To one that can my part in him advertise": In our remove, be thou at full ourself: Live in thy tongue and heart: Old Escalus, -I do bend my speech, To one that can my part in him advertise ;] This is obfcure. The meaning is, I direct my fpeech to one who is able to teach me how to govern: my part in him, fignifying my office, which I have delegated to him. My part in him advertife; i. e. who knows what appertains to the character of deputy or viceroy. Can advertife my part in him; that is, his reprefentation of my perfon. But all these quaintneffes of expreffion, the Oxford editor feems fworn to extirpate; that is, to take away one of Shakespeare's characteristic marks; which, if not one of the comeleft, is yet one of the strongest. So he alters this to, To one that can, in my part, me advertise. A better expreffion indeed, but, for all that, none of Shakespeare's. WARBURTON. I know not whether we may not better read, One that can my part to him advertise, One that can inform himself of that which it would be otherwise my part to tell him. JOHNSON. To advertife is used in this fenfe, and with this accentuation, by Chapman, in his tranflation of the 11th book of the Odyley. "Or, of my father, if thy royal ear "Hath been advertis'd. • Hold therefore Angelo:] That is, bold as thou art. JOHNSON. STEEVENS. continue to be Angelo; I believe that-Hold therefore Angelo, are the words which the duke utters on tendering his commiffion to him. He concludes with Take thy commiffion. STEEVENS. If a full point be put after therefore, the duke may be underftood to fpeak of himself. Hold therefore. i. e. Let me therefore hold, or ftop. And the sense of the whole paffage may be this. The duke, who has begun an exhortation to Angelo, checks himfelf thus. "But I am fpeaking to one, that can in him [in, or by himself] apprehend my part [all that I have to fay] I will therefore fay no more [on that fubject]." He then merely fignifies to Angelo his appointment. TYRWHITT. : 7-first in question,] That is, first called for; first appointed. JOHNSON. Ang. Ang. Now, good my lord, Let there be fome more teft made of my metal, Duke. No more evafion : We have with a leaven'd and prepared choice* Ang. Yet, give leave, my lord, That we may bring you fomething on the way. Nor need you, on mine honour, have to do As to your foul seems good. Give me your hand; But do not like to ftage me to their eyes: Though it do well, I do not relish well We have with a leaven'd and prepared choice] Leaven'd has no sense in this place: we should read, -levell'd choice. The allufion is to archery, when a man has fixed upon his object, after taking good aim. WARBURTON. No emendation is neceffary. Leaven'd choice is one of Shakefpeare's harsh metaphors. His train of ideas feems to be this. Į have proceeded to you with choice mature, concocted, fermented, leavened. When bread is leavened it is left to ferment: a leavened choice is therefore a choice not hafty, but confiderate, not declared as foon as it fell into the imagination, but fuffered to work long in the mind. Thus explained, it fuits better with prepared than levelled. JOHNSON. 9-your scope is as mine own.] That is, Your amplitude of power. JOHNSON. Their loud applause, and Ave's vehement; nefs! Duke. I thank you : Fare you well, [Exit. Efcal. I fhall defire you, fir, to give me leave To have free speech with you; and it concerns me To look into the bottom of my place : A power I have; but of what ftrength and nature I am not yet inftructed. Ang. 'Tis fo with me:-Let us withdraw together, And we may foon our fatisfaction have Touching that point, Efcal. I'll wait upon your honour. SCENE II. The Street. Enter Lucio, and two Gentlemen. [Exeunt. Lucio. If the duke, with the other dukes, come not to compofition with the king of Hungary, why, then all the dukes fall upon the king. 1 Gent. Heaven grant us its peace, but not the king of Hungary's! 2 Gent. Amen. Lucio. Thou conclud'ft like the fanctimonious pirate, that went to fea with the ten commandments, but fcrap'd one out of the table. 