9 1. PLAY. I warrant your honour. HAM. Be not too tame neither, but let your own -out-berods Herod :] The character of Herod in the ancient myfteries, was always a violent one. See the Coventrie Ludus among the Cotton MSS. Vespasian D. VIII: "Now I regne lyk a kyng arayd ful rych, 66 66 Dukys with dentys I drive into the dych; Again, in The Chefter Whitfun Plays, MS. Harl. 1013: "I kynge of kynges, non foe keene, "I welde this worlde withouten wene, "I beate all those unbuxome beene ; Deepe in hell adowne. "For I am kinge of all mankinde, I ame the greatest above degree, "No raine to fall fhall now be free, See The Vintner's Play, p. 67. Chaucer, defcribing a parish clerk, in his Miller's Tale, fays: "He playeth Herodes on a skaffold high.” The parish clerks and other fubordinate ecclefiafticks appear to have been our first actors, and to have reprefented their characters on diftinct pulpits or fcaffolds. Thus, in one of the ftage-directions to the 27th pageant in the Coventry collection already mentioned: "What tyme that proceffyon is entered into yt place, and the Herowdys taken his fchaffalde, and Annas and Cayphas their schaf faldys," &c. STEEVENS. difcretion be your tutor: fuit the action to the word, the word to the action; with this fpecial obfervance, that you o'er-ftep not the modefty of nature: for any thing fo overdone is from the purpofe of playing, whofe end, both at the firft, and now, was, and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirrour up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, fcorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time, his form and preffure. Now this, over To the inftances given by Mr. Steevens of Herod's lofty language, "Of bewte and of boldnes I ber evermore the belle, "I dynge with my dowtinefs the devyl down to helle, Again, in The Unluckie Firmentie, by G. Kyttes, 4to. bl. 1: 2 age and body of the time,] RITSON. The age of the time can hardly pafs. May we not read, the face and body, or did the author write, the page? The page fuits well with form and pressure, but ill with body. JOHNSON. To exhibit the form and pressure of the age of the time, is, to reprefent the manners of the time fuitable to the period that is treated of, according as it may be ancient, or modern. STEEVENS. I can neither think this paffage right as it ftands, or approve of either of the amendments fuggefted by Johnfon.-There is one more fimple than either, that will remove every difficulty. Inftead of the very age and body of the time," (from which it is hard to extract any meaning,) I read—" every age and body of the time;" and then the fenfe will be this:-" Show virtue her own likeness, and every ftage of life, every profeffion or body of men, its form and refemblance." By every age, is meant the different ftages of life-by every body, the various fraternities, forts, and ranks of mankind. M. MASON. Perhaps Shakspeare did not mean to connect thefe words. It i done, or come tardy off, though it make the unfkilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the cenfure of which one,+ muft, in your allowance,' o'er-weigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be players, that I have seen play,—and heard others the end of playing, fays Hamlet, to fhew the age in which we live, and the body of the time, its form and preffure: to delineate exactly the manners of the age, and the particular humour of the day. MALONE. 3 preffure.] Refemblance, as in a print. JOHNSON. the cenfure of which one, &c.] Ben Jonfon seems to have imitated this passage in his Poetafter, 1601: I will try "If tragedy have a more kind aspect; "A theatre unto me." MALONE. the cenfure of which one,] The meaning is, "the cenfure of one of which," and probably that fhould be the reading alfo. The prefent reading, though intelligible, is very licentious, efpecially in profe. M. MASON. 5 in your allowance,] In your approbation. See Vol. XIV. P. 129, n. 3. MALONE. 60, there be players, &c.] I would read thus: "There be players, that I have feen play, and heard others praise, and that highly (not to fpeak profanely) that neither having the accent nor the gait of Chriftian, Pagan, nor Muffulman, have fo ftrutted and bellowed, that I thought fome of nature's journeymen had made the men, and not made them well," &c. FARMER. I have no doubt that our author wrote," that I thought fome of nature's journeymen had made them, and not made them well," &c. Them and men are frequently confounded in the old copies. See the Comedy of Errors, Act II. fc. ii. folio, 1623:"because it is a bleffing that he beftows on beafts, and what he hath fcanted them [1. men] in hair, he hath given them in wit.”— In the prefent inftance the compofitor probably caught the word men from the last fyllable of journeymen. Shakspeare could not mean to affert as a general truth, that nature's journeymen had made men, i. e. all mankind; for, if that were the cafe, these praise, and that highly,-not to speak it profanely," that, neither having the accent of chriftians, nor the gait of christian, pagan, nor man, have so ftrutted, and bellow'd, that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity fo abominably. 1. PLAY. I hope, we have reform'd that indifferently with us. HAM O, reform it altogether. And let thofe, that play your clowns, fpeak no more than is set down for them: for there be of them, that will ftrutting players would have been on a footing with the reft of the fpecies. Nature herfelf, the poet means to fay, made all mankind except thefe ftrutting players, and they were made by Nature's journeymen. A paffage in King Lear, in which we meet with the fame fentiment, in my opinion fully fupports the emendation now proposed: "Kent. Nature difclaims in THEE, a tailor made THEE. "Corn. Thou art a ftrange fellow: A tailor make a man! "Kent. Ay, a tailor, fir; a ftone-cutter or a painter [Nature's journeymen] could not have made him fo ill, though he had been but two hours at the trade." This notion of Nature keeping a fhop, and employing journeymen to form mankind, was common in Shakspeare's time. See Lyly's Woman in the Moon, a comedy, 1597: They draw the curtains from before Nature's fhop, where ftands an image clad, and fome unclad." MALONE. 7not to speak it profanely,] Profanely feems to relate, not to the praife which he has mentioned, but to the cenfure which he is about to utter. Any grofs or indelicate language was called profane. JOHNSON. So, in Othello" he is a moft profane and liberal counsellor." MALONE. 8 -Speak no more than is fet down for them:] So, in The Antipodes, by Brome, 1638: 66 you, fir, are incorrigible, and "Take licence to yourfelf to add unto "Your parts, your own free fancy," &c. That is a way, my lord, has been allow'd themselves laugh, to fet on some quantity of barren fpectators to laugh too; though, in the mean time, fome neceffary queftion of the play be then to be confidered: that's villainous; and fhows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready.[Exeunt Players. Enter POLONIUS, ROSENCRANTZ, and GUILDEN STERN. How now, my lord? will the king hear this piece of work? POL. And the queen too, and that presently. "On elder ftages, to move mirth and laughter." "Yes, in the days of Tarlton, and of Kempe, "Before the stage was purg'd from barbarifm," &c. Stowe informs us, (p. 697, edit. 1615), that among the twelve players who were fworn the queen's fervants in 1583, "were two rare men, viz. Thomas Wilfon, for a quick delicate refined extemporall witte; and Richard Tarleton, for a wondrous plentifull, pleafant extemporall witt," &c. Again, in Tarleton's Newes from Purgatory: "I abfented myself from all plaies, as wanting that merrye Rofcius of plaiers that famofed all comedies fo with his pleafant and extemporall in vention." This caufe for complaint, however, against low comedians, is ftill more ancient; for in The Contention betwyxte Churchyard and Camell, &c. 1560, I find the following paffage : "But Vices in ftage plaies, "When theyr matter is gon, "They laugh out the refte "To the lookers on. "And fo wantinge matter, "You brynge in my coate," &c. STEEVENS. The clown very often addressed the audience, in the middle of the play, and entered into a conteft of raillery and sarcasm with fach of the audience as chofe to engage with him. It is to this abfurd practice that Shakspeare alludes. See the Hiftorical Account of our old English Theatres, Vol. II. MALONE. |