dipping all his faults in their affection,
Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone,
Convert his gyves to graces]
This simile is neither very seasonable in the deep interest of this
conversation, nor very accurately applied. If the _spring_ had changed
base metals to gold, the thought had been more proper.
IV.vii.27 (302,3) if praises may go back again] If I may praise what has
been, but is now to be found no more.
IV.vii.77 (304,5) Of the unworthiest siege] Of the lowest rank. _Siege_,
for _seat, place_.
IV.vii.82 (304,6) Importing health and graveness] [W: wealth]
_Importing_ here may be, not _inferring_ by logical consequence, but
_producing_ by physical effect. A young man regards show in his dress,
an old man, _health_.
IV.vii.90 (305,7) I, in forgery of shapes and tricks/Come short of what
he did] I could not contrive so many proofs of dexterity as he could
perform.
IV.vii.98 (305,8) in your defence] That is, _in the science of_ defence.
IV.vii.101 (305,9) The scrimers] The _fencers_.
IV.vii.112 (305,1) love is begun by time] This is obscure. The meaning
may be, _love_ is not innate in us, and co-essential to our nature, but
begins at a certain time from some external cause, and being always
subject to the operations of time, suffers change and diminution. (1773)
IV.vii.113 (300,2) in passages of proof] In transactions of daily
experience.
IV.vii.123 (306,4) And then this _should_ is like a spendthrift sigh/
That hurts by easing] [W: sign] This conjecture is so ingenious, that it
can hardly be opposed, but with the same reluctance as the bow is drawn
against a hero, whose virtues the archer holds in veneration. Here may
be applied what Voltaire writes to the empress:
_Le genereux Francois--
Te combat & t'admire._
Yet this emendation, however specious, is mistaken. The original reading
is, not a _spendthrift's_ sigh, but a _spendthrift_ sigh; a _sigh_ that
makes an unnecessary waste of the vital flame. It is a notion very
prevalent, that _sighs_ impair the strength, and wear out the animal
powers.
IV.vii.135 (307,5) He being remiss] He being not vigilant or cautious.
IV.vii.139 (307,7) a pass of practice] Practice is often by Shakespeare,
and other writers, taken for an _insidious stratagem_, or _privy_
treason, a sense not incongruous to this passage, where yet I rather
believe, that nothing more is meant than a _thrust for exercise_.
IV.vii.151 (308,8) May fit us to our shape] May _enable_ us to _assume
proper characters_, and to act our part.
IV.vii.155 (308,9) blast in proof] This, I believe, is a metaphor taken
from a mine, which, in the proof or execution, sometimes breaks out with
an ineffectual _blast_.
V.i.3 (310,1) make her grave straight] Make her grave from east to west
in a direct line parallel to the church; not from north to south,
athwart the regular line. This, I think, is meant.
V.i.87 (313,1) which this ass now o'er-reaches] In the quarto, for
_over-offices_ is, _over-reaches_, which agrees better with the
sentence: it is a strong exaggeration to remark that an _ass_ can
_over-reach_ him who would once have tried to _circumvent_.--I believe
both the words were Shakespeare's. An author in revising his work, when
his original ideas have faded from his mind, and new observations have
produced new sentiments, easily introduces images which have been more
newly impressed upon him, without observing their want of congruity to
the general texture of his original design.
V.i.96 (314,2) and now my lady Worm's] The scull that was _my lord Such
a one's_, is now my _lady Worm's_.
V.i.100 (314,3) to play at loggats with 'em?] A play, in which pins are
set up to be beaten down with a bowl.
V.i.149 (316,5) by the card] The _card_ is the paper on which the
different points of the compass were described. _To do any thing by the
card_, is, _to do it with nice observation_.
V.i.151 (316,6) the age is grown so picked] So _smart_, so _sharp_, says
HANMER, very properly; but there was, I think, about that time, a
_picked_ shoe, that is, _a shoe with a long pointed toe_, in fashion, to
which the allusion seems likewise to be made. _Every man now is smart;
and every man now is a man of fashion_.
V.i.239 (319,7) winter's flaw!] Winter's _blast_.
V.i.242 (319,8) maimed rites!] Imperfect obsequies.
V.i.244 (319,9) some estate] Some person of high rank.
V.i.255 (319,2) Yet here she is allow'd her virgin crants] I have been
informed by an anonymous correspondent, that _crants_ is the German word
for _garlands_, and I suppose it was retained by us from the Saxons. To
carry _garlands_ before the bier of a maiden, and to hang them over her
grave, is still the practice in rural parishes.
_Crants_ therefore was the original word, which the author, discovering
it to be provincial, and perhaps not understood, changed to a term more
intelligible, but less proper. _Maiden rites_ give no certain or
definite image. He might have put _maiden wreaths_, or _maiden
garlands_, but he perhaps bestowed no thought upon it, and neither
genius nor practice will always supply a hasty writer with the most
proper diction.
V.i.310 (323,6) When that her golden couplets] [W: E'er that] Perhaps it
should be,
_Ere yet_--
_Yet_ and _that_ are easily confounded.
V.ii.6 (324,7) mutinies in the bilboes] _Mutinies_, the French word for
seditious or disobedient fellows in the army or fleet. _Bilboes_, the
_ship's prison_.
V.ii.6 (324,8) Rashly,/And prais'd be rashness for it--Let us know] Both
my copies read,
--Rashly,
_And prais'd be rashness for it_, let _us know_.
Hamlet, delivering an account of his escape, begins with saying, that he
_rashly_--and then is carried into a reflection upon the weakness of
human wisdom. I rashly--praised be rashness for it--_Let us_ not think
these events casual, but _let us know_, that is, _take notice and
remember_, that we sometimes succeed by _indiscretion_, when we _fail_
by _deep plots_, and infer the perpetual superintendance and _agency_ of
the _Divinity_. The observation is just, and will be allowed by every
human being who shall reflect on the course of his own life.
V.ii.22 (325,9) With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life] With _such
causes of terror_, arising from my character and designs.
V.ii.29 (325,2) Being thus benetted round with villainies,/ Ere I could
make a prologue to my brains] [W: mark the prologue ... bane] In my
opinion no alteration is necessary. Hamlet is telling how luckily every
thing fell out; he groped out their commission in the dark without
waking them; he found himself doomed to immediate destruction. Something
was to be done for his preservation. An expedient occurred, not produced
by the comparison of one method with another, or by a regular deduction
of consequences, but before he _could make a prologue to his brains,
they had begun the play_. Before he could summon his faculties, and
propose to himself what should be done, a complete scheme of action
presented itself to him. His mind operated before he had excited it.
This appears to me to be the meaning.
V.ii.41 (326,5) As peace should still her wheaten garland wear,/ And
stand a comma 'tween their amities] HANMER reads,
_And stand a_ cement--