While fome men leave to do!

How fome men creep in skittish fortune's hall,'
Whiles others play the idiots in her eyes!
How one man eats into another's pride,
While pride is fasting in his wantonness!
To see these Grecian lords !-why, even already
They clap the lubber Ajax on the shoulder;
As if his foot were on brave Hector's breaft,
And great Troy fhrinking.'

we shall fee to-morrow an act that very chance doth throw upon him [we fhall fee] Ajax renown'd. HENLEY.

9 How fome men creep in skittish fortune's hall,] To creep is to keep out of fight from whatever motive. Some men keep out of notice in the hall of fortune, while others, though they but play the idiot, are always in her eye, in the way of diftinction.

JOHNSON.

I cannot think that creep, ufed without any explanatory word, can mean to keep out of fight. While fome men, fays Ulyffes, remain tamely inactive in fortune's hall, without any effort to excite her attention, others, &c. Such, I think, is the meaning.

MALONE. 2 fafting-] Quarto. The folio has feafting. Either word may bear a good fenfe. JOHNSON.

I have preferred fafting, the reading of the quarto, to feafting, which we find in the folio, not only because the quarto copies are in general preferable to the folio, but because the original reading furnishes that kind of antithefis of which our poet was fo fond. One man eats, while another fafts. Achilles is he who fafts; who capriciously abftains from thofe active exertions which would furnith new food for his pride. MALONE.

3 And great Troy fhrinking.] The quarto-bricking. The folio has, lefs poetically,-fhrinking. The following paffage in the subsequent fcene fupports the reading of the quarto:

"Hark, how Troy roars; how Hecuba cries out;

"How poor Andromache fhrills her dolours forth;
"And all cry-Hector, Hector's dead." MALONE.

I prefer the reading of the folio. That the collective body of martial Trojans fhould brink at fight of their hero's danger, is furely more natural to be fuppofed, than that, like frighted women, they would unite in a general briek.

As to what Caffandra fays, in the preceding note,-it is the fate of that lady's evidence-never to be received. STEEVENS.

The prefent eye praises the present object:
Then marvel not, thou great and cómplete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion fooner catch the eye,
Than what not ftirs. The cry went once on thee,*
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou would'ft not entomb thyfelf alive,
And cafe thy reputation in thy tent;

Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late, Made emulous miffions' 'mongst the gods themfelves,

And drave great Mars to faction.

tion of the amendment, which I have given in the text, to the fagacity of the ingenious Dr. Thirlby. I read:

And give to duft, that is a little gilt,

More laud than they will give to gold, o'er-dufted.

THEOBALD.

This emendation has been adopted by the fucceeding editors, but recedes too far from the copy. There is no other corruption than fuch as Shakspeare's incorrectnefs often refembles. He has omitted the article-to in the fecond line: he should have written; More laud than to gilt o'er-dufted. JOHNSON.

Gilt in the fecond line is a fubftantive. See Vol. XII. p. 29, n. 7.

Duft a little gilt means, ordinary performances oftentatiously dif played and magnified by the favour of friends and that admiration of novelty which prefers "new-born gawds" to " things paft." Gilt o'er-dufted means, fplendid actions of preceding ages, the remembrance of which is weakened by time.

The poet seems to have been thinking either of those monuments which he has mentioned in All's well that ends well;

"Where duft and damn'd oblivion is the tomb
"Of honour'd bones indeed ;- -."

or of the gilded armour, trophies, banners, &c. often hung up in churches in "monumental mockery." MALONE.

2

on thee.

went once on thee,] So the quarto. The folio-went out MALONE.

3 Made emulous miffions-] The meaning of miffion feems to be dispatches of the gods from heaven about mortal business, such as often happened at the fiege of Troy. JOHNSON.

It means the descent of deities to combat on either fide; an

ACHIL.

I have strong reasons.

ULYSS.

Of this my privacy

But 'gainst your privacy

The reasons are more potent and heroical: 'Tis known, Achilles, that you are in love With one of Priam's daughters.*

ACHIL.

ULrss. Is that a wonder?

Ha! known?"

The providence that's in a watchful state,
Knows almost every grain of Plutus' gold;"
Finds bottom in the uncomprehenfive deeps;
Keeps place with thought, and almoft, like the

gods,

idea which Shakspeare very probably adopted from Chapman's tranflation of Homer. In the fifth book Diomed wounds Mars, who on his return to heaven is rated by Jupiter for having interfered in the battle. This difobedience is the faction which I fuppofe Ulyffes would defcribe. STEEVENS.

