Or pile ten hills on the Tarpeian rock, 1 PAT. Enter VOLUMNIA. You do the nobler. 4 COR. I muse, my mother Does not approve me further, who was wont [TO VOLUMNIA. Why did you wish me milder? Would you have me I would have had you put your power well on, COR. Let go 7. - Thou venemouse serpente "With wilde horses thou shalt be drawe to morowe "And on this hille be brente." STEEVENS. I muse,] That is, I wonder, I am at a loss. JOHNSON. So, in Macbeth: "Do not muse at me, my most noble friends-." STEEVENS. 5- my ordinance -) My rank. JOHNSON. 6 The man I am.] Sir Thomas Hanmer supplies the defect in this line, very judiciously in my opinion, by reading: Truly the man I am." Truly is properly opposed to False in the preceding line. STEEVENS. 7 Let go.] Here again, Sir Thomas Hanmer, with sufficient propriety, reads-Why, let it go. -Mr. Ritson would complete the measure with a similar expression, which occurs in Othello :"Let it go all."-Too many of the short replies in this and other plays of Shakspeare, are apparently mutilated. STEEVENS. VOL. You might have been enough the man you are, With striving less to be so: Lesser had been The thwartings of your dispositions, if You had not show'd them how you were dispos'd Ere they lack'd power to cross you. COR. VOL. Ay, and burn too. Let them hang. Enter MENENIUS, and Senators. MEN. Come, come, you have been too rough, something too rough; You must return, and mend it. 1 SEN. There's no remedy; Unless, by not so doing, our good city Cleave in the midst, and perish. VOL. Pray be counsel'd : I have a heart as little apt as yours, But yet a brain, that leads my use of anger, To better vantage. MEN. Well said, noble woman; Before he should thus stoop to the herd, but that 8 The THWARTINGS of your dispositions,) The old copies exhibit it: "The things of your dispositions." A few letters replaced, that by some carelessness dropped out, restore us the poet's genuine reading : "The thwartings of your dispositions." THEOBALD. Mr. Theobald only improved on Mr. Rowe's correction : "The things that thwart your dispositions." MALONE. 9 Before he should thus stoop to the HERD, Old copy-stoop to the heart. But how did Coriolanus stoop to his heart? He rather, as we vulgarly express it, made his proud heart stoop to the necessity of the times. I am persuaded, my emendation gives the true reading. So before in this play: "Are these your herd?" So, in Julius Cæsar : " - when he perceived, the common herd was glad he refus'd the crown," &C. THEOBALD. Mr. Theobald's conjecture is confirmed by a passage, in which Coriolanus thus describes the people: The violent fit o' the time craves it as physick Which I can scarcely bear. COR. What must I do? MEN. Return to the tribunes. Well, what then? what then ? MEN. Repent what you have spoke. Must I then do't to them? VOL. You are too absolute; Though therein you can never be too noble, say, Honour and policy, like unsever'd friends, I' the war do grow together: Grant that, and tell me, In peace, what each of them by th' other lose, That they combine not there. COR. MEN. Tush, tush! A good demand. VOL. If it be honour, in your wars, to seem The same you are not, (which, for your best ends, You adopt your policy,) how is it less, or worse, That it shall hold companionship in peace "You shames of Rome! you herd of -." Herd was anciently spelt heard. Hence heart crept into the old copy. MALONE. For them?-1 cannot do it to the gods;] So, in Philaster: "When thunder speaks, which is the voice of Jove, • You are too absolute; Though therein you can never be too noble, But when extremities speak.] Except in cases of urgent necessity, when your resolute and noble spirit, however commendable at other times, ought to yield to the occasion. MALONE. With honour, as in war; since that to both It stands in like request? COR. Why force you3 this? VOL. Because that now it lies you on to speak To the people; not by your own instruction, Nor by the matter which your heart prompts you', But with such words that are but roted in 5 Your tongue, though but bastards, and syllables Of no allowance, to your bosom's truth 6. 3 Why FORCE You ] Why urge you. JOHNSON. So, in King Henry VIII. : " If you will now unite in your complaints, "And force them with a constancy-." MALONE. * Nor by the matter which your heart prompts you,] Perhaps the meaning is, which your heart prompts you to. We have many such elliptical expressions in these plays. See vol. xiii. p. 390, n. 8. So, in Julius Cæsar: "Thy honourable metal may be wrought "From what it is dispos'd [to]." But I rather believe, that our author has adopted the language of the theatre, and that the meaning is, which your heart suggests to you; which your heart furnishes you with, as a prompter furnishes the player with the words that have escaped his memory. So afterwards : "Come, come, we'll prompt you." The editor of the second folio, who was entirely unacquainted with our author's peculiarities, reads-prompts you to, and so all the subsequent copies read. MALONE. I am content to follow the second folio; though perhaps we ought to read : "Nor by the matter which your heart prompts in you." So, in A Sermon preached at St. Paul's Crosse, &c. 1589: - for often meditatyon prompteth in us goode thoughtes, begettyng thereon goode workes," &c. Without some additional syllable the verse is defective. 5 STEEVENS. -ROTED in-] Old copy, roated. Perhaps we should read rooted. 6 BOSWELL. - bastards, and syllables Of no ALLOWANCE, to your bosom's truth.) I read: "of no alliance;" therefore bastards. Yet allowance may well enough stand, as meaning legal right, established rank, or settled authority. JOHNSON. Allowance is certainly right. So, in Othello, Act II. Sc. I. : Now, this no more dishonours you at all, I would dissemble with my nature, where My fortunes, and my friends, at stake, requir'd, his pilot "Of very expert and approv'd allowance." Dr. Johnson's amendment, however, is countenanced by an expression in The Taming of the Shrew, where Petruchio's stirrups are said to be "of no kindred." STEEVENS. I at first was pleased with Dr. Johnson's proposed emendation, because "of no allowance, i. e. approbation, to your bosom's truth," appeared to me unintelligible. But allowance has no connection with the subsequent words, " to your bosom's truth." The construction is though but bastards to your bosom's truth, not the lawful issue of your heart. The words, "and syllables of no allowance," are put in opposition with bastards, and are as it were parenthetical. MALONE. 5 Than to take in a town - To subdue or destroy. See p. 25, n. 9. MALONE. 6 - I am in this, Your wife, your son, these senators, the nobles; And you, &c.] Volumnia is persuading Coriolanus that he ought to flatter the people, as the general fortune was at stake; and says, that in this advice, she speaks as his wife, as his son ; as the senate and body of the patricians; who were in some measure link'd to his conduct. WARBURTON. I rather think the meaning is, " I am in their condition, I am at stake, together with your wife, your son." JOHNSON. " I am in this," means, I am in this predicament. M. MASON. I think the meaning is, In this advice, in exhorting you to act thus, I speak not only as your mother, but as your wife, your son, &c. all of whom are at stake. MALONE. 7 - our general lowts - Our common clowns. JOHNSON. 8 - that WANT ) The want of their loves. JOHNSON. |