Hel. The honour, sir, that flames in your fair eyes, Before I speak, too threateningly replies: Love make your fortunes twenty times above Her that so wishes, and her humble love! 2 Lord. No better, if you please. Hel. My wish receive, Which great love grant! and so I take my leave. Laf. Do all they deny her? An they were sons of mine, I'd have them whipped; or I would send them to the Turk, to make eunuchs of. Hel. Be not afraid [to a Lord] that I your hand should take; I'll never do you wrong for your own sake: Laf. These boys are boys of ice, they 'Il none have her: sure, they are bastards to the English; the French ne'er got them. Hel. You are too young, too happy, and too good, To make yourself a son out of my blood. 4 Lord. Fair one, I think not so. Laf. There's one grape yet,5-I am sure, thy father drank wine. But if thou be'st not an ass, I am a youth of fourteen; I have known thee already. Hel. I dare not say, I take you; [to BER.] but I give Me, and my service, ever whilst I live, Into your guiding power.-This is the man. 4 Laf. Do all they deny her?] None of them have yet denied her, or deny her afterwards, but Bertram. The scene must be so regulated that Lafeu and Parolles talk at a distance, where they may see what passes between Helena and the lords, but not hear it, so that they know not by whom the refusal is made. Johnson. 5 There's one grape yet,] This speech the three last editors [Theobald, Hanmer, and Warburton] have perplexed themselves, by dividing between Lafeu and Parolles, without any authority of copies, or any improvement of sense. I have restored the old reading, and should have thought no explanation necessary, but that Mr. Theobald apparently misunderstood it. Old Lafeu having, upon the supposition that the lady was refused, reproached the young lords as boys of ice, throwing his eyes on Bertram, who remained, cries out, There is one yet into whom his father put good blood—but I have known thee long enough to know thee for an ass. Johnson. King. Why then, young Bertram, take her, she's thy wife. Ber. My wife, my liege? I shall beseech your highness, In such a business give me leave to use The help of mine own eyes. King. What she has done for me? Ber. Know'st thou not, Bertram, Yes, my good lord; But never hope to know why I should marry her. bed. Ber. But follows it, my lord, to bring me down King. 'Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the which All that is virtuous, (save what thou dislik'st From lowest place when virtuous things proceed, Is good, without a name; vileness is so:1 6 'Tis only title - ] i. e. the want of title. Malone. 8 7 Of colour, weight, and heat,] That is, which are of the same colour, weight, &c. Malone. 8 From lowest place when virtuous things proceed,] The old copy has-whence. This easy correction [when] was prescribed by Dr. Thirlby. Theobald. 9 Where great additions swell,] Additions are the titles and descriptions by which men are distinguished from each other. 1 good alone Malone. Is good, without a name; vileness is so:] Shakspeare may mean, that external circumstances have no power over the real ature of things. Good alone (i. e. by itself) without a name (i. e. Not by the title. She is young, wise, fair; without the addition of titles) is good. Vileness is so (i. e. is itself.) Either of them is what its name implies: "The property by what it is should go, "Not by the title "Let's write good angel on the devil's horn, "Tis not the devil's crest." Measure for Measure. Steevens. Steevens's last interpretation of this passage is very near being right; but I think it should be pointed thus: good alone Is good;--without a name, vileness is so. Meaning that good is good without any addition, and vileness would still be vileness, though we had no such name to distinguish it by. A similar expression occurs in Macbeth: Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace, "Yet grace must still look so." That is, grace would still be grace, as vileness would still be vileness. M. Mason. The meaning is,-Good is good, independent on any wordly distinction or title: so vileness is vile, in whatever state it may appear. Malone. 2 In these to nature she's immediate heir;] To be immediate heir is to inherit without any intervening transmitter: thus she inherits beauty immediately from nature, but honour is transmitted by ancestors. Johnson. 3 that is honour's scorn, Which challenges itself as honour's born, And is not like the sire: Perhaps we might read more elegantly-as honour-born,-honourably descended: the child of hon our. Malone. Honour's born, is the child of honour. Born is here used, as bairn still is in the North. Henley. 4 And is not like the sire: Honours best thrive, &c.] The first folio omits-best; but the second folio supplies it, as it is necessary to enforce the sense of the passage, and complete its mea-. Steevens. sure. The modern editors read-Honours best thrive; in which they have followed the editor of the second folio, who introduced the word best unnecessarily; not observing that sire was used by our author, like fire, hour, &c. as a dissyllable. Malone. Where is an example of sire, used as a dissyllable, to be found? Fire and hour were anciently written fier and hower; and conse Than our fore-goers: the mere word 's a slave, Where dust, and damn'd oblivion, is the tomb I can create the rest: virtue, and she, Is her own dower: honour, and wealth, from me. Hel. That you are well restor'd, my lord, I am glad; Let the rest go. King. My honour 's at the stake; which to defeat, My love, and her desert; that canst not dream, Shall weigh thee to the beam: that wilt not know, quently the concurring vowels could be separated in pronunciation. Steevens. 5 My honour's at the stake; which to defeat, I must produce my power:] The poor King of France is again made a man of Gotham, by our unmerciful editors. For he is not to make use of his authority to defeat, but to defend his honTheobald. our. Had Mr. Theobald been aware that the implication or clause of the sentence (as the grammarians say) served for the antecedent "Which danger to defeat," there had been no need of his wit or his alteration. Farmer. Notwithstanding Mr. Theobald's pert censure of former editors for retaining the word defeat, I should be glad to see it restored again, as I am persuaded it is the true reading. The French verb defaire (from whence our defeat) signifies to free, to disembarrass, as well as to destroy. Defaire un naud, is to untie a knot; and in this sense, I apprehend, defeat is here used. It may be observed, that our verb undo has the same varieties of signification; and I suppose even Mr. Theobald would not have been much puzzled to find the sense of this passage, if it had been written; -My honour's at the stake, which to undo I must produce my power. Tyrwhitt. 6 · that canst not dream, We, poizing us in her defective scale, Shall weigh thee to the beam;] That canst not understand, It is in us to plant thine honour, where We please to have it grow: Check thy contempt: Do thine own fortunes that obedient right, Of youth and ignorance; both my revenge and hate, King. Take her by the hand, And tell her, she is thine: to whom I promise A counterpoize; if not to thy estate, A balance more replete. Ber. I take her hand. King. Good fortune, and the favour of the king, that if you and this maiden should be weighed together, and our royal favours should be thrown into her scale, (which you esteem so light) we should make that in which you should be placed, to strike the beam. Malone. 7 Into the staggers,] One species of the staggers, or the horse's apoplexy, is a raging impatience, which makes the animal dash himself with a destructive violence against posts or walls. To this the allusion, I suppose, is made. Johnson. Shakspeare has the same expression in Cymbeline, where Posthumus says: 8 "Whence come these staggers on me?" Steevens. whose ceremony Shall seem expedient on the now-born brief, And be perform'd to-night:] Several of the modern editors read-new-born brief. Steevens. This, if it be at all intelligible, is at least obscure and inaccu rate. Perhaps it was written thus: |