'Tis a fhrewd doubt, though it be but a dream.' LAGO. And this may help to thicken other proofs, That do demonftrate thinly. She may be honeft yet. Tell me but this,- Отн. If it be that, LAGO. If it be that, or any that was hers," It speaks against her, with the other proofs. OTн. O, that the flave had forty thousand lives! One is too poor, too weak for my revenge! Now do I fee 'tis true.-Look here, Iago; ¡ 'Tis a fhrewd doubt, &c.] The old quarto gives this line, with the two following, to Iago; and rightly. WARBURTON. In the folio this line is given to Othello. MALONE. I think it more naturally spoken by Othello, who, by dwelling fo long upon the proof, encouraged Iago to enforce it. JOHNSON. 8 -yet we fee nothing done;] This is an oblique and fecret mock at Othello's faying,-Give me the ocular proof. WARBURTON. 9 — that was hers,] The only authentick copies, the quarto, 1622, and the folio, read-or any, it was hers. For the emendation I am anfwerable. The mistake probably arose from yt only being written in the manufcript. The modern editors, following an amendment made by the editor of the fecond folio, read-if 'twas her's. MALONE. I prefer Mr. Malone's correction to that of the fecond folio, though the latter gives fenfe where it was certainly wanting. • Now do I fee 'tis true.] The old quarto reads: STEEVENS. Now do I fee 'tis time. All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven: ' 'Tis gone. Arife, black vengeance, from thy hollow cell! + And this is Shakspeare's, and has in it much more force and folemnity, and preparation for what follows: as alluding to what he had faid before: 66 No, Iago! "I'll fee before I doubt, when I doubt, prove; This time was now come. WARBURTON. 3 All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven:] So, in Marlowe's Luft's Dominion, 1657: "Are thefe your fears? thus blow them into air.” MALONE. Marlowe's idea was perhaps caught from Horace: "Tradam protervis in mare Creticum "Portare ventis." STEEVENS. -from thy hollow cell!] Thus the quarto, 1622. The folio reads from the hollow bell. Hollow, Dr. Warburton confiders as "a poor unmeaning epithet." MALONE. I do not perceive that the epithet hollow is at all unmeaning, when applied to hell, as it gives the idea of what Milton calls, the void profound "Of uneffential night." The fame phrafe indeed occurs in Jafper Heywood's tranflation of Seneca's Thyeftes, 1560: "Where moft prodigious ugly things the hollow bell doth hide." Again, in Goulart's Admirable Hiftories, 1607, p. 626: “— caft headlong into places under-ground that were wonderful bollow where he had feen the perfons of the wicked, their punishments" &c. STEEVENS. Again, in Paradife Loft, B. I. v. 314, the fame epithet and fubject occur: "He call'd fo loud, that all the hollow deep "Of hell refounded." HOLT WHITE. Milton was a great reader and copier of Shakspeare, and he undoubtedly read his plays in the folio, without thinking of examining the more ancient quartos. In the first book of Paradife Loft, we find the univerfal hoft up fent "A fhout that tore hell's concave." MALONE, See Vol. XIV. p. 410, n. 9. STEEVENS. Yield up, O love, thy crown, and hearted throne,' To tyrannous hate! fwell, bofom, with thy fraught," For 'tis of afpicks' tongues! IAGO. Pray, be content. Отн. O, blood, İago, blood! LAGO. Patience, I fay; your mind, perhaps, may change. Отн. Never, Iago. Like to the Pontick fea, 5 -hearted throne,] Hearted throne, is the heart on which thou waft enthroned. JOHNSON. So, in Twelfth Night: "It gives a very echo to the feat, "Where love is thron'd." See alfo Romeo and Juliet, Vol. XIV. p. 533, n. 3. MALONE. -fwell, bofam, &c.] i. e. fwell, because the fraught is of poison. WARBURTON. 6 7 Never, Iago.] From the word Like, to marble heaven, inclufively, is not found in the quarto, 1622. MALONE. 