Imatges de pàgina
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Henry, your fovereign,
Is prifoner to the foe; his ftate ufurp'd,
His realm a flaughter-house, his fubjects flain,
His ftatutes cancell'd, and his treasure spent ;
And yonder is the wolf, that makes this spoil.

Henry VI. P. 3, A. 5, S. 4,

I fpake of most disastrous chances,

Of moving accidents, by flood, and field;

Of hair-breadth 'fcapes i' the imminent deadly breach; Of being taken by the infolent foe,

And fold to flavery.

Othello, A. 1, S. 3.

I have kept back their foes, While they have told their money, and let out Their coin upon large intereft; I myself, Rich only in large hurts. All thofe, for this? Is this the balfam that the ufuring fenate Pours into captain's wounds?

Timon of Athens, A. 3, S. 5.

FOOL, FOOLS, FOLLY.

God give them wifdom, that have it: and those that are fools, let them use their talents.

Twelfth Night, A.1, S. 5.

I.

The lady Olivia has no folly: she will keep no fool, fir, till fhe be married; and fools are as like husbands, as pilchards are to herrings, the husband's the bigger. Twelfth Night, A. 3, S. 1. There is no flander in an allow'd fool, though he do nothing but rail: nor no railing in a known difcreet man, though he do nothing but reprove. Twelfth Night, A. 1, S. 5. This fellow is wife enough to play the fool; And, to do that well, craves a kind of wit; He muft obferve their mood on whom he jests, The quality of the perfons, and the time;

And, like the haggard, checks at every feather
That comes before his eye. Twelfth Night, A. 3,
I am a fool,

To weep at what I am glad of.

S. I,

Tempest, A. 3, S. 1.

The loyalty, well held to fools, does make
Our faith mere folly:-Yet, he that can endure
To follow with allegiance a fallen lord,

Does conquer him that did his master conquer,
And earns a place i' the story.

Ant. and Cleop. A. 3, S. 11.

You may as well

Forbid the fea for to obey the moon,

As or, by oath, remove, or counsel, shake

The fabrick of his folly.

Winter's Tale, A. 1, S. 2. If thou wilt needs marry, marry a fool; for wife men know well enough, what monsters you make of them. Hamlet, A. 3, S. 1.

I must have liberty

Withal, as large a charter as the wind,

To blow on whom I please; for fo fools have:
And they that are moft galled with my folly,

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They most must laugh. As you like it, A. 2, S. 7. Thou art a fool: fhe robs thee of thy name;

And thou wilt show more bright, and seem more vir

tuous

When fhe is gone.

As you like it, A. 1, S. 3.

When I did hear

The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools fhould be fo deep contemplative.

As you like it,. A. 2, S. 7.

And my poor fool is hang'd! No, no, no life.

Lear, A. 5, S. 3.

And

And my poor fool is hang'd.] This is an expreffion of tendernefs for his dead Cordelia (not his fool, as fome have thought),

on

And how quote you my folly?'

Two Gentlemen of Verona, A. 2, S. 4.

Let thofe, that play your clowns, fpeak no more than is fet down for them: For there be of them, that will themselves laugh, to fet on fome quantity of barren fpectators to laugh too; though, in the mean time, fome necessary question of the play be then to be confidered: that's villainous; and fhews a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it.

Hamlet, A. 3, S. 2. Pity, that fools may not speak wifely what wife men do foolishly. As you like it, A. 1, S. 2. Sirrah, inquire further after me; I had talk of you laft night: though you are a fool and a knave, you fhall eat. All's well that ends well, A. 5, S. 2.

Never

on whofe lips he is ftill intent, and dies away while he is fearch ing for life there. That the thoughts of a father, in the bitterest of all moments, while his favourite child lay dead in his arms, fhould recur to the antic who had formerly diverted him, has somewhat in it that I cannot reconcile to the idea of genuine for row and despair.

Befides this, Cordelia was recently hanged; but we know not that the fool had fuffered in the fame manner, nor can imagine why he should. STEEVENS.

