Puslapio vaizdai
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have been what I am, had the maidenlieft ftar in the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing.

SCENE XV. Ingratitude in a Child.
(6) Ingratitude! thou marble-hearted fiend,
More hideous, when thou fhew'ft thee in a child,
Than the fea-monster.

ACT II. SCENE VI.

Flattering Sycophants.

That fuch a flave as this fhould wear a fword,

Who wears no honefty: (7) fuch fmiling rogues [as

these,]

Like

(6) Ingratitude &c.] Ingratitude a marble hearted-fiend is more hideous and dreadful, when fhewing itfelf in a child, than even that fea-monfter, which is the emblem itself of impiety and ingratitude by which monfter he means the Hippopotamus, or river-horfe, " which, fays Sandys, in his travels, p. 105. fignify'd, Murder, Impudence, Violence and Injustice: for they fay, that he killeth his fire, and ravisheth his own dam." Mr. Upton's alteration of, Than ith' fea-monster, feems unneceffary: for the poet makes ingratitude, a fiend, a monfter itself, and one more odious than even this hieroglyphical fymbol of impiety. See Obfervations on Shakespear, p. 203.

(7) Such, &c.] The words as thefe, may be safely omitted without injuring the fenfe; they are flat and spoil the metre. The next lines are read thus in the old editions;

Like rats, oft bite the holy cords atwaine,

Which are t' intrince t' unloofe.

Atwaine is doubtless the genuine word, which was commonly ufed, fignifying, in two, afunder, in twain. And Mr. Upton, obferving, that Shakespear fometimes ftrikes off a Syllable or more from the latter part of a word, would preferve intrince in the text, which he explains by intrinficate. 'Tis certain the author uíes intrinficate, but I don't rememember ever to have met with intrince: See vol. I. p. 169. "This fhortening of words is indeed too much the genius of our language ;" and as the reader knows the fenfe of the word, and what the criticks would read, I have kept to the old editions, notwithstanding the quotation made by

me

Like rats, oft bite the holy cords atwain
Which are too intrince t'unloofe; footh ev'ry paffion,
That in the nature of their lords rebels:

Bring oil to fire, fnow to their colder moods;
Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks
With ev'ry gale and vary of their mafters ;
As knowing naught, like dogs, but following.

Plain, blunt Men.

This is fome fellow,

;

Who, having been prais'd for bluntnefs, doth affect
A faucy roughness; and constrains the garb,
Quite from his nature. He can't flatter, he,
An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth
And they will take it, fo; if not, he's plain.
Thefe kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness
Harbour more craft, and more corrupter ends,
Than twenty (8) filly, ducking obfervants,
That ftretch their duties nicely.

SCENE VII. Defcription of Bedlam Beggars,
While I may 'fcape,

I will preserve my felf: and am bethought

To take the bafeft and the poorest shape,

That ever penury in contempt of man

Brought near to beaft: my face I'll grime with filth; Blanket my loins; elfe all my hair in knots;

And with prefented nakedness out-face

The winds, and perfecutions of the sky.

me from Mr. Edwards, in the place juft referr'd too. I forbear quoting any fimilar paffages here: Horace and Juvenal abound with them, and Shakespear himself hath excellently painted the character in Polonius. See particularly Hamlet, A& 4. Sc 7.

(8) Sily] Some read filky: filly is not always taken in a bad fenfe amongst the old writers.

The country gives me proof and prefident

Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices,
Strike in their numb'd and mortify'd bare arms,
Pins, wooden pricks, nails, fprigs of rosemary;
And with this horrible object, from low farms,
Poor pelting villages, theep-coats and mills,
Sometimes with lunatick bans, fometimes with pray'rs,
Inforce their charity.

SCENE X. The faults of Infirmity, pardonable.

