P. 118, l. 11. By our remembrances —} That is, according to our recollection. So we say, he is old by my reckoning. JOHNSON. P. 118, 1. 12. or then we thought them none.] We should read: O! then we thought them none. A motive for pity and pardon, agreeable to fact, and the indulgent character of the speaker. This was sent to the Oxford editor, and he altered 0, to though. WARBURTON. Such were the faulty weaknesses of which I was guilty in my youth, or such at least were then my feelings, though perhaps at that period. of my life I did not think they deserved the name of faults, Dr. Warburton, without necessity, as it seems to me, reads -,,0! then we thought them none;"" and the subsequent editors adopted the alteration. MALONE. P. 118, 1. 25. 26. and choice breeds A native slip to us from foreign seeds :] And our choice furnishes us with a slip propagated to us from foreign seeds, which we educate and treat, as if it were native to us, and sprung from ourselves. HEATH. thing exquisitely beautiful in this representation: of that suffusion of colours which glimmers around the sight when the eye lashes are with tears. HENLEY. wet P. 119, 1. 15: There is a designed ambignity: Í care no more for, is, I care as much for. 1 wish it equally. FARMER. P. 119, 1. 16. 17. Can't no other, But, I your daughter, he must be my brother?] The meaning is obscured by the elliptical diction, Can it be no other way, but if I be your daughter, he must be my brother? JOHNSON. P. 119, 1. 22. To strive is to contend. STEEVENS. P. 119, 1, 24. The mystery of your loneliness,] The late Mr. Hall had corrected this, I believe, rightly, your lowliness. TYRWHITT. P. 119, 1. 25. Your salt tears' head.] The source, the fountain of your tears, the cause of your grief. JOHNSON. P. 119, 1. 32. in their hind] i, e. in their language, according to their nature. STEEVENS. P. 120, L. 25. in this captious aud intenible sieve,] The word cap tious I never found in this sense; yet I cannot tell what to substisute, unless carious for rotten, which yet is a word more likely to have been mistaken by the copiers than used by the author. JOHNSON. Dr. Farmer supposes captious to be a contraction of capacious. As violent ones are to be found among our ancient writers, and especially in Churchyard's Poems, with which Shakspeare was not unacquainted. STEEVENS. By captious, I believe Shakspeare only meant recipient, capable of receiving what is put into it; and by intenible, incapable of holding or retaining it. How frequently he and the other writers of his age confounded the active and passive adjectives, has been already more than once observed. MALONE. P. 120, 1. 27. And lack snap to lose still :] Perhaps we should read And lack not to love still, TAWHITT. I believe lose is right. speech: So afterwards, in this A whose state is such that cannot choose ,,But lend and give, where she is sure to Helena means I think, to say shat, like a person who pours water into a vessel full of holes, and still continues his employment though he finds the water all lost, and the vessel empty, so, though she finds that the waters of her love are still lost, that her affection is thrown away on an object whom she thinks she never can deserve, she yet is not discouraged, but perseveres in her hopeless endeavour to accomplish her wishes. The poet evidently alludes to the trite story of the daughters of Danaus.' Malone. P. 120, 1.33. Whose aged honour cites a virtuous youth,] i. c. whose respectable conduct in age shows, or proves, that you were no less virtuous when young. As a fact is proved by citing witnesses, or examples from books our author with his usual license uses to cite," in the sense of to prove. MALONE. P. 120, 1. 32-36. if yourself etc.] Helena means to say - If ever you wished that the deity who presides over chastity, and the Queen of amorous rites, were one and the same person; or, in other words, if ever you wished for the honest and lawful completion of your chaste desires." I believe, however, the words were accidently transposed at the press, and would Jead Love dearly, and wish chastly, that your P. 121, 1. 9. Co Count. Wherefore? tell true?] This is an evident interpolation. It is needless, because it repeats what the Countess had already said: it is injurious, because it spoils the measure. STEEVENS. 121, 1. 16. whose faculties inclusive were,] Receipts in which greater virtues were inclosed than appeared to observation. JoHNSON, P. 121. last 1. but one, Embowell'd of their doctrine,] i.e. exhausted their skill. STEEVENS. P. 122, 1. 3. that his good receipt] Here is an inference, [that] without any thing preceding, to which it refers, which makes the sentence vicious, and shows that we should read There's something hints i. e. I have a secret, premonition, or presage. WARBURTON. P. 122, 1. 26 — 29. Farewell, young Lord, these warlike principles Do not throw from you: and yow, my Lord, fare well: etc.] In all the latter copies these lines stood thus : Farewell, young Lords; these warlike principles *Do not throw from you. You, my Lords, The gift doth stretch itself as 'tis receiv'd. The third line in that state was unintelligible. Sir Thomas Hanmer reads thus: Farewell, young Lord: these warlike principles Do not throw from you; you, my Lord, farewell; Share the advice betwixt you: If both The gift doth stretch itself as 'tis receiv'd, The first edition, from which the passage is restored, was sufficiently clear; yet it is plain, that the latter editors preferred a reading which they did not understand. JOHNSON. P. 122, last 1. and you, my Lord, farewell:] The old copy, both in this and the following instance, reads Lords. STEEVENS. It does not any where appear that more than two French lords (besides Bertram) went to serve in Italy; and therefore I think the King's speech. should be corrected thus: Farewell, young Lord; these warlike prin ciples Do not throw from you; and you, my what follows, shows this correction to be necessary: ,,Share the advice betwixt you; if both gain all," etc. TYAWHITT. |