men, so I scorne to be subject to the greatest prelate in the world. Tell thy master so from me; and say John of England said it, that never an Italian priest of them all shall either have tythe, toll, or polling penny out of England; but as I am king, so will I reign next under God, supreme head both over spiritual and temporal; and he that contradicts me in this, I'll make him hop headless." STEEVENS. The old copy reads: Can taste, &c. Earthy occurs in another of our author's plays: "To do his earthy and abhorr'd commands.' To taste is used ludicrously in Twelfth Night: “That puts quarrels purposely on others to taste their valour.". -To" taste the breath," is, however, a very harsh phrase, and can hardly be right. Breath for speech is common in our author. So, in a subsequent scene in this play : "The latest breath that gave the sound of words." Again: "Or let the church, our mother, breathe her curse." In another play we meet-" breathing courtesy," for -"verbal courtesy." In this passage there should, I think, be a comma after interrogatories.-What earthly name, subjoined to interrogatories, can force a king to speak and answer them? MALONE. The The emendation may be justified by the following passage in King Henry IV. P. I. "How show'd his tasking? seem'd it in contempt ?" Again, in King Henry V. "That task our thoughts concerning us and 180. France." STEEVENS. That takes away by any secret course, &c.] This may allude to the bull published against queen Elizabeth. Or we may suppose, since we have no proof that this play appeared in its present state before the reign of king James, that it was exhibited soon after the Popish plot. I have seen a Spanish book in which Garnet, Faux, and their accomplices, are registered as saints. JOHNSON. 209. Is, purchase of a heavy curse from Rome,] It is a political maxim, that kingdoms are never married. Lewis, upon the wedding, is for making war upon his new relations. JOHNSON. 213. -the devil tempts thee here In likeness of a new untrimmed bride.] Trim is dress. An untrimmed bride is a bride undrest. Could the tempter of mankind assume a semblance in which he was more likely to be successful? The devil (says Constance) raises to your imagination your bride disencumbered of the forbidding forms of dress, and the memory of my wrongs is lost in the anticipation of future enjoyment. Ben Jonson, in his New Inn, says, "Bur. "Bur. Here's a lady gay. "Tip. A well-trimm'd lady!” Again, in the Two Gentlemen of Verona: "And I was trimm'd in madam Julia's gown.” Again, in King Henry VI. P. III. act ii. "Trimm'd like a younker prancing to his love." Again, in Reginald Scott's Discovery of Witchcraft, 1584. "a good huswife, and also well trimmed up in apparel." Mr. Collins inclines to a colder interpretation, and is willing to suppose, that by an untrimmed bride is meant a bride unadorned with the usual pomp and formality of a nuptial habit. The propriety of this epithet he infers from the haste in which the match was made, and further justifies it from King John's preceding words: "Go we, as well as haste will suffer us, "To this unlook'd for, unprepared pomp.” Mr. Tollet is of the same opinion, and offers two instances, in which untrimmed indicates a deshabille or a frugal vesture. In Minshew's Dictionary it signifies one not finely drest or attired. Again, in Vives's Instruction of a Christian Woman, 1592, p. 98 and 99: "Let her [the mistress of the house] bee content with a maide not faire and wanton, that can sing a ballad with a clere voice, but sad, pale, and untrimmed." STEEVENS. 246. so strong in both,] I believe the meaning is, love so strong in both parties. JOHNSON. Rather, Rather, in hatred and in love; in deeds of blood or amity. 247. HENLEY. this kind regreet?] A regret is an exSTEEVENS. change of salutation. 265. A cased lion-] A cased lion is a lion irritated by confinement. So, in King Henry VI. P. III. act i. sc. 3. "So looks the pent-up lion o'er the wretch "That trembles under his devouring paws," &c. The author might, however, have written, a chased lion. STEEVENS. Cased, I believe, is the true reading. So, in Rowley's When you see Me you know Me, 1632: "The lyon in his cage is not so sterne "As royal Henry in his wrathful spleene.” MALONE. 277. Is not amiss, when it is truly done?] So the old copies. Pandulf having conjured the king to perform his first vow to heaven-to be champion of the churchtells him that what he has since sworn, is sworn against himself, and therefore may not be performed by him: for that, says he, which you have sworn to do amiss is not amiss (i. c. becomes right when it is done truly—that is, as he explains it, not done at all); and being not done where it would be a sin to do it, the truth is most done when you do it not. So, in Love's Labour Lost: "It is religion to be thus forsworn." REMARKS. 285. But thou hast sworn against religion, &c.] The propositions, propositions, that the voice of the church is the voice of heaven, and that the pope utters the voice of the church, neither of which Pandulph's auditors would deny, being once granted, the argument here used is irresistible; nor is it easy, notwithstanding the gingle, to enforce it with greater brevity or propriety. In swearing by religion against religion, to which thou hast already sworn, thou makest an oath the security for thy faith against an oath already taken. I will give, says he, a rule for conscience in these cases. Thou may'st be in doubt about the matter of an oath; when thou swearest thou may'st not be always sure to swear rightly, but let this be thy settled principle, swear only not to be forsworn ; let not the latter oaths be at variance with the former. Truth through this whole speech, means rectitude of conduct. JOHNSON. 326. I muse,] i. e. I wonder. 356. -To arms, let's hie.] I would point thus:To arms let's hie.-The proposition is, I believe, single. Let us begone to arms! MALONE. 358. Some airy devil] Shakspere here probably alludes to the distinctions and divisions of some of the demonologists, so much read and regarded in his time. They distributed the devils into different tribes and classes, each of which had its peculiar qualities, attributes, &c. These are described at length in Burton's Anatomie of Melancholy, Part I. sect. 2. p. 45, 1632: "Of these sublunary devils-Psellus makes six kinds; fiery, aeriall, terrestriall, watery, and subter ranean |