That policy may either last so long,
Or feed upon such nice and waterish diet,
Or breed itself so out of circumstance,
That I, being absent, and my place supplied,
My general will forget my love and service]
He may either of himself think it politic to keep me out of office so
long, or he may be satisfied with such slight reasons, or so many
accidents may make him think my re-admission at that time improper, that
I may be quite forgotten.
III.iii.23 (431,7) I'll watch him tame] It is said, that the ferocity of
beasts, insuperable and irreclaimable by any other means, is subdued by
keeping them from sleep.
III.iii.47 (431,8) His present reconciliation take] [W: make] To _take
his reconciliation_, may be to accept the submission which he makes in
order to be reconciled.
III.iii.65 (432,1) the wars must make examples/Out of their best] The
severity of military discipline must not spare the _best men_ of the
army, when their punishment nay afford a wholesome _example_.
III.iii.90 (433,2) Excellent wretch!--Perdition catch my soul,/But I do
love thee!] The meaning of the word _wretch_, is not generally
understood. It is now, in some parts of England, a term of the softest
and fondest tenderness. It expresses the utmost degree of amiableness,
joined with an idea, which perhaps all tenderness includes, of
feebleness, softness, and want of protection. Othello, considering
Desdemona as excelling in beauty and virtue, soft and timorous by her
sex, and by her situation absolutely in his power, calls her _Excellent
wretch!_ It may be expressed,
_Dear, harmless, helpless Excellence._
III.iii.91 (433,3) when I love thee not,/Chaos is come again] When my
love is for a moment suspended by suspicion, I have nothing in my mind
but discord, tumult, perturbation, and confusion.
III.iii.123 (435,4) They are close delations working from the heart,/
That passion cannot rule] _They are_ cold dilations _working from the
heart,/That passion cannot rule_.] I know not why the modern editors are
satisfied with this reading, which no explanation can clear. They might
easily have found, that it is introduced without authority. The old
copies uniformly give, _close dilations_, except that the earlier quarto
has _close denotements_; which was the author's first expression,
afterwards changed by him, not to _cold dilations_, for _cold_ is read
in no ancient copy; nor, I believe, to _close dilations_, but to _close
delations_; to _occult_ and _secret accusations, working_ involuntarily
_from the heart_, which, though resolved to conceal the fault, cannot
rule its _passion_ of resentment.
III.iii.127 (435,5) Or, those that be not, 'would they might seem none!]
[W: seem knaves] I believe the meaning is, _would they might no longer
seem_, or bear the shape of _men_.
III.iii.140 (436,6) Keep leets and law-days] [i.e. govern. WARBURTON.]
Rather _visit_ than _govern_, but visit with authoritative intrusion.
III.iii.149 (437,8) From one that so improbably conceits]--imperfectly
_conceits_,] In the old quarto it is,
--improbably _conceits_,
Which I think preferable.
III.iii.166 (437,9) the green-ey'd monster, which doth make/The meat it
feeds on] _which doth_ mock _The meat it feeds on_.] I have received
Hanmer's emendation ["make"]; because _to mock_, does not signify _to
loath_; and because, when Iago bids Othello _beware of jealousy, the
green-eyed monster_, it is natural to tell why he should beware, and for
caution he gives him two reasons, that jealousy _often_ creates its own
cause, and that, when the causes are real, jealousy is misery.
III.iii.173 (438,1) But riches, fineless] Unbounded, endless, unnumbered
treasures.