Thus I inforce thy rotten jaws to open, [Breaking up the monument. And, in defpight, I'll cram thee with more food! Par. This is that banish'd haughty Montague, That murder'd my love's coufin; with which grief, It is fuppofed, the fair creature dy'd, And here is come to do fome villainous fhame Rom. I muft, indeed; and therefore came I hither- By urging me to fury.-Oh be gone! And apprehend thee for a felon here. Rom. Wilt thou provoke me? then have at thee, [They fight, Paris falls. boy. 3 The old quarto reads, I do defy thy conjuration,] Tho' I have rarely pronounced that any word I did not like was an interpolation of the players, yet I cannot help thinking that commiferation (the reading of the folio) was inferted by them in the room of conjurations, which they might not have understood. "I do defy thy commiferation," cannot be received as a verfe, if harmony is at all effential; and to defy pity or commiferation is rather an uncommon expreffion. Paris conceived Romeo to have burft open the monument for no other purpofe than to do fome villainous fhame on the dead bodies, fuch as witches are reported to have practifed; and therefore tells him he defies him, and the magic arts which he fufpects he is preparing to use. STEVENS. Page. Page. Oh Lord, they fight! I will go call the watch. Par. Oh, I am flain! if thou be merciful, Open the tomb, lay me with Juliet. [Dies. Rom. In faith, I will:-Let me peruse this face- A grave? O, no; a lanthorn, flaughter'd youth; [Laying Paris in the monument. • presence-] A prefence is a public room. JOHNSON. This thought, extravagant as it is, is borrowed by Middleton in his comedy of Blurt Mafter Constable, 1602. "The darkest dungeon which fpite can devife ·0, how may I' STEEVENS. Call this a lightning ?-] I think we should read, O, now may I Call this a lightning! JOHNSON. This expreffion occurs frequently in the old dramatic pieces. So in the fecond part of The Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntington, 1601. "I thought it was a lightning before death, STEEVENS. Hath Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty, Forgive me, coufin!-Ah, dear Juliet, And never from this palace of dim night With Thy drugs are quick) ] Mr. Pope's, and fome other of the worfer editions acknowledge abfurdly the lines which I have put into parenthefis here; and which I have expunged from the text, for this reafon: Romeo is made to confefs the effect of the poifon before ever he has tafted it. I fuppofe, it hardly was fo favoury that the patient fhould choofe to make two draughts of it. And, eight lines after thefe, we find him taking the poifon in his hands, and making an apostrophe to it; inviting it to perform its office at once; and then, and not till then, does he clap it to his lips, or can with any probability fpeak of its inftant force and effects. Befides, Shakespeare would hardly have made Romeo drink to the health of his dead miftrefs. Though the first quarto in 1599, and the two old folios, acknowledge this abfurd ftuff, I find it left out in feveral later quarto impreffions. I ought to take notice, that though Mr. Pope has thought fit to flick to the old copies in this addition, yet he is no fair tranfcriber; for he has funk upon us an hemiftich of molt profound abfurdity, which poffeffes all thofe copies. Come, lie thou in my arms; Here's to thy health, where e'er thou tumblest in. THEOBALD. With worms that are thy chamber-maids; oh, here Will I fet up my everlasting rest, And shake the yoke of inaufpicious stars From this world-wearied flefh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, I have no edition but the folio, which has all the paffage here mentioned. I have followed Mr. Theobald. JOHNSON. I am forry to fay, that the foregoing note is an inftance of difingenuoufnefs, as well as inattention in Mr. Theobald, who, relying on the fcarcity of the old quartos, very frequently makes them anfwerable for any thing he thinks proper to affert. The quarto in 1599, was not the firft. It was preceded by one in 1597; and though Mr. Theobald declares, he found the paffage left out in feveral of the later quarto impreffions, yet in the lift of thofe he pretends to have collated for the ufe of his edition, he mentions but one of a later date, and had never feen either that published in 1609, or another without any date at all; for in the former of thefe, the paffage in question is preferved (the latter I have no copy of) and he has placed that in 1637, on the fingle faith of which he rejected it, among thofe only of middling authority: fo that what he fo roundly affirms of feveral, can with juftice be faid of but one; for there are in reality no later quarto editions of this play than I have here enumerated, and two of thofe (by his own confeffion) he had never met with. The hemiftich, which Mr. Theobald pronounces to be of most profound abfurdity, deferves a much better character; but being misplaced, could not be connected with the part of the fpeech where he found it; but, being introduced a few lines lower, feems to make very good fenfe. "Come bitter conduct! come unfav'ry guide! "Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kifs I die.” To tumble into port in a form, I believe to be a fea-phrase, as is a tumbling fea, and agrees with the allufion to the pilot or the tempeft beaten bark. Here's fuccefs, fays he (continuing the allufion) to the veel wherever it tumbles in, or perhaps, to the pilot who is to conduct, or tumble it in; meaning, I wish it may fucceed in ridding me of life, whatever may betide me after it, or wherever it may carry me. He then drinks to the memory of Juliet's love, adding (as he feels the poifon work) a fhort apoftrophe to the apothecary, the effect of whefe drugs Arms, take your laft embrace! and lips, oh you [Drinks the poifon. Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kifs I die. [Dies. he can doubt no longer, and turning his thoughts back again to the object moft beloved, he dies (like Othello) on a kifs. The other hemistich (not difpofed of) may yet be introduced; how naturally, muft be left to the reader to determine. The quarto of 16c9, exhibits the paffage thus: 66 Ah, dear Juliet! "Why art thou yet fo fair! I will believe; "Shall I believe? that unfubftantial death is amorous, "And that the lean," &c. If fuch an idea could have any foundation in nature, or be allowed in poetry, and Romeo in confequence of having raised it to his imagination, was jealous of death, it would follow, that in the firit frenzy of it, he might addrefs himself to his miftrefs, and take her in his arms for the greater fecurity. That being granted, with a flight tranfpofition (one verfe already exceeding the measure by two feet) the passage might be read thus: "Why art thou yet so fair! fball I believe? That unfubflantial death is amorous, "And that the lean," &c. The object of difpute may perhaps be fuch as hardly to deferve this toil of tranfpofition, but one critick has juft as good a right to attempt the infertion of what he thinks he underftands, as another has to omit a paffage, because he can make no ufe of it at all. The whole of the conjecture is offered with the leaft degree of confidence, and from no other motive than a defire of preferving every line of Shakespeare, when any reafon, tolerably plaufible, can be given in its favour. Mr. Theobald has not dealt very fairly in his account of his speech, as the abfurdity is apparently owing to the repetition of fome of the lines by a blunder of the printer, who had thereby made Romeo confefs the effects of the poifon before the had tafted it. STEEVENS. 2 Enter |