Edm. This is the excellent foppery of the world! that, when we are fick in fortune, (often the furfeit of

Our

This is the excellent foppery of the world, &c.] In Shakspeare's best plays, befides the vices that arife from the subject, there is generally fome peculiar prevailing folly, principally ridiculed, that runs through the whole piece. Thus, in The Tempest, the lying difpofition of travellers, and, in As You Like It, the fantaftic humour of courtiers, is expofed and fatirized with infinite pleafantry. In like manner, in this play of Lear, the dotages of judicial aftrology are feverely ridiculed. I fancy, was the date of its first performance well confidered, it would be found that fomething or other happened at that time which gave a more than ordinary run to this deceit, as these words feem to intimate; I am thinking, brather, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow thefe eclipfes. However this be, an im pious cheat, which had fo little foundation in nature or reason, fo deteftable an original, and fuch fatal confequences on the manners of the people, who were at that time strangely befotted with it, certainly deferved the fevereft lafh of fatire. It was a fundamental in this noble science, that whatever feeds of good difpofitions the infant unborn might be endowed with either from nature, or traductively from its parents, yet if, at the time of its birth, the delivery was by any cafualty fo accelerated or retarded, as to fall in with the predominancy of a malignant conflellation, that momentary influence would entirely change its nature, and bias it to all the contrary ill qualities: fo wretched and monstrous an opinion did it fet out with. But the Italians, to whom we owe this, as well as most other unnatural crimes and follies of thefe latter ages, fomented its original impiety to the most deteftable height of extravagance. Petrus Aponenfis, an Italian phyfician of the 13th century, affures us that those prayers which are made to God when the moon is in conjunction with Jupiter in the Dragon's tail, are infallibly heard. The great Milton, with a juft indignation of this impiety, hath, in his Paradife Regained, fatirized it in a very beautiful manner, by putting thefe reveries into the mouth of the devil. Nor could the licentious Rabelais himself forbear to ridicule this impious dotage, which he does with exquifite addrefs and humour, where, in the fable which he fo agreeably tells from Afop, of the man who applied to Jupiter for the lofs of his hatchet, he makes those who, on the poor man's good fuccefs, had projected to trick Jupiter by the fame petition, a kind of aftrologic atheilts, who afcribed this good fortune, that they imagined they were now all going to partake of, to the influence of fome rare conjunction and configuration of the ftars, "Hen, hen,

Dd4

difent

our own behaviour) we make guilty of our difafters, the fun, the moon, and the ftars: as if we were villains by neceffity; fools, by heavenly compulfion; knaves, thieves, and treachers, by fpherical predominance; drunkards, lyars, and adulterers, by an inforc'd obedience of planetary influence; and all that

difent ils-Et doncques, telle eft au temps prefent la revolution des Cieulx, la conftellation des Aftres, & afpect des planetes, que quiconque coignée perdra, foubdain deviendra ainfi riche ?" - Nou. Prol. du IV. Livre.- But to return to Shakspeare. So blafphemous a delufion, therefore, it became the honesty of our poet to expofe. But it was a tender point, and required managing. For this impious juggle had in his time a kind of religious reverence paid to it. It was therefore to be done obliquely; and the circumftances of the fcene furnished him with as good an opportunity as he could wish. The perfons in the drama are all Pagans, fo that as, in compliance to custom, his good characters were not to fpeak ill of judicial aftrology, they could on account of their religion give no reputation to it. But in order to expofe it the more, he with great judgment, makes thefe Pagans fatalifts; as appears by these words of Lear:

By all the operations of the orbs,

From whom we do exift and cease to be.

For the doctrine of fate is the true foundation of judicial aftrology. Having thus difcredited it by the very commendations given to it, he was in no danger of having his direct fatire against it mistaken, by its being put (as he was obliged, both in paying regard to cuftom, and in following nature) into the mouth of the villain and atheist, especially when he has added fuch force of reafon to his ridicule, in the words referred to in the beginning of the note. WARBURTON.

9

and treachers,-] The modern editors read treacherous; but the reading of the firft copies, which I have restored to the text, may be fupported from most of the old contemporary writers. So, in Doctor Dodypoll, a comedy, 1600:

"How fmooth the cunning treacher look'd upon it!"? Again, in Every Man in his Humour:

68

Oh, you treachour!"

Again, in Robert Earl of Huntingdon, 1601:

Hence, treacher as thou art!"

Again, in the Bloody Banquet, 1639:

"To poifon the right ufe of fervice-a trecher."

Chaucer, in his Romaunt of the Rofe, mentions "the falfe treacher," and Spenfer often ufes the fame word. STEEVENS.

we

2

we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on: An admirable evafion of whore-mafter man, to lay his goatifh difpofition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under urfa major; fo that it fol lows, I am rough and lecherous.-Tut, I fhould have been that I am, had the maidenlieft ftar in the firmament twinkled on my baftardizing. Edgar

and 3 pat

Eater Edgar.

