But will you hear? the King is my love fworn. In their own shapes; for it can never be, Boyet. They will, they will, God knows ; Prin. How, blow? how, blow? fpeak to be understood. Boyet. Fair ladies, mafkt, are rofes in their bud; courtly ftudents, and that better wits may be found in the common places of education. 4 Fair ladies, mafkt, are refes Fair ladies mafk'd are roses in Or ANGELS VEIL'D IN clouds: Or Angel-veiling Clouds, i. e. clouds which veil Angels: And by this means gave us, as Dif the old proverb fays, a cloud for a Juno. It was Shakespeare's purpofe to compare a fine lady to an angel; it was Mr. Theobald's chance to compare her to a cloud: And perhaps the illbred reader will fay a lucky one. However I fuppofed the Poet could never be fo nonfenfical as to compare a masked lady to a cloud, though he might compare her mak to one. The Oxford Editor, who had the advantage both of this emendation and criticifm, is a great deal more fubtile and refined, and fays it should not be angels veil'd in clouds, but angels wailing clouds, i. e. cap ping the fun as they go by him, just as a man veils his bonnet. WARBURTON. I know not why Sir T. Hanmer's explanation fhould be treated with fo much contempt, or why vailing clouds should be cap Difmafkt, their damask fweet Commixture fhewn, Prin. Avaunt, perplexity; what shall we do. Rof. Good Madam, if by me you'll be advis❜d, Boyet. Ladies, withdraw, the Gallants are at hand. [Exeunt *. SCENE VII. Before the Princess's Pavilion. Enter the King, Biron, Longueville, and Dumain, in their own habits; Boyet, meeting them. King. AIR Sir, God fave you! Where's the Princefs? FAIR Boyet. Gone to her Tent. Pleafe it your Majefty, command me any fervice to - her? King. That the vouchfafe me audience for one word. Boyet. I will; and fo will fhe, I know, my lord. ping the fun. Ladies unmasked, fays Boyet, are like angels vailing clouds, or letting thofe clouds which obfcured their brightnefs, fink from before them. What is there in this abfurd or contemptible? [Exit. fhapeless gear ;] Shapeless, for uncouth, or what Shakespeare elsewhere calls diffufed. WARBURTON. *Mr. Theobald ends the fourth act here, Biron. This fellow picks up wit, as pigeons peas; At wakes and waffels, meetings, markets, fairs: This is the flower, that fmiles on ev'ry one. The broken disjointed metaphor is a fault in writing. But in order to pass a true judgment on this fault, it is ftill to be obferved, that when a metaphor is grown fo common as to defert, as it were, the figurative, and to be received into the common ftile, then what may be affirmed of the thing reprefented, or the fubftance, may be affirmed of the thing reprefenting, or the image. To il luftrate this by the inftance be fore us, a very complaifant, finical, over-gracious perfon, was fo commonly called the flower, or, as he elsewhere expreffes it, the pink of courtefte, that in common talk, or in the loweft ftile, this metaphor might be ufed without keeping up the image, And but any thing affirmed of it as of an agnomen: hence it might be faid, without offence, to smile, to flatter, &c. And the reafon is this; in the more folemn, lefs-used metaphors, our mind is fo turned upon the image which the metaphor conveys, that it expects, this image fhould be, for fome little time, continued, by terms proper to keep it in view. And if, for want of thefe terms, the image be no fooner prefented than difmiffed, the mind fuffers a kind of violence by being drawn off abruptly and unexpectedly from its contemplation. Hence it is that the broken, disjointed, and mix'd metaphor fo much fhocks us. But when it is once become worn and hacknied by common ufe, then even the very first mention of And confciences, that will not die in debt, King. A blifter on his fweet tongue with my heart, That put Armado's Page out of his Part! SCENE VIII. Enter the Princefs, Rofaliné, Maria, Catharine, Biron. See, where it comes; behaviour, what wert thou", 'Till this man fhew'd thee? and what art thou now? To lead you to our Court; vouchfafe it then. Prin. This field fhall hold me, and fo hold your VOW: Nor God, nor I, delight in perjur'd men. of it is not apt to excite in us the reprefentative image; but brings immediately before us the idea of the thing reprefented. And then to endeavour to keep up and continue the borrow'd ideas, by right adapted terms, would have as ill an effect on the other hand: Becaufe the mind is already gone off from the image to the fubftance. Grammarians would do well to confider what has been here faid when they fet upon amending Greek and Roman writings. For the much ufed hack nied metaphors being now very imperfectly known, great care is equired not to act in this cafe temerariously. WARBURTON. 7 behaviour, what wert thou, 'Till this man fhew'd thee? and what art thou now?] Thefe are two wonderfully fine lines, intimating that what courts call manners, and value themfelves fo much upon teaching, as a thing no where else to be learnt, is a modeft filent accomplishment, under the direction of nature and common fenfe, which does its office in promoting focial life without being taken notice of. But that when it degenerates into fhew and parade it becomes an unmanly contemptible quality. WARBURTON. What is told in this note is undoubtedly true, but is not comprifed in the quotation. King. Rebuke me not for That, which you provoke; The virtue of your eye muft break my oath . Prin. You nick-name virtue; vice you fhould have fpoke: For virtue's office never breaks men's troth. A world of torments though I should endure, King. How, Madam? Ruffians? Prin. Ay, in truth, my lord; Trim gallants, full of courtship, and of state. Rof. Madam, fpeak true. It is not fo, my lord: We four, indeed, confronted were with four The virtue of your eye MUST break my oath.] Common fenfe requires us to read, -MADE break my oath, i. e. made me. And then the reply is pertinent-It was the force of your beauty that made me break my oath, therefore you ought not to upbraid me with a crime which you yourself was the cause of. WARBURTON I believe the author means that the virtue, in which word good nefs and power are both comprifed, muft diffolve the obligation of the oath. The princefs, in her anfwer, takes the most invidious part of the ambiguity. |