Complete Works of Samuel Johnson

by Samuel Johnson

  IV.ii.32 (282,7) Of nothing] Should it not be read, Or nothing? When the courtiers remark, that Hamlet has contemptuously called the king a thing, Hamlet defends himself by observing, that the king must be a thing, or nothing.

  IV.ii.46 (283,9) the wind at help] I suppose it should be read, The bark is ready, and the wind at helm.

  IV.ii.68 (284,3) And thou must cure me: till I know ’tis done,/ Howe’er my haps, my joys will ne’er begin] This being the termination of a scene, should, according to our author’s custom, be rhymed. Perhaps he wrote,

  Howe’er my hopes, my joys are not begun.

  If haps be retained, the meaning will be, ‘till I know ’tis done, I shall be miserable, whatever befall me (see 1785, VIII, 257, 3)

  IV.iv.33 (286,4)

  What is a man,

  If his chief good and market of his time

  Be but to sleep and feed?]

  If his highest good, and that for which he sells his time, be to sleep and feed.

  IV.iv.36 (286,5) large discourse] Such latitude of comprehension, such power of reviewing the past, and anticipating the future.

  IV.iv.53 (286,6) Rightly to be great,/Is not to stir without great argument] This passage I have printed according to the copy. Mr. THEOBALD had regulated it thus:

  — ’Tis not to be great,

  Never to stir without great argument;

  But greatly, &c.

  The sentiment of Shakespeare is partly just, and partly romantic.

  — Rightly to be great,

  Is not to stir without great argument;

  is exactly philosophical.

  But greatly to find quarrel in a straw,

  When honour is at stake,

  is the idea of a modern hero. But then, says he honour is an argument, or subject of debate, sufficiently great, and when honour is at stake, we must find cause of quarrel in a straw.

  IV.iv.56 (287,7) Excitements of my reason and my blood] Provocations which excite both my reason and my passions to vengeance.

  IV.v.37 (289,4) Larded all with sweet flowers] The expression is taken from cookery. (1773)

  IV.v.53 (290,6) And dupt the chamber-door] To dup, is to do up; to lift the latch. It were easy to write,

  And op’d —

  IV.v.58 (290,7) By Gis] I rather imagine it should be read,

  By Cis, —

  That is, by St. Cecily.

  IV.v.83 (291,8) but greenly] But unskilfully; with greenness; that is, without maturity of judgment.

  IV.v.84 (291,9) In hugger-mugger to inter him] All the modern editions that I have consulted give it,

  In private to inter him; —

  That the words now replaced are better, I do not undertake to prove; it is sufficient that they are Shakespeare’s: if phraseology is to be changed as words grow uncouth by disuse, or gross by vulgarity, the history of every language will be lost; we shall no longer have the words of any author; and, as these alterations will be often unskilfully made, we shall in time have very little of his meaning.

  IV.v.89 (292,1) Feeds on his wonder] The folio reads,

  Keeps on his wonder, —

  The quarto,

  Feeds on this wonder. —

  Thus the true reading is picked out from between them. HANMER reads unnecessarily,

  Feeds on his anger. —

  IV.v.92 (292,2) Wherein necessity, of matter beggar’d,/ Will nothing stick our persons to arraign] HANMER reads,

  Whence animosity, of matter beggar’d.

  He seems not to have understood the connection. Wherein, that is, in which pestilent speeches, necessity, or, the obligation of an accuser to support his charge, will nothing stick, &c.

  IV.v.99 (293,4) The ocean, over-peering of his list] The lists are the barriers which the spectators of a tournament must not pass.

  IV.v.105 (293,5) The ratifiers and props of every ward] [W: ward] With this emendation, which was in Theobald’s edition, Hanmer was not satisfied. It is indeed harsh. HANMER transposes the lines, and reads,

  They cry, “Chuse we Laertes for our king;”

  The ratifiers and props of every word,

  Caps, hands, and tongues, applaud it to the clouds.

  I think the fault may be mended at less expence, by reading,

  Antiquity forgot, custom not known,

  The ratifiers and props of every weal.

  That is, of every government.

  IV.v.110 (294,6) Oh, this is counter, you false Danish dogs] Hounds run counter when they trace the trail backwards.

