Enter TIMON. Tim. Thou fun, that comfort't, burn!-Speak, and For each true word, a blifter! and each falfe 1. Sen. Worthy Timon, Tim. Of none but fuch as you, and you of Timon. 2. Sen. The fenators of Athens greet thee, Timon. Tim. I thank them; and would fend them back the plague, Could I but catch it for them. 1. Sen. O, forget What we are forry for ourselves in thee. The fenators, with one concent of love', Entreat thee back to Athens; who have thought On special dignities, which vacant lie For thy beft ufe and wearing. 2. Sen. They confefs, Toward thee, forgetfulness too general, grofs: Which now the publick body 2,-which doth feldom Play Thou fun, that comfort'ft, burn !] "Thine eyes," fays Lear to STEEVENS. one of his daughters, "do comfort, and not burn." 9-a cauterizing-] The old copy reads-cantberizing; the poet might have written, cancerizing. STEEVENS. To cauterize was a word of our authour's time; being found in Bullokar's English Expofitor, octavo, 1616, where it is explained, "To burn to a fore." It is the word of the old copy, with the a changed to an n, which has happened in almost every one of thefe plays. Of the word cancerize I have found no example. MALONE. 1 with one concent of love,] With one united voice of affection. So, in Sternhold's tranflation of the 100th Pfalm: "With one confent let all the earth." All our old writers fpell the word improperly, confent, without regard to its etymology, concentus. See Vol. V. p.413, n. *; and p. 483, n. 3. MALONE. Which now the publick body,] Thus the old copy, ungramatically certainly; but our authour frequently thus begins a fentence, and concludes it without attending to what has gone before: for which perhaps the carelessness and ardour of colloquial language may be an apology. See Vol. I. p. 9, n. 6. So afterwards in the third fcene of this act : "Whom, Play the recanter,-feeling in itself A lack of Timon's aid, hath fenfe withal Than their offence can weigh down by the dram"; "Whom, though in general part we were oppos'd, "And made us fpeak like friends." See alfo the Poet's laft fpeech in p. 121.-Sir T. Hanmer and the fubfequent editors read here more correctly-And now the publick body, &c. but by what overfight could Which be printed inftead of And? MALONE. 3 Of its own fall,-] The Athenians bad fenfe, that is, felt the danger of their own fail, by the arms of Alcibiades. JOHNSON. I once fufpected that our authour wrote-of its own fail, i, e. failure. So, in Coriolanus: "That if you fail in our request, the blame "May hang upon your hardness." But a fubfequent paffage fully fupports the reading of the text: "Our's is the fall, I fear, our foes the fnare.' Again, in fc. iv: "Before proud Athens he's fet down by this, "Whofe fall the mark of his ambition is." MALONE. 4 —reftraining aid to Timon ;] I think it should be refraining aid, that is, with-holding aid that should have been given to Timon. JOHNSON. Surely this is the meaning of the word furnished by the old copy. 5 MALONE. forrowed render,] Thus the old copy. Render is confeffion. So, in Cymbeline, A& IV. fc. iv. may drive us to a render -a recompence more e fruitful The modern editors read-tender. STEEVENS. 6 Than their offence can weigh down by the dram;] A recompence fo large that the offence they have committed, though every dram of that offence thould be put into the fcale, cannot counterpoife it. The recompence will outweigh the offence, which, inftead of weighing down the fcale in which it is placed, will kick the beam. MALONE. Ever to read them thine. Tim. You witch me in it; Surprize me to the very brink of tears: Lend me a fool's heart, and a woman's eyes, Who, like a boar too favage, doth root up 2. Sen. And shakes his threat'ning fword Against the walls of Athens. 