4 he comes, like the catastrophe of the old

comedy:

An admirable evafion-to lay bis-difpofition on the charge of a ftar!] We should read, change of a star! which both the fenfe and grammar require. It was the opinion of astrologers (fee what is faid just above) that the momentary influence did all; and we do not fay, Lay a thing on the charge, but to the charge. Befides, change answering to evasion just above, gives additional elegance to the expreffion. WARBURTON.

2

of a far.] Both the quartos read-to the charge of ftars. STEEVENS.

he comes- ] The quartos read,

-and out he comes.

STEEVENS.

4 he comes, like the catastrophe of the old comedy :- -] This we are to understand, as a compliment intended by the author, on the natural winding up of the plot in the comedy of the antients; which as it was owing to the artful and yet natural introduction of the perfons of the drama into the scene, juft in the nick of time, or pat, as our author fays, makes the fimilitude very proper. This, without doubt, is the fupreme beauty of comedy, confidered as an action. And as it depends folely on a ftrict obfervance of the unities, it fhews that these unities are in nature, and in the reafon of things, and not in a mere arbitrary invention of the Greeks, as fome of our own country critics, of a low mechanic genius, have, by their works, perfuaded our wits to believe. For common fenfe requiring that the subject of one comedy fhould be one action, and that that action fhould be contained nearly within the period of time which the representation of it takes up; hence we have the unities of time and action; and, from thefe, unavoidably arifes the third, which is that of place. For when the whole of one action is included within a proportionable small space of time, there is no room to change the fcene, but all must be done upon one spot of ground. Now

from

4

comedy: My cue is villainous melancholy, with a figh like Tom o' Bedlam.-O, these eclipses do portend these divifions! fa, fol, la, me

Edg. How now, brother Edmund? What serious contemplation are you in?

Edm. I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what fhould follow thefe eclipfes.

Edg. Do you bufy yourself with that?

Edm. I promise you, the effects he writes of,

fucceed

from this laft unity, (the neceffary iffue of the two other, which derive immediately from nature) proceeds all that beauty of the catastrophe, or the winding up the plot in the ancient comedy. For all the perfons of the drama being to appear and act on one limited spot, and being by their feveral interefts to embarrass, and at length to conduct the action to its deftin'd period, there is need of confummate skill to bring them on, and take them off, naturally and neceffarily; for the grace of action requires the one, and the perfection of it the other. Which conduct of the action muft needs produce a beauty that will give a judicious mind the highest pleasure. On the other hand, when a comic writer has a whole country to range in, nothing is easier than to find the perfons of the drama just where he would have them; and this requiring no art, the beauty we speak of is not to be found. Confequently a violation of the unities deprives the drama of one of its greatest beauties; which proves what I afferted, that the three unities are no arbitrary, mechanic invention, but founded in reafon and the nature of things. The Tempest of Shakspeare fufficiently proves him to be well acquainted with these unities; and the paffage in queftion fhews him to have been struck with the beauty that refults from them. WARBURTON.

This fuppofition will not at all fuit with the character of Edmund, with the comic turn of his whole fpeech, nor with the general idea of Shakspeare's want of learning; fo that I am more apt to think the paffage fatire than panegyric, and intended to ridicule the very aukward conclufions of our old comedies, where the perfons of the fcene make their entry inartificially, and juft when the poet wants them on the stage. WARNER.

• I promife you,] The folio edition commonly differs from the first quarto, by augmentations or infertions, but in this place it varies by omiffion, and by the omiflion of fomething which naturally introduces the following dialogue. It is eafy to remark, that in this fpeech, which ought, I think, to be inferted as it

now

fucceed unhappily; *as of unnaturalnefs between the child and the parent; death, dearth, diffolutions of ancient amities; divifions in ftate, menaces and maledictions against king and nobles; needlefs diffi dences, banishment of friends, diffipation of cohorts", nuptial breaches, and I know not what.

8

Edg. How long have you been a fectary aftronomical?

Edm. Come, come; * when faw you my father laft? Edg. Why, the night gone by.

Edm. Spake you with him?

Edg. Ay, two hours together.

Edm. Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure in him, by word, or countenance? Edg. None at all.

Edm. Bethink yourself, wherein you may have offended him and at my entreaty, forbear his prefence, until fome little time hath qualified the heat of his displeasure; which at this inftant fo rageth in him, that with the mischief of your person it would fcarcely allay.

now is in the text, Edmund, with the common craft of fortunetellers, mingles the past and future, and tells of the future only what he already foreknows by confederacy, or can attain by probable conjecture. JOHNSON.

—as of—] All from this afterisk to the next, is omitted

in the folio.

STEEVENS.

7-diffipation of cohorts.-] Thus the old copy. Dr. Johnfon reads, of courts. STEEVENS.

8 How long have you] This line I have restored from the two eldeit quartos, and have regulated the following speech according to the fame copies. STEEVENS.

9 that with the mifchief of your perfon] This reading is in both copies; yet I believe the author gave it, that but with the mischief of your person it would scarce allay.

JOHNSON.

I do not fee any need of alteration. He could not express the violence of his father's difpleafure in stronger terms than by faying it was fo great that it would fcarcely be appeafed by the deAruction of his fon. MALONE.

Edg,