2

Why cloud they not their fights perpetually,
If this be true, which makes me pale to read it?
Fair glass of light, I lov'd you, and could ftill,

1

[Takes hold of the hand of the princess.

Were not this glorious casket ftor'd with ill:
But I must tell you, -now, my thoughts revolt;
For he's no man on whom perfections wait,
That knowing fin within, will touch the gate.
You're a fair viol, and your fenfe the strings;
Who, finger'd to make man his lawful mufick,4
Would draw heaven down, and all the gods to

hearken;

But, being play'd upon before your time,
Hell only danceth at fo harsh a chime:
Good footh, I care not for you.

ANT. Prince Pericles, touch not, upon thy life,
For that's an article within our law,
As dangerous as the rest. Your time's expir'd;
Either expound now, or receive your fentence.

Why cloud they not - ) So, in Macbethe

"ftars, hide your fires,

"Let not light fee," &c. STEEVENS.

* For be's no man on whom perfections wait,] Means no more

than-he's no honest man, that knowing, &c. MALONE.

4 to make man - ] i. e. to produce for man, &c.

MALONE.

5 Prince Pericles, touch not, upon thy life, This is a stroke of pature. The incestuous king cannot bear to see a rival touch the hand of the woman he loves. His jealousy resembles that of Antony:

to let him be familiar with

My play-fellow, your hand, this kingly seal,-
And plighter of high hearts." STEEVENS.

Malefort, in Maffinger's Unnatural Combat, expresses the like impatient jealousy, when Beaufort touches his daughter Theocrine, to whom he was betrothed. M. MASON.

PER. Great king,

Few love to hear the fins they love to act;
'Twould 'braid yourself too near for me to tell it
Who has a book of all that monarchs do,
He's more fecure to keep it shut, than shown;
For vice repeated, is like the wand'ring wind,
Blows dust in others' eyes, to spread itself;
And yet the end of all is bought thus dear,
The breath is gone, and the fore eyes see clear
To ftop the air would hurt them. The blind mole

cafts

5. For vice repeated, is like the wand'ring wind,

Blows duft in others' eyes, to spread itself; &c.] That is, which blows duft, &c.

The man who knows of the ill pra&ices of princes, is unwise if he reveals what he knows; for the publisher of vicious actions resembles the wind, which, while it paffes along, blows duft into men's eyes. When the blast is over, the eye that has been affeded by the duft, fuffers no farther pain, but can fee as clearly as before; so by the relation of criminal aus, the eyes of mankind (though they are affected, and turn away with horror,) are opened, and fee clearly what before was not even suspeded: but by expofing the crimes of others, the relater suffers himself; as the breeze paffes away, so the breath of the informer is gone; he dies for his temerity. Yet, to stop the course or ventilation of the air, would hurt the eyes; and to prevent informers from divulging the crimes of men would be prejudicial to mankind.

Such, I think, is the meaning of this obfcure passage.

• The breath is gone, and the fore eyes fee clear To stop the air would hurt them.]

MALONE.

Malone has miftaken the meaning of this part of the speech of Pericles: - There should be no stop after the word clear, that line being neceffarily connected with the following words; and the meaning is this: " The breath is gone, and the eyes, though fore, see clear enough to stop for the future the air that would annoy them."

Malone supposes the sentence to end with the first of these lines, and makes the other a general political aphorifm, not perceiving that, " to stop the air would hurt them;" ;" means only to " ftop the air that would hurt them;" the pronoun being omitted; an ellipfis frequent not only in poetry, but in profe.

Pericles means only, by this fimilitude, to thew the danger of

Copp'd hills' towards heaven, to tell, the earth is

wrong'd

Ey man's oppreffion; and the poor worm doth die

for't. 9

Kings are earth's gods: in vice their law's their

will;

And if Jove stray, who dares say, Jove doth ill?
It is enough you know; and it is fit,
What being more known grows worse, to smother

it.

All love the womb that their first being bred,
Then give my tongue like leave to love my head.

revealing the crimes of princes; for as they feel themselves hurt by the publication of their shame, they will, of course, prevent a repetition of it, by destroying the person who divulged it: He pursues the same idea in the instance of the mole, and concludes with requesting that the king would

" Give his tongue like leave to love his head."

That is, that he would not force his tongue to speak what, if spoken, would prove his deftruction.

