Harry, that prophesy'd thou shouldst be king, Doth comfort thee in thy fleep; Live, and flourish. Enter the Ghost of Clarence. Ghost. Let me fit heavy on thy foul to-morrow! [To K. Rich. I, that was wash'd to death with fulsome wine 7, : [To Richm. The wronged heirs of York do pray for thee; Good angels guard thy battle! Live, and flourish! : Enter the Ghosts of Rivers, Grey, and Vaughan. Riv. Let me fit heavy on thy foul to-morrow, [To K. Rich. Rivers, that dy'd at Pomfret! Despair, and die! Grey. Think upon Grey, and let thy foul despair! [To K. Rich. Vaugh. Think upon Vaughan; and, with guilty Let fall thy lance! Despair, and die ! fear, [To K. Rich. All. Awake! and think, our wrongs in Richard's bofon Will conquer him;-awake, and win the day! 1 [To Richm. 1 6 Harry, that prophesy'd thou shouldst be king,] This prophecy, to which this allufion is made, was uttered in one of the parts of Henry the Sixth. JOHNSON. 7 with fulsome wine, Fulfome fignifies here, as in many other places, rich, unctuous. The wine in which the body of Clarence was thrown, was Malmsey. MALONE. Enter Enter the Ghost of Lord Hastings. Ghost. Bloody and guilty, guiltily awake; [To K. Rich. And in a bloody battle end thy days! Enter the Ghosts of the two young Princes. Ghosts. Dream on thy cousins smother'd in the Tower; * Let us be lead within thy bosom, Richard, [To K. Rich. And weigh thee down to ruin, shame, and death! Thy nephews' fouls bid thee despair and die. Sleep, Richmond, sleep in peace, and wake in joy; [To Richm. Good angels guard thee from the boar's annoy! Enter the Ghost of Lady Anne. Ghoft. Richard, thy wife, that wretched Anne thy [To K. Rich. wife, That never fslept a quiet hour with thee, • Let us be laid within thy besom, Richard,] This is a poor feeble reading. I have restored from the elder quarto, published in 1597, which Mr. Pope does not pretend to have feen: Let us be lead within thy bosom, Richard. This corresponds with what is faid in the line immediately fo lowing: And weigh thee down to ruin, shame, and death! THEOBALD. Thou, quiet foul, sleep thou a quiet sleep; Dream of success and happy victory; Enter the Ghost of Buckingham. [To Rich. Ghost. The first was I that help'd thee to the [To K. Rich. The last was I, that felt thy tyranny: 9 " I dy'd for hope, ere I could lend thee aid : [To Rich. 1 dy'd for hope,-] i. e. I died for wishing well to you. But Mr. Theobald, with great sagacity, conjectured bolpe or aid; which gave the line this fine sense, I died for giving thee aid before I could give thee aid. WARBURTON. Hanmer reads: I died forfook, and supports his conjecture thus. This, as appears from history, was the cafe of the duke of Buckingham: that being stopp'd with his army upon the banks of Severn by great deluges of rain, he was deserted by his foldiers, who, being in great distress, half famished for want of victuals, and destitute of pay, disbanded themselves and fled. Hanmer's emendation is very plausible; but may not the meaning of the expression be, I died for only having hoped to give you that afsistance, which I never had it in my power to afford you in reality ? It may, however, be observed, that fore, or for, when joined to a verb, had anciently a negative fignification. So, in Macbeth: "He shall live a man forbid." As to bid was to pray, so to forbid had the meaning directly oppofite, i. e. to curse. In Antony and Cleopatra, to forespeak is to Speak against. In Hamlet, and the Midsummer Night's Dream, to fordo is the very reverse of to do. Holpen or help is the old participle passive of help, and is used in Macbeth : His great love, sharp as his spur, hath bolp him "To his home before us." い Instead But cheer thy heart, and be thou not dismay'd: [The Ghosts vanish [K. Richard starts out of his dream. K. Rich. Give me another horse, bind up my wounds, Have mercy, Jefu !-Soft; I did but dream. * O coward confcience, how doft thou afflict me!The lights burn blue 3.-Is it not dead midnight? Cold Instead of for hope, we may therefore read forholpe, which would mean unaided, abandon'd, deserted, unbelp'd, which was the real misfortune of the duke of Buckingham. The word holp has occurred likewife in this play: " Let him thank me that holp to send him thither." Again in Coriolanus : "Have help to make this rescue." STEEVENS. Perhaps we should read, I dy'd fore done, &c. So in Hamlet, act V. * Give me another horse, There is in this, as in many of our author's speeches of passion, something very trifling, and something very striking. Richard's debate, whether he should quarrel with himself, is too long continued, but the subsequent exaggeration of his crimes is truly tragical. JOHNSON. 2 The O coward confcience.-] This is extremely fine speaker had entirely got the better of his confcience, and banished it from all his waking thoughts. But it takes advantage of his sleep, and frights him in his dreams. With greater elegance therefore he is made to call it coward confcience, which dares not encounter him while he is himself awake, and his faculties entire; but takes advantage of reason being off its guard, and the powers of the foul dissolved in sleep. But the players, amongst their other innumerable absurdities in the representation of this tragedy, make Richard say, instead of O coward confcience, O tyrant confcience! whereby not only a great beauty is loft, but a great blunder committed. For Richard had entirely got the better of his confciences; which could, on no account, therefore, be faid to play the tyrant with him. WARBURTON. 3 The lights burn blue.] So, in Lilly's Galathea, 1592: "I thought there was some Spirit in it because it burnt so blue; for my mother would often tell me when the candle burnt blue, there was / Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh. Methought the fouls of all that I had murder'd Came to my tent; and every one did threat To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Richard. was some ill spirit in the house." It was anciently supposed that fire was a preservative against evil spirits; "because," says Nath; in Pierce Penniless's Supplications to the Devil, 1595) "when any spirit appeareth, the lights by little and little goe out as it were of their own accord, and the takers are by degrees extinguished." The takers are the spirits who blast or take. So, in K. Lear : "strike her young bones, "Ye taking airs, with lameness!" STEEVENS. + I love myself.] The old copies read-Alack, I love, &c. STEEVENS. 5 Methought, the fouls &c.] These lines stand with so little propriety at the end of this speech, that I cannot but fufpect them to be misplaced. Where then shall they be inferted? Per haps after these words: Fool, do not flatter. JOHNSON. VOL. VII. M Enter 1 |