But Romeo may not; he is banished:9

Flies may do this, when I from this must fly;
They are free men, but I am banished.

And says't thou yet, that exile is not death?1
Hadst thou no poison mix'd, no sharp-ground knife,
No sudden mean of death, though ne'er so mean,
But-banished-to kill me; banished?

O friar, the damned use that word in hell;
Howlings attend it: How hast thou the heart,
Being a divine, a ghostly confessor,

A sin-absolver, and my friend profess'd,

To mangle me with that word-banishment?

Fri. Thou fond mad man, hear me but speak a word. Rom. O, thou wilt speak again of banishment.

Fri. I'll give thee armour to keep off that word; Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy,

To comfort thee, though thou art banished.3

• But Romeo may not; he is banished:] This line has been very aukwardly introduced in the modern as well as ancient copies, and might better be inserted after-their own kisses sin. Steevens.

This line, in the original copy, immediately follows-" And steal immortal blessing from her lips." The two lines, Who, even, &c. were added in the copy of 1599, and are merely parenthetical: the line, therefore, But Romeo may not; &c. undoubtedly ought to follow these two lines. By mistake, in the copy of 1599, it was inserted lower down, after-is not death. Malone.

1 They are free men, but I am banished.

And say'st thou yet, that exile is not death?] These two lines are not in the original copy. Malone.

2 Thou fond mad man, hear me but speak a word.] So the quarto, 1597. The quartos 1599 and 1609 read:

Then fond man, hear me a little speak.

The folio:

Then fond mad man, hear me speak. Malone.

3 Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy,

To comfort thee, though thou art banished.] So, in Romeus and Juliet, the Friar says

"Virtue is always thrall to troubles and annoy."

"But wisdom in adversity finds cause of quiet joy."

See also Lyly's Euphues, 1580: "Thou sayest banishment is better to the freeborne. There be many meates which are sowre in the mouth and sharp in the maw; but if thou mingle them with sweet sawces, they yeeld both a pleasant taste and wholesome nourishment. I speake this to this end; that though thy exile seeme grievous to thee, yet guiding thyselfe with the rules of philosophy, it shall be more tolerable." Malone.

Rom. Yet banished?-Hang up philosophy!
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet,
Displant a town, reverse a prince's doom;
It helps not, it prevails not, talk no more.

Fri. O, then I see that madmen have no ears. Rom. How should they, when that wise men have no eyes?

Fri. Let me dispute with thee of thy estate.

Rom. Thou canst not speak of what thou dost not feel: Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,"

An hour but married, Tybalt murdered,

Doting like me, and like me banished,

Then might'st thou speak, then might'st thou tear thy hair,

And fall upon the ground, as I do now,

Taking the measure of an unmade grave.

Fri. Arise; one knocks; good Romeo, hide thyself. [Knocking within.

Rom. Not I; unless the breath of heart-sick groans, Mist-like, infold me from the search of eyes. [Knocking. Fri. Hark, how they knock!-Who's there?-Ro

meo, arise;

Thou wilt be taken:-Stay a while :-stand up;

[Knocking.

Run to my study:-By and by:-God's will!
What wilfulness is this?-I come, I come. [Knocking.
Who knocks so hard? whence come you? what's your

will?

Nurse. [within] Let me come in, and you shall know my errand;

4 Let me dispute with thee of thy estate.] The same phrase, and with the same meaning, occurs in The Winter's Tale:

66 can he speak? hear?

"Know man from man? dispute his own estate?" i. e. is he able to talk over his own affairs, or the present state he is in? Steevens.

5 Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,] Thus the original copy; for which in the folio we have

Wert thou as young as Juliet my love.

I only mention this to show the very high value of the early quarto editions. Malone.

6 What wilfulness-] Thus the quarto, 1597. That of 1599 and the folio, have-What simpleness. Malone.

I come from lady Juliet.

Fri.

Welcome then.

Enter Nurse.

Nurse. O holy friar, O, tell me, holy friar, Where is my lady's lord, where 's Romeo?

Fri. There on the ground, with his own tears made

Blubbering and weeping, weeping and blubbering :-
Stand up, stand up; stand, an you be a man:
For Juliet's sake, for her sake, rise and stand;
Why should you fall into so deep an O?

Rom. Nurse!

Nurse. Ah sir! ah sir!—Well, death 's the end of all.. Rom. Spak'st thou of Juliet? how is it with her? Doth she not think me an old murderer,

Now I have stain'd the childhood of our joy
With blood remov'd but little from her own?

Where is she? and how doth she? and what says
My conceal'd lady to our cancell❜d love?8

Nurse. O, she says nothing, sir, but weeps and weeps;

And now falls on her bed; and then starts up,
And Tybalt calls; and then on Romeo cries,
And then down falls again.

Rom.