I confefs, I am one of those who have thought that Lear means his fool, and not Cordelia. If he means Cordelia, then what I have always confidered as a beauty, is of the fame kind as the accidental stroke of the pencil that produced the foam. Lear's affectionate remembrance of the fool in this place, I used to think, was one of thofe ftrokes of genius, or of nature, which are fo often found in Shakespeare, and in him only. The words poor fool, are undoubtedly expreffive of endearment; and Shakespeare in another place, fpeaking of a dying animal, calls it poor dappled fool; but it never is, nor never can be used with any degree of propriety, but to commiferate fome very inferior object, which may be loved, without much efteem or refpect. Sir J. REYNOLDS. If we read," poor foul," (confidering foul like fool a word: of endearment) all difficulty is at once removed. That the 68 fool," or poor poor foul," is meant to be applied to Cordelia, there cannot be the fmalleft doubt; and the words, "no, no, no life," which immediately follow, fufficiently confirin it. A. B. How quote you my folly.] To quote is to obferve. STEEVENS.

I

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"Quote,"

Never flee and jest at me;

I fpeak not like a dotard, nor a fool;
As under privilege of age, to brag

What I have done being young, or what would do,
Were I not old. Much ado about nothing, A. 5, S. 1

He is the prince's jefter: a very dull fool; only his gift is in devifing impoffible flanders: none but libertines delight in him; and the commendation is not in his wit, but in his villainy.

Much ado about nothing, A. 2, S. 1.

Hear you me, Jeffica:

Lock up my doors; and when you hear the drum,
And the vile squeaking of the wry-neck'd fife,
Clamber not you up to the cafements then,
Nor thruft your head into the public street,
To gaze on Chriftian fools with varnish'd faces.

Merchant of Venice, A. 2, S. 5.

The fool hath planted in his memory
An army of good words: and I do know
A many fools, that stand in better place,
Garnish'd like him,

Defy the matter.

that for a tricksy word
Merchant of Venice, A. 3, S. 5:

'Carded his state,

Mingled his royalty with carping fools;

Had

"Quote." This word occurs in many of Shakespeare's playsIt fhould be printed cote, a French word fignifying mark. Cote is thus explained in the Dictionaries, Marque dont fe fervent les gens de pratique. A. B.

Carded his ftate.] The metaphor feems to be taken from mingling coarfe wool with fine, and carding them together, whereby the value of the latter is diminished. STEEVENS. By carding his ftate, the king means that his predeceffor fet his confequence to hazard, played it away, as a man lofes his fortune at cards. REMARKS. Carded his ftate," is harfh. To card, is to mix; and if we acknowledge carded to be right, the fenfe will yet be defective unlefs we are told with what he mixed his ftate. I am therefore inclined to think that Shakespeare wrote gawded his ftate, meaning

that

I

Had his great name profaned with their scorns; his countenance, against his name, i To laugh at gybing boys. Henry IV, P. 1, A. 3. $2.

And gave

A fool, a fool!-I met a fool i' the forest,

A motley fool,—a miferable world!2

As you like it, A. 2. S. 7.

FORTUNE, FORTUNES.

'Tis yet to know,

(Which when I know that boafting is an honour,
I fhall promulgate) I fetch my life and being
From men of royal fiege; and my demerits
May speak, unbonnetted, to as proud a fortune
As this that I have reach'd. Othello. A. 1, S. 2.
If I do prove her haggard,

Though that her jeffes were my dear heart-ftrings,
I'd whistle her off, and let her down the wind,

To prey at fortune.

Othello, A. 3, S. 3.

To be a well-favour'd man is the gift of fortune; but to write and read comes by nature.

Much ado about nothing, A. 3, S. 3.

I count

that he was too fond of fhew and oftentation; and this is the cha racter of Richard. Gawds, in old language are toys, trifles, or

naments.

A. B.

1 And dgave bis countenance against his name.] Made his prefence injurious to his reputation. JOHNSON. "Countenance" is fupport. The meaning is, he gave support and protection to what could never do him credit.

A, B,

2 A motley fool,-a miferable world!] What! because he met a motley fool, was it therefore a miferable world! This is fadly blundered. We should read-a miserable varlet. WARBURton. I fee no need of change. A miferable world is a parenthetical exclamation frequent among melancholy men, and natural to Jaques at the fight of a fool, or at the hearing of reflections on the fragility of life. JOHNSON.

Some force may be given to the paflage, by reading
Ö miferable world!

Or

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