  IV.v.161 (296,9)

  Nature is fine in loves and, where ’tis fine,

  It sends some precious instance of itself

  After the thing it loves]

  These lines are not in the quarto, and might hare been omitted in the folio without great loss, for they are obscure and affected; but, I think, they require no emendation. Love (says Laertes) is the passion by which nature is most exalted and refined; and as substances refined and subtilised, easily obey any impulse, or follow any attraction, some part of nature, so purified and refined, flies off after the attracting object, after the thing it loves.

  As into air the purer spirits f1ow,

  And separate from their kindred dregs below,

  So flew her soul. —

  IV.v.171 (297,1) O how the wheel becomes it!] [W: weal] I do not see why weal is better than wheel. The story alluded to I do not know; but perhaps the lady stolen by the steward was reduced to spin.

  IV.v.175 (297,2) There’s rosemary, that’ll far rememberance. Pray you, love, remember. And there’s pansies, that’s for thoughts] There is probably some mythology in the choice of these herbs, but I cannot explain it. Pansies is for thoughts, because of its name, Pensées; but rosemary indicates remembrance, except that it is an ever-green, and carried at funerals, I have not discovered.

  IV.v.214 (300,7) No trophy, sword, nor batchment] It was the custom, in the times of our author, to hang a sword over the grave of a knight.

  IV.v.218 (300,8) And where the offence is, let the great axe fall] [W: tax] Fall corresponds better to axe.

  IV.vi.26 (301,9) for the bore of the matter] The bore is the calibier of a gun, or the capacity of the barrel. The matter (says Hamlet) would carry the heavier words.

  IV.vii.18 (302,1) the general gender] The common race of the people.

  IV.vii.19 (302,2)

  dipping all his faults in their affection,

  Would, like the spring that turneth wood to stone,

  Convert his gyves to graces]

  This simile is neither very seasonable in the deep interest of this conversation, nor very accurately applied. If the spring had changed base metals to gold, the thought had been more proper.

  IV.vii.27 (302,3) if praises may go back again] If I may praise what has been, but is now to be found no more.

  IV.vii.77 (304,5) Of the unworthiest siege] Of the lowest rank. Siege, for seat, place.

  IV.vii.82 (304,6) Importing health and graveness] [W: wealth] Importing here may be, not inferring by logical consequence, but producing by physical effect. A young man regards show in his dress, an old man, health.

  IV.vii.90 (305,7) I, in forgery of shapes and tricks/Come short of what he did] I could not contrive so many proofs of dexterity as he could perform.

  IV.vii.98 (305,8) in your defence] That is, in the science of defence.

  IV.vii.101 (305,9) The scrimers] The fencers.

  IV.vii.112 (305,1) love is begun by time] This is obscure. The meaning may be, love is not innate in us, and co-essential to our nature, but begins at a certain time from some external cause, and being always subject to the operations of time, suffers change and diminution. (1773)

  IV.vii.113 (300,2) in passages of proof] In transactions of daily experience.

  IV.vii.123 (306,4) And then this should is like a spendthrift sigh/ That hurts by easing] [W: sign] This conjecture is so ingenious, that it can hardly be opposed, but with the same reluctance as the bow is drawn against a hero,
whose virtues the archer holds in veneration. Here may be applied what Voltaire writes to the empress:

  Le genereux Francois —

  Te combat & t’admire.

  Yet this emendation, however specious, is mistaken. The original reading is, not a spendthrift’s sigh, but a spendthrift sigh; a sigh that makes an unnecessary waste of the vital flame. It is a notion very prevalent, that sighs impair the strength, and wear out the animal powers.

  IV.vii.135 (307,5) He being remiss] He being not vigilant or cautious.

  IV.vii.139 (307,7) a pass of practice] Practice is often by Shakespeare, and other writers, taken for an insidious stratagem, or privy treason, a sense not incongruous to this passage, where yet I rather believe, that nothing more is meant than a thrust for exercise.

  IV.vii.151 (308,8) May fit us to our shape] May enable us to assume proper characters, and to act our part.

  IV.vii.155 (308,9) blast in proof] This, I believe, is a metaphor taken from a mine, which, in the proof or execution, sometimes breaks out with an ineffectual blast.

