CXLIII.

Lo, as a careful house-wife runs to catch
One of her feathered creatures broke away,
Sets down her babe, and makes all swift despatch
In pursuit of the thing she would have stay;
Whilst her neglected child holds her in chase,
Cries to catch her whose busy care is bent
To follow that which flies before her face,
Not prizing her poor infant's discontent;
So run'st thou after that which flies from thee,
Whilst I thy babe chase thee afar behind;
But if thou catch thy hope, turn back to me,
And play the mother's part, kiss me, be kind:
So will I pray that thou mayst have thy Will,
If thou turn back, and my loud crying still.
CXLIV.

Two loves I have of comfort and despair,
Which like two spirits do suggest me still;
The better angel is a man right fair,
The worser spirit a woman coloured ill.
To win me soon to hell, my female evil
Tempteth my better angel from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devil,
Wooing his purity with her foul pride.
And whether that my angel be turned fiend,
Suspect I may, yet not directly tell;
But being both from me, both to each friend,
I guess one angel in another's hell.

Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt,
Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

CXLV.

Those lips, that love's own hand did make,
Breathed forth the sound that said I hate,"
To me that languished for her sake:
But when she saw my woful state,
Straight in her heart did mercy come,
Chiding that tongue, that ever sweet
Was used in giving gentle doom;
And taught it thus a-new to greet;
"I hate" she altered with an end,
That followed it as gentle day
Doth follow night, who, like a fiend,
From heaven to hell is flown away;
"I hate" from hate away she threw,
And saved my life, saying-"not you."
CXLVI.

Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth,
Fooled by those rebel powers that thee array,
Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth,
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?
Why so large cost, having so short a lease,
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess,
Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end?
Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss,
And let that pine to aggravate thy store;
Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross;
Within be fed, without be rich no more:
So shalt thou feed on death that feeds on men,
And death once dead there's no more dying then.
VOL. III.
4 G

CXLVII.

My love is as a fever, longing still

For that which longer nurseth the disease;
Feeding on that which doth preserve the ill,
The uncertain sickly appetite to please.
My reason, the physician to my love,
Angry that his prescriptions are not kept,
Hath left me, and I desperate now approve,
Desire is death, which physic did except.
Past cure I am, now reason is past care,
And frantic-mad with ever-more unrest;
My thoughts and my discourse as madmen's are,
At random from the truth vainly expressed :
For I have sworn thee fair and thought thee bright,
Who art as black as hell, as dark as night.

CXLVIII.

O me! what eyes hath Love put in my head,
Which have no correspondence with true sight!
Or if they have where is my judgment fled,
That censures falsely what they see aright?
If that be fair whereon my false eyes dote,
What means the world to say it is not so?
If it be not, then love doth well denote
Love's eye is not so true as all men: no,
How can it? O, how can Love's eye be true,
That is so vexed with watching and with tears?
No marvel then though I mistake my view;
The sun itself sees not till heaven clears.

O cunning Love! with tears thou keep'st me blind,
Lest eyes well-seeing thy foul faults should find.

CXLIX.

Canst thou, O cruel! say I love thee not,
When I, against myself, with thee partake?
Do I not think on thee when I forgot
Am of myself all tyrant for thy sake?
Who hateth thee, that I do call my friend?
On whom frown'st thou that I do fawn upon?
Nay, if thou low'rst on me do I not spend
Revenge upon myself with present moan?
What merit do I in myself respect,
That is so proud thy service to despise,
When all my best doth worship thy defect,
Commanded by the motion of thine eyes?
But love, hate on, for now I know thy mind;
Those that can see thou lov'st, and I am blind.

CL.

O, from what power hast thou this powerful might,
With insufficiency my heart to sway?