In the second scene Pericles says, speaking of the King: " And what may make him blush in being known, "He'll flop the course by which it might be known."

Which confirms my explanation.

M. MASON.

7 Copp'd hills-] i. e. rifing to a top or head. Copped Hall, in Effex, was so named from the lofty pavilion on the roof of the old house, which has been since pulled down. The upper tire of masonry that covers a wall is ftill called the copping or coping. High-crowned hats were anciently called copatain hats.

the earth is wrong'd

STEEVENS.

By man's oppreffion;) Old copies - throng'd. For this change I am anfwerable. STEEVENS.

9

and the poor worm doth die for't.) I suppose he means to call the mole, (which suffers in its attempts to complain of man's injuftice) a poor worm, as a term of commiferation. Thus, in The Tempest, Profpero speaking to Miranda, says,

"Poor worm! thou art infected."

The mole remains secure till he has thrown up those hillocks, which, by pointing out the course he is pursuing, enable the vermin-hunter to catch him. STEEVENS.

ANT. Heaven, that I had thy head! he has found the meaning;

But I will gloze with him.3 [Afide.] Young prince

of lyre,

Though, by the tenour of our strict edit,4
Your expofition mifinterpreting,
We might proceed to cancel of your days;
Yet hope, fucceeding from fo fair a tree

!

Heaven, that I had thy head!] The speaker may either mean to fay, O, that I had thy ingenuity! or, O, that I had thy head, fever'd from thy body! The latter, I believe, is the meaning.

Б

But I will gloze with him. So, Gower:
"The kinge was wondre forie tho,
"And thought, if that he faid it oute,
"Then were he shamed all aboute:
"With flie wordes and with felle

MALONE

He fayth: My fonne I shall thee telle,
"Though that thou be of littel witte," &c. MALONE.

our trid tid, The old copy has - your tria edia Correded in the folio. MALONF.

5 Your exposition misinterpreting,,]

Your exposition of the riddle

being a mistaken one; not interpreting it rightly. MALONE.

6

to cancel of your days;) The quarto, 1609, reads - to counsel of your days; which may mean, to deliberate how long you Shall be permitted to live. But I believe that counsel was merely an error of the press, which the editor of the folio, 1664, correded by reading to cancel off your days The substitution of off for of is unneceffary; for cancel may have been used as a fubftantive. We might proceed to the cancellation or destrution of your life. Shakspeare uses the participle cancell'd in the feuse required here, in his Rape of Lucrece, 1594:

"An expir'd date, cancell'd ere well begun."

The following lines in King Richard III. likewife confirm the reading that has been chofen:

Cancel his bond of life, dear God, I pray,

"That I may live to lay, the dog is dead." MALONE.

To omit the article was formerly a practice not uncommon. So, in Titus Andronicus: " Afcend, fair queen, Pantheon," i. e. the Pantheon.

STEEVENS.

Again, in King Lear:

Hot queftrifts after him, met him at gate." MALONE.

As your fair felf, doth tune us otherwife:
Forty days longer we do refpite you;"
If by which time our fecret be undone,
This mercy shows, we'll joy in fuch a fon:
And until then, your entertain shall be,
As doth befit our honour, and your worth.

[Exeunt ANTIOCHUS, his daughter, and Attend, PER. How courtesy would feem to cover fin! When what is done is like an hypocrite, The which is good in nothing but in fight. If it be true that I interpret falfe, Then were it certain, you were not so bad,' As with foul incest to abuse your foul; Where now you're both a father and a fon,

7 Forty days longer we do respite you;] In The Gesta Romanorum, Confeffio Amantis, and The History of King Appolyn, thirty days only are allowed for the solution of this question. It is difficult to account for this minute variation, but by fuppofing that our author copied fome tranflation of the Gefla Romanorum hitherto undifcovered. MALONE.

It is thirty days in Twine's tranflation. Forty. as I have obseryed in a note on fome other play (I forget which) was the familiar term when the number to be mentioned was not of arithe metical importance, STELLENS.

8

your entertain shall be,

As doth befit our honour, and your worth.] I have no doubt bus that these two lines were intended to rhyme together in our author's copy, where originally they might have stood thus :

your entertain shall be,

9 Where now you're both a father and a son.] Where, in this place, has the power of whereas. So, in The Two Gentlemen of Verona:

" And where I thought the remnant of mine age
"Should have been cherish'd by her childlike duty,
I am now full refoly'd to take a wife."