Glo. Here, take this purfe, thou whom the heavens' plagues Have humbled to all ftrokes. That I am wretched; * That flaves your ordinance, that will not fee And each man have enough. Do'st thou know Dover? Edg. Ay, mafter. Glo. There is a cliff, whofe high and bending head Looks fearfully on the confined deep; Bring me but to the very brim of it, From that place And I'll repair the mifery thou do'st bear, Edg. Give me thy arm; fers or Jugglers. WARBURTON. The paffage in Italicks is omitted in the folio, because I fuppofe as the ftory was forgotten, the jeft was lost. Let the fuperfluous,] Lear has before uttered the fame fentiment, which indeed cannot be too strongly impreffed, though it may be too often repeated. That SLAVES your ordinance,] Superfluous is here used for one living in abundance. But the next line is corrupt. The only fenfe I know of, in which flaves your ordinance can be understood, is when men employ the form or femblance of religion to compafs their ill defigns. But this will not do here. Glo'fter is fpeaking of fuch who by an uninterrupted courfe of profperity [Exeunt are grown wanton, and callous to the misfortunes of others; fuch as thofe who fearing no reverfe, flight and neglect, and therefore may be faid to BRAVE the ordinance of heaven. Which is certainly the right reading. And this is the fecond time in which flaves has, in this play, been read for braves. WARB. The emendation is plaufible, yet I doubt whether it be right. The language of Shakepeare is very licentious, and his words have often meanings remote from the proper and original use. To flave or beflave another is to treat him with terms of indignity; in a kindred fenfe, to flave the ordinance, may be, to flight or ridicule it. SCENE Gon. ELCOME, my Lord. I marvel,' our WE Not met us on the way. Enter Steward. Now, where's your mafter? Stew. Madam, within; but never man fo chang'd. I told him of the army that was landed; He smiled at it. I told him, you were coming, When I inform'd him, then he call'd me fot; Gon. Then fhall you go no further. It is the cowish terror of his fpirit, [To Edmund. Brother; That dares not undertake; he'll not feel wrongs, A mistress's command. Wear this; fpare speech; our mild hufband] It must be remembered that Albany, the husband of Gonerill, difliked, in the end of the first act, the fcheme of oppreffion and ingratitude. De Decline your head. This kifs, if it durft speak, Would stretch thy fpirits up into the air. Conceive, and fare thee well. Edm. Yours in the ranks of death. Gon. My most dear Glo'fter! [Exit Edmund Oh, the strange difference of man, and man! To thee, a woman's fervices are due, My fool ufurps my body. Stew. Madam, here comes my Lord. Enter Albany. Gon. I have been worth the whistle. Alb. Oh Gonerill, You are not worth the duft, which the rude wind Blows in your face. I fear your difpofition: 2 That Nature, which contemns its origine, 3 Cannot be border'd certain in itself; 21 fear your difpofition:] Thefe and the fpeech enfuing are in the edition of 1608, and are but neceffary to explain the reasons of the deteftation which Albany here expresses to his wife. РОРЕ. 3 Cannot be border'd certain-] Certain, for within the bounds that nature prescribes. WARBURTON. 4 She that herself will SHIVER, and difbranch,] Thus all the Editions, but the old quarto, that reads SLIVER, which is right. Shiver means to fhake or fly apieces into splinters. As he fays afterwards, Thou'd' fhiver'd like an egg. But fliver fignifies to tear off or dibranch. So in Mackbeth, And -flips of yew Sliver'd in the moon's eclipfe. WARBURTON. 5 From her material Sap,Thus the old Quarto; but mate. rial Sap is a Phrafe that I don't understand. The Mother-Tree is the true technical Term; and confidering our Author has faid but just above, That Nature, which contemns its Origine, there is little room to question but he wrote, From her maternal Sap.- From her material Sap,--] Thus all the Editions 'till Mr. Theobald's, who alters material to maternal; and for thefe wife reafons, Material sap, (says he) I own is a phrafe that I don't un derstand. 5 And come to deadly use. Gon. No more; 'tis foolish.. Alb. Wisdom and goodnef to the vile feem vile, Moft barbrous, moft degenerate, have you madded. derstand. The mother-tree is the true technical term, and confidering our author bad faid juft before, That Nature, which contemns its origine there is no room to question but he wrote, From her maternal fap. And to prove that we may fay maternal jap, he gives many authorities from the claffics, and fays he could produce more, where words equivalent to maternal stock are used : which is quite another thing, as we fhall now fee. In making his emendation, the editor did not confider the difference between material fap, and material body, or trunk or ftock: The latter expreffion being indeed not fo well; material being a properer epithet for body. But the firft is right; and we should fay, material jap, not maternal. For material fap fignifies, that whereby a branch is nourished, and increases in bulk by fresh acceffion of matter. On which account material is elegant. Indeed fap, when applied to the whole tree, might be called ma ternal, but could not be fo when applied to a branch only. For tho' fap might, in fome fenfe, be faid to be maternal to the tree, yet it is the tree that is maurnal to the branch, and not -VOL. VI. the fap: but here the epithet is applied to the branch. From all this, we conclude that the old reading is the true. But what if, after all, material was used by the writers of thefe times in the very fenfe of maternal? It would feem fo by the title of an old English translation of Freif jart's Chronicle, which runs in thefe words, Syr John Froiffurt's Chronicle tranflated out of Frenthe into our MATERIAL English Tongue by John Bouchier, printed 1525 WARBURTON. I fuppofe no reader doubts but the word fhould be maternal. Dr. Warburton has taken great pains without much fuccefs, and indeed without much exactness of attention, to prove that material has a more proper fenfe than maternal, and yet feems glad at laft to infer from an apparent errour of another prefs that material and maternal mean the fame. And come to deadly use.] Alluding to the ufe that witches and inchanters are faid to make of wither'd branches in their charms. A fine infinuation in the fpeaker. that he was ready for the moft unnatural mifchief, and a preparative of the poet to her plotting with the baftard against her husband's life. WARD. A man, a Prince by him fo benefited? 8 Gon. Milk-liver'd man! That bear'ft a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs; Ere they have done their mischief. Where's thy Drum? Alb. See thyfelf, devil: • Proper deformity feems not in the fiend 7 A man, a Prince by him fo benefited? After this line, I fufpect a line or two to be wanting, which upbraids her for her fifter's cruelty to Glofter. And my reafon is, that in her anfwer we find thefe words, Fools do thoje villains pity, who are punish'd Ere they have done their mifchief which evidently allude to Glof ter's cafe. Now I cannot conceive that he would here apologize for what was not objected to her. But I fuppofe the Players thought the fpeech too long; which has occafioned thro'out, and more particularly in this play, the retrenchment of nu merous lines and fpeeches; many of which have been restored by the care and difcernment of Mr. Pope. WARBURTON. Here is a pompous note to fupport a conjecture apparently erroncous, and confuted by the next scene, in which the account is given for the first time to Albany of Glo'fter's fufferings. Like monfiers of the deep.] Fishes are the only animals that are known to prey upon their own fpecies. 9 Proper deformity-] i. e. diabolic qualities appear not fohorrid in the devil to whom they belong, as in woman who unnaturally affumes them. WARBURTON. Alb. |