To make me give the lie to my true sight,
And swear that brightness doth not grace the day?
Whence hast thou this becoming of things ill,
That in the very refuse of thy deeds

There is such strength and warrantise of skill,
That in my mind thy worst all best exceeds ?
Who taught thee how to make me love thee more,
The more I hear and see just cause of hate?
O, though I love what others do abhor,
With others thou should'st not abhor my state;
If thy unworthiness raised love in me,
More worthy I to be beloved of thee.

CLI

Love is too young to know what conscience is;
Yet who knows not conscience is born of love?
Then, gentle cheater, urge not my amiss,
Lest guilty of my faults thy sweet self prove.
For, thou betraying me, I do betray -
My nobler part to my great body's treason;
My soul doth tell my body that he may
Triumph in love; flesh stays no further reason;
But rising at thy name, doth point out thee
As his triumphant prize. Proud of this pride,
He is contented thy poor drudge to be,
To stand in thy affairs, fall by thy side.
No want of conscience hold it that I call
Her-love, for whose dear love I rise and fall.

CLII.

In loving thee thou know'st I am forsworn,
But thou art twice forsworn to me love swearing;
In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torn,
In vowing new hate after new love bearing.
But why of two oaths' breach do I accuse thee,
When I break twenty? I am perjured most;
For all my vows are oaths but to misuse thee,
And all my honest faith in thee is lost:
For I have sworn deep oaths of thy deep kindness,
Oaths of thy love, thy truth, thy constancy:
And, to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindness,
Or made them swear against the thing they see;
For I have sworn thee fair: more perjured I,
To swear, against the truth, so foul a lie!

CLIII.
Cupid laid by his brand, and fell asleep,
A maid of Dian's this advantage found,
And his love-kindling fire did quickly steep
In a cold valley-fountain of that ground;
Which borrowed from this holy fire of love
A dateless lively heat, still to endure,
And grew a seething bath which yet men prove,
Against strange maladies a sovereign cure.
But at my mistress' eye love's brand new fired,
The boy for trial needs would touch my breast;
I sick withal, the help of bath desired,
And thither hied, a sad distempered guest,
But found no cure: the bath for my help lies
Where Cupid got new fire; my mistress' eyes.
CLIV.

The little love-god lying once asleep,
Laid by his side his heart-inflaming brand,
Whilst many nymphs that vowed chaste lives to keep.
Came tripping by ; but in her maiden hand
The fairest votary took up that fire
Which many legions of true hearts had warmed;
And so the general of hot desire

Was sleeping by a virgin hand disarmed.
This brand she quenchéd in a cool well by,
Which from love's fire took heat perpetual,
Growing a bath and healthful remedy
For men diseased; but I, my mistress thrall,
Came there for cure, and this by that I prove,
Love's fire heats water, water cools not love.

'K. John. For cre thou canst report I will be
there,

The thunder of my cannon shall be heard."
Act I., Scene 1.

The anachronism in this and many other passages of Shakespeare has furnished ground. of cavil to cavillers. But it, and others like it, are justifiable, as Mr. Knight says, on the principle of using terms and making reference to things familiar to the audience. Shakespeare never, I think, introduces anachronism in the actions of his personages.

"Const. Stay for an answer to your embassy,
Lest unadvis'd you stain your swords with blood:
My lord Chatillon may from England bring
That right in peace, which here we urge in war;
And then we shall repent cach drop of blood,
That hot rash haste so indirectly shed."

Act II., Scene 1. Mr. Collier's folio changes the last line to, "That rash, hot haste so indiscreetly shed." There can be no doubt of the propriety of the correction. The Constable begs them to "stay for an answer," “lest unadvised" they stain their swords with blood; and in addition to this, the use of 'so' indicates that indiscreetly and not "indirectly" was the word.

"That rash, hot haste so indirectly shed," is not sense. The typographical error might easily have been made.

"Bast. And this same bias, this commodity, This bawd, this broker, this all-changing word, Clapp'd on the outward eye of fickle France, Hath drawn him from his own determined aid." Act II., Scene 2.

