Page images
PDF
EPUB

chase is a mere sophism:-the hounds dipping their mouths in the blood of the animal they kill, is not dipping their meat: neither can it be said, in any just reference to Timon, that it is the animal, but rather the huntsman who cheers the hounds. The only sense I can extract from the passage, as it stands, is this, so many feed luxuriously, or "sauce their meat" at the expence of one man, whose very "blood" (means of living) must at length be exhausted by them; and yet he preposterously encourages them to proceed in his destruction.

If I

"Were a huge man, I should fear to drink at meals."

This is pretty versification: I suppose it was, "Were I a huge man, I'd fear drink at meals." i. e. According to a warranted ellipsis,

[ocr errors]
[ocr errors]

I should fear to drink."

38. Amen, so fall to't.”

This is deficient by a foot and a half.-I suppose the words missing were,

"Amen, say I, and so fall to't."

39. "We should think ourselves for ever perfect."

Dr. Johnson's interpretation of "perfect" (arrived at the height of perfection), I believe is incorrect it means, I think, no more than, satisfied, free from uneasiness or solicitude; in which sense the word occurs in Macbeth:

"Then comes my fit again, (the disorder of my anxious apprehensions)

[ocr errors]

43.

[ocr errors]

I had been perfect else."

Hey day, what a sweep of vanity comes this way!

They dance! they are mad women."

Does the editor give us this for metre? I suppose it should be,

[ocr errors]

Why, heyday! what a sweep of vanity

"Comes this way dancing! They are mad wo

[ocr errors][merged small]

44. "We make ourselves fools, to disport our

selves;

"And spend our flatteries, to drink those

men,

Upon whose age we void it up again, "With poisonous spite, and envy."

The meaning of this passage is to me not at all obvious; yet the commentators have passed it by in silence.I cannot explain it otherwise than by "drink those men," understanding, compliment them, while the bottle is in circulation, drink their healths; and, by taking age," to imply, as well a decline from prosperity, as an advancement in years.

66

In many parts of the dialogue in this play, the attempt to exhibit correct metre may appear not only fruitless but absurd: yet where the writer, whoever he might be, was composing in verse, there can hardly be a doubt he would have given the necessary numbers: I would regulate the text, here, after

[blocks in formation]

Faith, for the worst, is filthy,

"And would not hold the taking-in, I doubt me."

Apem.

[ocr errors]

Tim.

[ocr errors]

Ladies, pray tarry; there's an idle banquet

"Attends you; please you to, dispose yourselves."

All Lad. "Most thankfully, my lord."

Tim.

[ocr errors]

Here, Flavius !"

[blocks in formation]

My lord."

[merged small][ocr errors]

ther."

The little casket bring me hi

Here, I apprehend, Flavius pauses, in honest reluctance, and gives Timon reason to suppose his orders were not exactly understood, who therefore repeats,

"The casket!"

Flav. 66

Yes, my lord, more jewels yet! "There is no crossing him in's humour now."

46. "Tis pity, bounty had not eyes behind; "That man might ne'er be wretched for his mind."

It is pity that Generosity should not reflect, and avail itself of experience, so as to prevent a man's becoming a sacrifice to the nobleness of his disposition.

[ocr errors][merged small][ocr errors][merged small]
[ocr errors]

Here, sir, in readiness."

Timon's speech following this is miserably lame and prosaic; but if it is to be measured, let it have fair play:

2d Lord. "Our horses."

Tim.

O, my good friends, I have yet "One word to say; look you, my lord,

I must

"Entreat that you will honour me so much

"As to advance this jewel; pray accept, "And wear it, kind my lord."

1st Lord. "I am so far already in your gifts."

2d Lord."

3d Lord. "

And I."

And I."

4th Lord."

5th Lord."

And I."

So are we all."

"Neur? why then another time I'll hear thee."

We can here count ten syllables, indeed, but find nothing like metre: I would propose: "Me! near! why then another time I'll hear thee."

48. "I pr'ythee, let us be provided."

The defective measure, and the sense of the context, shew that a rhyme was intended here: at some other opportunity, says Timon, I will hear thee, but

"I pr'ythee let us be provided now,
"To shew them entertainment."
I scarce know how."

Flav. "

"He commands us to provide, and give great

gifts,

"And all out of an empty coffer."

It is not always in the power of an editor to repair a corrupted passage, or produce metre from a combination of words incorrigibly prosaic; but, I apprehend, he is no where justifiable in counting out syllables merely, and putting into the page, as a quintameter, a line without the cadences necessary to constitute verse.-If the order of the words will not conform to measure, they should, doubtless, be set down as prose :-in the present instance perhaps we might regulate:

"Here he commands us to provide and give "Great gifts, and all out of an empty coffer." 49. "To shew him what a beggar his heart is.”

As this awkward rhyme appears to be accidental; I think it would be usefully removed by transposition:

[ocr errors]

"To shew him what a beggar is his heart." Again, the measure wants correction :

He owes

"For every word; he is so kind, that he now,'

&c.

That should be taken away.

"Well, would I were gently put out of office Before I were forc'd out."

[ocr errors]

Why should such a disposition of words assume the form of verse? We might, by an easy transposition, restore the first line to measure, and guess at the deficiency of the other:

66

Well, would I were put, gently, out of office, "Before I were forc'd out, and ruin whelm us.” Again:

"I bleed inwardly for my lord."
You do yourselves."

Tim."

« PreviousContinue »