From fairies and the tempters of the night, Guard me, I beseech ye. [Sleeps. [Iachimo rifes from the Trunk. Iach. The crickets fing, and man's o'er-labour'd fenfe Repairs itself by reft our Tarquin thus Did foftly prefs the rushes, e'er he waken'd How bravely thou becom'ft thy bed! fresh lilly, How dearly they do't-Tis her breathing that (4) O, fleep, thou ape of death, lie dull upon her, Thus in a chapel lying! Come off, come off.- (4) O fleep, &c.] So Ovid fays, Stulte quid eft fomnus, gelidæ nifi mortis imago? Stronger Fool, what is fleep, but th' image of cold death? See Measure for Measure (the Duke's fine speech to Claudio.} . Stronger than ever law could make this fecret Will force him think, I have pick'd the lock, and taʼen No more-to what end? Why should I write this down, that's rivetted, Screw'd to my memory. She hath been reading late To th' trunk again, and shut the spring of it. Swift, fwift you dragons of the night, that dawning (5) May bear the raven's eye; I lodge in fear; Tho' this a heav'nly angel, hell is here. [He goes into the Trunk, the Scene clofes SCENE IV. Gold. (6) 'Tis gold Which buys admittance, oft it doth, yea, makes Diana's (5) May bear, &c.] Some copies read, bare, or make bare; others, ope: but the true reading is, bear, a term taken from heraldry, and very fublimely applied. The meaning is, that morning may affume the colour of the raven's eye, which is grey: hence it is so commonly called, the grey-cy'd morning; in Romeo and Juliet, I'll fay yon grey is not the morning's eye. Warburton. No term in heraldry is so common as to bear, so that, doubtless, Mr. Warburton's explanation must be allowed: Shakespear ufes it in Much ado about Nothing; "So that if he have wit enough to keep himself warm, him bear it for a difference between him and his horse." let (6) Tis, &c.] See the 2d part of Henry IV. Act 4. Sc. 11. Virgil fays, Curs'd gold, how high will daring mortals rife Diana's rangers falfe themselves, and yield up Their deer to th' stand o'th' stealer: and 'tis gold Which makes the true man kill'd, and faves the thief; Nay, fometimes hangs both thief and true man; what Can it not do, and undo? SCENE VII. A Satire on Women. (7) Is there no way for men to be, but women Must be half-workers? We are baftards all; And Horace has an ode expreffly on this subject, That gold makes its way thro' all things: 'tis in his 3d book, and the 16th ode. Take part of it in the words of Creech; A tower of brafs, gates ftrong and barr'd, That fought imprifon'd Danae's bed When Jove himself was bribe, and turn'd to gold. It is the thunderbolt of wars: It flies thro' walls, and breaks away: It taught the children to rebel, (7) Is there, &c.] Milton fays, O why did God Creator wife, that peopled highest heaven And that most venerable man, which I This novelty on earth, this fair defect When Par. Loft, B. 1o. W. 888. This thought, as Dr. Neruton has well obferved, both in Shakefp.ar and Milton, "was originally from Euripides, who makes Hippolitus, in like manner, expoftulate with Jupiter, for not creating man without woman." See Hip. 616. O Jupiter, why woman, man's fole woe, Haft thou created? Wherefore didst thou not, And Jafon is made to talk in the fame ftrain, in the Medka, 573. Children by other means should be created, Dr. Newton adds, "Such fentiments as thefe, we fuppofe, procured Euripides the name of woman-hater. Arifto, however, hath ventured upon the fame, in Rodomont's invective against woman. Orlando Furiofo, Cant. 27. S. 120. Why did not nature rather fo provide, Without your help, that man of man might come, As are the apples with the pear and plumb? Harrington, St. 97. It would be endlefs to quote from authors, paffages fimilar to this in Shakespear: thofe of our own nation have greatly labour'd on the topic: Mr. Warburton himself hath joined the band, and fought against the ladies, as his pithy reflections on the wife of fob, in his Divine Legation, fhew: however, we ftill find them retaining their power in spite of all the malice of their foes, and amidft fo many enemies ftill triumphaat. The manner in which the jealous Pofthumus defcribes the anparent modesty of his wife, deferves to be compared with the following paffage from Philafter, who having received a letter to inform him of the falfhood of his mistress,whom he dearly loved and believed perfectly chafte, fays; 10, let When I was stampt. Some coiner with his tools. The nonpareil of thisOh, vengeance, vengeance! And pray'd me oft forbearance; did it with A pudency fo rofy, the sweet view on't Might well have warm'd old Saturn-that I thought her As chafte as unfunn'd fnow. * * * part in me;-for there's no motion O, let all women, That love black deeds learn to diffemble here! A maiden fnow that melted with my looks. That See Philafter, A&. 3. A little further in the same act, he thus declaims against the sex. Some far place, Where never womankind durft fet her foot, For bursting with her poifons, must I seek, And live to curfe you : There dig a cave and preach to birds and beasts, What woman is, and help to fave them from you: How heav'n is in your eyes, but, in your hearts More hell, than hell has: how your tongues like scor pions, Both heal and poifon; how your thoughts are woven With thousand changes in on fubtle web, And worn fo by you. How that foolish man, |