1 PLAY. I warrant your honour. HAM. Be not too tame neither, but let your own Again, in Bale's Acts of English Votaries : 9 "Grennyng upon her, lyke Termagauntes in a play." RITSON. -out-herods HEROD:] The character of Herod in the an eient mysteries, was always a violent one. See the Coventriæ Ludus among the Cotton MSS. Vespasian D. VIIL: "Now I regne lyk a kyng arrayd ful rych, 66 66 Dukys with dentys I drive into the dych; My dedys be full dowty demyd be day." Again, in The Chester Whitsun Plays, MS. Harl. 1013: "I kynge of kynges, non soe keene, "I tyrant that maye bouth take and teene "I welde this worlde withouten wene, "I beate all those unbuxome beene; "I drive the devills alby dene "Deepe in hell adowne. "For I am kinge of all mankinde, "I byd, I beate, I lose, I bynde, "I master the moone; take this in mynde "I ame the greatest above degree, "And I byd him goe downe. "No raine to fall shall now be free, See the Vintner's Play, p. 67. Chaucer, describing a parish clerk, in his Miller's Tale, says: "He plaieth Herode on a skaffold high." to The parish clerks and other subordinate ecclesiasticks appear have been our first actors, and to have represented their characters on distinct pulpits or scaffolds. Thus, in one of the stage-directions to the 27th pageant in the Coventry collection already mentioned: What tyme that processyon is entered into y' place, and the Herowdys taken his schaffalde, and Annas and Cayphas. their schaffaldys," &c. STEEVENS.. 66 discretion be your tutor: suit the action to the word, the word to the action; with this special observance, that you o'er-step not the modesty of nature for any thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing, whose end, both at the first, and now, was, and is, to hold, as 'twere, the mirrour up to nature: to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time', his form and pressure 2. Now, this, over To the instances given by Mr. Steevens of Herod's lofty language, may be added these lines from the Coventry plays among the Cotton MSS. p. 92: "Of bewte and of boldnes I ber evermore the belle, "I dynge with my dowtiness the devyl down to helle, MALONE. Again, in the Unluckie Firmentie, by G. Kyttes, 4to. bl. 1: "But he was in such a rage "As one that shulde on a stage "The part of Herode playe." RITSON. AGE and BODY of the TIME,] The age of the time can hardly pass. May we not read, the face and body, or did the author write, the page? The page suits well with form and pressure, but ill with body. JOHNSON. To exhibit the form and pressure of the age of the time, is, to represent the manners of the time suitable to the period that is treated of, according as it may be ancient, or modern. STEEVENS. I can neither think this passage right as it stands, or approve of either of the amendments suggested by Johnson.-There is one more simple than either, that will remove every difficulty. Instead of "the very age and body of the time," (from which it is hard to extract any meaning,) I read-" every age and body of the time;" and then the sense will be this:- Show virtue her own likeness, and every stage of life, every profession or body of men, its form and resemblance.' By every age, is meant, the different stages of life;-by every body, the various fraternities, sorts, and ranks of mankind. M. MASON. Perhaps Shakspeare did not mean to connect these words. It is the end of playing, says Hamlet, to show the age in which we live, and the body of the time, its form and pressure; to delineate exactly the manners of the age, and the particular humour of the day. MALONE. pressure.] Resemblance, as in a print. JOHNSON. done, or come tardy off, though it make the unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure of which one*3 must, in your allowance*, o'er-weigh a whole theatre of others. O, there be players, that I have seen play, and heard others 3 *First folio, the which one. the censure of which one,] Ben Jonson seems to have imitated this passage in his Poetaster, 1601 : 66 66 I will try If tragedy have a more kind aspect : 66 If he judicious be, he shall be alone "A theatre unto me." MALONE. the censure of which one." The meaning is, the censure of one of which,' and probably that should be the reading also. The present reading, though intelligible, is very licentious, especially in prose. M. MASON. in your ALLOWANCE,] In your approbation. See King Lear, Act II. Sc IV. MALONE. 