Why I should welcome such a guest as grief,
Save bidding farewell to so sweet a guest
As my sweet Richard: Yet, again, methinks,
Some unborn sorrow, ripe in fortune's womb,
Is coming towards me; and my inward soul
With nothing trembles: at some thing it grieves',
More than with parting from my lord the king.
BUSHY. Each substance of a grief hath twenty
shadows,

Which show like grief itself, but are not so:
For sorrow's eye, glazed with blinding tears,
Divides one thing entire to many objects;
Like pérspectives, which, rightly gaz'd upon,
Show nothing but confusion; ey'd awry,

:

7 With NOTHING trembles at SOME THING it grieves,] The following line requires that this should be read just the contrary way:

"With something trembles, yet at nothing grieves." WARBURTON.

All the old editions read:

66

my inward soul

"With nothing trembles: at some thing it grieves."

The reading, which Dr. Warburton corrects, is itself an innovation. His conjectures give indeed a better sense than that of any copy, but copies must not be needlessly forsaken. JOHNSON. suppose it is the unborn sorrow which she calls nothing, because it is not yet brought into existence. STEEVENS.

I

Warburton does not appear to have understood this passage, nor Johnson either. Through the whole of this scene, till the arrival of Green, the Queen is describing to Bushy, a certain unaccountable despondency of mind, and a foreboding apprehension which she felt of some unforeseen calamity. She says, "that her inward soul trembles without any apparent cause, and grieves at something more than the King's departure, though she knows not what." He endeavours to persuade her that it is merely the consequence of her sorrow for the King's absence. She says it may be so, but her soul tells her otherwise. He then tells her it is only conceit; but she is not satisfied with that way of accounting for it, as she says that conceit is still derived from some forefather grief, but what she feels was begot by nothing; that is, had no preceding cause. Conceit is here used in the same sense that it is in Hamlet, when the King says that Ophelia's madness was occasioned by " conceit upon her father." M. MASON.

Distinguish form: so your sweet majesty,
Looking awry upon your lord's departure,

8 Like perspectives, which, RIGHTLY gaz'd upon,
Show nothing but confusion; EY'D AWRY,

Distinguish form:] This is a fine similitude, and the thing meant is this. Amongst mathematical recreations, there is one in optics, in which a figure is drawn, wherein all the rules of perspective are inverted: so that, if held in the same position with those pictures which are drawn according to the rules of perspective, it can present nothing but confusion: and to be seen in form, and under a regular appearance, it must be looked upon from a contrary station; or, as Shakspeare says, ey'd awry." WARBURTON.

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Dr. Plot's History of Staffordshire, p. 391, explains this perspective, or odd kind of "pictures upon an indented board, which, if beheld directly, you only perceive a confused piece of work; but, if obliquely, you see the intended person's picture; " which, he was told, was made thus: "The board being indented, [or furrowed with a plough-plane,] the print or painting was cut into parallel pieces equal to the depth and number of the indentures on the board, and they were pasted on the flats that strike the eye holding it obliquely, so that the edges of the parallel pieces of the print or painting exactly joining on the edges of the indentures, the work was done." TOLLET.

The following short poem would almost persuade one that the words rightly and awry [perhaps originally written aright and wryly,] had exchanged places in the text of our author:

Lines prefixed to "Melancholike Humours, in Verses of Diverse Natures, set down by Nich. Breton, Gent. 1600: "In Authorem.

"That thou wouldst finde the habit of true passion,
"And see a minde attir'd in perfect straines;
"Not wearing moodes, as gallants doe a fashion
"In these pide times, only to shewe their braines;
"Looke here on Breton's worke, the master print,
"Where such perfections to the life doe rise:
"If they seeme wry, to such as looke asquint,
"The fault's not in the object, but their eyes.
"For, as one comming with a laterall viewe
"Unto a cunning piece-wrought perspective,
"Wants facultie to make a censure true:

"So with this author's readers will it thrive:

"Which, being eyed directly, I divine,

"His proofe their praise will meete, as in this line." Ben Jonson, STEEVENS.

Finds shapes of grief, more than himself, to wail;
Which, look'd on as it is, is nought but shadows
Of what it is not. Then, thrice-gracious queen,
More than your lord's departure weep not; more's

not seen:

Or if it be, 'tis with false sorrow's eye,

Which for things true, weeps things imaginary.
QUEEN. It may be so; but yet my inward soul
Persuades me, it is otherwise: Howe'er it be,
I cannot but be sad; so heavy sad,

As, though, in thinking, on no thought I think 9,Makes me with heavy nothing faint and shrink.

BUSHY. "Tis nothing but conceit1, my gracious

lady.

