Enter Duke FREDERICK, OLIVER, Lords, and DUKE F. Not fee him fince? Sir, fir, that can not be: 8 But were I not the better part made mercy, Thy lands, and all things that thou dost call thine, Worth seizure, do we feize into our hands; OLI. O, that your highness knew my heart in this! I never lov'd my brother in my life. 8 DUKE F. More villain thou.-Well, push him out of doors; an abfent argument-] An argument is used for the contents of a book, thence Shakspeare confidered it as meaning the fubject, and then used it for fubject in yet another sense. JOHNSON. Seek him with candle ;) Alluding, probably, to St. Luke's Gospel, ch. xv. v. 8: " If she lose one piece, doth she not light a candle, and feek diligently till she find it?" STEEVENS. And let my officers of such a nature [Exeunt. SCENE II. The Forest. Enter Orlando, with a Paper. ORL. Hang there, my verse, in witness of my love: And, thou, thrice-crowned queen of night, sur vey With thy chaste eye, from thy pale sphere above, Thy huntress' name, that my full life doth sway. 9 And let my officers of fuch a nature 4 Make an extent upon his house and lands:] "To make an extent of lands," is a legal phrafe, from the words of a writ, (extendi facias) whereby the sheriff is directed to cause certain lands to be appraised to their full extended value, before he delivers them to the person entitled under a recognizance, &c. in order that it may be certainly known how foon the debt will be paid. 2 MALONE. -expediently,] That is, expeditiously. JOHNSON. Expedient, throughout our author's plays, signifies-expeditious. So, in King John: "His marches are expedient to this town." Again, in King Richard II: 3 "Are making hither with all due expedience." STEEVENS. thrice-crowned queen of night, Alluding to the triple character of Proferpine, Cynthia, and Diana, given by some mythologifts to the fame goddess, and comprised in these memorial lines: 4 Terret, luftrat, agit, Proferpina, Luna, Diana, JOHNSON. that my full life doth sway.] So, in Twelfth Night: "M. O. A. I. doth sway my life." STEEVENS. O Rosalind! these trees shall be my books, And in their barks my thoughts I'll character; That every eye, which in this forest looks, Shall fee thy virtue witness'd every where. Run, run, Orlando; carve, on every tree, The fair, the chaste, and unexpressives the. [Exit. Enter CORIN and TOUCHSTONE. Cor. And how like you this shepherd's life, mafter Touchstone? I TOUCH. Truly, shepherd, in respect of itself, it is a good life; but in refpect that it is a shepherd's life, it is naught. In respect that it is folitary, like it very well; but in respect that it is private, it is a very vile life. Now in respect it is in the fields, it pleaseth me well; but in respect it is not in the court, it is tedious. As it is a spare life, look you, it fits my humour well; but as there is no more plenty in it, it goes much againft my stomach. Hast any philosophy in thee, shepherd? COR. No more, but that I know, the more one fickens, the worse at ease he is; and that he that wants money, means, and content, is without three good friends :-That the property of rain is to wet, and fire to burn: That good pasture makes fat sheep; and that a great cause of the night, is lack of the fun: That he, that hath learned no wit by 4-unexpressive-] For inexpressible. JOHNSON. Milton also, in his Hymn on the Nativity, uses unexpreffive for inexpreffible: Harping with loud and folemn quire, MALONF. nature nor art, may complain of good breeding, or comes of a very dull kindred.s TOUCH. Such a one is a natural philofopher. 6 Wast ever in court, shepherd? Сок. No, truly, TOUCH. Then thou art damn'd. COR. Nay, I hope, TOUCH. Truly, thou art damn'd; like an ill roasted egg, all on one fide. she, that hath learned no wit by nature nor art, may complain of good breeding, or comes of a very dull kindred.] I am in doubt whether the custom of the language in Shakfpeare's time did not authorise this mode of speech, and make complain of good breeding the fame with complain of the want of good breeding. In the last line of The Merchant of Venice we find that to fear the keeping is to fear the not keeping. JOHNSON. I think, he means rather-may complain of a good education, for being so inefficient, of so little use to him. MALONE. 6 Such a one is a natural philofopher.) The shepherd had faid all the philofophy he knew was the property of things, that rain wetted, fire burnt, &c. And the Clown's reply, in a fatire on phyficks or natural philosophy, though introduced with a quibble, is extremely just. For the natural philosopher is indeed as ignorant (notwithstanding all his parade of knowledge) of the efficient cause of things, as the ruftic. It appears, from a thousand instances, that our poet was well acquainted with the physics of his time; and his great penetration enabled him to fee this remediless defect of it. WARBURTON. Shakspeare is responsible for the quibble only, let the commentator anfwer for the refinement. STEEVENS. The Clown calls Corin a natural philosopher, because he reafons from his obfervations on nature. M. MASON. A natural being a common term for a fool, Touchstone, perhaps, means to quibble on the word. He may however only mean, that Corin is a felf-taught philofopher; the difciple of nature. 7 MALONE. like an ill-roasted egg,] Of this jest I do not fully comprehend the meaning. JOHNSON. There is a proverb, that a fool is the best roafter of an egg, because he is always turning it. This will explain how an egg may COR. For not being at court? Your reason. TOUCH. Why, if thou never wast at court, thou never faw'st good manners; if thou never faw'st good manners, then thy manners must be wicked; and wickedness is fin, and sin is damnation: Thou art in a parlous state, shepherd. Cor. Not a whit, Touchstone: those, that are good manners at the court, are as ridiculous in the country, as the behaviour of the country is most mockable at the court. You told me, you falute not at the court, but you kiss your hands; that courtesy would be uncleanly, if courtiers were shepherds. TOUCH. Instance, briefly; come, instance. COR. Why, we are still handling our ewes; and their fells, you know, are greafy. TOUCH. Why, do not your courtier's hands sweat? and is not the grease of a mutton as wholesome as the sweat of a man? Shallow, shallow: A better instance, I say; come. 1 COR. Besides, our hands are hard. Touch. Your lips will feel them the sooner. Shallow, again: A more founder instance, come. be damn'd all on one fide; but will not sufficiently show how Touchstone applies his fimile with propriety; unless he means that he who has not been at court is but half educated. STEEVENS. I believe there was nothing intended in the corresponding part of the fimile, to answer to the words, "all on one fide." Shakspeare's fimiles (as has been already observed) hardly ever run on four feet. Touchstone, I apprehend, only means to say, that Corin is completely damned; as irretrievably destroyed as an egg that is utterly spoiled in the roasting, by being done all on one side only. So, in a subsequent scene, " and both in a tune, like two gypfies on a horfe." Here the poet certainly meant that the speaker and his companion should fing in unifon, and thus resemble each other as perfectly as two gypfies on a horsfe;-not that two gypfies on a horse sing both in a tune. MALONE. |