Since kings break faith upon commodity, Gain, be my lord; for I will worship thee! [Exit. ACT III. SCENE I. The fame. The French King's Tent. Enter CONSTANCE, ARTHUR, and SALISBURY. CONST. Gone to be married! gone to swear a peace! Falfe blood to falfe blood join'd! Gone to be friends! Shall Lewis have Blanch? and Blanch those pro vinces ? It is not fo; thou haft misfpoke, misheard; Opprefs'd with wrongs, and therefore full of fears; 2 In the old copy the fecond act extends to the end of the fpeech of Lady Conftance in the next fcene, at the conclufion of which the throws herself on the ground. The present divifion which was made by Mr. Theobald, and has been adopted by the fubfequent editors, is certainly right. MALONE. See Mr. Theobald's note, p. 73. STEEVENS. For I am fick, and capable of fears;] i. e. I have a ftrong fenfibility; I am tremblingly alive to apprehenfion. So, in Hamlet: "His form and caufe conjoin'd, preaching to ftones, "Would make them capable." MALONE. A widow, husbandless, subject to fears; And though thou now confefs, thou didst but jeft, SAL. As true, as, I believe, you think them false, That give you cause to prove my saying true. CONST. O, if thou teach me to believe this for row, Teach thou this forrow how to make me die; As doth the fury of two defperate men, 4 A widow,] This was not the fact. Conftance, was at this time married to a third husband, Guido, brother to the Viscount of Touars. She had been divorced from her fecond husband, Ranulph, Earl of Chester. MALONE. 5 Like a proud river peering o'er his bounds?] This feems to have been imitated by Maríton, in his Infatiate Countefs, 1603: "Then how much more in me, whose youthful veins, "Like a proud river o'erflow their bounds—. MALONE. Be thefe fad figns-] The fad figns are, the shaking of his head, the laying his hand on his breaft, &c. We have again the fame words in our author's Venus and Adonis : "So fhe, at these fad figns exclaims on death." Mr. Pope and the fubfequent editors read-Be thefe fad fighs-&c. MALONE. France friend with England! what becomes of me? Fellow, be gone; I cannot brook thy fight; SAL. What other harm have I, good lady, done, But spoke the harm that is by others done? CONST. Which harm within itself so heinous is, As it makes harmful all that speak of it, ARTH. I do befeech you, madam, be content. CONST. If thou," that bid'ft me be content, wert grim, 8 Ugly, and fland'rous to thy mother's womb, "If thou, &c.] Maffinger appears to have copied this passage in The Unnatural Combat: - If thou hadft been born "Deform'd and crooked in the features of Thy body, as the manners of thy mind; 8 Ugly, and fland'rous to thy mother's womb, Full of unpleafing blots,] So, in our author's Rape of Lucrece, 1594: "The blemish that will never be forgot, MALONE. -fightlefs-] The poet ufes fightlefs for that which we now exprefs by unfightly, difagreeable to the eyes. JOHNSON. 2fwart,] Swart is brown, inclining to black. So, in K. Henry VI. Part I. Act I. fc. ii: "And whereas I was black and swart before." Again, in The Comedy of Errors, Act III. fc. ii: 3 Swart like my fhoe, but her face nothing fo clean kept." STEEVENS. -prodigious,] That is, portentous, fo deformed as to be taken for a foretoken of evil. JOHNSON. In this fenfe it is used by Decker, in the first part of The Honeft Whore, 1604: I Patch'd with foul moles, and eye-offending marks, I SAL. Pardon me, madam, may not go without you to the kings. CONST. Thou may'ft, thou fhalt, I will not go with thee: I will inftruct my forrows to be proud; For grief is proud, and makes his owner ftout.* yon comet fhews his head again; "Twice hath he thus at cross-turns thrown on us "Prodigious looks,” Again, in The Revenger's Tragedy, 1607: "Over whofe roof hangs this prodigious comet." Again, in The English Arcadia, by Jarvis Markham, 1607: "O, yes, I was prodigious to thy birth-right, and as a blazing ftar at thine unlook'd for funeral," STEEVENS. 4 —makes his owner ftout.] The old editions have-makes its owner ftoop: the emendation is Sir T. Hanmer's, JOHNSON, So, in Daniel's Civil Wars, B, VI: "Full with stout grief and with disdainful woe." STEEVENS, To me, and to the ftate of my great grief, Our author has rendered this paffage obfcure, by indulging himself in one of thofe conceits in which he too much delights, and by bounding rapidly, with his ufual licence, from one idea to another. This obfcurity induced Sir T. Hanmer for ftoop to fub. ftitute fout; a reading that appears to me to have been too hastily adopted in the fubfequent editions. The confufion arifes from the poet's having perfonified grief in the first part of the paffage, and fuppofing the afflicted perfon to be bowed to the earth by that pride or haughtiness which Grief is faid to poffefs; and by making the afflicted perfon, in the latter part of the paffage, actuated by this very pride, and exacting the fame kind of obeifance from others, that Grief has exacted from her." I will not go (fays Conftance) to these kings; I will teach my forrows to be proud; for Grief is proud, and makes the afflicted foop; therefore here I throw myfelf, and let them come to me." Here, had the ftopped, and thrown herself on the ground, and had nothing more been added, however we might have difapproved of the conceit, we should have had no temptation to disturb the text. But the idea of throwing herself on the ground fuggefts a new image; and becaufe her fately grief is fo great that nothing but the huge earth can fupport it, the confiders the ground as her throne; and having thus invefted herself with regal dignity, fhe as queen in mifery, as poffeffing (like Imogen) "the fupreme crown of grief," calls on the princes of the world to bow down before her, as she has herself been bowed down by affliction. Such, I think, was the procefs that paffed in the poet's mind; which appears to me fo clearly to explain the text, that I fee no reafon for departing from it. MALONE. 5 To me, and to the ftate of my great grief, Let kings affemble;] In Much ado about Nothing, the father of Hero, depreffed by her difgrace, declares himself fo fubdued by grief that a thread may lead him. How is it that grief in Leonato and Lady Conftance produces effects directly oppofite, and yet both agreeable to nature? Sorrow foftens the mind while it is yet warmed by hope, but hardens it when it is congealed by defpair, Diftrefs, while there remains any profpect of relief, is weak and flexible, but when no fuccour remains, is fearlefs and ftubborn; angry alike at thofe that injure, and at thofe that do not help; careless to please where nothing can be gained, and fearless to offend when there is nothing further to be dreaded. Such was this writer's knowledge of the paffions. JOHNSON. |