Fiery? the fiery duke? tell the hot duke, that
No, but not yet; may be, he is not well;
Infirmity doth still neglect all office,

Whereto our health is bound; we're not ourselves,
When nature, being oppreft, commands the mind
To fuffer with the body. I'll forbear;
And am fall'n out with my more headier will,
To take the indifpos'd and fickly fit

For the found man.

SCENE XI.

UNKINDNESS.

Thy fifter's naught; oh Regan, she hath tied Sharp-tooth'd unkindness, like a vulture here.

[Points to his heart.

SCENE XII. Offences mistaken.

All's not offence that indifcretion (9) finds, And dotage terms fo.

VOL. II.

G

Rifing

(9) Finds Finds is an allufion to a jury's verdict: and the word fo relates to that as well as to terms.

very fame expreffion in Hamlet, A&t 5. Sc. 1.

Why, 'tis found fo. ́

We meet with the

Shakespear ufes the word in this fenfe in other places;

The coroner bath fat on her, and finds it chriftian burial. Ib.

As

(

Rifing Paffion,

I prythee, daughter, do not make me mad,
I will not trouble thee, my child. Farewel;
We'll no more meet, no more fee one another;
But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter,
Or rather a difeafe that's in my flesh,

Which I must needs call mine; thou art a bile,
A plague-fore, or imboffed carbuncle,

In my corrupted blood; but I'll not chide thee.
Let fhame come when it will, I do not call it ;
I do not bid the thunder-bearer shoot,
Nor tell tales of thee to high-judging Jove.

The Neceffaries of Life, few.

(10) O, reafon not the need our bafeft beggars Are in the pooreft things fuperfluous;

Allow not nature more than nature needs,

Man's life is cheap as beasts.

Lear

As you like it. A. 4. S. 2. Leander was drown'd, and the foolish chroniclers [perhaps coroners] of that age found it was----Hero of Seftos," Edwards.

(10) O reafon, &c. The poets abound with fentiments fimilar to this take the two following pages from Lucretius and

Lucan.

O wretched man, in what a mift of life,
Inclos'd with dangers, and befet with ftrife,
He spends his little span, and over-feeds

His cram'd defires with more than nature needs.

For nature wifely ftints our appetite,

And craves no more than undifturb'd delight.
Which minds unmixt with cares and fears obtain
A foul ferene, a body void of pain.
So little this corporeal frame requires,
So bounded are our natural defires,
That wanting all and fetting pain afide,
With bare privation fenfe is fatisfy'd.

See LUCRET. B. 2.
Behold

Lear on the Ingratitude of his Daughters.

You fee me here, you gods, a poor
old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both!
If it be you, that stir these daughters hearts
Against their father, fool me not so much

To bear it tamely; (11) touch me with noble anger
O let not womens weapons, water-drops,

Stain my man's cheeks. No, you unnatʼral hags,
I will have fuch revenges on you both,

(12) That all the world fhall-- I will do fuch things;What they are, yet I know not; but they shall be The terrors of the earth: you think, I'll weep:

Behold, ye fons of luxury, behold,

Who scatter in excefs your lavifh gold;
For whom all earth all ocean are explor'd,
To fpread the various proud voluptuous board
Behold how little thrifty mature craves.

See Lucan, B. 4. Rowe's tranfl. (11) Touch me, &c.] "If you, ye gods have ftirred my daughters hearts against me: at left let me not bear it with any unworthy tameness; but touch are with noble anger; let me refent it with fuch refolution as becomes a man."---And "let not woman's weapons, water-drops, ftain my man's cheeks." Canons of Crit. p. 78.

(12) That, &c.] See vol. 1. p. 110.

See

This feems to have

been imitated from the one or the other of these paffages fol- .

lowing:

Haud quid fit fcio

Sed grande quiddam eft.

What it is I know not ---

But fomething terrible it is --

Nefcio quid ferox

Senec. Thyeft. A. 2.

Decrevit animus intus, & nondum fibi audet fateri.

1 know not what, my furious mind

Hath inwardly determin'd, and still dares not

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Medea,

Ovid, Met. 6.

No:

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