O, if in black my lady's brows be deckt,

It mourns, that painting, and usurping hair,8 Should ravish doters with a false aspéct;

And therefore is she born to make black fair. Her favour turns the fashion of the days;

For native blood is counted painting now; And therefore red, that would avoid dispraise, Paints itself black, to imitate her brow.

Dum. To look like her, are chimney-sweepers black. Long. And, since her time, are colliers counted bright. King. And Ethiops of their sweet complexion crack. Dum. Dark needs no candles now, for dark is light. Biron. Your mistresses dare never come in rain,

For fear their colours should be wash'd away. King. 'Twere good, yours did; for, sir, to tell you plain,

I'll find a fairer face not wash'd to day.

Biron. I'll prove her fair, or talk till dooms-day here. King. No devil will fright thee then so much as she. Dum. I never knew man hold vile stuff so dear. Long. Look, here's thy love: my foot and her face see. [Showing his shoe.

7 And beauty's crest becomes the heavens well.] Crest is here properly opposed to badge. Black, says the king, is the badge of hell, but that which graces the heaven is the crest of beauty. Black darkens hell, and is therefore hateful: white adorns heaven, and is therefore lovely. Johnson.

And beauty's crest becomes the heavens well, i. e. the very top the height of beauty, or the utmost degree of fairness, becomes the heavens. So the word crest is explained by the poet himself in King John:

66 this is the very top

"The height, the crest, or crest unto the crest

"Of murder's arms.'

In heraldry, a crest is a device placed above a coat of arms. Shakspeare therefore assumes the liberty to use it in a sense equivalent to top or utmost height, as he has used spire in Coriolanus:

8

— to the spire and top of praises vouch'd." Tollet. and usurping hair,] And, which is wanting in the old copies, was supplied by the editor of the second folio. Usurping hair alludes to the fashion, which prevailed among ladies in our author's time, of wearing false hair, or periwigs, as they were then called, before that kind of covering for the head was worn by men. The sentiments here uttered by Biron, may be found, in nearly the same words, in our author's 127th Sonnet. Malone.

Biron. O, if the streets were paved with thine eyes,
Her feet were much too dainty for such tread!
Dum. O vile! then as she goes, what upward lies
The street should see as she walk'd over head.
King. But what of this? Are we not all in love?
Biron. O, nothing so sure; and thereby all forsworn.
King. Then leave this chat; and, good Birón, now prove
Our loving lawful, and our faith not torn.

Dum. Ay, marry, there;-some flattery for this evil.
Long. O, some authority how to proceed;

9

Some tricks, some quillets, how to cheat the devil.
Dum. Some salve for perjury.

Biron.
Have at you then, affection's men at arms:1
Consider, what you
first did swear unto;-

O, tis more than need!

To fast, to study, and to see no woman;-
Flat treason 'gainst the kingly state of youth.
Say, can you fast? your stomachs are too young;
And abstinence engenders maladies.

And where that you have vow'd to study, lords,
In that each of you hath forsworn2 his book:
Can you still dream, and pore, and thereon look?
For when would you, my lord, or you, or you,
Have found the ground of study's excellence,
Without the beauty of a woman's face?
From women's eyes this doctrine I derive:
They are the ground, the books, the academes,
From whence doth spring the true Promethean fire.
Why, universal plodding prisons up3

3

9 some quillets,] Quillet is the peculiar word applied to lawchicane. I imagine the original to be this. In the French pleadings, every several allegation in the plaintiff's charge, and every distinct plea in the defendant's answer, began with the words qu'il est:-1 -from whence was formed the word quillet, to signify a false charge or an evasive answer. Warburton.

1 - affection's men at arms:] A man at arms, is a soldier armed at all points, both offensively and defensively. It is no more than, Ye soldiers of affection. Johnson.

2

hath forsworn-] Old copies-have.

Pope. Malone.

3

Corrected by Mr.

prisons up-] The quarto, 1598, and the folio, 1623, read-poisons up. The emendation was made by Mr. Theobald. A passage in King John may add some support to it:

The nimble spirits in the arteries; 4
As motion, and long during-action, tires
The sinewy vigour of the traveller.
Now, for not looking on a woman's face,
You have in that forsworn the use of eyes;
And study too, the causer of your vow:
For where is any author in the world,

Teaches such"beauty" as a woman's eye?s learning

Learning is but an adjunct to ourself,

And where we are, our learning likewise is.
Then, when ourselves we see in ladies' eyes,
Do we not likewise see our learning there?
O, we have made a vow to study, lords;
And in that vow we have forsworn our books;6
For when would you, my liege, or you, or you,
In leaden contemplation, have found out
Such fiery numbers," as the prompting eyes
Of beauteous tutors have enrich'd you with?
Other slow arts entirely keep the brain;9

"Or, if that surly spirit, melancholy,

"Had back'd thy blood, and made it heavy, thick,
"Which else runs tickling up and down the veins," &c.
Malone.

4 The nimble spirits in the arteries;] In the old system of physic they gave the same office to the arteries as is now given to the nerves; as appears from the name, which is derived from apa Tapety. Warburton.

