Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Beaumont and Fletcher Part 8

"_Shal._ The luce is the fresh fish, the salt fish is an old coat."

I cannot understand this. Perhaps there is a corruption both of words and speakers. Shallow no sooner corrects one mistake of Sir Hugh's, namely, "louse" for "luce," a pike, but the honest Welchman falls into another, namely, "cod" (_baccala_). _Cambrice_-"cot" for coat.

"_Shal._ The luce is the fresh fish-

_Evans._ The salt fish is an old cot."

"Luce is a fresh fish, and not a louse;" says Shallow. "Aye, aye," quoth Sir Hugh; "the _fresh_ fish is the luce; it is an old cod that is the salt fish." At all events, as the text stands, there is no sense at all in the words.

_Ib._ sc. 3-

"_Fal._ Now, the report goes, she has all the rule of her husband's purse; He hath a legion of angels.

_Pist._ As many devils entertain; and _To her, boy_, say I."

Perhaps it is-

"As many devils enter (or enter'd) swine; and _to her, boy_, say I:"-

a somewhat profane, but not un-Shakespearian, allusion to the "legion" in St. Luke's "gospel."

"Measure For Measure."

This play, which is Shakespeare's throughout, is to me the most painful-say rather, the only painful-part of his genuine works. The comic and tragic parts equally border on the ?s?t??,-the one being disgusting, the other horrible; and the pardon and marriage of Angelo not merely baffles the strong indignant claim of justice-(for cruelty, with l.u.s.t and d.a.m.nable baseness, cannot be forgiven, because we cannot conceive them as being morally repented of); but it is likewise degrading to the character of woman. Beaumont and Fletcher, who can follow Shakespeare in his errors only, have presented a still worse, because more loathsome and contradictory, instance of the same kind in the _Night-Walker_, in the marriage of Alathe to Algripe. Of the counter-balancing beauties of _Measure for Measure_, I need say nothing; for I have already remarked that the play is Shakespeare's throughout.

Act iii. sc. 1.-

"Ay, but to die, and go we know not where," &c.

"This natural fear of Claudio, from the antipathy we have to death, seems very little varied from that infamous wish of Maecenas, recorded in the 101st epistle of Seneca:-

"_Debilem facito manu,_ _Debilem pede, c.o.xa_" &c.-Warburton's note.

I cannot but think this rather a heroic resolve, than an infamous wish. It appears to me to be the grandest symptom of an immortal spirit, when even that bedimmed and overwhelmed spirit recked not of its own immortality, still to seek to be,-to be a mind, a will.

As fame is to reputation, so heaven is to an estate, or immediate advantage. The difference is, that the self-love of the former cannot exist but by a complete suppression and habitual supplantation of immediate selfishness. In one point of view, the miser is more estimable than the spendthrift;-only that the miser's present feelings are as much of the present as the spendthrift's. But _caeteris paribus_, that is, upon the supposition that whatever is good or lovely in the one coexists equally in the other, then, doubtless, the master of the present is less a selfish being, an animal, than he who lives for the moment with no inheritance in the future. Whatever can degrade man, is supposed in the latter case; whatever can elevate him, in the former. And as to self;-strange and generous self! that can only be such a self by a complete divestment of all that men call self,-of all that can make it either practically to others, or consciously to the individual himself, different from the human race in its ideal. Such self is but a perpetual religion, an inalienable acknowledgment of G.o.d, the sole basis and ground of being. In this sense, how can I love G.o.d, and not love myself, as far as it is of G.o.d?

_Ib._ sc. 2.-

"Pattern in himself to know, Grace to stand, and virtue go."

Worse metre, indeed, but better English would be,-

"Grace to stand, virtue to go."

"Cymbeline."

Act i. sc. 1.-

"You do not meet a man, but frowns: our bloods No more obey the heavens, than our courtiers'

Still seem, as does the king's."

There can be little doubt of Mr. Tyrwhitt's emendations of "courtiers" and "king," as to the sense;-only it is not impossible that Shakespeare's dramatic language may allow of the word "brows" or "faces" being understood after the word "courtiers'," which might then remain in the genitive case plural. But the nominative plural makes excellent sense, and is sufficiently elegant, and sounds to my ear Shakespearian. What, however, is meant by "our bloods no more obey the heavens?"-Dr. Johnson's a.s.sertion that "bloods" signify "countenances," is, I think, mistaken both in the thought conveyed-(for it was never a popular belief that the stars governed men's countenances)-and in the usage, which requires an ant.i.thesis of the blood,-or the temperament of the four humours, choler, melancholy, phlegm, and the red globules, or the sanguine portion, which was supposed not to be in our own power, but to be dependent on the influences of the heavenly bodies,-and the countenances which are in our power really, though from flattery we bring them into a no less apparent dependence on the sovereign, than the former are in actual dependence on the constellations.

I have sometimes thought that the word "courtiers" was a misprint for "countenances," arising from an antic.i.p.ation, by foreglance of the compositor's eye, of the word "courtier" a few lines below. The written _r_ is easily and often confounded with, the written _n_. The compositor read the first syllable _court_, and-his eye at the same time catching the word "courtier" lower down-he completed the word without reconsulting the copy. It is not unlikely that Shakespeare intended first to express, generally, the same thought, which a little afterwards he repeats with a particular application to the persons meant;-a common usage of the p.r.o.nominal "our," where the speaker does not really mean to include himself; and the word "you" is an additional confirmation of the "our,"

being used in this place for "men" generally and indefinitely,-just as "you do not meet" is the same as "one does not meet."

Act i. sc. 1 Imogen's speech:-

... "My dearest husband, I something fear my father's wrath; but nothing (Always reserved my holy duty) what His rage can do on me;"

Place the emphasis on "me"; for "rage" is a mere repet.i.tion of "wrath."

"_Cym._ O disloyal thing; That should'st repair my youth; thou heapest A year's age on me!"

How is it that the commentators take no notice of the un-Shakespearian defect in the metre of the second line, and what in Shakespeare is the same, in the harmony with the sense and feeling? Some word or words must have slipped out after "youth,"-possibly "and see":-

"That should'st repair my youth!-and see, thou heap'st," &c.

_Ib._ sc. 3. Pisanio's speech:-

... "For so long As he could make me with _this_ eye or ear Distinguish him from others," &c.

But "_this_ eye," in spite of the supposition of its being used de??t????, is very awkward. I should think that either "or" or "the" was Shakespeare's word;-

"As he could make me or with eye or ear."

_Ib._ sc. 6. Iachimo's speech:-

... "Hath nature given them eyes To see this vaulted arch, and the rich crop Of sea and land, which can distinguish 'twixt The fiery orbs above, and the twinn'd stones Upon the number'd beach."

I would suggest "cope" for "crop." As to "twinn'd stones"-may it not be a bold _catachresis_ for muscles, c.o.c.kles, and other empty sh.e.l.ls with hinges, which are truly twinned? I would take Dr. Farmer's "umber'd,"

which I had proposed before I ever heard of its having been already offered by him: but I do not adopt his interpretation of the word, which I think is not derived from _umbra_, a shade, but from _umber_, a dingy yellow-brown soil, which most commonly forms the ma.s.s of the sludge on the sea-sh.o.r.e, and on the banks of tide-rivers at low water. One other possible interpretation of this sentence has occurred to me, just barely worth mentioning;-that the "twinn'd stones" are the _augrim_ stones upon the number'd beech,-that is, the astronomical tables of beech-wood.

Act v. sc. 5.-

"_Sooth._ When, as a lion's whelp," &c.