  V.i.3 (310,1) make her grave straight] Make her grave from east to west in a direct line parallel to the church; not from north to south, athwart the regular line. This, I think, is meant.

  V.i.87 (313,1) which this ass now o’er-reaches] In the quarto, for over-offices is, over-reaches, which agrees better with the sentence: it is a strong exaggeration to remark that an ass can over-reach him who would once have tried to circumvent. — I believe both the words were Shakespeare’s. An author in revising his work, when his original ideas have faded from his mind, and new observations have produced new sentiments, easily introduces images which have been more newly impressed upon him, without observing their want of congruity to the general texture of his original design.

  V.i.96 (314,2) and now my lady Worm’s] The scull that was my lord Such a one’s, is now my lady Worm’s.

  V.i.100 (314,3) to play at loggats with ‘em?] A play, in which pins are set up to be beaten down with a bowl.

  V.i.149 (316,5) by the card] The card is the paper on which the different points of the compass were described. To do any thing by the card, is, to do it with nice observation.

  V.i.151 (316,6) the age is grown so picked] So smart, so sharp, says HANMER, very properly; but there was, I think, about that time, a picked shoe, that is, a shoe with a long pointed toe, in fashion, to which the allusion seems likewise to be made. Every man now is smart; and every man now is a man of fashion.

  V.i.239 (319,7) winter’s flaw!] Winter’s blast.

  V.i.242 (319,8) maimed rites!] Imperfect obsequies.

  V.i.244 (319,9) some estate] Some person of high rank.

  V.i.255 (319,2) Yet here she is allow’d her virgin crants] I have been informed by an anonymous correspondent, that crants is the German word for garlands, and I suppose it was retained by us from the Saxons. To carry garlands before the bier of a maiden, and to hang them over her grave, is still the practice in rural parishes.

  Crants therefore was the original word, which the author, discovering it to be provincial, and perhaps not understood, changed to a term more intelligible, but less proper. Maiden rites give no certain or definite image. He might have put maiden wreaths, or maiden garlands, but he perhaps bestowed no thought upon it, and neither genius nor practice will always supply a hasty writer with the most proper diction.

  V.i.310 (323,6) When that her golden couplets] [W: E’er that] Perhaps it should be,

  Ere yet —

  Yet and that are easily confounded.

  V.ii.6 (324,7) mutinies in the bilboes] Mutinies, the French word for seditious or disobedient fellows in the army or fleet. Bilboes, the ship’s prison.

  V.ii.6 (324,8) Rashly,/And prais’d be rashness for it — Let us know] Both my copies read,

  — Rashly,

  And prais’d be rashness for it, let us know.

  Hamlet, delivering an account of his escape, begins with saying, that he rashly — and then is carried into a reflection upon the weakness of human wisdom. I rashly — praised be rashness for it — Let us not think these events casual, but let us know, that is, take notice and remember, that we sometimes succeed by indiscretion, when we fail by deep plots, and infer the perpetual superintendance and agency of the Divinity. The observation is just, and will be allowed by every human being who shall reflect on the course of his own life.

  V.ii.22 (325,9) With, ho! such bugs and goblins in my life] With such causes of terror, arising from my character and designs.

  V.ii.29 (325,2) Being thus benetted round with villainies,/ Ere I could make a prologue to my brains] [W: mark the prologue ... bane] In my opinion no alteration is necessary. Hamlet is telling how luckily every thing fell out; he groped out their commission in the dark without waking them; he found himself doomed to immediate destruction. Something was to be done for his preservation. An expedient occurred, not produced by the comparison of one method with another, or by a regular deduction of consequences, but before he could make a prologue to his brains, they had begun the play. Before he could summon his faculties, and propose to himself what should be done, a complete scheme of action presented itself to him. His mind operated before he had excited it. This appears to me to be the meaning.

  V.ii.41 (326,5) As peace should still her wheaten garland wear,/ And stand a comma ‘tween their amities] HANMER reads,

  And stand a cement —

  I am again inclined to vindicate the old reading.