The last line is changed in Mr. Collier's folio to,

"Hath drawn him from his own determined aim;" VOL. III. 4 G 2

a correction proposed by Monck Mason, and "the necessity for which," Mr. Collier says, "is not very evident." If a tithe of the change in that volume were as imperatively demanded as this is, Mr. Collier's discovery would have done ten times the service that it has done. How could "commodity" draw France from "his own determined aid ?" What was "his own determined aid ?" The aid which he had determined to give to Arthur? That is not the way in which Shakespeare uses the English language. But, besides this, the previous line demands the change. Commodity,

We have here as fine a specimen of Warbur ton's peculiar fitness to comprehend and improve the text of Shakespeare as can be found throughout the Variorum. He remarks upon “untrimmed bride," "untrimmed' signifies unsteady. The term is taken from navigation." Well done, Warburton! you deserve a mitre for that:-the Abbot of Un-reason's. Think of the coxswain of a wedding-that is, the groomsman, calling out, 'trim the bride, my lads! keep her steady! This note was too much for even Johnson's solemnity; and with ponderous pleasantry, he remarks: "A commentator should be grave, and therefore I can read these notes with a proper severity of attention; but the idea of trimming a lady to keep her steady, would be too risible for any power of face."

"K. John. But as we under heaven are supreme
head,

So, under him, that great supremacy,
Where we do reign, we will alone uphold," &c.

Evidently "heaven" in the first line should be God, as is shown by the pronoun in the second. The correction is made in Mr. Collier's folio. The original word was evidently changed to "heaven," on account of the statute of James I. before alluded to, while the corresponding change in the pronoun was neglected, as it was in a similar case, which I have pointed out in Measure for Measure, Act II., Sc. 4. Mr. Collier's folio gives heaven for "him" in the second line; but needlessly and, indeed, injuriously, as it destroys the parallel between the king's tenure of power and his exercise of it. This is another marked evidence of the conjectural nature of the corrections in that folio. The corrector having made the necessary change of "heaven” to God, either from the sight of an actor's copy of his part, from memory, or from conjecture, went on to improve the text by guess-work, and struck from it the very word which gave force to the passage.

"K. John.

If the midnight bell Did with his iron tongue and brazen mouth Sound on into the drowsy race of night :" &c. Act III., Scene 3. As the last line has been frittered away by the editors into,

"Sound one unto the drowsy race of night,"

it seems plausible to read with Mr. Collier's folio 'ear of night," for "race of night." But all the changes are alike uncalled for. Let any one who has listened to a church clock striking twelve at midnight, and seeming as if it would never complete its solemn task, say whether,

"Sound on into the drowsy race of night,” does not bring up the memory of his sensations more vividly than,

or,

"Sound one into the drowsy ear of night,"

"Sound one unto the drowsy race of night.” The line as it stands in the original is one of the most suggestive in all Shakespeare's works.

"K. Phil. So, by a roaring tempest on the flood, A whole armado of convicted sail

Is scatter'd," &c.-Act III., Scene 4.

For the obviously mistaken "convicted," Mr. Dyce proposed convected. He came within one letter of that which is doubtless the right word, -convented, which is found on the margins of Mr. Collier's folio.

"Arthur. There is no malice in this burning coal." Act IV., Scene 1.

This should evidently be

"There is no malice burning in this coal."

Arthur has just spoken of the fire as having gone out, as being "dead with grief;" the transposition gives us the words and the thoughts of the author, and in such a form as is consistent with what has gone before.

I find that Dr. Grey made this suggestion, which Monck Mason called hypercriticism, because Hubert says, he "can revive" the coal; and which Boswell well defended, on the ground that, whatever really was the case, Arthur evidently believed that the coal was not burning when he spoke.

"Pem. If, what in rest you have, in right you held, Why then your fears (which, as they say, attend The steps of wrong), should move you to mew up Your tender kinsman, and to choke his days With barbarous ignorance, and deny his youth The rich advantage of good exercise?"

