PROPER = good-looking, handsome, fair. Because they saw he was a proper child. Heb. xi. 23. The same Greek word, which is here used, is applied also to Moses, when a child, in Acts vii. 20, and is there translated fair.' Compare Exod. ii. 2, ' goodly child.' QUICK animate. She finds, altho' I can not, Myself to be a marvellous proper man ; = King Richard III. Act i. Sc. 3. alive, lively. QUICKEN = to revive, If the Lord make a new thing, and the earth open her mouth ... and they go down quick into the pit, Numb. xvi. 30. See verse 33, They went down alive into the pit.' See also Ps. xxxv. 15, cxxiv. 3. Quick and dead,' Acts x. 42; 2 Tim. iv. 1; 1 Pet. iv. 5. The word of God is quick and powerful. Heb. iv. 12. See also Isaiah xi. 3. That which thou sowest is not quickened, except it die, But 1 Cor. xv. 36. yet I'll bury thee. Thou'rt quick, Timon of Athens, Act iv. Sc. 3. Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 1. Tempest, Act iii. Sc. 1. The mistress which I serve quickens what's dead. Shakspeare also uses the verb as neuter : These hairs which thou dost ravish from my chin, ROAD 'raid,' inroad, once in Bible. Whither have ye made a road to-day? I Sam. xxvii. 10. This word does not occur in the Bible in the modern sense; but Shakspeare uses it (1) in the sense above named; (2) for roadstead, i. e. a place for ships to anchor in; and (3) in its present ordinary signification for a public way. 1. Against the Scot, who will make road upon us In one place also, Henry VIII. iv. 2, 'with easy roads' is used for easy stages. When thou art bidden of any man to a wedding, sit not down Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me. Luke xiv. 8. King John, Act iii. Sc. 4. RUNAGATE = fugitive, rebel, apostate; French, renégat. God bringeth the prisoners out of captivity, but letteth the runagates continue in scarceness. Prayer Book version of Ps. lxviii. 6, where the Bible has the rebellious.' I'll send to one in Mantua, Where that same banished runagate doth live. TABLE = tablet. The tables were written on both their sides. Comp. 2 Cor. iii. 3. Exod. xxxii. 15. Henry IV. 2nd Part, Act iv. Sc. 1. Comp. Phil. iv. 6, where the same Greek word is rendered careful.' If he love Cæsar, all that he can do Is to himself; take thought, and die for Cæsar. Jul. Cesar, Act ii. Sc. 1. Compare Antony and Cleopatra, think and die.' Act iii. Sc. 2. WIS, WIT, and Wor (originally the past tense of the former), to know, perceive, think. They wist not what it was. Exod. xvi. 15. We do you to wit of the grace of God, &c. My master wotteth not what is with me in the house. What I shall choose, I wot not. Gen. xxxix. 8. I wis your grandam had a worser match. Phil. i. 22. King Richard III. Act i. Sc. 3. Submission, Dauphin ? 'tis a mere French word; We English warriors wot not what it means. King Henry VI. 1st Part, Act iv. Sc. 7. I conclude this chapter with a remark upon the phrase well stricken in years, which we find in Luke i. 7: < They had no child because that Elisabeth was barren, and they both were now well stricken in years.' In Tyndale's Translation, 1534, and Cranmer's, 1539, the words were 'well stricken in age;' which we find also in Gen. xviii. 11, and xxiv. 1. Is it possible that our translator of St. Luke altered the expression out of deference to the following passage of Shakspeare? We speak no treason, man; we say the King Is wise and virtuous: and his noble Queen Well struck in years. King Richard III. Act i. Sc. 1. Mr. Steevens, in his note upon the place (and there is no other note upon it in the Variorum edition), calls the phrase an odd, uncouth expression.' It does not appear to have occurred to him that it is used several times in the English Bible (see besides the passage in St. Luke, and the other texts referred to above, Josh. xiii. 1, xxiii. 1, and 1 Kings i. 1); still less that our poet might have chosen it in the above passage because the Queen spoken of was also an Elizabeth, wife of King Edward IV. |