—one of Priam's daughters.] Polyxena, in the act of marrying whom, he was afterwards killed by Paris. STEEVENS.

5 Ha! known? I muft fuppofe that, in the prefent inftance, fome word, wanting to the metre, has been omitted. Perhaps the poet wrote-Ha! is't known? STEEVENS.

the

6 Knows almost every grain of Plutus' gold;] For this elegant line. quarto has only :

Knows almost every thing. JOHNSON.

The old copy has-Pluto's gold; but, I think, we should readof Plutus' gold. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Philafter, A& IV: ""Tis not the wealth of Plutus, nor the gold

"Lock'd in the heart of earth." STEEVENS.

The correction of this obvious error of the prefs, needs no juftification, though it was not admitted by Mr. Steevens in his own edition. The fame error is found in Julius Cæfar, Act IV. sc. iii. where it has been properly corrected:

within, a heart,

"Dearer than Pluto's mine, richer than gold."

So, in this play, Act IV. fc. i. we find in the quarto-to Calcho's houfe-instead of-to Calchas' house. MALONE.

7 Keeps place with thought,] i. e. there is in the providence of a ftate, as in the providence of the univerfe, a kind of ubiquity,

Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles."
There is a mystery (with whom relation
Durft never meddle) in the foul of state;
Which hath an operation more divine,
Than breath, or pen, can give expreffure to:
All the commérce that you have had with Troy,
As perfectly is ours, as yours, my lord;
And better would it fit Achilles much,
To throw down Hector, than Polyxena:
But it must grieve young Pyrrhus now at home,
When fame shall in our islands found her trump;
And all the Greekish girls shall tripping fing,—
Great Hector's fifter did Achilles win;
But our great Ajax bravely beat down him.
Farewell, my lord: I as your lover speak;
The fool flides o'er the ice that you should break.
[Exit.

The expreffion is exquifitely fine: yet the Oxford editor alters it to-Keeps pace, and so destroys all its beauty. WARBURTON.

Is there not here fome allufion to that fublime defcription of the divine omniprefence in the 139th Pfalm? HENLEY.

Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.] It is clear from the defect of the metre that fome word of two fyllables was omitted by the carelessness of the tranfcriber or compofitor. Shakspeare perhaps wrote:

or,

Does thoughts themselves unveil in their dumb cradles,—

Does infant thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.

So, in King Richard III :

"And turn his infant morn to aged night." In Timon of Athens, we have the fame allufion :

Joy had the like conception in my brain,

"And at that inftant, like a babe sprung up." MALONE. Sir Thomas Hanmer reads:

Does even our thoughts &c. STEEVENS.

(with whom relation

Durft never meddle)-] There is a fecret administration of affairs, which no history was ever able to discover. JOHNSON.

PATR. To this effect, Achilles, have I mov'd you: A woman impudent and mannish grown Is not more loath'd than an effeminate man In time of action. I ftand condemn'd for this; They think, my little ftomach to the war, And your great love to me, reftrains you thus: Sweet, roufe yourself; and the weak wanton Cupid Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold, And, like a dew-drop from the lion's mane, Be fhook to air."

ACHIL.

Shall Ajax fight with Hector?

PATR. Ay; and, perhaps, receive much honour

by him.

ACHIL. I fee, my reputation is at stake

My fame is fhrewdly gor'd."

PATR.

O, then beware;

Those wounds heal ill, that men do give them

felves:

Omiffion to do what is neceffary'

Seals a commiffion to a blank of danger;
And danger, like an ague, fubtly taints

Even then when we fit idly in the fun.

ACHIL. Go call Therfites hither, fweet Patroclus:

I'll fend the fool to Ajax, and defire him
To invite the Trojan lords after the combat,
To fee us here unarm'd: I have a woman's longing,

to air.] So the quarto. The folio-ayrie air.

JOHNSON.

My fame is fhrewdly gor'd.] So, in our author's 110th Sonnet:
"Alas, 'tis true; I have gone here and there,—
"Gor'd mine own thoughts,." MALONE.

Omiffion to do &c.] By neglecting our duty we commiffion or enable that danger of dishonour, which could not reach us before, to lay hold upon us. JOHNSON.