ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL. Note (1.) Act I. Scene 1, Line 61, "Countess. -No more of this, Helena,―go to, no more; lest it be rather thought you affect a sorrow than to have it. Hel. I do affect a sorrow, indeed; but I have it too. Lafeu. Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead; excessive grief the enemy to the living. Count. If the living be not enemy to the grief, the excess makes it soon mortal. Bertram. Madam, I desire your holy wishes. Lafeu. How understand we that? The folio has "then to haue--" (a dash of considerable length) "as if the MS. had been here slightly imperfect or illegible; for the author certainly did not intend a broken sentence."-" Compare in Helena's reply but I have it too."" Dyce, Note. Dyce and the Camb. eds. print "have it." The other compared eds. print "have." The folio has "If the living be enemie," "not" having evidently dropped out; for the Countess' speech, while carrying the view of Lafeu to the extreme, plays on the arrangement of his concluding words. Compare M. A. v. 1, 2,— "If you go on thus, you will kill yourself; And 'tis not wisdom thus to second grief All the compared eds. retain the old text. "How understand we that?" The cor is the humorous allusion of Lafeu to the possibility of the Countess' wishes being anything else but holy. Compare Scott, The Antiquary, chap. xiii.,— "On my word, it reminds me of our minister, who, choosing, like a formal old fop as he is, to drink to my sister's inclinations, thought it necessary to add the saving clause, Provided, madam, they be virtuous." Compare Act iv. 5, 95, "Countess. I shall beseech your lordship to remain with me till they meet together. Lafeu. Madam, I was thinking with what manners I might safely be admitted. Countess. You need but plead your honourable privilege." "honourable privilege" — privilege of age. So Act ii. 3, 220, "Had'st thou not the privilege of antiquity upon thee." Dyce, Singer and Staunton, following Tieck, give the speech," If the living," &c. to Helen, and consider that Lafeu's inquiry refers to it. Helen is absorbed in her own grief at Bertram's departure, and says nothing during the interview but the words, as above, -which plainly refer to her thoughts, whilst apparently replying to the Countess. Note (2.) Ib. Line 115,— "Yet these fix'd evils sit so fit in him, That they take place, when virtue's steely bones "Take place" have admittance; so Falstaff is "of great admittance" (M. W. W. ii. 2, 235). steely bones." "Virtue's We have, 3 Hy. VI. ii. 3, 16,— "Broach'd with the steely point of Clifford's lance." Edward III. iii. 5, 68, "Of war's devouring gulfs and steely rocks." In both of these passages, steely = (1) hard, (2) re morseless; here the meaning is unbending: virtue that will not bend the knee to the god of Parolles. Compare Ham. iii. 3, 70, "Bow, stubborn knees; and, heart with strings of steel, Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe!" "Without" outside, that waits admittance. So Hy. VIII. v. 3, 5, "Nor. Keeper. Without, my noble lords? Gar. Keep. Who waits there? Yes. My lord archbishop; And has done half an hour, to know your pleasures." Compare Spenser, Colin Clout's Come Home Again,— "Ne is there place for any gentle wit, But should'red is, or out of door quite shut." “And purchase highest rooms in bower and hall : Do wander up and down despised of all; Their plain attire such glorious gallantry Disdains so much, that none them in doth call.” The folio has, "Lookes bleake i'th cold wind: withall, full ofte we see," evidently in error, for "with all" has no connection with "full ofte;" the construction here is as in Lear, iv. 1, 21, "I stumbled when I saw : full oft 'tis seen, Our means secure us," &c. "Without" seems undoubtedly the true reading; compare, further, C. of E. iii. 1, 71, 78,— "Ant. E. There is something in the wind, that we cannot get in. Dro. E. You would say so, master, if your garments were thin. Your cake is warm within [there]; you stand here in the cold.”— Dro. S. " out upon thee, hind! Dro. E. Here is too much 'out upon thee!' I pray thee, let me in." "Wisdom" and "folly" have the sense of virtue and vice, in "Cold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly." "Cold wisdom." Cold refers not to the cold wind, the effects of which are given in "Look bleak," but to "virtue's steely bones," virtue which wants,— "those soft parts of conversation That chamberers have." (Oth. iii. 3, 264); that is, like Octavia, "of a holy, cold, and still conversation" (A. and C. ii. 6, 131). The meaning of the line is," Cold wisdom" sober virtue stands without, while "superfluous folly" = vicious excess has place within. "Waiting on" implies, in itself, a without and a within. All the compared eds. change "Lookes" to Look-another example of the final “s” added in the folio-otherwise they retain the old text, the Camb. eds. marking it as corrupt. Note (3.) Ib. Line 179, "Parolles. Will you any thing with it? Helen. Not my virginity yet. You're to the court: I know not what he shall :-God send him well!- "You're to the court" has dropped out of the text of the folio. "The court's a learning place" indicates the omission. Act ii. 2, 4, we have, " my business is but to the court," "for the court" occurs a few lines after with a different meaning. The lines which follow "A mother," &c., "A phoenix, captain, and an enemy, A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign," &c. have been condemned by Warburton, Johnson, and others, as supposititious. 1146, But compare V. and A. “It [love] shall be sparing, and, too, full of riot;— It shall be raging-mad, and silly-mild;" &c. And the whole passage from line 1135 to line 1158. Compare also R. and J. i. 1, 182,— "Why, then, O brawling love! O loving hate !-- O heavy lightness! serious vanity!" &c. Helen is relieving her heart by speaking, but so that the hearer does not understand; as in her speech, line 62, "I do affect a sorrow," &c. She fears Bertram will find another to christen with the love-names she wishes her own. Note (4.) Ib. Line 227,— "When thou hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hast none, remember thy friends." i.e. pray for your friends when you have time; when you have none, don't forget them. 3, 14, "Grandam, I will pray, If ever I remember to be holy, For Compare John iii. your fair safety; so, I kiss your hand." |