Which manifold record not matches? See, Jew. Nay, that's most fix'd. Mer. A moft incomparable man; breath'd, as it were, To an untirable and continuate goodness +: He paffes". Jew. I have a jewel here. Mer. O, pray, let's fee't: For the lord Timon, fir? Jew. If he will touch the estimate: But, for thatPoet. When we for recompence have prais'd the vile, It ftains the glory in that happy verse Which aptly fings the good. Mer. 'Tis a good form. [Looking on the jewel Jew. And rich: here is a water, look you. Pain. You are rapt, fir, in fome work, fome dedication To the great lord. Poet. A thing flipt idly from me. «See, obferving fo many conjured by Timon's bounty to attend. Magick of bounty!" &c. This furely is very natural, MALONE. I can by no means approve of the arrangement proposed by Dr. Johnfon; for as the poet and the painter are going to pay their court to Timon, it would be strange if the latter fhould point out to the former, as a particular rarity which manifold record could not match, a merchant and a jeweller, who came there on the fame errand. MASON. 4-breath'd as it were, To an untirable and continuate goodness:] Breatbed is inured by conftant practice; fo trained as not to be wearied. To breathe a horfe, is to exercife him for the courfe. JOHNSON. -continuate- This word is ufed by many ancient English writers. Thus, by Chapman in his verfion of the 4th book of the Odyssey: "Her handmaids join'd in a continuate yell." STEEVENS. * He paffes.] i. e. he exceeds, goes beyond common bounds. So, in the Merry Wives of Windfor: 6 "Why this paffes, mafter Ford." STEEVENS. touch the effimate :-] Come up to the price. JOHNSON. 7 When we for recompence, &c.] We must here fuppofe the poet bufy in reading his own work; and that these three lines are the introduction of the poem addreffed to Timon, which he afterwards gives the painter an account of. WARBURTON. Our poefy is as a gum, which oozes9 From whence 'tis nourished: The fire i' the flint Pain. A picture, fir. What have you there? Let's 9—which oozes-] The folio copy reads-which uses. The modern editors have given it-which iffues. JOHNSON. The only ancient copy reads-Our poefie is as a gowne which uses. STEEVENS. Gam and iffues were inferted by Mr. Pope; ooxes by Dr. Johnfon. MALONE 1 — and, like the current, flies Each bound it chafos.] This fpeech of the poet is very obfcure. He seems to boaft the copioufnefs and facility of his vein, by declaring that verfes drop from a poet as gums from odoriferous trees, and that his flame kindles itself without the violence neceflary to elicit fparkles from the flint. What follows next? that it, like a current, flies each bound it chafes. This may mean, that it expands itself notwithstanding all obftructions: but the images in the comparison are fo ill-forted, and the effect so obfcurely expreffed, that I cannot but think fomething omitted that connected the laft fentence with the former. It is well known that the players often fhorten fpeeches to quicken the reprefentation and it may be fufpected, that they fometimes performed their amputations with more hafte than judgment. JOHNSON. Perhaps the fenfe is, that having touch'd on one fubject, it flies off in queft of another. The old copy feems to read: Each bound it chafes. The letters fand fare not always to be diftinguished from each other, efpecially when the types have been much worn, as in the first folio. If chafes be the true reading, it is best explained by the " que fugitque-" of the Roman poet. Some what fimilar occurs in the Tempest: "Do chafe the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him, In Julius Cæfar, we have fe fequitur "The troubled Tyber chafing with her fhores,-". MALONE. 2 Upon the heels of my prefentment,] As foon as my book has been prefented to lord Timon. JOHNSON. The patrons of Shakspeare's age do not appear to have been all Timons. "I did determine not to have dedicated my play to any body, becaufe forty fhillings I care not for, and above, few or none will bestow Let's fee your piece. Pain. 'Tis a good piece. Poet. So 'tis this comes off well and excellent3. Poet. Admirable: How this grace Speaks his own standing? what a mental power This on these matters." Preface to a Woman is a Weathercock, by N. Field, 1612. STEEVENS. It should however be remembered, that forty fhillings at that time were equal to at least fix, perhaps eight, pounds at this day. MALONE. 