Purpose to make mon glorious; &c.] Old copy

The putchase is to make men glorious; &c. STEEVENS.

There is an irregularity of metre in this couplet. The same variation is observable in Macbeth:

"I am for the air; this night I'll spend

The old copies read - The purchase &c. Mr. Steevens suggested this emendation. MALONE.

Being now convinced that all the irregular lines detected in The Midsummer Night's Dream, Macbeth, and Pericles, have been prolonged by interpolations which afford no additional beauties, I am become more confident in my attempt to amend the passage before us. Throughout this play it should seem to be a very frequent pradice of the reciter, or transcriber, to supply words which, for fome foolish reason or other, were supposed to be wanting. Unskill'd in the language of poetry, and more especially in that which was clouded by an affectation of antiquity, thefe ignorant people regarded many contrations and ellipfes, as indications of fomewhat accidentally omitted; and while they inserted only monofyllables or unimportant words in imaginary vacancies, they conceived themselves to be doing little mischief. Liberties of this kind must have been taken with the piece under confideration. The meafure of it is too regular and harmonious in many places, for us to think it was utterly neglected in the rest. As this play will never be received as the entire composition of Shakspeare, and as violent diforders require medicines of proportionable violence, I have been by no means fcrupulous in ftriving to reduce the metre to that exactness which I suppose it originally to have poffeffed. Of the fame license I should not have availed myself had I been employed on any of the undisputed dramas of our author. Those experiments which we are forbidden to perform ou living subjects, may properly be attempted on dead ones, among which our Pericles may be reckoned; being dead, in its present form to all purposes of the stage, and of no very promifing life in the closet.

The purpose is to make men glorious,

Et bonum quo antiquius co melius. As I suppose these lines with their context, to have originally stood as follows, I have fo given them:

And lords and ladies, of their lives

Have read it es restoratives:

'Purpose to make men glorious;

Et quo antiquius, co melius.

If you, born in these latter times,
When wit's more ripe, accept my rhymes,
And that to hear an old man fing,
May to your wishes pleasure bring,
I life would wish, and that I might
Waste it for you, like taper-light.-

This innovation may feem to introduce obscurity; but in huddling words on each other, without their neceffary articles and prepofitions, the chief skill of our present imitator of antiquated rhyme appears to have confifted.

Again, old copy:

"This Antioch then, Antiochus the great

"Built up; this city, for his chiefest seat."

I suppose the original lines were these, and as such have printed them:

This city then, Antioch the great

"Built up for his chiefest seat."

Another redundant line offers itself in the fame chorus:
"Bad child, worse father! to entice his own -"
which I also give as I conceive it to have originally stood, thust

"Bad father! to entice his own."

The words omitted are of little consequence, and the artificial comparison between the guilt of the parent and the child, has no refemblance to the fimplicity of Gower's narratives. The lady's frailty is fufficiently ftigmatized in the ensuing lines. See my further sentiments concerning the irregularities of Shakspeare's metre, in a note on The Tempest, Vol. IV. p. 68, n. 6; and again in Vol. XI. p. 173, n. 7. STEEVENS.

for his chiefest seat;) So, in Twine's Translation - "The most famous and mighty King Antiochus, which builded the goodlie citie of Antiochia in Syria, and called it after his owne name, as the chiefeft feat of all his dominions. STEEVENS.

7 (I tell you what mine authors say :)) This is added in imitation of Gower's manner, and that of Chaucer, Lydgate, &c. who often thus refer to the original of their tales. - These choruses refemble Gower in few other particulars. STEEVENS.

1

8

This king unto him took a pheere,
Who died and left a female heir,
So buxom, blithe, and full of face,
As heaven had lent her all his grace:
With whom the father liking took,
And her to incest did provoke:
Bad father! to entice his own
To evil, thould be done by none.
By custom. what they did begin,
Was, with long use, account no fin.
The beauty of this finful dame,
Made many princes thither frame,3
To feek her as a bed-fellow,
In marriage-pleasures play-fellow:
Which to prevent, he made a law,
(To keep her still, and men in awe, 4)

unto him took a pheere, ] This word, which is frequently used by our old poets, fignifies a mate or companion. The old copies have-peer. For the emendation I am answerable. Throughout this prece, the poet, though he has not closely copied the language of Gower's poem, has endeavoured to give his speeches somewhat of an autique air. MALONE.

