Biron. I'll prove her fair, or talk till dooms-day here.

King. No devil will fright thee then so much as

she.

Dum. I never knew man hold vile stuff so dear. Long. Look, here's thy love: my foot and her [Showing his shoe. Biron. O, if the streets were paved with thine

face see.

eyes,

Her feet were much too dainty for such tread! Dum. O vile! then as she goes, what upward lies

The street should see as she walk'd over head. King. But what of this? Are we not all in love? Biron. O, nothing so sure; and thereby all for

sworn.

King. Then leave this chat; and, good Birón, now prove

Our loving lawful, and our faith not torn. Dum. Ay, marry, there;-some flattery for this evil.

Long. O, some authority how to proceed; Some tricks, some quillets,' how to cheat the devil. Dum. Some salve for perjury.

Biron.
O, 'tis more than need!-
Have at you then, affection's men at arms :
Consider, what you first did swear unto ;-
To fast, to study, and to see no woman ;-
Flat treason 'gainst the kingly state of youth.
Say, can you fast? your stomachs are too young;
And abstinence engenders maladies.

And where that you hath vow'd to study, lords,
In that each of you hath forsworn his book:
Can you still dream, and pore, and thereon look?
For when would you, my lord, or you, or you,

some quillets,] Quillet is the peculiar word applied to

law-chicane.

- affection's men at arms :] i. e. Ye soldiers of affection.

Have found the ground of study's excellence,
Without the beauty of a woman's face?
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive:
They are the ground, the books, the academes,
From whence doth spring the true Promethean fire.
Why, universal plodding prisons up

The nimble spirits in the arteries;?

eyes;

As motion, and long during-action, tires
The sinewy vigour of the traveller.
Now, for not looking on a woman's face,
You have in that forsworn the use of
And study too, the causer of your vow:
For where is any author in the world,
Teaches such beauty as a woman's eye?
Learning is but an adjunct to ourself,
And where we are, our learning likewise is.
Then, when ourselves we see in ladies' eyes,
Do we not likewise see our learning there?
O, we have made a vow to study, lords;
And in that vow we have forsworn our books;
For when would you, my liege, or you, or you,
In leaden contemplation, have found out
Such fiery numbers, as the prompting eyes
Of beauteous tutors have enrich'd you with?
Other slow arts entirely keep the brain;
And therefore finding barren practisers,
Scarce show a harvest of their heavy toil :
But love, first learned in a lady's eyes,
Lives not alone immured in the brain;
But with the motion of all elements,
Courses as swift as thought in every power;
And gives to every power a double power,

The nimble spirits in the arteries;] In the old system of physic they gave the same office to the arteries as is now given to the nerves.

• Other slow arts entirely keep the brain;] As we say, keep the house, or keep their bed. M. MASON.

Above their functions and their offices.
It adds a precious seeing to the eye;
A lover's eyes will gaze an eagle blind;
A lover's ear will hear the lowest sound,
When the suspicious head of theft is stopp'd;'
Love's feeling is more soft, and sensible,
Than are the tender horns of cockled' snails;
Love's tongue proves dainty Bacchus gross in taste:
For valour, is not love a Hercules,

Still climbing trees in the Hesperides?2
Subtle as sphinx; as sweet, and musical,
As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair;
And, when love speaks, the voice of all the gods
Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.
Never durst poet touch a pen to write,
Until his ink were temper'd with love's sighs;
O, then his lines would ravish savage ears,
And plant in tyrants mild humility.
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive:
They sparkle still the right Promethean fire;
They are the books, the arts, the academes,
That show, contain, and nourish all the world;
Else, none at all in aught proves excellent:
Then fools you were these women to forswear;
Or, keeping what is sworn, you will prove fools.
For wisdom's sake, a word that all men love;
Or for love's sake, a word that loves all men ;3

the suspicious head of theft is stopp'd;] i. e. a lover in pursuit of his mistress has his sense of hearing quicker than a thief (who suspects every sound he hears) in pursuit of his prey. Or, The suspicious head of theft may mean the head suspicious

of theft.

'cockled-] i. e. inshelled, like the fish called a cockle. * Still climbing trees in the Hesperides?] Our author seems to have thought that the latter word was the name of the garden in which the golden apples were kept: and some of his contemporaries are chargeable with the same inaccuracy.

3

men.

a word that loves all men ;] i. e. that is pleasing to all

Or for men's sake, the authors of these women;
Or women's sake, by whom we men are men ;
Let us once lose our oaths, to find ourselves,
Or else we lose ourselves to keep our oaths:
It is religion to be thus forsworn:

For charity itself fulfils the law;

And who can sever love from charity?

King. Saint Cupid, then! and, soldiers, to the field!

Biron. Advance your standards, and upon them, lords;

Pell-mell, down with them! but be first advis'd,
In conflict that you get the sun of them.

Long. Now to plain-dealing; lay these glozes by: Shall we resolve to woo these girls of France?

King. And win them too: therefore let us devise Some entertainment for them in their tents.

Biron. First, from the park let us conduct them thither;

Then, homeward, every man attach the hand
Of his fair mistress: in the afternoon

We will with some strange pastime solace them,
Such as the shortness of the time can shape;
For revels, dances, masks, and merry hours,
Fore-run fair Love, strewing her way with flowers.
King. Away, away! no time shall be omitted,
That will be time, and may by us be fitted.
Biron. Allons! Allons!-Sow'd cockle reap'd no

corn;

And justice always whirls in equal measure: Light wenches may prove plagues to men forsworn; If so, our copper buys no better treasure. [Exeunt.

ACT V.

SCENE I. Another part of the same.

Enter HOLOFERNES, Sir Nathaniel, and Dull. Hol. Satis quod sufficit.

Nath. I praise God for you, sir: your reasons at dinner have been sharp and sententious; pleasant without scurrility, witty without affection, audacious without impudency, learned without opinion, and strange without heresy. I did converse this quondam day with a companion of the king's, who is intituled, nominated, or called, Don Adriano de Armado.

Hol. Novi hominem tanquam te: His humour is lofty, his discourse peremptory, his tongue filed, his eye ambitious, his gait majestical, and his general behaviour vain, ridiculous, and thrasonical. He is too pricked, too spruce, too affected, too odd, as it were, too peregrinate, as I may call it. Nath. A most singular and choice epithet.

[Takes out his table book.

your reasons at dinner have been, &c.] I know not well what degree of respect Shakspeare intends to obtain for his vicar, but he has here put into his mouth a finished representation of colloquial excellence. It is very difficult to add any thing to his character of the schoolmaster's table-talk, and perhaps all the precepts of Castiglione will scarcely be found to comprehend a rule for conversation so justly delineated, so widely dilated, and so nicely limited.

It may be proper just to note, that reason here, and in many other places, signifies discourse; and that audacious is used in a good sense for spirited, animated, confident. Opinion is the same with obstinacy or opiniatreté. JOHNSON.

without affection,] i. e. without affectation.

thrasonical.] Boastful, bragging, from Terence. He is too picked,] nicely drest.