1. Sen. Therefore, Timon, Tim. Well, fir, I will; therefore I will, fir; Thus,If Alcibiades kill my countrymen, Let Alcibiades know this of Timon, That-Timon cares not. But if he fack fair Athens, And take our goodly aged men by the beards, Of contumelious, beaftly, mad-brain'd war; Then let him know,-and, tell him, Timon fpeaks it, In pity of our aged, and our youth, I cannot choose but tell him, that-I care not, And let him take't at worst; for their knives care not, But I do prize it at my love, before The reverend'ft throat in Athens. So I leave you 7 Allow'd with abfolute power,] Allowed is licensed, privileged, uncontrolled. So of a buffoon, in Love's Labour's Loft, it is faid, that he is allowed, that is, at liberty to fay what he will; a privileged fcofter. JOHNSON. There's not a whittle in th' unruly camp,] A whittle is fill in the midland counties the common name for a pocket clafp knife, fuch as children ufe. Chaucer fpeaks of a "Sheffield thaittell." STEEVENS. Το To the protection of the profperous gods, Flav. Stay not, all's in vain. Tim. Why, I was writing of my epitaph, And laft fo long enough! 1. Sen. We fpeak in vain. Tim. But yet I love my country; and am not One that rejoices in the common wreck, As common bruit doth put it. 1. Sen. That's well spoke. Tim. Commend me to my loving countrymen,1. Sen. Thefe words become your lips as they pass through them. 2. Sen. And enter in our ears, like great triumphers In their applauding gates. Tim. Commend me to them; And tell them, that, to ease them of their griefs, In life's uncertain voyage, I will fome kindnefs do them: 2. Sen. I like this well, he will return again. Tim. I have a tree, which grows here in my close 2, That 9- of the profperous gods,] I believe profpercus is ufed here with our poet's ufual laxity, in an active, instead of a patlive, fenfe: the gods who are the authours of the profperity of mankind. So, in Othello: "To my unfolding lend a profperous ear." I leave you, fays Timon, to the protection of the gods, the great diftributors of profperity, that they may fo keep and guard you, as jailors do thieves; i. e. for final punishment. MALONE. 1-My long fickness] The difeafe of life begins to promife me a period. JOHNSON. 2 I have a tree which grows bere in my clofe,] Our authour was indebted for this thought to Plutarch's Life of Antony: It is reported of That mine own ufe invites me to cut down, him. Tim. Come not to me again: but fay to Athens, Timon hath made his everlafting manfion Upon the beached verge of the falt flood; Whom once a day with his emboffed froth $ The turbulent furge fhall cover; thither come, And let my grave-ftone be your oracle.Lips, let four words go by, and language end: What is amifs, plague and infection mend! Graves only be men's works; and death, their gain! Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign. [Exit TIMON. of him also, that this Timon on a time, (the people being affembled in the market-place about dispatch of fome affaires) got up into the pulpit for orations, where the orators commonly ufe to fpeake unto the people; and filence being made, everie man liftening to hear what he would fay, because it was a wonder to fee him in that place, at length he began to speak in this manner: My lordes of Athens, I have a little yard in my house where there groweth a figge tree, on the which many citizens have hanged themselves; and because I meane to make fome building upon the place, I thought good to let you all un derstand it, that before the figge tree be cut downe, if any of you be desperate, you may there in time go hang yourselves." MALONE. 3-in the fequence of degree,] Methodically, from highest to loweft. JOHNSON. Whom once a day-] Old Copy-Who. For the correction I am answerable. Whom refers to Timon. All the modern editors (following the fecond folio) read" Which once," &c. MALONE. 5-emboffed froth-] When a deer was run hard and foamed at the mouth, he was faid to be embofs'd. See a note on the first scene of the Taming of the Shrew. The thought is from Painter's Palace of Picafure, Tom. I. Nov. 28. STEEVENS. Embofled froth, is fwollen froth; from boffe, Fr. a tamour. The term emboffed, when applied to a deer, is from emboçar, Sp. to caft out of the mouth. See Vol. III. p. 246, n.2. MALONE. VOL. VIII. K 1. Sen. |