3this comes off well and excellent.] The meaning is: The figure rifes well from the canvas. C'eft bien relevè. JOHNSON. What is meant by this term of applause I do not exactly know. It occurs again in the Widow, by B. Jonfon, Fletcher, and Middleton: It comes off very fair yet." Again, in A Trick to catch the old One, 1616: "Put a good tale in his ear, fo that it comes off cleanly, and there's a horfe and man for us, I warrant thee." Again, in the first part of Marston's Antonio and Mellide, 1602: bow this grace Speaks bis own ftanding?] This relates to the attitude of the figure, and means that it ftands judiciously on its own centre. And not only fo, but that it has a graceful ftanding likewife. Of which the poet in Hamlet, fpeaking of another picture, says: "A ftation like the herald, Mercury, which lines Milton feems to have had in view, where he says of Ra phael: "At once on th' eaftern cliff of Paradife "He lights, and to his proper fhape returns. Like Maia's fon be food." WARBURTON. This fentence feems to me obfcure, and, however explained, not very forcible. This grace Speaks bis own ftanding, is only, The gracefulness of this figure fhews bow it ftands. I am inclined to think fomething corrupted. It would be more natural and clear thus: bow this standing Speaks bis own graces ? How this pofture displays its own gracefulness. But I will indulge conjecture further, and propofe to read: bow this grace Speaks understanding? what a mental power This eye fhoots forth? JOHNSON. B 4 The This eye shoots forth? how big imagination Pain. It is a pretty mocking of the life. Poet. I'll fay of it, It tutors nature: artificial ftrife Lives in these touches, livelier than life. The paffage, to my apprehenfion at least, speaks its own meaning, which is, how the graceful attitude of this figure proclaims that it ftands firm on its centre, or gives evidence in favour of its own fixture. Grace is introduced as bearing witness to propriety. A fimilar expreffion occurs in Cymbeline, A&t II. fc. iv: "never faw I figures "So likely to report themselves." STEEVENS. 5 to the dumbness of the gefture One might interpret.] The figure, though dumb, feems to have a capacity of speech. The allufion is to the puppet-thows, or motions, as they were termed in our author's time. The perfon who spoke for the puppets was called an interpreter. See a note on Hamlet, A&t III. fc. v. MALONE. ✪ — artificial strife Lives in thefe touches, livelier than life.] Strife is either the conteft of art with nature; "Hic ille eft Raphael, timuit, quo fofpite vinci or it is the contraft of forms or oppofition of colours. JOHNSON. "Faithorne, with nature at a noble Arife, "Hath paid the author a great share of life," &c. STELVENS. That artificial ftrife means, as Dr. Johnson has explained it, the conteft of art with nature, and not the contraft of forms or oppofition of colours, may appear from our author's Venus and Adonis, where the fame thought is more clearly expressed: "Look, when a painter would furpass the life, In Drayton's Mortimeriados, printed I believe in 1596, (afterwards entitled The Barons' Wars,) there are two lines nearly resembling thefe: "Done for the laft with fuch exceeding life, "As art therein with nature were at ftrife." MALONE. Enter Enter certain Senators, and pass over. Pain. How this lord is follow'd! Poet. The fenators of Athens ;--Happy men1! Poet. You fee this confluence, this great flood of vifitors 3. I have, in this rough work, fhap'd out a man, 2 In a wide fea of wax1: no levell'd malice 2 7 — Happy men!] I think we had better read-Happy man! It is the happiness of Timon, and not of the senators, upon which the Poet means to exclaim. STEEVENS. Mr. Theobald reads-happy man; and certainly the emendation is fufficiently plaufible, though the old reading may well ftand. MALONE. This confluence, this great flood of vifitors.] "Mane falutantum totis vomit ædibus undam." JoHNSON. 9 Halts not particularly,] My defign does not stop at any single characters. JOHNSON. In a wide fea of wax :] Anciently they wrote upon waxen tables with an iron ftile. HANMER. I once thought with Hanmer that this was only an allufion to the Roman practice of writing with a ftyle on waxen tablets; but it appears that the fame cuftom prevailed in England about the year 1395. It seems alfo to be pointed out by implication in many of our old collegiate establishments. See Warton's Hiftory of English Poetry, Vol. III. P. 151. STEEVENS. Mr. Aftle obferves in his very ingenious work On the Origin and Progress of Writing, quarto, 1784, that "the practice of writing on table-books covered with wax was not entirely laid afide till the commencement of the fourteenth century." As Shakspeare, I believe, was not a very profound English antiquary, it is furely improbable that he fhould have had any knowledge of a practice which had been difused for more than two centuries before he was born. The Roman practice he might have learned from Golding's Translation of the ninth book of Ovid's Metamorphofes : "Her right hand holds the pen, her left doth hold the emptie waxe," &c. MALONE. 2- no levell'd malice] To level is to aim, to point the shot at a mark. Shakspeare's meaning is, my poem is not a fatire written with any particular view, or levelled at any fingle perfon; I fly like an eagle into the general expanfe of life, and leave not, by any private mischief, the trace of my paffage. JOHNSON. Infects |