21

5 Teaches such beauty as a woman's eye?] i. e. a lady's eyes give a fuller notion of beauty than any author. Johnson.

6 our books;] i. e. our true books, from which we derive most information;-the eyes of women. Malone.

7 In leaden contemplation, have found out

Such fiery numbers,] Numbers are, in this passage, nothing more than poetical measures. Could you, says Biron, by solitary contemplation, have attained such poetical fire, such spritely numbers, as have been prompted by the eyes of beauty? Johnson. In leaden contemplation,] So, in Milton's Il Penseroso: "With a sad, leaden, downward cast."

Again, in Gray's Hymn to Adversity:

"With leaden eye that loves the ground."

8 Of beauteous tutors-] Old copies-beauty's.

Sir T. Hanmer. Malone.

Steevens.

Corrected by

9 Other slow arts entirely keep the brain;] As we say, keep the house, or keep their bed. M. Mason.

And therefore finding barren practisers,
Scarce show a harvest of their heavy toil;
But love, first learned in a lady's eyes,
Lives not alone immured in the brain;
But with the motion of all elements,
Courses as swift as thought in every power;
And gives to every power a double power,
Above their functions and their offices.
It adds a precious seeing to the eye;
A lover's eyes will gaze an eagle blind;
A lover's ear will hear the lowest sound,
When the suspicious head of theft is stopp'd;1
Love's feeling is more soft, and sensible,
Than are the tender horns of cockled2 snails;
Love's tongue proves dainty Bacchus gross in taste;
For valour, is not love a Hercules,

Still climbing trees in the Hesperides? 3
Subtle as sphinx; as sweet, and musical,

As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair;4

11

the suspicious head of theft is stopp'd;] i. e. a lover in pursuit of his mistress has his sense of hearing quicker than a thief (who suspects every sound he hears) in pursuit of his prey. Warburton.

"The suspicious head of theft (says a writer in the Edinburgh Magazine, Nov. 1786) is the suspicious head of the thief. There is no man who listens so eagerly as a thief, or whose ears are so acutely upon the stretch." Steevens.

2 ·cockled—] i. e. inshelled, like the fish called a cockle. Steevens.

3 Still climbing trees in the Hesperides?] Our author had heard or read of "the gardens of the Hesperides," and seems to have thought that the latter word was the name of the garden in which the golden apples were kept; as we say, the gardens of the Tuilleries, &c.

So, in Friar Bacon and Friar Bungay, by Robert Greene, 1598: "Shew thee the tree, leav'd with refined gold,

"Whereon the fearful dragon held his seat, "That watch'd the garden, call'd HESPERIDES." The word may have been used in the same sense in The Legend of Orpheus and Eurydice, a poem, 1597:

"And, like the dragon of the Hesperides,
"Shutteth the garden's gate-."

Malone.

As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair;] This expression, like that other in The Two Gentlemen of Verona, of

"Orpheus' harp was strung with poets' sinews,"

is extremely beautiful, and highly figurative. Apollo, as the

And, when love speaks, the voice of all the gods
Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.5

sun, is represented with golden hair; so that a lute strung with his hair means no more than strung with gilded wire. Warburton. 66 as sweet and musical

"As bright, Apollo's lute strung with his hair."

The author of the Revisal supposes this expression to be allegorical, p. 138: "Apollo's lute strung with sunbeams, which in poetry are called hair." But what idea is conveyed by Apollo's lute strung with sunbeams? Undoubtedly the words are to be taken in their literal sense; and in the style of Italian imagery, the thought is highly elegant. The very same sort of conception occurs in Lyly's Mydas, a play which most probably preceded Shakspeare's. Act IV, sc. i, Pan tells Apollo: "Had thy lute been of lawrell, and the strings of Daphne's haire, thy tunes might have been compared to my notes," &c. T. Warton.

Lyly's Mydas, quoted by Mr. Warton, was published in 1592. The same thought occurs in How to chuse a Good Wife from a Bad, 1602:

"Hath he not torn those gold wires from thy head, "Wherewith Apollo would have strung his harp, "And kept them to play musick to the gods?" Again, in Storer's Life and Death of Cardinal Wolsey, a poem,

1599:

"With whose heart-strings Amphion's lute is strung,
"And Orpheus' harp hangs warbling at his tongue."

Steevens.

And, when love speaks, the voice of all the gods Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.] This nonsense we should read and point thus:

And when love speaks the voice of all the gods,

Mark, heaven drowsy with the harmony.

i. e. in the voice of love alone is included the voice of all the gods. Alluding to that ancient theogony, that love was the parent and support of all the gods. Hence, as Suidas tells us, Palaphatus wrote a poem called "AQgodirns "Egal pain λoy. The Voice and Speech of Venus and Love, which appears to have been a kind of cosmogony, the harmony of which is so great, that it calms and allays all kinds of disorders: alluding again to the ancient use of music, which was to compose monarchs, when, by reason of the cares of empire, they used to pass whole nights in restless inquietude. Warburton.

The ancient reading is

"Make heaven.

"Johnson.

I cannot find any reason for Dr. Warburton's emendation, nor do I believe the poet to have been at all acquainted with that ancient theogony mentioned by his critick. The former reading, with the slight addition of a single letter, was, perhaps, the true

one.

When love speaks, (says Biron) the assembled gods reduce the