  The expression of our author is, like many of his phrases, sufficiently constrained and affected, but it is not incapable of explanation. The comma is the note of connection and continuity of sentences; the period is the note of abruption and disjunction. Shakespeare had it perhaps in his mind to write, That unless England complied with the mandate, war should put a period to their amity; he altered his mode of diction, and thought that, in an opposite sense, he might put, that Peace should stand a comma between their amities. This is not an easy stile; but is it not the stile of Shakespeare?

  V.ii.43 (327,6) as’s of great charge] Asses heavily loaded. A quibble is intended between as the conditional particle, and ass the beast of burthen. That charg’d anciently signified leaded, may be proved from the following passage in The Widow’s Tears, by Chapman, 1612.

  “Thou must be the ass charg’d with crowns to make way.” (see 1765, VIII, 294, 2)

  V.ii.53 (327,7) The changeling never known] A changeling is a child which the fairies are supposed to leave in the room of that which they steal.

  V.ii.68 (328,1) To quit him] To requite him; to pay him his due.

  V.ii.84 (329,2) Dost know this water-fly] A water-fly, skips up and down upon the surface of the water, without any apparent purpose or reason, and is thence the proper emblem of a busy trifler.

  V.ii.89 (329,3) It is a chough] A kind of jackdaw.

  V.ii.112 (330,5) full of most excellent differences] Full of distinguishing excellencies.

  V.ii.114 (330,6) the card or calendar of gentry] The general preceptor of elegance; the card by which a gentleman is to direct his course; the calendar by which he is to choose his time, that what he does may be both excellent and seasonable.

  V.ii.115 (330,7) for you shall find in him the continent of what part a gentleman would see] You shall find him containing and comprising every quality which a gentleman would desire to contemplate for imitation. I know not but it should be read, You shall find him the continent

  V.ii.119 (330,9) and yet but raw neither in respect of his quick sail] [W: but slow] I believe raw to be the right word; it is a word of great latitude; raw signifies unripe, immature, thence unformed, imperfect, unskilful. The best account of him would be imperfect, in respect of his quick sail. The phrase quick sail was, I suppose, a proverbial term for activity of mind.

  V.ii.122 (330,1) a soul of great article] This is obscure. I once thought it might have been, a soul of great altitude; but, I suppose, a soul of great article, means a soul of large comprehension, of many con
tents; the particulars of an inventory are called articles.

  V.ii.122 (331,2) his infusion of such dearth and rareness] Dearth is dearness, value, price. And his internal qualities of such value and rarity.

  V.ii.131 (331,3) Is’t not possible to understand in another tongue? you will do’t, Sir, really] Of this interrogatory remark the sense ie very obscure. The question may mean, Might not all this be understood in plainer language. But then, you will do it, Sir, really, seems to have no use, for who could doubt but plain language would be intelligible? I would therefore read, Is’t possible not to be understood in a mother tongue. You will do it, Sir, really.

  V.ii.140 (331,4) if you did, it would not much approve me] If you knew I was not ignorant, your esteem would not nuch advance my reputation. To approve, is to recommend to approbation.

  V.ii.145 (331,5) I dare not confess that, lest I should compare with him in excellence] I dare not pretend to know him, lest I should pretend to an equality: no man can completely know another, but by knowing himself, which is the utmost extent of human wisdom.

  V.ii.149 (332,6) in his meed] In his excellence.

  V.ii.156 (332,7) impon’d] Perhaps it should be, depon’d. So Hudibras,

  “I would upon this cause depone,

  “As much as any I have known.”

  But perhaps imponed is pledged, impawned, so spelt to ridicule the affectation of uttering English words with French pronunciation.

  V.ii.165 (332,9) more germane.] Morea-kin.

  V.ii.172 (333,1) The king, Sir, hath laid, that in a dozen passes between yourself and him, he shall not exceed you three hits; he hath laid on twelve for nine] This wager I do not understand. In a dozen passes one must exceed the other more or less than three hits. Nor can I comprehend, how, in a dozen, there can be twelve to nine. The passage is of no importance; it is sufficient that there was a wager. The quarto has the passage as it stands. The folio, He hath one twelve for mine.

  V.ii.193 (333,2) This lapwing runs away with the shell on his head] I see no particular propriety in the image of the lapwing. Osrick did not run till he had done his business. We may read, This lapwing ran away — That is, this fellow was full of unimportant bustle from his birth.