Count. You have difcharg'd this honeftly; keep it to yourself: many likelihoods inform'd me of this before, which hung fo tottering in the balance, that I could neither believe nor mifdoubt: pray you, leave me ftall this in your bofom, and I thank you for your honeft care; I will speak with you further anon. [Exit Steward. Enter Helena. Count. Even fo it was with me, when I was young: If we are nature's, these are ours.: this thorn Doth to our rofe of youth rightly belong; Our blood to us, this to our blood, is born; Hel. What is your pleasure, madam? Count. Nay, a mother; Why not a mother? when I faid, a mother, That were enwombed mine: 'Tis often feen, 3 By our remembrances. That is, according to our recollection. So we fay, he is old by my reckoning. JOHNSON. + Such were our faults, or the we thought them none.] We should read, -O! thin we thou ht them none. A motive for pity and pardon; agreeable to fact, and the indulgent character of the speaker. This was fent to the Oxford editor, and he altered O, to the'. WARBURTON. You You ne'er opprefs'd me with a mother's groan, Count. I fay, I am your mother. The count Roufillon cannot be my brother: Count. Nor I your mother? Hel. You are my mother, madam; would you were, (So that my lord, your fon, were not my brother) Indeed, my mother!-or, were you both our mothers I care no more for, than I do for heaven. The fecond line has not the leaft glimmering of fenfe. Helen, by the indulgence and invitation of her mistress, is encouraged to difcover the hidden cause of her grief; which is the love of her miftrefs's fon; and taking hold of her mittrefs's words, where she bids her call her mother, the unfolds the mystery: and, as the is difcovering it, emboldens herself by this reflection, in the line in queftion, as it ought to be read in a parenthefis, (I CAN no more FEAR, than I do FEAR heav'n.) i. e. I can no more fear to truft fo indulgent a mistress with the fecret, than I can fear heaven, who has my vows for its happy iffue. This break, in her difcovery, is exceeding pertinent and fine. Here again the Oxford editor does his part. WARBURTON. 6 So I were not his fifter: can't no other, But, I your daughter, he must be my brother? Count. Yes, Helen, you might be my daughter-in law; God fhield, you mean it not! daughter, and mother Now I fee I do not much yieid to this emendation; yet I have not been able to please myself with any thing to which even my own partiality can give the preference. Sir Thomas Hanmer reads, Or were you both our mothers, I cannot ask for more than that of heaven. So I were not his fifter; can be no other Way I your daughter, but be must be my brother? JOHNSON. 6 Can't no other, But, I your daughter, he must be my brother.] The meaning is obfcur'd by the elliptical diction. Can it be no other way, but if I be your daughter he must be my brother? JOHNSON. The mystery of her levelings is beyond my comprehenfion: the old Countess is saying nothing ironical, nothing taunting, or in reproach, that this word fhould find a place here; which it could not, unless farcaftically employed, and with some spleen. I dare warrant, the poet meant, his old lady should fay no more than this: "I now find the mystery of your creeping into corners, "and weeping, and pining in fecret." For this reason I have amended the text, lonelines. The Steward, in the foregoing fcene, where he gives the Countefs intelligence of Helena's be haviour, fays; Alone fhe was, and did communicate to herself her own words to THEOBALD. her own ears. T. T. Your falt tears' head.] The force, the fountain of your tears, the cause of your grief. I JOHNSON. Against Against the proclamation of thy paffion, That truth fhould be fufpected: fpeak, is't fo? Hel. Good madam, pardon me! Hel. Do not you love him, madam ? Count. Go not about; my love hath in't a bond, Whereof the world takes note: come, come, difclofe The state of your affection; for your paffions Have to the full appeach'd. Hel. Then, I confefs, Here on my knee, before high heaven and you, My friends were poor, but honeft; fo's my love: By any token of prefumptuous fuit; Nor would I have him, 'till I do deferve him; 9 Captious and intenible fieve.] The word captious I never found in this fenfe; yet I cannot tell what to fubftitute, unless car ou for rotten, which yet is a word more likely to have been mistaken by the copyers than used by the author. JOHNSON. I still I still pour in the waters of my love, The fun, that looks upon his worshipper, Count. Had you not lately an intent, speak truly, To go to Paris? Hel. Madam, I had.. Count. Wherefore? tell true. Hel. I will tell truth; by grace itself, I fwear. For general fovereignty; and that he will'd me, 1 And lack not to lose fill: Perhaps we should read, And lack not to love ftill. T. T. 2 Notes, whofe faculties inclufive.] Receipts in which greater virtues were inclosed than appeared to obfervation. JOHNSON. |