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——whose daughter His tears proclaim'd her parting with her.

The prince first tells that the lady came from Lybia. the king interrupting him, says, from Smalus; from him, says the prince, whose tears, at parting, shewed her to be his daughter.

V.i.214 (376, 4) [Your choice is not so rich in worth as beauty] [W. in birth] Worth is as proper as birth. Worth signifies any kind of worthiness, and among others that of high descent. The King means that he is sorry the prince's choice is not in other respects as worthy of him as in beauty.

V.ii.105 (380, 5) [that rare Italian meter, Jolio Romano] [Theobald praised the passage but called it an anachronism] Poor Theobald's eucomium of this passage is not very happily conceired or expressed, nor is the passage of any eminent excellence; yet a little candour will clear Shakespeare from part of the impropriety imputed to him. By eternity he means only i_mmortality_, or that part of eternity which is to come; so we talk of eternal renown and eternal infamy. Immortality may subsist without divinity, and therefore the meaning only is, that if Julio could always continue his labours, he would mimick nature.

V.ii.107 (381, 6) [would beguile nature of her custom] That is, of her trade,—would draw her customers from her.

V.ii.118 (381, 7) [Who would be thence, that has the benefit of access?] It was, I suppose, only to spare his own labour that the poet put this whole scene into narrative, for though part of the transaction was already known to the audience, and therefore could not properly be shewn again, yet the two kings might have met upon the stage, and after the examination of the old shepherd, the young lady might have been recognised in sight of the spectators.

V.ii.173 (383, 8) [franklins say it] Franklin is a freeholder, or yeoman, a man above a Villain, but not a gentleman.

V.ii.179 (383 ,9) [tall fellow] Tall, in that time, was the word used for stout.

V.iii.17 (384,1) [therefore I keep it Lonely, apart] [Hammer: lovely] I am yet inclined to lonely, which in the old angular writing cannot be distinguished from lovely. To say, that I keep it alone, separate from the rest, is a pleonasm which scarcely any nicety declines.

V.iii.46 (385,2) [Oh, patience] That is, Stay a while, be not go eager.

V.iii.56 (386,3)

[Indeed, my lord,

If I had thought, the sight of my poor image

Would thus have wrought you, (for the stone is mine)

I'd not have shew'd it]

[Tyrwhitt: for the stone i' th' mine] To change an accurate expression for an expression confessedly not accurate, has somewhat of retrogradation. (1773)

V.iii.131 (389,6) [You precious winners all] You who by this discovery have gained what you desired may join in festivity, in which I, who have lost what never can be recovered, can have no part.

(300) General Observation, Of this play no edition is known published before the folio of 1623.

This play, as Dr. Warburton justly observes, is, with all its absurdities, very entertaining. The character of Antolycus is very naturally conceived, and strongly represented, (see 1765, II, 349)

NOTES TO TRAGEDIES by Samuel Johnson

CONTENTS

Introduction on Tragedies

TRAGEDIES

MACBETH

CORIOLANUS

JULIUS CAESAR

ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA

TIMON OF ATHENS

TITUS ANDRONICUS

TROILUS AND CRESSIDA

CYMBELINE

KING LEAR

ROMEO AND JULIET

HAMLET

OTHELLO

Introduction on Tragedies

Dr. Johnson's reaction to Shakespeare's tragedies is a curious one, compounded as it is of deep emotional involvement in a few scenes in some plays and a strange dispassionateness toward most of the others. I suspect that his emotional involvement took root when he read Shakespeare as a boy—one remembers the terror he experienced in reading of the Ghost in Hamlet, and it was probably also as a boy that he suffered that shock of horrified outrage and grief at the death of Cordelia that prevented him from rereading the scene until be came to edit the play. Johnson's deepest feelings and convictions, Professor Clifford has recently reminded us, can