See Vol. XIX. p. 324, n. 6. STEEVENS.

8 full of face, i. e. completely, exuberantly beautiful. A means a complete, a large one. See alfo

full fortune, in Othello, Vol. XVI. p. 373, n. 7. 9 By custom, what they ligibly-But cuftom &c.

2

MALONE.

did begin, ) All the copies read, unintel

MALONE.

account no fin.) Account for accounted. So, in King

John, waft for wafted:

Than now the English bottoms have waft o'er."

Again, in Gascoigne's Complaint of Philomene, 1575:

"And by the lawde of his pretence

His lewdness was acquit."

STEEVENS.

The old copies read-account'd. For the correction I am an

fwerable.

3

MALONE.

thither frame,] i. e. shape or direct their course thither.

MALONE.

(To keep her still, and men in awe,)] The meaning, I think,

is, not to keep her and men in awe, but, to keep her ftill to himself, and to deter others from demanding her in marriage. MALONE.

Mr. Malone has properly interpreted this passage. So, in Twine's tranflation: which false resemblance of hateful marriage, to the intent that he might alwaies enjoy, he invented &c. to drive away all fuitors that should refort unto her, by propounding" &c. See alfo p. 22, n. 5. STEEVENS.

5

many a wight-]

The quarto, 160g, reads - many of wight. Correded in the folio. MALONE.

Perhaps the corre&ion is erroneous, and we should read, nearer

to the traces of the old copy:

So for her many of might did die,--. i. e. many men of might. Thus, afterwards:

" You fometime famous princes," &c..

Thew in the quarto 1609, might be only an m reversed. STEEVENS.
As yon grim looks do teflify. Gower must be supposed here to
point to the heads of those uufortunate wights, which, he tells us,
in his poem, were fixed on the gate of the palace at Antioch:

"The fader, whan he understood
"That thei his doughter thus befought,
"With all his wit he cast and fought
" Howe that he mighte fyude a lette;
"And fuch a statute them he sette,
"And in this wife his lawe taxeth,
"That what man his doughter axeth,
"But if he couth his queftion
"Affoyle upon fuggeftion,
"Of certeyn thinges that befell,
"The which he wolde unto him tell,
"He shulde in certeyn lese his hedes
"And thus there were many dede,
"Her heades ftondinge on the gate;
"Till at laft, long and late,

"For lack of answere in this wife
"The remenant, that wexen wyfe,
Eschewden to make affaie."

MALONE.

As yon grim looks do testify] This is an indication to me of the ufe of scenery in our ancient theatres. I suppose the audience were here entertained with the view of a kind of Temple-bar at Antioch. STEEYANS.

4

6

What now ensues, to the judgment of your eye
I give, my cause who best can justify.' [Exit.

SCENE I.

Antioch. A Room in the Palace.

Enter ANTIOCHUS, PERICLES, and Attendants.

ANT. Young prince of Tyre, you have at large

receiv'd

The danger of the task you undertake.

• What now ensues, ] The folio-What ensues. The original copy has What now ensues. MALONE.

7--my cause who beft can justify.] i. e. which (the judgment of your eye) best can justify, i. e. prove its resemblance to the ordinary course of nature. So, afterwards:

"When thou shalt kneel, and justify in knowledge,-." But as no other of the four next choruses concludes with a heroick couplet, unless through interpolation, I susped that the two lines before us originally stood thus:

What

"What now ensues,

" I give to the judgment of your eye,

My cause who best can juftify."

In another of Gower's monologues there is an avowed hemiftichs

"And yet he rides it out. Now please you wit

"The epitaph is for Marina writ

" By wicked Dionyza."

Sce A& IV. Sc. iv. STEEVENS.

• Young prince of Tyre.] It does not appear in the present drama that the father of Pericles is living. By prince, therefore, throughout this play, we are to understand prince regnant. Sce A& II. fc. iv. and the epitaph in A& III. sc. iii. In the Gefla Romanorum, Apollonius is king of Tyre; and Appolyn, in Copland's tranflation from the French, has the same title. Our author, in calling Pencies a prince, seems to have followed Gower.

MALONE.

In Twine's tranflation he is repeatedly called "Prince of Tyrus."
STEEVENS.