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Upon the Lines, and Life, of the famous Scenic Poet, Master
William Shakespeare.

Those hands which you so clapp'd, go now and wring,
You Britons brave; for done are Shakespeare's days:
His days are done that made the dainty plays,
Which made the Globe of heaven and earth to ring.
Dried is that vein, dried is the Thespian spring,
Turn'd all to tears, and Phoebus clouds his rays;
That corpse, that coffin, now bestick those bays,
Which crown'd him poet first, then poet's king.
If tragedies might any prologue have,

All those he made would scarce make one to this;
Where fame, now that he gone is to the grave,
(Death's public tiring-house) the Nuntius is:
For, though his line of life went soon about,
The life yet of his lines shall never out.

HUGH HOLLAND.

COMMENDATORY VERSES,

PREFIXED TO THE FOLIO OF 16322.

Upon the Effigies of my worthy Friend, the Author, Master
William Shakespeare, and his Works.

Spectator, this life's shadow is :-to see
This truer image, and a livelier he,

Turn reader. But observe his comick vein,
Laugh; and proceed next to a tragick strain,

Then weep: so,-when thou find'st two contraries,
Two different passions from thy rapt soul rise,-
Say, (who alone effect such wonders could)
Rare Shake-speare to the life thou dost behold.

An Epitaph on the admirable Dramatic Poet, W. Shakespeare.
What needs my Shakespeare for his honour'd bones,
The labour of an age in piled stones;

* In addition to those in the folio of 1623, also reprinted in 1632. The folios of 1664 and 1685 contain no others.

3 An Epitaph on the admirable Dramatic Poet, W. Shakespeare.] These lines, like the preceding, have no name appended to them in the folio, 1632, but

Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?

Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,

What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou, in our wonder and astonishment,

Hast built thyself a live-long monument:

For whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art,
Thy easy numbers flow; and that each heart
Hath, from the leaves of thy unvalued book,
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took;
Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,
Dost make us marble with too much conceiving;
And, so sepulcher'd, in such pomp dost lie,
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.

On worthy Master Shakespeare, and his Poems*.
A mind reflecting ages past, whose clear
And equal surface can make things appear,
Distant a thousand years, and represent
Them in their lively colours, just extent:
To outrun hasty time, retrieve the fates,
Roll back the heavens, blow ope the iron gates
Of death and Lethe, where confused lie
Great heaps of ruinous mortality:

In that deep dusky dungeon to discern

A royal ghost from churls; by art to learn

the authorship is ascertained by the publication of them as Milton's, in the edition of his Poems in 1645, 8vo. We give them as they stand there, because it is evident that they were then printed from a copy corrected by the author: the variations are interesting, and Malone pointed out only one, and that certainly the least important. Instead of "weak witness" in line 6, the folio 1632 has "dull witness:" instead of "live-long monument," in line 8, the folio has "lasting monument:" instead of "heart," in line 10, the folio has "part," an evident misprint: and instead of "itself bereaving," in line 13, the folio has "herself bereaving." The last is the difference mentioned by Malone, who also places "John Milton" at the end, as if the name were found in the folio of 1632. 4 On worthy Master Shakespeare, and his Poems.] These lines are subscribed I. M. S. in the folio 1632, "probably Jasper Mayne," says Malone. Most probably not, because Mayne has left nothing behind him to lead us to suppose that he could have produced this surpassing tribute. I. M. S. may possibly be John Milton, Student, and no name may have been appended to the other copy of verses by him prefixed to the folio of 1632, in order that his initials should stand at the end of the present. We know of no other poet of the time capable of writing the ensuing lines. We feel morally certain that they are by Milton.

3

The physiognomy of shades, and give

Them sudden birth, wondering how oft they live;
What story coldly tells, what poets feign
At second hand, and picture without brain,
Senseless and soul-less shows: to give a stage
(Ample, and true with life) voice, action, age,
As Plato's year, and new scene of the world,
Them unto us, or us to them had hurl'd:
To raise our ancient sovereigns from their herse,
Make kings his subjects; by exchanging verse
Enlive their pale trunks, that the present age
Joys in their joy, and trembles at their rage:
Yet so to temper passion, that our ears
Take pleasure in their pain, and eyes in tears
Both weep and smile; fearful at plots so sad,
Then laughing at our fear; abus'd, and glad
To be abus'd; affected with that truth
Which we perceive is false, pleas'd in that ruth
At which we start, and, by elaborate play,
Tortur'd and tickl'd; by a crab-like way
Time past made pastime, and in ugly sort
Disgorging up his ravin for our sport:-
-While the plebeian imp, from lofty throne,
Creates and rules a world, and works upon
Mankind by secret engines; now to move
A chilling pity, then a rigorous love;

