and they spent the rest of their lives in great felicity and contentment. Ruggieri de Figiovanni took a resolution of going, for some time, to the court of Alfonso king of Spain. He was graciously received, and living there some time in great magnificence, and giving remarkable proofs of his courage, was greatly esteemed. Having frequent opportunities of examining minutely the behaviour of the king, he observed, that he gave, as he thought, with little discernment, castles, and baronies, to such who were unworthy of his favours; and to himself, who might pretend to be of some estimation, he gave nothing: he therefore thought the fittest thing to be done, was to demand leave of the king to return home. His request was granted, and the king presented him with one of the most beautiful and excellent mules, that had ever been mounted. One of the king's trusty servants was commanded to accompany Ruggieri, and riding along with him, to pick up, and recollect every word he said of the king, and then mention that it was the order of his Sovereign, that he should go back to him. The man watching the opportunity, joined Ruggieri when he set out, said he was going towards Italy, and would be glad to ride in company with him. Ruggieri jogging on with his mule, and talking of one thing or other, it being near nine o' clock, told his companion, that they would do well to put up their mules a little, and as soon as they entered the stable, every beast, except his, began to stale. Riding on further they came to a river, and watering the beasts, his mule staled in the river: You untoward beast, says he, you are like your master, who gave you to me. The servant remembered this expression, and many others as they rode on all day together; but he heard not a single word drop from him, but what was in praise of the king. The next morning Ruggieri was told the order of the king, and instantly turned back. When the king had heard what he had said of the mule, he commanded him into his presence, and with a smile, asked him, for what reason he had compared the mule to him. Ruggieri answered, My reason is plain, you give where you ought not to give, and where you ought to give, you give nothing; in the same manner the mule would not stale where she ought, and where she ought not, there she staled. The king said upon this, If I have not rewarded you as I have many, do not entertain a thought that I was insensible to your great merit; it is Fortune who hindered me; she is to blame, and not I; and I will shew you manifestly that I speak truth. My discontent, Sir, proceeds not, answered Ruggieri, from a desire of being enriched, but from your not having given the smallest testimony to my deserts in your service: nevertheless your excuse is valid, and I am ready to see the proof you mention, though I can easily believe you without it. The king conducted him to a hall, where he had already commanded two large caskets, shut close, to be placed; and before a large company told Ruggieri, that in one of them was contained his crown, scepter, and all his jewels, and that the other was full of earth: choose which of them you like best, and then you will see that it is not I, but your fortune that has been ungrateful. Ruggieri chose one. It was found to be the casket full of earth. The king said to him with a smile, Now you may see, Ruggieri, that what I told you of fortune is true; but for your sake, I will oppose her with all my strength. You have no intention, I am certain, to live in Spain; therefore I will offer you no preferment here, but that casket which fortune denied you, shall be yours in despite of her: carry it with you into your own country, shew it to your friends, and neighbours, as my gift to you, and you have my permission to boast, that it is a reward of your virtues. Of The Merchant of Venice the stile is even and easy, with few peculiarities of diction, or anomalies of construction. The comick part raises laughter, and the serious fixes expectation. The probability of either one or the other story cannot be maintained. The union of two actions in one event is in this drama eminently happy. Dryden was much pleased with his own address in connecting the two plots of his Spanish Friar, which yet, I believe, the critick will find excelled by this play.6Q0045

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