5 O, there be players, &c.] I would read thus: "There be players, that I have seen play, and heard others praise, and that highly (not to speak profanely) that neither have the accent nor the gait of Christian, Pagan, nor Mussulman, have so strutted and bellowed, that I thought some of nature's journeymen had made the men, and not made them well," &c. FARMER. 11 I have no doubt that our author wrote, "that I thought some of nature's journeymen had made them, and not made them well," &c. Them and men are frequently confounded in the old copies. See The Comedy of Errors, Act II. Sc. II. folio, 1623: because it is a blessing that he bestows on beasts, and what he hath scanted them [r. men] in hair, he hath given them in wit." In the present instance the compositor probably caught the word men from the last syllable of journeymen. Shakspeare could not mean to assert as a general truth, that nature's journeymen had made men, i. e. all mankind; for, if that were the case, these strutting players would have been on a footing with the rest of the species. Nature herself, the poet means to say, made all mankind except these strutting players, and they were made by Nature's journeymen. A passage in King Lear, in which we meet with the same sentiment, in my opinion fully supports the emendation now proposed: "Kent. Nature disclaims in THEE, a tailor made THEE. "Corn. Thou art a strange fellow: A tailor make a man! praise, and that highly, not to speak it profanely, that, neither having the accent of christians, nor the gait of christian, pagan, nor man *, have so strutted, and bellowed, that I have thought some of nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably. 1 PLAY. I hope, we have reformed that indifferently with us. HAM. O, reform it altogether. And let those, that play your clowns, speak no more than is set down for them': for there be of them, that will * First folio, or Norman. "Kent. Ay, a tailor, sir; a stone-cutter or a painter [Nature's journeymen] could not have made him so ill, though he had been but two hours at the trade." This notion of Nature keeping a shop, and employing journeymen to form mankind, was common in Shakspeare's time. See Lyly's Woman in the Moon, a comedy, 1597: "They draw the curtains from before Nature's shop, where stands an image clad, and some unclad." MALONE. 6 — not to speak it PROFANELY,] Profanely seems to relate, not to the praise which he has mentioned, but to the censure which he is about to utter. Any gross or indelicate language was called profane. JOHNSON. So, in Othello :-"he is a most profane and liberal counsellor." MALONE. 7-speak no more than is set down for them:] So, in The Antipodes, by Brome, 1638: 66 you, sir, are incorrigible, and "Take licence to yourself to add unto 66 હું That is a way, my lord, has been allow'd "On elder stages, to move mirth and laughter." Yes, in the days of Tarlton, and of Kempe, "Before the stage was purg'd from barbarism," &c. Stowe informs us, (p. 697, edit. 1615,) that among the twelve players who were sworn the queen's servants in 1583, were two rare men, viz. Thomas Wilson, for a quick delicate refined extemporall witte; and Richard Tarleton, for a wondrous plentifull, pleasant extemporall witt," &c. 66 66 Again, in Tarleton's Newes from Purgatory: I absented myself from all plaies, as wanting that merrye Roscius of plaiers themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too; though, in the mean time, some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that's villainous; and shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. Go, make you ready.[Exeunt Players. Enter HOLONIUS, Rosencrantz, and GUILDENSTERN. How now, my lord? will the king hear this piece of work? POL. And the queen too, and that presently. HAM. Bid the players make haste. Will you two help to hasten them? Ros. Ay, my lord *. [Exit POLONIUS. Exeunt ROSENCRANTZ and GUILDENSTErn. HAM. What, ho; Horatio! Enter HORATIO. HOR. Here, sweet lord, at your service. * First folio, Bотн. We will my lord. that famosed all comedies so with his pleasant and extemporall invention." This cause for complaint, however, against low comedians, is still more ancient; for in The Contention Betwyxte Churchyard and Camell, &c. 1560, I find the following passage: "But Vices in stage plaies, "When theyr matter is "They laugh out the reste "To the lookers on. "And so wantinge matter, gon, "You brynge in my coate," &c. STEEVENS. The clown very often addressed the audience, in the middle of the play, and entered into a contest of raillery and sarcasm with such of the audience as chose to engage with him. It is to this absurd practice that Shakspeare alludes. See the Historical Account of our Old English Theatres, vol. iii. MALONE. |