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THE THIRD PART OF KING HENRY VI.

This play is only divided from the former for the convenience of exhibition; for the series of action is continued without interruption, nor are any two scenes of any play more closely connected than the first scene of this play with the last of the former.

ACT I. SCENE iii. (1. i. 236.)

What is it but to make thy Sepulchre.

The Queen's reproach is founded on a position long received among politicians, that the loss of a King's power is soon followed by loss of life.

ACT I. SCENE IV. (1. ii. 22–3.)

An oath is of no moment, being not took
Before a true and lawful magistrate.

The obligation of an oath is here eluded by very despicable sophistry. A lawful magistrate alone has the power to exact an oath, but the oath derives no part of its force from the magistrate. The plea against the obligation of an oath obliging to maintain an usurper, taken from the unlawfulness of the oath itself in the foregoing play, was rational and just.

ACT I. SCENE iv. (1. ii. 49–50.)

The Queen, with all the Northern Earls and Lords,
Intend bere to besiege you your castle.

in

I know not whether the authour intended any moral instruction, but he that reads this has a striking admonition against that precipitancy by which men often use unlawful means to do that which a little delay would put honestly in their power. Had York staid but a few moments he had saved his cause from the stain of perjury.

ACT I. SCENE Vi. (1. iv. 132.)

'Tis government that makes them [i.e.women] seem divine. Government, in the language of that time, signified evenness of temper, and decency of manners.

ACT II. SCENE i. (11. i. 48.)

EDWARD. Ob, speak no more!

The generous tenderness of Edward, and savage fortitude of Richard, are well distinguished by their different reception of their father's death.

ACT II. SCENE ii. (II. i. 130–2.)

Our soldiers, like the night-owl's lazy flight,

Or like a lazy thrasher with a flail,

Fell gently down.

This image [of the night-owl] is not very congruous to the subject, nor was it necessary to the comparison, which is happily enough completed by the thresher.

ACT II. SCENE Vi. (II. v. 21 foll.)

O God! methinks it were a happy life
To be no better than a homely swain.

This speech is mournful and soft, exquisitely suited to the character of the king, and makes a pleasing interchange, by affording, amidst the tumult and horrour of the battle, an unexpected glimpse of rural innocence and pastoral tranquillity.

ACT III. SCENE i. (III. i. 17.) Thy balm washt off.

It is common in these plays to find the same images, whether jocular or serious, frequently recurring.

ACT III. SCENE ii. (III. ii. 16 foll.)

This is a very lively and spritely dialogue [between King Edward and Lady Gray]; the reciprocation is quicker than is common in Shakespeare.

ACT III. SCENE iii. (111. ii. 161.) Unlick'd bear-whelp.

It was an opinion which, in spite of its absurdity, prevailed long, that the bear brings forth only shapeless lumps of animated flesh, which she licks into the form of bears. It is now well known that the whelps of a bear are produced in the same state with those of other creatures.

ACT III. SCENE iii. (111. ii. 166–7.)

To o'erbear such

As are of better person than myself.

Who

Richard speaks here the language of nature. ever is stigmatised with deformity has a constant source of envy in his mind, and would counterballance by some other superiority these advantages which they feel themselves to want. Bacon remarks that the deformed are commonly daring, and it is almost proverbially observed that they are ill-natured. The truth is, that the deformed, like all other men, are displeased with inferiority, and endeavour to gain ground by good or bad means, as they are virtuous or corrupt.

ACT III. SCENE V. (III. iii. 127.) Exempt from envy.

Envy is always supposed to have some fascinating or blasting power, and to be out of the reach of envy is therefore a privilege belonging only to great excellence.

ACT IV. SCENE i. (IV. i. 42–3.)

HASTINGS. 'Tis better using France, than trusting France. Let us be back'd with God, and with the seas. This has been the advice of every man who in any age understood and favoured the interest of England. ACT IV. SCENE i. (IV, i. 56.)

You would not have bestow'd the heir.

It must be remembered, that till the restoration the

heiresses of great estates were in the wardship of the king, who in their minority gave them up to plunder, and afterwards matched them to his favourites. I know not when liberty gained more than by the abolition of the court of wards.

ACT IV. SCENE vii. (IV. vi. 29.)

Few men rightly temper with the stars.

I suppose the meaning is, that few men conform their temper to their destiny, which King Henry did, when finding himself unfortunate he gave the management of publick affairs to more prosperous hands.

ACT IV. SCENE Vii. (IV. vi. 70.)

This pretty lad will prove our country's bliss.

He was afterwards Henry VII. A man who put an end to the civil war of the two houses, but not otherwise remarkable for virtue. Shakespeare knew his trade. Henry VII. was Grandfather to Queen Elizabeth, and the King from whom James inherited.

ACT V. SCENE iii. (v. ii. 24-5.)

My parks, my walks, my manors that I had,
Ev'n now forsake me.

Cedes camptis saltibus, et domo, Villâque. HOR. This mention of his parks and manours diminishes the pathetick effect of the foregoing lines.

ACT V. SCENE vi. (v. iv. 67 foll.)

This scene is ill-contrived, in which the king and queen appear at once on the stage at the head of opposite armies. It had been easy to make one retire before the other entered.

ACT V. SCENE Vi. (v. v. 51.)

QUEEN. Ob Ned, sweet Ned!

The condition of this warlike queen would move

compassion could it be forgotten that she gave York, to wipe his eyes in his captivity, a handkerchief stained with his young child's blood.

The three parts of Henry VI. are suspected, by Mr. Theobald, of being supposititious, and are declared, by Dr. Warburton, to be certainly not Shakespeare's. Mr. Theobald's suspicion arises from some obsolete words; but the phraseology is like the rest of our authour's stile, and single words, of which however I do not observe more than two, can conclude little.

Dr. Warburton gives no reason, but I suppose him to judge upon deeper principles and more comprehensive views, and to draw his opinion from the general effect and spirit of the composition, which he thinks inferior to the other historical plays.

From mere inferiority nothing can be inferred; in the productions of wit there will be inequality. Sometimes judgment will err, and sometimes the matter itself will defeat the artist. Of every authour's works one will be the best, and one will be the worst. The colours are not equally pleasing, nor the attitudes equally graceful, in all the pictures of Titian or Reynolds.

Dissimilitude of stile and heterogeneousness of sentiment, may sufficiently show that a work does not really belong to the reputed authour. But in these plays no such marks of spuriousness are found. The diction, the versification, and the figures, are Shakespeare's. These plays, considered, without regard to characters and incidents, merely as narratives in verse, are more happily conceived and more accurately finished than those of king John, Richard II., or the tragick scenes of Henry IV. and V. If we take these plays from Shakespeare, to whom shall they be given? What authour of that age had the same easiness of expression and fluency of numbers?

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