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Ben. Madam, an hour before the worshipp'd Suri Peer'd through the golden window of the Eaft, A troubled mind drew me to walk abroad, Where underneath the grove of fycamour, That westward rooteth from the City fide, So early walking did I fee your fon. Tow'rds him I made; but he was 'ware of me, And stole into the covert of the wood. I, measuring his affections by my own, 5 That most are bufied when they're most alone, Pursued my humour, not pursuing him;

And gladly shun'd, who gladly fled from me. Mon. Many a morning hath he there been feen With tears augmenting the fresh morning-dew, Adding to clouds more clouds with his deep fighs, But all fo foon as the all-chearing Sun Should, in the furthest East, begin to draw The shady curtains from Aurora's bed; Away from light steals home my heavy fon, And private in his chamber pens himself, Shuts up his windows, locks fair day-light out, And makes himself an artificial night. Black and portentous must this humour prove, Unless good counsel may the cause remove.

Ben. My noble uncle, do you know the cause ? Mon. I neither know it, nor can learn it of him. Ben. Have you importun'd him by any means? Mon. Both by myself and many other friends; But he, his own affections' counsellor,

5 That most are bufied, &c.] Edition 1597. Instead of which it is in the other editions thus. -by my own. Which then most fought, where moft might not be found, Being one too many by my weary Self,

Purfued my humour, &c. POPE.

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Is to himself, I will not say, how true,
But to himself so secret and fo close,
So far from founding and discovery,
As is the bud bit with an envious worm,
Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the Air,
* Or dedicate his beauty to the Sun.
Could we but learn from whence his sorrows grow,
We would as willingly give Cure, as know.

Enter Romeo.

Ben. See, where he comes. So please you, step aside,

I'll know his grievance, or be much deny'd.

• Mon. I would, thou wert so happy by thy stay

To hear true shrift. Come, Madam, let's away.

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Rom. Is the day so young?

Ben. But new struck nine.

Rom. Ah me, sad hours seem long!

[Exeunt.

-Was that my father that went hence so fast?
Ben. It was. What sadness lengthens Romeo's hours?
Rom. Not having that, which, having, makes them

short.

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!

Ben. Of love ?

Rom. Out of her favour, where I am in love.
Ben. Alas, that love, so gentle in his view,
Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof!
Rom. Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still,
Should without eyes see-path-ways to his will!
Where shall we dine? - O me! - What fray was here?
Yet tell me not, for I have heard it all.

Here's much to do with hate, but more with love.

[Striking his breaft.

'Why then, O brawling love! O loving hate!
Oh, any thing of nothing first create!
O heavy lightness! ferious vanity!
Mif-shapen chaos of well-feeming forms!
Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, fick health!
Still-waking fleep, that is not what it is!
This love feel I, that feel no love in this.

Doft thou not laugh?

Ben. No, coz, I rather weep.
Rom. Good heart, at what?
Ben. At thy good heart's oppression.

Rom. Why, such is love's tranfgreffion.
Griefs of mine own lie heavy in my breast;
Which thou wilt propagate, to have them prest
With more of thine; this love, that thou hast shown,
Doth add more grief to too much of mine own

-to his will!] Sir T. Hanmer, and after him Dr. Warbur tan, read, to his ill. The prefent reading has some obscurity; the meaning may be, that love finds out means to pursue his defire. That the blind should find paths to ill is no great wonder.

Why then, O brawling love, &c.] Of these lines neither the fense nor occafion is very evident. He is not yet in love with an enemy, and to love one and

hate another is no such uncom-
mon state, as can deserve all this
toil of antithesis.

Why Such is love's tranfgref-
fion. Such is the confe-
quence of unskilful and miltaken
kindness.

This line is probably mutilated, for being intended to rhyme to the line foregoing, it must have originally been complete in its measure.

?

Love is a smoke rais'd with the fume of fighs,
3 Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;
* Being vext, a fea nourish'd with lovers' tears;
What is it elfe? a madness most discreet,
A choaking gall, and a preserving sweet.
Farewel, my cousin,

Ben. Soft, I'll go along.

[Going.

And if you leave me fo, you do me wrong.
Rom. Tut, I have lost myself, I am not here;

This is not Romeo, he's fome other where.

Ben. Tell me in sadness, who she is you love?
Rom. What, shall I groan and tell thee?
Ben. Groan? why, no; but sadly tell me, who.
Rom. Bid a fick man in sadness make his will?

O word, ill urg'd to one that is so ill!
In sadness, cousin, I do love a woman.

Ben. I aim'd so near, when I suppos'd you lov'd.
Rom. A right good marks-man;-and she's fair, I

love.

Bea. A right fair mark, fair coz, is foonest hit. Rom. But, in that hit, you miss; she'll not be hit With Cupid's arrow; the hath Dian's wit: And, in strong proof of chastity well arm'd, From love's weak childish bow, she lives unharm'd. She will not stay the siege of loving terms, Nor 'bide th' encounter of affailing eyes, Nor ope her lap to saint-seducing gold,

3 Being purg'd, a fire Sparkling in lovers' eyes;] The authour may mean being purged of Smoke, but it is perhaps a meaning never given to the word in any other place. I would rather read,

Being urged, a fire Sparkling. Being excited and inforced. To urge the fire is the technical term. Being vex'd, &c.] As this

line stands fingle, it is likely that the foregoing or following line that rhym'd to it, is loft.

5 Tell me in Sadness,] That is, tell me gravely, tell me in feriousness

in fti ong proof-] In chastity of proof, as we say in armour of proof.

O, she is rich in beauty; only poor
That when she dies, 7 with Beauty dies her Store.

Ben. Then she hath sworn, that she will still live chafte ?

Rom. She hath, and in that Sparing makes huge

waste.

For beauty, starv'd with her severity,

Cuts beauty off from all pofterity.

She is too fair, too wife, 9 too wisely fair,
To merit bliss by making me defpair;
She hath forfworn to love, and in that vow
Do I live dead, that live to tell it now.

>

Ben. Be rul'd by me, forget to think of her. Rom. O, teach me how I should forget to think. Ben. By giving liberty unto thine eyes;

Examine other Beauties.

Rom. 'Tis the way

To call hers exquisite in question more;
Those happy masks, that kifs fair ladies' brows,
Being black, puts us in mind they hide the fair;
He that is strucken blind, cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eye-fight loft,
Shew me a mistress, that is paffing fair,
What doth her beauty serve, but as a note,
Where I may read, who pass'd that passing fair?
Farewel, thou canst not teach me to forget.

Ben. I'll pay that doctrine, or else die in debt.

[Exeunt,

7 with Beauty dies her Store.] Mr. Theobald reads.

With her dies beauties store. and is followed by the two fucceeding editors. I have replaced the old reading, because I think it at least as plausible as the correction. She is rich, says he, in beauty, and only poor in being subject to the lot of huma

nity, that her store, or riches, can be destroyed by death, who shall, by the same blow, put an end to beauty.

$ Rom, She hath, and in that Sparing, &c.] None of the following speeches of this scene in the first edition of 1597. POPE. 9 too wisely fair,] Hanmer, For, wisely too fair. SCENE

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