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Thunder, and enter the devils.

O mercy, Heaven! look not so fierce on me.
Adders and serpents, let me breathe awhile:
Ugly hell gape not; come not, Lucifer:

55 I'll burn my books: O, Mephostophilis !

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Shakespeare. 1564-1616. (History, pp. 73-86.)

A.-COMEDIES.

From THE TEMPEST, Act IV. Sc. 1.

51. "These things shall vanish all.”—LUTHER'S Hymn.
Prospero [Aside]. I had forgot that foul conspiracy
Of the beast Caliban and his confederates

5

Against my life: the minute of their plot

Is almost come. [To the Spirits.] Well done! Avoid;

no more!

Ferdinand. This is strange: your father's in some passion That works him strongly.

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Saw I him touch'd with anger so distemper'd.

Prospero. You do look, my son, in a moved sort,

As if you were dismay'd be cheerful, Sir,

10 Our revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,

1. Forgot, for forgotten, is very common in Shakespeare.

2. Caliban: Shakespeare seems to have formed this name by metathesis from Canibal.

4. Avoid, begone, make the place void or empty, from Fr. vuider, vider. Chaucer, Canon's Yeoman's Tale,' 125, has"Voydith youre man, and let him be theroute."

9. Dismay'd: though this word comes to us immediately from the Romance, Ptg. desmayer, It. smagare, still the ori

ginal source is O. H. G. magen, to be strong, which is in fact identical with Eng. may. Dismay therefore would radically signify to unmight, deprive of all force.

13-20. This magnificent passage, supposed to be perhaps the most poetical ever written, forms a part of the inscription on the poet's monument in Westminster Abbey. A similar thought, though expressed in vastly inferior language, is found in Lord Sterline's tragedy of Darius (1603).'

The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
15 The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind.

As dreams are made on;

20 Is rounded with a sleep.

We are such stuff

and our little life

Sir, I am vexed;

Bear with my weakness; my old brain is troubled :
Be not disturb'd with my infirmity:

If

you

be pleased, retire into my cell,

And there repose: a turn or two I'll walk,

25 To still my beating mind.

16. Inherit, possess, inhabit-a usual meaning of this word in Shakespeare's time. In Scotland, Heritor is still the ordinary name given to the owner of the soil.

18. Rack: if this be the correct reading, which is far from certain, this clause is equivalent to "leave not the flimsiest portion of vapour behind." Strictly speaking, the term rack is applied to the mass of floating clouds which is produced by the reek of the earth: accordingly, Mr. Dyce maintains that such an

expression as "a rack" is altogether inadmissible, and introduces wreck into his text.

19. Made on the nice distinction between the various uses of the prepositions on and of was not recognized at this time.

20. "The passage of Shakespeare, Rounded with a sleep," says the German humourist, Jean Paul Richter, "created whole books in me." Rounded is surrounded.

From As YOU LIKE IT.

52. The World a Stage.-Act II. Sc. 7.

The thought that is worked out in this famous passage was in all probability suggested to Shakespeare by the motto of the Globe Theatre-Totus mundus agit histrionem.

Jaques.

All the world's a stage,

And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits, and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
5 His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms:
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel,
And shining morning face, creeping like snail

SPECS. ENG. LIT.

Unwillingly to school: and then, the lover, 10 Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad

Made to his mistress' eyebrow: Then, a soldier;
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honour, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation

15 Even in the cannon's mouth and then, the justice;
In fair round belly, with good capon lin❜d,
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances,

And so he plays his part: The sixth age shifts 20 Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon;

With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side;
His youthful hose well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
25 And whistles in his sound: Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness, and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

18. Saws, sayings, from 0. E. sagu (just as law comes from lagu), and that from secgan, to say. We now hear a good deal of the Norse sagas.

Modern instances, trite, trivial examples. Modern (id quod modo est), seems to have got this signification from the prevalent feeling that all things new are worthless in comparison with what is old.

20. Pantaloon, It. pantalone, was the

stock buffoon of Italian comedy; a ridiculous old dotard, whose absurd loveaffairs made him the laughing-stock of the other characters.

21. Pouch. This word, of which pocket is the diminutive, signifies that into which anything is poked or thrust. In Scotland the word is still poke.

28. Sans, Fr. sans (Lat. sine), was once in common use as an English preposition.

From THE MERCHANT OF VENICE.

53. Mercy.-Act IV. Sc. 1.

Portia. The quality of mercy is not strain'd;
It droppeth, as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath it is twice bless'd;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes :

5 "T is mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
10 But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
15 Though justice be thy plea, consider this-
That in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.

8. Attribute to, appendage to, that which is added to set "awe and majesty" off.

9. Doth sit the dread and fear: the singular verb is employed here because "dread and fear" express but one no

tion. So Othello, i. 3, says

"The very head and front of my offending Hath this extent...

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14. Seasons, qualifies, mitigates the force of.

From A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM.

54. Oberon's Vision.-Act II. Sc. 2.

This celebrated passage forms by far the most interesting of the few contemporary allusions that are found in Shakespeare. According to the more probable interpretation, the "Mermaid" is Mary, Queen of Scots; the "certain stars" that "shot madly from their spheres," are the Northern Earls (1569) and Norfolk (1569-72), who were drawn into conspiracy and rebellion, with ruinous results to themselves, by the irresistible charm of Mary's presence. However this may be, there can be no doubt that the "fair vestal" is Queen Elizabeth.

Obe. My gentle Puck, come hither: Thou remember'st Since once I sat upon a promontory,

1. Puck. At bottom the same word as bug (bugbear), fr. W. bwg, a goblin,

from which also come bogle, bogie, buggaboo, &c.

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And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back,
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath,
5 That the rude sea grew civil at her song;
And certain stars shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid's music...

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Obe. That very time I saw (but thou couldst not), Flying between the cold moon and the earth, 10 Cupid all arm'd ;' a certain aim he took

At a fair vestal, throned by the west;

And loos'd his love-shaft smartly from his bow,
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts:
But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft
15 Quench'd in the chaste beams of the watery moon;
And the imperial votaress passed on,

In maiden meditation, fancy-free.

Yet mark'd I where the bolt of Cupid fell:

It fell upon a little western flower,

20 Before, milk-white; now, purple with love's wound,— And maidens call it love-in-idleness.

Fetch me that flower; the herb I show'd thee once;

The juice of it on sleeping eyelids laid,

Will make or man or woman madly dote

25 Upon the next live creature that it sees.

Fetch me this herb: and be thou here again,

Ere the leviathan can swim a league.

Puck. I'll put a girdle round about the earth

In forty minutes.

17. Fancy-free: Fancy, as already explained, often means love at this time.

B.-HISTORICAL PLAYS.

From KING JOHN.

55. Lamentation of Constance.-Act III. Sc. 4.

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Const. Yes, that I will; And wherefore will I do it? I tore them from their bonds; and cried aloud,

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