And gladly shunn'd who gladly fled from me. Mon. Many a morning hath he there been seen, Should in the furthest east begin to draw Black and portentous must this humour prove, Ben. My noble uncle, do you know the cause? Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air, And gladly shunn'd &c.] The ten lines following, not in edition 1597, but in the next of 1599. Pope. 7 Ben. Have you impórtun'd &c.] These two speeches also omitted in edition 1597, but inserted in 1599. Pope 8 Or dedicate his beauty to the sun.] [Old copy-same.] When we come to consider, that there is some power else besides balmy air, that brings forth, and makes the tender buds spread themselves, I do not think it improbable that the poet wrote: Or dedicate his beauty to the sun. which Theobald. Or, according to the more obsolete spelling, sunne; brings it nearer to the traces of the corrupted text. I cannot but suspect that some lines are lost, which connected this simile, more closely with the foregoing speech: these lines, if such there were, lamented the danger that Romeo will die of his melancholy, before his virtues or abilities were known to the world Johnson. I suspect no loss of connecting lines. An expression somewhat similar occurs in Timon, Act IV, sc. ii: "A dedicated beggar to the air." I have, however, adopted Theobald's emendation. Mr. M. Mason observes "that there is not a single passage in our author Could we but learn from whence his sorrows grow, Enter ROMEO, at a distance. Ben. See, where he comes: So please you, step aside; I'll know his grievance, or be much denied. Mon. I would, thou wert so happy by thy stay, To hear true shrift.-Come, madam, let's away. Ben. Good morrow, cousin. Ben. But new struck nine. [Exeunt MoN. and Lady. Is the day so young? Ah me! sad hours seem long. 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. where so great an improvement of language is obtained, by so slight a deviation from the text." Steevens. Dr. Johnson's conjecture is, I think unfounded; the simile relates solely to Romeo's concealing the cause of his melancholy, and is again used by Shakspeare in Twelfth Night: 66 She never told her love, "But let concealment, like a worm i' th' bud, In the last Act of this play our poet has evidently imitated the Rosamond of Daniel; and in the present passage might have remembered the following lines in one of the Sonnets of the same writer, who was then extremely popular. The lines, whether remembered by our author or not, add such support to Mr. Theobald's emendation, that I should have given it a place in my text, but that the other mode of phraseology was not uncommon in Shakspeare's time: "And whilst thou spread'st unto the rising sunne, The line quoted by Mr. Steevens does not appear to me to be adverse to this emendation. The bud could not dedicate its beauty to the sun, without at the same time dedicating it to the air. A similar phraseology, however, to that of my text may be found in Daniel's 14th, 32d, 44th, and 53d Sonnets. Malone. VOL. XII. U Rom. Out of her favour, where I am in love. Ben. Alas, that love, so gentie in his view, Should be so tyrannous and rough in proof! Rom. Alas, that love, whose view is muffled still, Should, without eyes, see pathways to his will !9 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:Why then, O brawling love!1 O loving hate! 9 to his will!] Sir T. Hanmer, and after him Dr. Warburton, read-to his ill. The present reading has some obscurity; the meaning may be, that love finds out means to pursue his desire. That the blind should find paths to ill is no great wonder. Johnson. It is not unusual for those who are blinded by love to overlook every difficulty that opposes their pursuit. Nichols What Romeo seems to lament is, that love, though blind, should discover pathways to his will, and yet cannot avail bimself of them; should perceive the road which he is forbidden to take. The quarto, 1597, reads Should, without laws, give path-ways to our will! i. e. being lawless itself, prescribe laws to others. Steevens. This passage seems to have been misapprehended. Benvolio has lamented that the God of love, who appears so gentle, should be a tyrant. It is no less to be lamented, adds Romeo, that the blind god should yet be able to direct his arrows at those whom he wishes to hit, that he should wound whomever he wills, or desires to wound. Malone. 1 Why then, O brawling love! &c.] Of these lines neither the sense nor occasion is very evident. He is not yet in love with an enemy; and to love one and hate another is no such uncommon state, as can deserve all this toil of antithesis. Johnson. Had Dr. Johnson attended to the letter of invitation in the next scene, he would have found that Rosaline was niece to Capulet. Anonymus. Every sonnetteer characterises Love by contrarieties. Watson begins one of his canzonets: "Love is a sowre delight, a sugred griefe, Turberville makes Reason harangue against it in the same manner: "A fierie frost, a flame that frozen is with ise! "A heavie burden light to beare! A vertue fraught with vice!" &c. This kind of antithesis was very much the taste of the Provençal and Italian poets; perhaps it might be hinted by the ode of Sappho preserved by Longinus. Petrarch is full of it: O any thing, of nothing first create! O heavy lightness! serious vanity! Feather of lead, bright smoke, cold fire, sick health! This love feel I, that feel no love in this. Dost thou not laugh? Ben. No, coz, I rather weep. Rom. Good heart, at what? At thy good heart's oppression. Rom. Why, such is love's transgression."— With more of thine: this love, that thou hast shown, "Pace non trovo, e non ho da far guerra; "E temo, e spero, e ardo, e son un ghiaccio; "E nulla stringo, e tutto'l mondo abbraccio." &c. Sonnet 105. Sir Thomas Wyat gives a translation of this sonnet, without any notice of the original, under the title of Description of the contrarious Passions in a Louer amongst the Songes and Sonnettes, by the Earle of Surrey, and others, 1574. Farmer. 2 Why, such is love's transgression.] Such is the consequence of unskilful and mistaken kindness. Johnson. 3 Being purg'd, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes;] The author 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 urg'd, a fire sparkling. Being excited and inforced. To urge the fire is the technical term. Johnson. Dr. Akenside in his Hymn to Cheerfulness, has the same expression: "Haste, light the tapers, urge the fire, Reed. Again, in Chapman's version of the 21st Iliad: "And as a caldron, under put with store of fire- 4 Being vex'd, &c.] As this line stands single, it is likely that the foregoing or following line that rhymed to it is lost. Johnson. It does not seem necessary to suppose any line lost. In the former speech about love's contrarieties, there are several lines which have no other to rhyme with them; as also in the following, about Rosaline's chastity Steevens. What is it else? a madness most discreet, Ben. Soft, I will go along; An if you leave me so, you do me wrong. [Going Rom. Tut, I have lost myself; I am not here; But sadly tell me, who. Groan? why, noż Rom. Bid a sick man in sadness make his will:Ah, 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. love. Ben. A right fair mark, fair coz, is soonest hit. Rom. Well, in that hit, you miss: she 'll not be hit With Cupid's arrow, she hath Dian's wit; And, in strong proof of chastity well arm'd, From love's weak childish bow she lives unharm'd. That, when she dies, with beauty dies her store.8* 5 Tell me in sadness,] That is, tell me gravely, tell me in seriousness. Johnson. 6 And, in strong proof &c.] As this play was written in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, I cannot help regarding these speeches of Romeo as an oblique compliment to her majesty, who was not liable to be displeased at hearing her chastity praised after she was suspected to have lost it, or her beauty commended in the 67th year of her age, though she never possessed any when she was young. Her declaration that she would continue unmarried, increases the probability of the present supposition. Steevens. in strong proof-] In chastity of proof, as we say in armour of proof. Johnson. 7 She will not stay the siege of loving terms,] So, in our author's Venus and Adonis: "Remove your siege from my unyielding heart; "To love's alarm it will not ope the gate." Malone. •with beauty dies her store.] Mr. Theobald reads, " With |