8 Like to the Pontick fea, &c.] This fimile is omitted in the first edition: I think it fhould be fo, as an unnatural excurfion in this place. POPE. Every reader will, I durft fay, abide by Mr. Pope's cenfure on this paffage. When Shakspeare grew acquainted with fuch particulars of knowledge, he made a difplay of them as foon as opportunity offered. He found this in the 2d Book and 97th Chapter of Pliny's Natural Hiftory, as tranflated by Philemon Holland, 1601: “ And the fea Pontus evermore floweth and runneth out into Propontis, but the fea never retireth backe againe within Pontus.” Mr. Edwards, in his MSS. notes, conceives this fimile to allude to Sir Philip Sidney's device, whofe imprefs, Camden, in his Remains, fays, was the Cafpian sea, with this motto, Sine refluxu. STEEVENS. 9 Ne'er feels retiring ebb,] The folio, where alone this paffage is found, reads-Ne'er keeps retiring ebb, &c. Many fimilar miftakes have happened in that copy, by the compofitor's repeating a word twice in the fame line. So, in Hamlet: "My news fhall be the news [r. fruit] to that great feast,” To the Propontick, and the Hellefpont; Swallow them up.-Now, by yond' marble heaven,' I here engage my words. IAGO. [Kneels. Do not rife yet.— [Kneels. Witness, you ever-burning lights above! Again, ibidem: "The fpirit, upon whose spirit depend and reft," &c. instead of upon whofe weal. The correction was made by Mr. Pope. MALONE. 2 —a capable and wide revenge-] Capable perhaps fignifies ample, capacious. So, in As you like it: "The cicatrice and capable impreffure." Again in Pierce Pennilesse his Supplication to the Devil, by Nashe, 1592: "Then belike, quoth I, you make this word, Dæmon, a capable name, of Gods, of men, of devils." It may, however, mean judicious. In Hamlet the word is often ufed in the fenfe of intelligent. What Othello fays in another place feems to favour this latter interpretation: "Good; good;-the juftice of it pleases me." Capable means, I fuppofe, comprehenfive. STEEVENS. 3 MALONE. by yond' marble heaven,] In Soliman and Perfeda, 1599 I find the fame expression: "Now by the marble face of the welkin," &c. STEEVENS. So, in Marston's Antonio and Mellida, 1602: 4 The execution-] The firft quarto reads-excellency. STEEVENS. By execution Shakspeare meant employment or exercife. So, in Love's Labour's Loft: To wrong'd Othello's fervice! let him command, "Full of comparisons and wounding flouts, "Which you on all eftates will execute." The quarto, 1622, reads-hand. MALONE. Again, in Troilus and Creffida: 5 "In felleft manner execute your arms." And to obey ball be in me remorse, STEEVENS. What bloody work foever.] Iago devotes himself to wronged Othello, and fays, Let him command whatever blody business, and in me it fhall be an act, not of cruelty, but of tenderness, to obey him; not of malice to others, but of tenderness for him. If this fense be thought too violent, I fee nothing better than to follow Mr. Pope's reading, as it is improved by Mr. 'I heobald. JOHNSON. They first apThe quarto, 1622, has not the words-in me. peared in the folio. Theobald reads-Nor to obey, &c. MALONE. Dr. Johnfon's interpretation is undoubtedly the true one; and I can only claim the merit of fupporting his fenfe of the word remorse, i. e. pity, by the following inftances. In Lord Surrey's tranflation of the 4th Eneid, Dido fays to her fifter: "Sifter I crave thou have remorse of me." Again, in King Edward III. 1599, that Prince speaking to the citizens of Calais: "But for yourselves, look you for no remorse." Again, in Sir Clyomon Knight of the Golden Shield, 1599: "Who taketh no remorfe of womankind," Again, in Sir John Oldcastle, 1600: "Here ftand I, craving no remorse at all." I could add many more inftances, but fhall content myself to obferve that the fentiment of Iago bears no fmall refemblance to that of Arviragus in Cymbeline: "I'd let a parish of fuch Clotens blood, "And praise myself for charity." STEEVENS. Before I faw Dr. Johnson's edition of Shakspeare, my opinion of this paffage was formed, and written, and thus I understood it: "Let him command any bloody business, and to obey him fhall be in me an act of pity and compaffion for wrong'd Othello." Remorse frequently fignifies pity, mercy, compaffion, or a tenderness of heart, unattended with the ftings of a guilty confcience. So, in |