Act IV., Scene 2.

A moment's consideration of the construction of this passage makes it plain that it is corrupt. As it stands, though it is pointed as a question, it is an assertion; and an assertion, too, which involves a contradiction. The obvious transposition in Mr. Collier's folio obviates all difficulty. “Why should your fears (which, as they say, attend The steps of wrong) then move you to mew up Your tender kinsman ?" &c.

"K. John. How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds,

Makes deeds ill done! Had'st thou not been by,
A fellow by the hand of nature mark'd,
Quoted, and sign'd to do a deed of shame,
This murder had not come into my mind:"

Can any one read the whole of this passage, and question for an instant the propriety of Mr. Knight's change?

"How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds
Makes ill deeds done!"

"Sal. The king hath dispossess'd himself of us: We will not line his thin bestained cloak."

Act IV., Scene 3.

"Thin bestained cloak," is most probably a misprint for "Sin bestained cloak," as the corrector in Mr. Collier's folio conjectures.

"Pem. All murders past do stand excus'd in this: And this, so sole, and so unmatchable, Shall give a holiness, a purity,

To the yet unbegotten sin of times,
And prove a deadly bloodshed but a jest,
Exampled by this heinous spectacle."

It is very plain to me that "the yet unbegotten sin of times" is a misprint for "the yet unbegotten sins of time," as Pope suggested. Pembroke says that,-all murders past stand excused in this; and this shall excuse all other crimes to be committed. "Sin," it is true, might be used collectively; but then at least we should read "sin of time." In lifting the matter,' the s was evidently transferred from one word to the other. Read:

"Shall give a holiness, a purity

To the yet unbegotten sins of time."

The correction, "Send fair play offers," made in Mr. Collier's folio, seem to be a necessary correction of a probable misprint.

"Sal. My arm shall give thee help to bear thee hence,

For I do see the cruel pangs of death
Right in thine eye."-Act V., Scene 4.

Some commentators, being unable to understand "right in thine eye," proposed to read fright, and others "fight in thine eye." But, as Steevens says, "right" signifies here 'immediate.' He adds,-three quarters of a century ago,"It is now obsolete." But it has survived in America, and is in constant and common use in the phrase Right away,' for 'on the instaut, 'immediately.'

"Gaunt. More are men's ends mark'd, than their lives before:

The setting sun, and music at the close,
As the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last,
Writ in remembrance more than things long past."
Act II., Scene 1.

This is, to say the least, very confused. How inept the assertion, that "the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last!" and what a slender and even doubtful connection the last line has with the preceding part of the passage! What is writ in remembrance? As the sentence now stands, "writ" has no nominative. Monck Mason's punctuation makes the passage perfectly clear. "More are men's ends mark'd than their lives before. The setting sun, and music at the close (As the last taste of sweets is sweetest) last, Writ in remembrance more than things long past."

That is, the setting sun and music at the close are lasting, are writ in remembrance, just as the last taste of sweets is sweetest.

"York. The king is come: deal mildly with his youth;

For young hot colts, being rag'd do rage the more."

Ritson substituted rein'd for "rag'd," and Mr. Collier's folio has urg'd. Mr. Singer gives preference to the former word, which is certainly much the better suited to the sense of the con

"Scroop. -and boys, with women's voices, Strive to speak big, and clap their female joints In stiff, unwieldy arms," &c.-Act III., Scene 2.

As a specimen of the fitness of the editors and critics of the last century for their task, I cannot forbear quoting the following comments upon this passage:

-"and clap their female joints-] Mr. Pope more elegantly reads- and clasp-;' which has been adopted by subsequent editors. But the emendation does not seem absolutely necessary." -MALONE.

"Clip would be still nearer than clasp."-RIT

SON.

"Lee, in his Mithridates, has imitated this passage, Act IV.:

"The very boys, like Cupids dress'd in arms, Clan their young harness'd thighs, and trust to battle.'"-STEEVENS.