To strike up and stroke down, both joy and ire;
To steer th' affections; and by heavenly fire
Mold us anew, stoln from ourselves :-

This, and much more, which cannot be express'd
But by himself, his tongue, and his own breast,
Was Shakespeare's freehold; which his cunning brain
Improv'd by favour of the nine-fold train ;

The buskin'd muse, the comick queen, the grand
And louder tone of Clio, nimble hand
And nimbler foot of the melodious pair,

The silver-voiced lady, the most fair
Calliope, whose speaking silence daunts,

And she whose praise the heavenly body chants;

pleased in that RUTH] Malone (Shakspeare by Boswell, ii. 480) made nonsense of this line by printing "ruth" truth, the word which closes the preceding line

These jointly woo'd him, envying one another,
(Obey'd by all as spouse, but lov'd as brother)
And wrought a curious robe, of sable grave,
Fresh green, and pleasant yellow, red most brave,
And constant blue, rich purple, guiltless white,
The lowly russet, and the scarlet bright:
Branch'd and embroider'd like the painted spring;
Each leaf match'd with a flower, and each string
Of golden wire, each line of silk: there run
Italian works, whose thread the sisters spun;
And there did sing, or seem to sing, the choice
Birds of a foreign note and various voice :
Here hangs a mossy rock; there plays a fair
But chiding fountain, purled: not the air,
Nor clouds, nor thunder, but were living drawn;
Not out of common tiffany or lawn,

But fine materials, which the muses know,
And only know the countries where they grow.
Now, when they could no longer him enjoy,
In mortal garments pent,-death may destroy,
They say, his body; but his verse shall live,
And more than nature takes our hands shall give:
In a less volume, but more strongly bound,

Shakespeare shall breathe and speak; with laurel crown'd,

Which never fades; fed with ambrosian meat,

In a well-lined vesture, rich, and neat.

So with this robe they clothe him, bid him wear it;

For time shall never stain, nor envy tear it.

The friendly admirer of his endowments,

I. M. S.

ADDITIONAL NOTES AND CORRECTIONS.

VOL. I.

P. lxxviii.—the registration of his fifth child, Richard] It would have been more correct to say, "his fifth living child." Richard Shakespeare was the seventh child of John Shakespeare, but two had died before Richard was born. P. lxxxi.-In note 10, for "Vicar of Anston," read Vicar of Auston, the letter u having been accidentally turned.

P. xcvii.-Sir Thomas Lucy died in 1600] According to Camden, Sir Thomas Lucy died on 7th July, 1600.

P. cii.-The statement contained in the first part of note 5, that the only evidence to show that Thomas Greene was related to Shakespeare is the entry in the Stratford register, was written without recollecting that in 1614, in a letter sent to Stratford, Thomas Greene, the solicitor, calls Shakespeare his cousin. The remark as to family connexion should, perhaps, have been confined to him.

P. cxxi.-In note 3, it is stated by an oversight, that " Eastward Ho!" was published in 1607: it was first printed in 1605: the error is not committed when the comedy is mentioned elsewhere.

P. cxxxvi. In the same feeling Ben Jonson calls him "my gentle Shakespeare," in the noble copy of verses prefixed to the folio of 1623] It ought here to have been also noticed, as indeed it is afterwards, that Ben Jonson repeats the same epithet in his lines upon the portrait on the title-page of the folio of 1623.

P. cliv.-who withdrew from the company in 1601] The precise date when William Kempe quitted the company of the Lord Chamberlain's servants is not known, but it must probably have been before, and not "in" 1601, as he was seen at Rome in the autumn of that year.

P. clxxxix.-the cancel was made at the instance of one of the four poets who were the real authors of the play] In Vol. viii. p. 266, an opinion is given that the cancel was perhaps made at the instance of Shakespeare: this is probably a mistake.

P. 194. We shall all be SHENT] The more ancient and correct meaning of "shent" is ruined, destroyed, but it seems often used merely for rebuked.

P. 255.-with some DIFFUSED Song] Perhaps diffused ought to be taken here, and elsewhere, merely in the sense of confused or unintelligible. Palsgrave, in his Eccl. de la Langue Franç. 1530, explains “diffuse” as "hard to be understood.” See Skelton's Works by the Rev. A. Dyce, vol. ii. p. 144, &c.

VOL. II.

P. 37.—Shakespeare's word may have been "cycles"] Supposing him, of course, to have somewhat misapplied it; and judging only from the misprint in the folios.

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