2 Gent. Thou shalt not steal? Lucio. Ay, that he raz'd. 1 Gent. Why, 'twas a commandment to command the captain and all the reft from their functions; they put forth to fteal: There's not a foldier of us all, that, that, in the thanksgiving before meat, doth relish the petition well that prays for peace. 2 Gent. I never heard any foldier diflike it. Lucio. I believe thee; for, I think, thou never waft where grace was faid. 2 Gent. No? a dozen times at least. 1 Gent. What? in metre? Lucio. In any proportion, or in any language. 1 Gent. I think, or in any religion. Lucio. Ay! why not? Grace is grace, defpight of all controverfy3: As for example; Thou thyfelf art a wicked villain, despight of all grace. 1 Gent. Well, there went but a pair of fheers be. tween us +. Lucio. in metre?] In the primers, there are metrical graces, fuch as, I fuppofe, were used in Shakespeare's time. JOHNSON. In any proportion, &c.] The Oxford editor gives us a dialogue of his own inftead of this: and all for want of knowing the meaning of the word proportion, which fignifies measure: and refers to the queftion, What? in metre? WARBURTON. 3 defpight of all controverfy:] Satirically infinuating that the controverfies about grace were fo intricate and endless, that the difputants unfettled every thing but this, that grace was grace; which, however, in spite of controversy, still remained certain. WARBURTON. I am in doubt whether Shakespeare's thoughts reached fo far into ecclefiaftical difputes. Every commentator is warped a little by the tract of his own profeffion. The question is, whether the fecond gentleman has ever heard grace. The first gentleman limits the question to grace in metre. Lucio enlarges it to grace in. any form or language. The firft gentleman, to go beyond him, fays, or in any religion, which Lucio allows, because the nature of things is unalterable; grace is as immutably grace, as his merry antagonist is a vicked villain. Difference in religion cannot make a grace not to be grace, a prayer not to be holy; as nothing can make a villain not to be a villain. This feems to be the meaning, fuch as it is. JOHNSON. there went but a pair of heers between us. s.] We are both of the fame piece. JOHNSON. So in the Maid of the Mill, by Beaumont and Fletcher. "There went but a pair of sheers and a bodkin between them.” STEEVENS. The Lucio. I grant; as there may between the lifts and the velvet: Thou art the lift. I Gent. And thou the velvet: thou art good velvet; thou art a three-pil'd piece, I warrant thee: I had as lief be a lift of an English kerfey, as be pil'd, as thou art pil'd, for a French velvet. Do I speak feelingly now? Lucio. I think thou doft; and, indeed, with most painful feeling of thy fpeech: I will, out of thine own confeffion, learn to begin thy health; but, whilft I live, forget to drink after thee. 1 Gent. I think, I have done myself wrong; have I not? 2 Gent. Yes, that thou haft; whether thou art tainted, or free. Lucio. Behold, behold, where madam Mitigation comes! I have purchas'd as many diseases under her roof, as come to 2 Gent. To what, I pray? 1 Gent. Judge. 2 Gent. To three thousand dollars a year. 1 Gent. Ay, and more. The fame expreffion is likewise found in Marston's Malecontent, 1604: "There goes but a pair of heers betwixt an emperor and "the fon of a bagpiper; only the dying, dreffing, pressing, and "gloffing, makes the difference." MALONE. 5 pil'd, as thou art pil'd, for a French velvet.] The jest about the pile of a French velvet alludes to the lofs of hair in the French difeafe, a very frequent topick of our author's jocularity. Lucio finding that the gentleman understands the distemper fo well, and mentions it fo feelingly, promifes to remember to drink his health, but to forget to drink after him. It was the opinion of Shakespeare's time, that the cup of an infected person was contagious. JOHNSON. The jeft lies between the fimilar found of the words pill'd and pil'd. This I have elsewhere explained, under a paffage in Henry VIII. "Pill'd prieft thou lieft." STEEVENS. 6 To three thousand dollars a year.] A quibble intended between dollars and dolours. HANMER. The fame jeft occurred before in the Tempeft. JOHNSON. ་ |