But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly;
The knave turns fool, that runs away;
The fool no knave, perdy]
I think this passage erroneous, though both the copies concur. The sense
mill be mended if we read,
But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly;
The fool turns knave, that runs away;
The knave no fool,--
That I stay with the king is a proof that I am a fool, the wise men are
deserting him. There is knavery in this desertion, but there is no
folly.
II.iv.116 (383,3) Is practice only] _Practice_ is in Shakespeare, and
other old writers, used commonly in an ill sense for _unlawful
artifice_.
II.iv.122 (384,4) Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels,
when she put them i' the paste alive] Hinting that the eel and Lear are
in the same danger.
II.iv.142 (384,7) Than she to scant her duty] The word _scant_ is
directly contrary to the sense intended. The quarto reads,
--_slack_ her duty,
which is no better. May we not change it thus:
You less know bow to value her desert,
Than she to _scan_ her duty.
To _scan_ may be to _measure_ or _proportion_. Yet our author uses his
negatives with such licentiousness, that it is hardly safe to make any
alteration.--_Scant_ may mean to _adapt_, to _fit_, to _proportion_;
which sense seems still to be retained in the mechanical term scantling.
(see 1765, VI, 67, 4)
II.iv.155 (385,1) Do you but mark how this becomes the house?] [T: the
use?] [Warburton called "becomes the house" "a most expressive phrase"]
with this _most expressive phrase_ I believe no reader is satisfied. I
suspect that it has been written originally,
Ask her forgiveness?
Do you but mark how this becometh--thus.
Dear daughter, I confess, &c.
_Becomes the house_, and _becometh thus_, might be easily confounded by
readers so unskilful as the original printers.
II.iv.157 (386,2) _Age is unnecessary_] i.e. Old age has few wants.
II.iv.162 (386,3) Look'd black upon me] To _look black_, may easily be
explained to _look cloudy_ or _gloomy_. See Milton:
"So frown'd the mighty combatants, that hell
Grew darker at their frown."--
II.iv.170 (386,4) To fall, and blast her pride!] Thus the quarto: the
folio reads not so well, _to fall and blister_. I think there is still a
fault, which may be easily mended by changing a letter:
--Infect her beauty,
Ye fen-suck'd fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
_Do_, fall, and blast her pride!
II.iv.174 (387.6) Thy tender-hested nature shall not give/Thee o'er to
harshness] This word, though its general meaning be plain, I do not
critically understand.
II.iv.178 (387,7) to scant my sizes] To contract my allowances or
proportions settled.
II.iv.203 (388,9) much less advancement] The word _advancement_ is
ironically used here for _conspicuousness_ of punishment; as we now say,
_a man is advanced to the pillory_. We should read,
--but his own disorders
Deserv'd much _more_ advancement.
II.iv.204 (388,1) I pray you, father, being weak, seem so] [W: deem't
so] The meaning is, since _you are weak_, be content to think yourself
weak. No change is needed.
II.iv.218 (389,3) base life] i.e. In a _servile_ state.
II.iv.227 (390,5) embossed carbuncle] _Embossed_ is _swelling,
protuberant_.
II.iv.259 (391,6) Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favour'd:/
When others are more wicked] Dr. Warburton would exchange the repeated
epithet _wicked_ into _wrinkled_ in both places. The commentator's only
objection to the lines as they now stand, is the discrepancy of the
metaphor, the want of opposition between _wicked_ and _well-favoured_.
But he might have remembered what he says in his own preface concerning
_mixed modes_. Shakespeare, whose mind was more intent upon notions than
words, had in his thoughts the pulchritude of virtue, and the deformity
of wickedness; and though he had mentioned _wickedness_, made the
correlative answer to _deformity_.
III.i.7 (394,1) That things might change, or cease: tears his white
hair] The first folio ends the speech at _change, or cease_, and begins
again with Kent's question, _But who is with him?_ The whole speech is
forcible, but too long for the occasion, and properly retrenched.
III.i.18 (395,3) my note] My observation of your character.
III.i.29 (395,6) _are but furnishings_] _Furnishings_ are what we now
call _colours, external pretences_. (1773)