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Ib. 1. 15.

Then in a number, &c.

Read---Then in

the number, &c.

P. 92, 1.4. Yet, love, to tell me so. To tell me thou dost love me. MALONE.

Ib. 1. 9. Ill-wrestling. Read--ill-wresting.

Ib. 1. 22. But my five wits, nor my five senses can, &c. i. e. But neither my wits, nor senses, can &c.

"The wits," Dr. Johnson observes, "seeins to have been reckoned five, by analogy to the five senses, or the five inlets of ideas. Wit, in our author's time, was the general term for the intellectual power." From Stephen Hawes's Poem, called Gruunde Amour, and La Bell Pucell, 1554, ch. 24, it appears, that the five wits were, "Common wit, imagination, fantasy, estimation, and memory." MALONE.

P. 93, 1. 2.

pain.

Ib. 1. 3 and 4.

Rewards my pain. Read---awards me

hate, &c. Read--

Love is my sin, and my dear virtue

"Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,
"Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving.”
Ib. 1. 14. To pity be. Read---to pity'd be.

Ib. 1. 15. If thou dost seek, &c.

If thou do seek, &c. EDITOR.

We should read--

Ib. 1. 21. In pursuit, &c. The accent here is on the first syllable (púrsuit.) EDITOR.

Ib. 1. 25. Not prizing her poor infant's discontent. Not regarding, nor making any account of, her child's

uneasiness. MALONE.

P. 94, 1. 20 and 21. I HATE, from hate away she

threw, &c.

Such sense as these sonnets abound with,

may, perhaps, be discovered as the words at present stand; but I had rather read :--

"I hate, away from hate she flew," &c.

Having pronounced the word I hate, she left me with a declaration in my favour. STEEVENS.

The meaning is, she removed the words I hate to a distance from hatred; she changed their natural import, and rendered them inefficacious, and undescriptive of dislike, by subjoining---not you. The old copy is certainly right. The poet relates what the lady said; she is not herself the speaker. MALONE.

Surely Mr. Steevens had not considered the preceding lines; particularly--

"I hate she altered with an end;"

Which end was--not you.

I have met with worse conceits in many modern sonnets. EDITOR.

P. 95, 1. 3. My sinful earth, these rebel powers that thee array. Thus the old copy.

It is manifest that the compositor inadvertently repeated the last three words of the first verse in the beginning of the second, omitting two syllables, which are sufficient to complete the metre. What the omitted word or words were it is impossible now to determine. MALONE.

Mr. Malone, in his edition," rather than leave an hiatus," has substituted--

"Fool'd by those rebel powers," &c.

I would read---starv'd by these rebel powers, &c. The dearth complained of in the succeeding line appears to authorize the conjecture. The poet seems to allude to

the short commons and gaudy habit of soldiers. STEE

VENS.

Ib. 1. 5. In costly clay. Thus a modern edition. Read--so costly gay.

Ib. 1. 7. Faded mansion. Read-fuding mansion. Ib. 1. 24. Why physic did accept. Read--which physic did except.

P. 96, l. 1. Now reason is past cure. Read-past

cure.

That censures falsely.

Ib. 1. 11. falsely. MALONE.

That estimates

Ib. 1. 23. When I against myself with thee partake; i. e. take part with thee against myself. STEEVENS. A partaker was, in Shakespeare's time, the term for an associate, or confederate, in any business. MA

LONE.

Ib. 1. 25.

All of myself, all tyrant for thy sake! Other copies read---Am of myself, &c.

All tyrant, for thy suke---that is, for the sake of thee, thou tyrant. Perhaps, however, the author wrote--"When I forgot,

"Am of myself, all truant for thy sake."

MALONE.

P. 97, 1. 1. Who hatest thou, that I do call my friend? Other copies read-Who hateth thee, &c. This is from one of the Psalms :--

"Do I not hate those that hate thee?" &c.

STEEVENS.

P. 99, 1. 7. Bare ruin'd quires, where lute the sweet birds sang. The quarto has-Bare rn'w'd quiers---from

which the reader must extract what meaning he can. The edition of our author's Poems, in 1640, has ruin’d. Quires, or choirs, here means, that part of cathedrals where divine service is performed, to which, when uncovered, and in ruins, the poet compares the trees at the end of autumn, stripped of that foliage which at once invited and sheltered the feathered songsters of MALONE.

summer.

The resemblance be

This image was, probably, suggested to Shakespeare by our desolated monasteries. tween the vaulting of a Gothic isle, and an avenue of trées, whose upper branches meet and form an arch overhead, is too striking not to be acknowledged. When the roof of one is shattered, and the boughs of the other leafless, the comparison becomes yet more solemn and picturesque. STEEVENS.

Ib. 1. 8. Twilights of such day. Read-twilight,

&c.

Ib. 1. 16.

Ib. 1. 20.

'Tis thou, &c. Read-This thou, &c.

The vacant leaves, &c. Perhaps Shake-
MALONE.

speare wrote-These vacant leaves.

Ib. 1. 21.

And of this book, &c.

This, their, and

thy, are so often confounded in these

sonnets, that it is

only by attending to the context that we can discover which was the author's word. In the present instance, instead of this book, should we not read-thy book? MALONE.

Ib. 1. 22 and 23. Thy glass will shew-give the meRead-thy glass will truly show--and---give

mory.

thee memory.

P. 100, 1. 4. To these waste blocks.

Thus the old copy. Mr. Theobald proposes to read---waste blanks, which emendation, Mr. Malone says, is fully supported by a preceding line; The vacant leaves, &c.

Ib. 1.15. And the sad augurs mock their own presage. I suppose he means that they laugh at the futility of their own predictions. STEEVENS.

Ib. 1. 19. And death to me subscribes. To subscribe is to acknowledge as a superior---to obey.

MALONE. P. 101, 1. 3. What's now to speak, what now to register? Thus the quarto. Read---What's new to speak, what new to register?

Ib. 1. 9. In love's fresh case.

By the case of love

the poet means his own compositions. Ib. 1. 10. Weighs not the dust; i. e. disregards the dust.

Ib. ib. And injuries of age. Read--and injury, &c. P. 102, l. 17. More perjur'd I. The quarto is here certainly corrupt. It reads---more perjur'd eye. MA

LONE.

CEPHALUS AND PROCRIS. (p. 103.)

This tale from Ovid, and others herewith blended, (p. 107 to 117) are ascribed to the pen of Heywood; they were originally printed together, in 1612, and have been continued in many succeeding editions.

P. 105, 1. 18, Cupid laid by his brand, &c. This and the following stanza are composed of the very same thoughts differently versified. They seem to be early

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