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I.i.39 (361,9) If I in any just term am affin'd] Affine is the reading of the third quarto and the first folio. The second quarto and all the modern editions have assign'd. The meaning is, Do I stand within any such terms of propinquit or relation to the Moor, as that it is my duty to love him?

I.i.49 (362,1) honest knaves] Knave is here for servant, but with a mixture of sly contempt.

I.i.63 (362,2) In compliment extern] In that which I do only for an outward shew of civility.

I.i.76 (363,3) As when, by night and negligence, the fire/Is spied in populous cities] [Warburton, objecting to "by": Is spred] The particle is used equivocally; the same liberty is taken by writers more correct.

The wonderful creature! a woman of reason!

Never grave out of pride, never gay out of season.

I.i.115 (364,4) What profane wretch art thou?] That is, what wretch of gross and licentious language? In that sense Shakespeare often uses the word profane.

I.i.124 (365,6) this odd even] The even of night is midnight, the time when night is divided into even parts.

I.i.149 (366,7) some check] Some rebuke.

I.i.150 (366,8) cast him] That is, dismiss him; reject him. We still say, a cast coat, and a cast serving-man.

I.i.162 (366,9) And what's to come of my despised time] [W: despited] Despised time, is time of no value; time in which

"There's nothing serious in mortality,

The wine of life is drawn, and the mere dregs

Are left, this vault to brag of." Macbeth.

I.i.173 (367,2) By which the property of youth and maidhood/May be abus'd?] By which the faculties of a young virgin may be infatuated, and made subject to illusions and to false imagination.

"Wicked dreams abuse

The curtain'd sleep." Macbeth.

I.ii.2 (368,3) stuff o' the conscience] This expression to common readers appears harsh. Stuff of the conscience is, substance, or essence of the conscience. Stuff is a word of great force in the Teutonic languages. The elements are called in Dutch, Hoefd stoffen, or head stuffs.

I.ii.13 (368,4) And hath, in his effect, a voice potential/As double as the duke's] [Warburton had given a source in Dioscorides and Theocritus for "double"] This note has been much censured by Mr. Upton, who denies, that the quotation is in Dioscorides, and disputes, not without reason, the interpretation of Theocritus.

All this learning, if it had even been what it endeavours to be thought, is, in this place, superfluous. There is no ground of supposing, that our author copied or knew the Greek phrase; nor does it follow, that, because a word has two senses in one language, the word which in another answers to one sense, should answer to both. Manus, in Latin, signifies both a hand and troop of soldiers, but we cannot say, that the captain marched at the head of his hand; or, that he laid his troop upon his sword. It is not always in books that the meaning is to be sought of this writer, who was much more acquainted with naked reason and with living manners.

Double has here its natural sense. The president of every deliberative assembly has a double voice. In our courts, the chief justice and one of the inferior judges prevail over the other two, because the chief justice has a double voice.

Brabantio had, in his effect, though not by law, yet by weight and influence, a voice not actual and formal, but potential and operative, as double, that is, a voice that when a question was suspended, would turn the balance as effectually as the duke's. Potential is used in the sense of science; a caustic is called potential fire.

I.ii.23 (370,7) speak, unbonnetted] [Pope: unbonnetting] I do not see the propriety of Mr. Pope's emendation, though adopted by Dr. Warburton. Unbonnetting may as well be, not putting on, as not putting off, the bonnet. Hamner reads e'en bonnetted.

I.ii.26 (370,8) unhoused] Free from domestic cares. A thought natural to an adventurer.

I.ii.28 (370,9) For the sea's worth] I would not marry her, though she were as rich as the Adriatic, which the Doge annually marries.

I.ii.30 (371,2) a land-carrack] A carrack is a ship of great bulk, and