Suppofing that I lack'd it: But on, Cæfar; CES. To lend me arms, and aid, when I requir'd them; you both denied. The which LEP. 'Tis nobly spoken.8 MEC. If it might please you, to enforce no fur ther I do not think that either Johnson's or Malone's explanation of this paffage is fatisfactory. The true meaning of it appears. to be this:" Cæfar accuses Antony of a breach of honour in denying to fend him aid when he required it, which was contrary to his oath. Antony fays, in his defence, that he did not deny his aid, but, in the midft of diffipation, neglected to fend it: that having now brought his forces to join him against Pompey, he had redeemed that error; and that therefore the honour which Cæfar talked of, was now facred and inviolate, fuppofing that he had been fomewhat deficient before, in the performance of that engagement."-The adverb now refers to is, not to talks on; and the line should be pointed thus: The honour's facred that he talks on, now, 7 Suppofing that I lack'd it. M. MASON. nor my power Work without it:] Nor my greatness work without mine honefty. MALONE. 8 'Tis nobly Spoken.] Thus the fecond folio. The firstnoble. STEEVENS. The griefs between ye: to forget them quite, Speaks to atone you.1 LEP. Worthily fpoke, Mecænas. ENO. Or, if you borrow one another's love for the inftant, you may, when you hear no more words of Pompey, return it again: you fhall have time to wrangle in, when you have nothing else to do. ANT. Thou art a foldier only; fpeak no more. ENO. That truth fhould be filent, I had almost forgot. I ANT. You wrong this prefence, therefore fpeak no more. ENO. Go to then; your confiderate stone.3 The griefs-] i. e. grievances. See Vol. XI. p. 392, n. 2. MALONE. to atone you.] i. e. reconcile you. See Cymbeline, Vol. XVIII. A&t I. fc. v. STEEVENS. ? That truth fhould be filent,] We find a fimilar fentiment in King Lear: "Truth's a dog that must to kennel,—.” STEEVENS. 3 your confiderate ftone.] This line is paffed by all the editors, as if they understood it, and believed it univerfally intelligible. I cannot find in it any very obvious, and hardly any poffible, meaning. I would therefore read: Go to then, you confiderate ones. You who dislike my frankness and temerity of speech, and are fo confiderate and difcreet, go to, do your own bufinefs. JOHNSON. I believe, Go to then; your confiderate ftone, means only this-If I must be chidden, henceforward I will be mute as a marble ftatue, which feems to think, though it can fay nothing. As filent as a Stone, however, might have been once a common phrafe. So, in the interlude of Jacob and Efau, 1598: 66 Bring thou in thine, Mido, and fee thou be a stone. "Rebecca.] I meant thou should't nothing fay." CES. I do not much dislike the matter, but The manner of his fpeech :4 for it cannot be, We shall remain in friendship, our conditions Again, in the old metrical romance of Syr Guy of Warwick, bl. 1. no date: "Guy let it paffe as ftill as ftone, "And to the fteward word fpake none." Again, in Titus Andronicus, Act IIÌ. sc. i: "A ftone is filent and offendeth not." Again, Chaucer : "To riden by the way, dombe as a ftone." In Burton's Anatomy of Melancholy, Part I. Sect. 2, Memb. 3, Subf. 15, is the following quotation from Horace : 66 -ftatua taciturnior exit, Plurumque et rifum populi quatit." The fame idea, perhaps, in a more dilated form, will be found in our author's King Henry VIII: If we fhall ftand still, "In fear our motion should be mock'd or carp'd at, "State ftatues only." Mr. Tollet explains the paffage in queftion thus: "I will henceforth feem fenfelefs as a stone, however I may obferve and confider your words and actions." STEEVENS. The metre of this line is deficient. It will be perfect, and the fense rather clearer, if we read (without altering a letter): your confiderateft one. I doubt, indeed, whether this adjective is ever used in the fuperlative degree; but in the mouth of Enobarbus it might be pardoned. BLACKSTONE. Your, like hour, &c. is used as a diffyllable; the metre, therefore, is not defective. MALone. That the metre is completed by reading your as a diffyllable, my ear, at leaft, is unconvinced. STEEVENS. As Enobarbus, to whom this line belongs, generally speaks in plain profe, there is no occafion for any further attempt to harmonize it. RITSON.. 4 I do not much dislike the matter, but The manner of his Speech:] I do not, fays Cæfar, think the man wrong, but too free of his interpofition; for it cannot be, we shall remain in friendship: yet if it were poffible, I would endeavour it. JOHNSON, So differing in their acts. Yet, if I knew edge O' the world I would pursue it. AGR. CES. Speak, Agrippa. Give me leave, Cæfar, AGR. Thou haft a fifter by the mother's fide, Admir'd Octavia: great Mark Antony Is now a widower. CES. Say not fo, Agrippa ; 6. If Cleopatra heard you, your reproof 5 What hoop Should hold us ftaunch,] So, in King Henry IV. Part II: 6 Say not fo, Agrippa ;] The old copy has-Say not say. Mr. Rowe made this neceffary correction. MALONE. 7 -your reproof Were well deferv'd-] In the old edition : -your proof Were well deferved which Mr. Theobald, with his usual triumph, changes to approof, which he explains, allowance. Dr. Warburton inserted reproof very properly into Hanmer's edition, but forgot it in his own. JOHNSON. Your reproof &c.] That is, you might be reproved for your rafhnefs, and would well deserve it.-Your reproof, means, the reproof you would undergo. The expreffion is rather licentious; but one of a fimilar nature occurs in The Cuftom of the Country, where Arnoldo, fpeaking to the Phyfician, fays: And by your fuccefs "In all your undertakings, propagate Here, your opinion means, the opinion conceived of you. M. MASON. Dr. Warburton's emendation is certainly right. The error was one of many which are found in the old copy, in confequence of the transcriber's ear deceiving him. So, in another ANT. I am not married, Cæfar: let me hear Agrippa further speak. your hearts AGR. To hold you in perpetual amity, To make you brothers, and to knit With an unflipping knot, take Antony Octavia to his wife: whose beauty claims No worse a husband than the best of men; Whofe virtue, and whofe general graces, fpeak That which none else can utter. By this marriage, All little jealoufies, which now seem great, And all great fears, which now import their dan gers, Would then be nothing: truths would be but tales, ANT. Will Cæfar speak? CES. Not till he hears how Antony is touch'd With what is spoke already." ANT. If I would fay, Agrippa, be it fo, CES. What power is in Agrippa, The power of Cæfar, and scene of this play, we find in the firft copy-mine nightingale, inftead of my nightingale; in Coriolanus, news is coming, for news is come in; in the fame play, higher for hire, &c. &c. 8 MALONE. but tales,] The conjunction-but, was fupplied by Sir Thomas Hanmer, to perfect the metre. We might read, I think, with lefs alliteration-as tales. STEEVENS. 9 already.] This adverb may be fairly confidered as an interpolation. Without enforcing the fenfe, it violates the meafure. STEEVENS. |