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;
It is the fhew and feal of nature's truth,
Where love's strong paffion is impreft in youth:
By our remembrances of days foregone,
Such were our faults, O! then we thought them none.
Her eye is fick on't; I obferve her now.

Hel. What is your pleasure, madam?
Count. You know, Helen, I am a mother to you.
He!. Mine honourable miftrefs.

Count. Nay, a mother;

Why not a mother? when I faid, a mother,
Methought, you faw a ferpent: What's in mother,
That you ftart at it? I fay, I am your mother;
And put you in the catalogue of thofe,

That were enwombed mine: 'Tis often feen,
Adoption frives with nature; and choice breeds
A native flip to us from foreign feeds.

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,
Yet I express to you a mother's care :-
God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood,
To fay, I am thy mother? What's the matter,
That this diftemper'd meffenger of wet,
The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye?
Why?that you are my daughter?
Hel. That I am not.

Count. I fay, I am your mother.
Hel. Pardon, madam.

The count Roufillon cannot be my brother:
I am from humble, he from honour'd name;
No note upon my parents, his all noble.
My mafter, my dear lord he is; and I
His fervant live, and will his vaffal die :
He must not 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
So ftrive upon your pulfe: What, pale again?
My fear hath catch'd your fondness.

Now I fee
The mystery of your lonelinefs, and find
"Your falt tears' head. Now to all fenfe 'tis grofs,
You love my fon; invention is afham'd,

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.
The late Mr. Hall had corrected this, I believe, rightly,-
your lowlines.

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,
To say, thou dost not: therefore tell me true;
But tell me then 'tis fo :-For, look, thy cheeks
Confefs it one to the other; and thine eyes
See it fo grofly fhewn in thy behaviour,
That in their kind they fpeak it only fin
And hellish obftinacy tie thy tongue,

That truth fhould be fufpected: fpeak, is't fo?
If it be fo, you have wound a goodly clue:
If it be not, forfwear't: howe'er, I charge thee,
As heaven shall work in me for thine avail,
To tell me truly.

Hel. Good madam, pardon me!
Count. Do you love my fon?
Hel. Your pardon, noble mistress!
Count. Love you my fon?

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,
That before you, and next unto high heaven,
I love your fon :-

My friends were poor, but honeft; fo's my love:
Be not offended; for it hurts not him,
That he is lov'd of me: I follow him not

By any token of prefumptuous fuit;

Nor would I have him, 'till I do deferve him;
Yet never know, how that defert should be.
I know, I love in vain, ftrive against hope;
Yet, in this captious and intenible sieve,

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,
And lack not to lofe ftill: thus, Indian-like,
Religious in mine error, I adore

The fun, that looks upon his worshipper,
But knows of him no more. My dearest madam,
Let not your hate encounter with my love,
For loving where you do: but if yourself,
Whofe aged honour cites a virtuous youth,
Did ever, in fo true a flame of liking
Wish chaftly, and love dearly, that your Dian
Was both herself and love; O then, give pity
To her, whose state is such, that cannot chufe
But lend, and give, where she is fure to lofe;
That feeks not to find that, her fearch implies;
But, riddle-like, lives fweetly where fhe dies.

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.
You know, my father left me fome prescriptions
Of rare, and prov'd effects; fuch as his reading
And manifeft experience had collected

For general fovereignty; and that he will'd me,
In heedfulleft refervation to bestow them,
As notes, whofe faculties inclufive were,
More than they were in note: amongst the rest,
There is a remedy, approv'd, fet down,
To cure the defperate languifhings, whereof
The king is render'd loft.

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.
Count.