Invest me in my motley; give me leave

To speak my mind, and I will through and through
Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,3
If they will patiently receive my medicine.

DUKE S. Fye on thee! I can tell what thou wouldst do.

JAQ. What, for a counter, would I do, but good?

DUKE S. Most mischievous foul sin, in chiding

sin:

5

For thou thyself hast been a libertine,
As sensual as the brutish sting itself;
And all the embossed sores, and headed evils,
That thou with licence of free foot hast caught,
Wouldst thou disgorge into the general world.

3 Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,] So, in Macbeth:

"Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff."

DOUCE.

-for a counter,] Dr. Farmer observes to me, that about the time when this play was written, the French counters (i. e. pieces of false money used as a means of reckoning) were brought into use in England. They are again mentioned in Troilus and Cressida :

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will you with counters sum

"The past proportion of his infinite?" STEEVENs.

As sensual as the brutish sting-] Though the brutish sting is capable of a sense not inconvenient in this passage, yet as it is a harsh and unusual mode of speech, I should read the brutish sty. JOHNSON.

I believe the old reading is the true one. So, in Spenser's Fairy Queen, B. I. c. viii:

"A heard of bulls whom kindly rage doth sting."

Again, B. II. c. xii:

"As if that hunger's point, or Venus' sting,

"Had them enrag'd."

Again, in Othello:

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our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts."

STEEVENS.

6

JAQ. Why, who cries out on pride,
That can therein tax any private party?
Doth it not flow as hugely as the sea,
Till that the very very means do ebb?
What woman in the city do I name,
When that I say, The city-woman bears
The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?
Who can come in, and say, that I mean her,
When such a one as she, such is her neighbour?
Or what is he of basest function,

That says, his bravery is not on my cost,
(Thinking that I mean him,) but therein suits
His folly to the mettle of my speech?

There then; How, what then? Let me see wherein
My tongue hath wrong'd him if it do him right,
Then he hath wrong'd himself; if he be free,
Why then, my taxing like a wild goose flies,
Unclaim'd of any man.-But who comes here?

Enter ORLANDO, with his sword drawn.

ORL. Forbear, and eat no more.

JAQ.

Why, I have eat none yet. ORL. Nor shalt not, till necessity be serv'd. JAQ. Of what kind should this cock come of?

• Till that the very very-] The old copy reads-weary very. Corrected by Mr. Pope. MALONE.

7 his bravery-] i. e. his fine clothes. So, in The Taming of a Shrew:

With scarfs and fans, and double change of bravery." STEEVENS. There then; How, what then? &c.] The old copy reads, very redundantly

"There then; How then? What then? &c. STEEVENS. I believe we should read-Where then? So, in Othello: "What then? How then? Where's satisfaction?"

MALONE.

DUKE S. Art thou thus bolden'd, man, by thy

distress;

Or else a rude despiser of good manners,
That in civility thou seem'st so empty?

ORL. You touch'd my vein at first; the thorny

point

Of bare distress hath ta'en from me the show
Of smooth civility: yet am I inland bred,'
And know some nurture:2 But forbear, I say;
He dies, that touches any of this fruit,

Till I and my affairs are answered.

JAQ. An will not be answered with reason, you I must die.

DUKE S. What would you have? Your gentleness shall force,

More than your force move us to gentleness.

ORL. I almost die for food, and let me have it.

DUKE S. Sit down and feed, and welcome to our table.

-the thorny point

Of bare distress hath ta'en from me the show

Of smooth civility:] We might read torn with more elegance, but elegance alone will not justify alteration.

2

JOHNSON.

elsewhere in this play, Orlando means to say, HOLT WHITE.

education, breeding,

And know some nurture:] Nurture is manners. So, in Greene's Never too late, 1616:

"He shew'd himself as full of nurture as of nature." Again, as Mr. Holt White observes to me, Barret says, in his Alvearie, 1580: "It is a point of nurture, or good manners, to salute them that you meete. Urbanitatis est salutare obvios."

STEEVENS.

St. Paul advises the Ephesians, in his Epistle, ch. vi. 4, to bring their children up "in the nurture and admonition of the Lord." HARRIS.

4

ORL. Speak you so gently? Pardon me, I pray you: I thought, that all things had been savage here; And therefore put I on the countenance

Of stern commandment: But whate'er you are,
That in this desert inaccessible,3

Under the shade of melancholy boughs,
Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time;
If ever you have look'd on better days;
If ever been where bells have knoll'd to church;
If ever sat at any good man's feast;

If ever from your eye-lids wip'd a tear,
And know what 'tis to pity, and be pitied;
Let gentleness my strong enforcement be:
In the which hope, I blush, and hide my sword.
DUKE S. True is it that we have seen better days; +
And have with holy bell been knoll❜d to church;
And sat at good men's feasts; and wip'd our eyes
Of drops that sacred pity hath engender'd:
And therefore sit you down in gentleness,
And take upon command what help we have,*
That to your wanting may be ministred.

ORL. Then, but forbear your food a little while,
Whiles, like a doe, I go to find my fawn,
And give it food. There is an old poor man,
Who after me hath many a weary step
Limp'd in pure love; till he be first suffic'd,-

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3- desert inaccessible,] This expression I find in The Adventures of Simonides, by Barn. Riche, 1580: - and onely acquainted himselfe with the solitarinesse of this unaccessible desert." HENDERSON.

• And take upon command what help we have,] Upon command, is at your own command. STEEvens.

Whiles, like a doe, I go to find my fawn,

And give it food.] So, in Venus and Adonis:

"Like a milch doe, whose swelling dugs do ake,
"Hasting to feed her fawn." MALONE.

Oppress'd with two weak evils, age and hunger,—

I will not touch a bit.

DUKE S.

Go find him out,

And we will nothing waste till you return.

ORL. I thank ye; and be bless'd for

comfort!

your good [Exit.

DUKE S. Thou seest, we are not all alone un

happy:

This wide and universal theatre

Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play in."

JAQ.

All the world's a stage,"

6 Wherein we play in.] Thus the old copy. Mr. Pope more correctly reads:

Wherein we play.

I believe, with Mr. Pope, that we should only read—

Wherein we play.

and add a word at the beginning of the next speech, to complete the measure; viz.

66

Why, all the world's a stage."

Thus, in Hamlet:

"Hor. So Rosencrantz and Guildenstern go to't.

"Ham. Why, man, they did make love to their employment."

Again, in Measure for Measure:

"Why, all the souls that were, were forfeit once." Again, ibid:

"Why, every fault's condemn'd, ere it be done." In twenty other instances we find the same adverb introductorily used. STEEvens.

7 All the world's a stage, &c.] This observation occurs in one of the fragments of Petronius: "Non duco contentionis funem, dum constet inter nos, quod fere totus mundus exerceat histrioniam." STEEVENS.

This observation had been made in an English drama before the time of Shakspeare. See Damon and Pythias, 1582: "Pythagoras said, that this world was like a stage, "Whereon many play their parts."

+ this mode of expression is common to Thakur prase But on us both did haggish ave steal a

alls will that

A.1.302