characters fometimes difguft, but cannot corrupt, for both Creffida and Pandarus are detefted and contemned. The comic characters feem to have been the favourites of the writer; they are of the fuperficial kind, and exhibit more of manners than nature; but they are copioufly filled and powerfully impreffed. Shakespeare has in his story followed, for the greater part, the old book of Caxton, which was then very popular; but the character of Therfites, of which it makes no mention, is a proof that this play was written after Chapman had published his verfion of Homer. JOHNSON. The first seven books of Chapman's Homer were published in the year 1596, and again in 1598. They were dedicated as follows: To the most honored now living inftance of the Achilleian virtues eternized by divine Homere, the Earle of Effexe, Ear! Marshall, &c. STEEVENS, Perfons Represented. CYMBELINE, king of Britain. Leonatus Pofthumus, a gentleman married to the princess. Guiderius, difguifed under the names of Polydore and Arviragus, Cadwal, fuppofed fons to Belarius. Philario, an Italian, friend to Pofthumus. lachimo, friend to Philario. Caius Lucius, ambassador from Rome. A French Gentleman. Cornelius, a doctor. Two Gentlemen. Queen, wife to Cymbeline. Imogen, daughter to Cymbeline by a former queen. Lords, Ladies, Roman Senators, Tribunes, Apparitions, a Soothsayer, Captains, Soldiers, Messengers, and other Attendants. SCENE, fometimes in BRITAIN; Sometimes in ITALY, ACT I. SCENE I. Cymbeline's palace in Britain. Enter two Gentlemen. I GENTLEMAN. OU do not meet a man, but frowns: our bloods No more obey the heavens, than our courtiers' Still feem, as does the king's. 2 Gent. But what's the matter? 1 Gent. Mr. POPE fuppofed the ftory of this play to have been taken from a novel of Boccace; but he was mistaken, as an imitation of it is found in an old ftory-book entitled, Weftward for Smelts. This imitation differs in as many particulars from the Italian novellift, as from Shakespeare, though they concur in the more confiderable parts of the fable. It was published in a a quarto pamphlet 1603. This is the only copy of it which I have hitherto feen. STEEVENS. 2 You do not meet a man, but frowns: our BLOODS No more obey the heavens, than our courtiers Still feem, as does the king's.] The thought is this: we are not now (as we were wont) influenced by the weather, but by the king's looks. We no more obey the heavens [the fky] than our courtiers obey the heavens [God]. By which it appears that the reading-our bloods, is wrong. For though the blood may be affected with the weather, yet that affection is discovered not by change of colour, but by change of countenance. And it is the outward not the inward change that is here talked of, as appears from the word feem. We should read therefore, Our BROWS No more obey the heavens, &c. Which is evident from the preceding words, You do not meet a man but frowns. And 1 Gent. His daughter, and the heir of his kingdom, He purpos'd to his wife's fole fon (a widow, Her husband banifh'd; fhe imprifon'd: all 2 Gent. None but the king? 1 Gent. He, that hath loft her, too: fo is the queen, That moft defir'd the match. But not a courtier, Although they wear their faces to the bent Of the king's look, hath a heart that is not Altho' they wear their faces to the bent Of the king's look, but hath a heart that is The Oxford Editor improves upon this emendation, and reads, our looks No more obey the heart ev'n than our courtiers. But by venturing too far, at a fecond emendation, he has stript it of all thought and fentiment. WARBURTON. This paffage is. fo difficult, that commentators may differ .concerning it without animofity or fhame. Of the two emendations propofed, Hanmer's is the more licentious; but he makes the fenfe clear, and leaves the reader an eafy paffage. Dr. Warburton has corrected with more caution, but lefs improvement: his reafening upon his own reading is fo obfcure and perplexed, that I fufpect fome injury of the prefs.I am now to tell my opinion, which is, that the lines itand as they were originally written, and that a paraphrafe, fuch as the licentious and abrupt expreflions of our author too frequently require, will make emendation unneceffary. We do not meet a man but frowns; our bloods-our countenances, which, in popular speech, are faid to be regulated by the temper of the blood,—no more obey the laws of heaven, which direct us to appear what we really are, than our courtiers ;—that is, than the bloods of our courtiers; but our bloods, like theirs,-ftill feem, as doth the king's. JOHNSON, 2 Gent. |