QUEEN. 'Tis nothing less; conceit is still deriv'd From some forefather grief; mine is not so; For nothing hath begot my something grief; Or something hath the nothing that I grieve2:

So, in Hentzner, 1598, Royal Palace, Whitehall: "Edwardi VI. Angliæ regis effigies, primo intuitu monstrosum quid repræsentans, sed si quis effigiem rectâ intueatur, tum vera depræhenditur." FARMER.

The perspectives here mentioned, were not pictures, but round chrystal glasses, the convex surface of which was cut into faces, like those of the rose-diamond; the concave left uniformly smooth. These chrystals-which were sometimes mounted on tortoise-shell box-lids, and sometimes fixed into ivory cases-if placed as here represented, would exhibit the different appearances described by the poet.

The word shadows is here used, in opposition to substance, for reflected images, and not as the dark forms of bodies, occasioned by their interception of the light that falls upon them. HENLEY. 9 As, though, IN thinking, on no thought I think,] Old copy, -on thinking; but we should read-" As though in thinking; that is, "though musing, I have no distinct idea of calamity." The involuntary and unaccountable depression of the mind, which every one has sometime felt, is here very forcibly described.

JOHNSON.

'Tis nothing but CONCEIT,] Conceit is here, as in King Henry VIII. and many other places, used for a fanciful conception. MALONE.

2 For nothing hath begot my something grief; Or something hath the nothing that I grieve:] With these

'Tis in reversion that I do possess;

But what it is, that is not yet known; what
I cannot name; 'tis nameless woe, I wot.

Enter GREEN.

GREEN. God save your majesty !—and well met, gentlemen:

lines I know not well what can be done. The Queen's reasoning, as it now stands, is this: my trouble is not conceit, for conceit is still derived from some antecedent cause, some fore-father grief; but with me the case is, that either my real grief hath no real cause, or some real cause has produced a fancied grief.' That is, 'my grief is not conceit, because it either has not a cause like conceit, or it has a cause like conceit.' This can hardly stand. Let us try again, and read thus:

"For nothing hath begot my something grief;

"Not something hath the nothing that I grieve: " That is, my grief is not conceit; conceit is an imaginary uneasiness from some past occurrence.' But, on the contrary, here is real grief without a real cause; not a real cause with a fanciful sorrow.' This, I think, must be the meaning; harsh at the best, yet better than contradiction or absurdity. JOHNSON. 3 'Tis in reversion that I do possess ;

But what it is, that is not yet known, &c.] I am about to propose an interpretation which many will think harsh, and which I do not offer for certain. To possess a man, in Shakspeare, is to inform him fully, to make him comprehend. To be possessed, is to be fully informed. Of this sense the examples are numerous : "I have possess'd him my most stay can be but short." Measure for Measure.

Is he yet possess'd

"What sum you would?" Merchant of Venice.

I therefore imagine the Queen says thus :

""Tis in reversion-that I do possess ;

"The event is yet in futurity"-that I know with full conviction -" but what it is, that is not yet known." In any other interpretation she must say that she possesses what is not yet come, which, though it may be allowed to be poetical and figurative language, is yet, I think, less natural than my explanation. JOHNSON.

As the grief the Queen felt, was for some event which had not yet come to pass, or at least not yet come to her knowledge, she expresses this by saying that the grief which she then actually possessed, was still in reversion, as she had no right to feel the grief until the event should happen which was to occasion it.

M. MASON.

I hope, the king is not yet shipp'd for Ireland. QUEEN. Why hop'st thou so? 'tis better hope, he is;

For his designs crave haste, his haste good hope;
Then wherefore dost thou hope, he is not shipp'd?
GREEN. That he, our hope, might have retir'd
his power*,

And driven into despair an enemy's hope,
Who strongly hath set footing in this land:
The banish'd Bolingbroke repeals himself,
And with uplifted arms is safe arriv'd

At Ravenspurg.

QUEEN.

Now God in heaven forbid!

GREEN. O, madam, 'tis too true: and that is

worse,

The lord Northumberland, his son young Henry

Percy,

The lords of Ross, Beaumond, and Willoughby,
With all their powerful friends, are fled to him.

BUSHY. Why have you not proclaim'd Northumberland,

And all the rest of the revolted faction, traitors 5 ? GREEN. We have: whereon the earl of Wor

cester

Hath broken his staff, resign'd his stewardship,
And all the household servants fled with him
To Bolingbroke.

4

QUEEN. So, Green, thou art the midwife to my woe,

might have RETIR'D his power,] Might have drawn it back. A French sense. JOHNSON.

So, in The Rape of Lucrece :

"Each one, by him enforc'd, retires his ward." MALONE. 5 And ALL the rest OF THE revolted faction, traitors ?] The first quarto, 1597, reads:

"And all the rest revolted faction, traitors?"

The folio and quartos 1598 and 1608 :

“And the rest of the revolting faction, traitors?"

MALONE.