As if that name,

Shot from the deadly level of a gun,

Did murder her; as that name's cursed hand

70 woeful sympathy

Piteous predicament!] The old copies give these words to the Nurse. One may wonder the editors did not see that such language must necessarily belong to the Friar. Farmer.

Dr. Farmer's emendation may justly claim that place in the text to which I have now advanced it. Steevens.

8 cancell'd love?] The folio reads-conceal'd love. Johnson. The quarto, cancell'd love. Steevens.

The epithet concealed is to be understood, not of the person, but of the condition of the lady. So, that the sense is, my lady, whose being so, together with our marriage which made her so, is concealed from the world. Heath.

Murder'd her kinsman.-O tell me, friar, tell me,
In what vile part of this anatomy

Doth my name lodge? tell me, that I may sack
The hateful mansion.

Fri.

[Drawing his Sword. Hold thy desperate hand:

Art thou a man? thy form cries out, thou art;
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beast:

Unseemly woman, in a seeming man!
Or ill-beseeming beast, in seeming both!
Thou hast amaz'd me: by my holy order,
I thought thy disposition better temper'd.
Hast thou slain Tybalt? wilt thou slay thyself?
And slay thy lady too that lives in thee,1
By doing damned hate upon thyself?

Why rail'st thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth?3
Since birth, and heaven, and earth, all three do meet
In thee at once; which thou at once would'st lose.

9 Unseemly woman, &c.] Thou art a beast of ill qualities, under the appearance both of a woman and a man. Johnson.

A person who seemed both man and woman, would be a mon. ster, and of course an ill-beseeming beast. This is all the Friar meant to express. M. Mason.

1 And slay thy lady too that lives in thee,] The quarto, 1599, and the folio, have

And slay thy lady, that in thy life lives.

My copy of the first folio reads:

Thus the first copy.

Malone.

And slay thy lady that in thy life lies. Steevens.

2 Why rail'st thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth?] Romeo has not here railed on his birth, &c. though in his interview with the Friar as described in the poem, he is made to do so:

"First Nature did he blame, the author of his life,

"In which his joys had been so scant, and sorrows aye so rife;

"The time and place of birth he fiercely did reprove;

"He cryed out with open mouth against the stars above."On fortune eke he rail'd."

Shakspeare copied the remonstrance of the Friar, without reviewing the former part of his scene. He has in other places fallen into a similar inaccuracy, by sometimes following and sometimes deserting his original.

The lines, Why rail'st thou, &c. to-thy own defence, are not in the first copy. They are formed on a passage in the poem:

..

"Why cry'st thou out on love? why dost thou blame thy fate? Why dost thou so cry after death? thy life why dost thou hate?" &c. Malone.

Fy, fy! thou sham'st thy shape, thy love, thy wit;
Which, like an usurer, abound'st in all,

And usest none in that true use indeed

Which should bedeck thy shape, thy love, thy wit.
Thy noble shape is but a form of wax,
Digressing from the valour of a man:3
Thy dear love, sworn, but hollow perjury,
Killing that love which thou hast vow'd to cherish:
Thy wit, that ornament to shape and love,
Mis-shapen in the conduct of them both,
Like powder in a skill-less soldier's flask,
Is set on fire by thine own ignorance,

And thou dismember'd with thine own defence.5
What, rouse thee, man! thy Juliet is alive,
For whose dear sake thou wast but lately dead;
There art thou happy: Tybalt would kill thee,
But thou slew'st Tybalt; there art thou happy too :6
The law, that threaten'd death, becomes thy friend,
And turns it to exile; there art thou happy:
A pack of blessings lights upon thy back;
Happiness courts thee in her best array;
But, like a mis-behav'd and sullen wench,

3 Digressing from the valour of a man:] So, in the 24th Book of Homer's Odyssey, as translated by Chapman:

my deservings shall in nought digress

"From best fame of our race's foremost merit." Steevens. 4 Like powder in a skill-less soldier's flask, &c.] To understand the force of this allusion, it should be remembered that the ancient English soldiers, using match-locks, instead of locks with flints as at present, were obliged to carry a lighted match hanging at their belts, very near to the wooden flask in which they kept their powder. The same allusion occurs in Humour's Ordinary, an old collection of English epigrams:

"When she his flask and touch-box set on fire,

"And till this hour the burning is not out." Steevens. 5 And thou dismember'd with thine own defence.] And thou torn to pieces with thine own weapons. Johnson.

6

there art thou happy too:] Thus the first quarto. In the subsequent quartos and the folio too is omitted. Malone. It should not be concealed, that the reading of the second folio corresponds with that of the first quarto:·

there art thou happy too.

Steevens.

The word is omitted in all the intermediate editions; a sufficient proof that the emendations of that folio are not always the result of ignorance or caprice. Ritson.