BEN. Then she hath sworn, that she will still live chaste? ROM. She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste; 2 For beauty, starv'd with her severity, BEN. Be rul'd by me, forget to think of her. ROM. O, teach me how I should forget to think. She is rich in beauty; and poor in this circumstance alone, that with her, beauty will expire; her store of wealth [which the poet has already said was the fairness of her person,] will not be transmitted to posterity, inasmuch as she will "lead her graces to the grave, and leave the world no copy." MAlone. 2 She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste;] So, in our author's first Sonnet: "And, tender churl, mak'st waste in niggarding." 3 For beauty, starv'd with her severity, MALONE. Cuts beauty off from all posterity.] So, in our author's third Sonnet: "Or who is he so fond will be the tomb Again, in his Venus and Adonis: "What is thy body but a swallowing grave, "Which by the rights of time thou need'st must have!" MALONE. wisely too fair, &c.] There is in her too much sanctimonious wisdom united with beauty, which induces her to continue chaste with the hopes of attaining heavenly bliss. MALONE. None of the following speeches of this scene are in the first edition of 1597. POPE. * Do I live dead,] So, Richard the Third: 66 now they kill me with a living death." See Vol. XIV. p. 291, n. 2. MALONE. BEN. By giving liberty unto thine eyes; Examine other beauties. ROM. 'Tis the way To call hers, exquisite, in question more:" 8 [Exeunt. To call hers, exquisite, in question more:] That is, to call hers, which is exquisite, the more into my remembrance and contemplation. It is in this sense, and not in that of doubt, or dispute, that the word question is here used. HEATH. More into talk; to make her unparalleled beauty more the subject of thought and conversation. See Vol. VII. p. 349, n. 9. MALONE. 7 These happy masks, &c.] i. e. the masks worn by female spectators of the play. So, in Beaumont and Fletcher's Beggar's Bush, sc. ult: "We stand here for an Epilogue. Ladies, your bounties first! the rest will follow; "If you be pleas'd, look cheerly, throw your eyes Former editors print those instead of these, but without authority. STEEVENS. These happy masks, I believe, means no more than the happy masks. Such is Mr. Tyrwhitt's opinion. See Vol. VI. p. 278, n. 5. MALone. • What doth her beauty serve,] i. e. what end does it answer? In modern language we say-" serve for." STEEVENS. 9 -thou canst not teach me to forget.] Of all afflictions taught a lover yet, “'Tis sure the hardest science, to forget." Pope's Eloisa. STEEVENS. SCENE II. A Street. Enter CAPULET, PARIS, and Servant. CAP. And Montague is bound' as well as I, In penalty alike; and 'tis not hard, I think, For men so old as we to keep the peace. PAR. Of honourable reckoning are you both; And pity 'tis, you liv'd at odds so long. But now, my lord, what say you to my suit? CAP. But saying o'er what I have said before: My child is yet a stranger in the world, She hath not seen the change of fourteen years; Let two more summers wither in their pride," Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride. 2 PAR. Younger than she are happy mothers made. CAP. And too soon marr'd are those so early made.3 'And Montague is bound-] This speech is not in the first quarto. That of 1599 has-But Montague. In that of 1609, and the folio, But is omitted. The reading of the text is that of the undated quarto. MALOne. 2 Let two more summers wither in their pride,] So, in our poet's 103d Sonnet: 66 Three winters cold "Have from the forests shook three summer's pride,-." MALONE. 3 And too soon marr'd are those so early made.] The quarto, 1597, reads:-And too soon marr'd are those so early married. Puttenham, in his Art of Poesy, 1589, uses this expression, which seems to be proverbial, as an instance of a figure which he calls the Rebound: "The maid that soon married is, soon marred is.' The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but she, 5 The jingle between marr'd and made is likewise frequent among the old writers. So, Sidney: "Oh! he is marr'd, that is for others made!" Spenser introduces it very often in his different poems. STEEVENS. Making and marring is enumerated among other unlawful games in the Stat. 2 and 3, Phi. and Ma. c. 9. Great improvements have been made on this ancient game in the present century. MALONE. She is the hopeful lady of my earth:] This line is not in the first edition. POPE. She is the hopeful lady of my earth:] This is a Gallicism: Fille de terre is the French phrase for an heiress. King Richard II. calls his land, i. e. his kingdom, his earth: "Feed not thy sovereign's foe, my gentle earth.” Again: "So weeping, smiling, greet I thee, my earth." Earth in other old plays is likewise put for lands, i. e. landed estate. So, in A Trick to catch the Old One, 1619: "A rich widow, and four hundred a year in good earth.” Again, in the Epistle Dedicatorie to Dr. Bright's Characterie, an Arte of Shorte, Swifte, and Secrete writing by Character, 12mo. 1588: "And this my inuention being altogether of English yeeld, where your Majestie is the Ladie of the Soyle, it appertayneth of right to you onely." STEEVENS. The explanation of Mr. Steevens may be right; but there is a passage in The Maid's Tragedy, which leads to another, where Amintor says: "This earth of mine doth tremble, and I feel "A stark affrighted motion in my blood." Here earth means corporal part. M. MASON. Again, in this play: "Can I go forward, when my heart is here? Again, in our author's 146th Sonnet: "Poor soul, the center of my sinful earth, MALONE. My will to her consent is but a part;] To, in this instance, An she agree, within her scope of choice Such as I love; and you, among the store, signifies in comparison with, in proportion to. So, in King Henry VIII: These are but switches to them." STEEVENS. • Earth-treading stars, that made dark heaven light :] This nonsense should be reformed thus: Earth-treading stars that make dark even light: i. e. When the evening is dark, and without stars, these earthly stars supply their place, and light it up. So again, in this play: "Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night, "Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear." WARBURTON. But why nonsense? is any thing more commonly said, than that beauties eclipse the sun? Has not Pope the thought and the word? "Sol through white curtains shot a tim❜rous ray, Both the old and the new reading are philosophical nonsense; but they are both, and both equally, poetical sense. JOHNSON. I will not say that this passage, as it stands, is absolute nonsense; but I think it very absurd, and am certain that it is not capable of the meaning that Johnson attributes to it, without the alteration I mean to propose, which is, to read: Earth-treading stars that make dark, heaven's light. That is, earthly stars that outshine the stars of heaven, and make them appear dark by their own superior brightness. But according to the present reading, they are earthly stars that enlighten the gloom of heaven. M. MASON. The old reading is sufficiently supported by a parallel passage in Churchyard's Shore's Wife, 1593: "My beautie blasd like torch or twinckling starre, "A liuely lamp that lends darke world some light." Mr. M. Mason's explanation, however, may receive countenance from Sidney's Arcadia, Book III: "Did light those beamy stars which greater light did dark." STEEVENS, |