H

Then weigh, what loss your Honour may fustain, uh
If with too credent ear you lift his songs tot
Or lose your heart, or your chaste treasure open
To his unmaster'd importunity
Fear it, Ophelia, fear it, my dear sister;
And + keep within the rear of your affection,
Out of the shot and danger of desire.
The chariest maid is prodigal enough,
If she unmask her beauty to the moon :
Virtue itself 'scapes not calumnious strokes ;
The canker galls the Infants of the Spring,
Too oft before their buttons be disclos'd;
And in the morn and liquid dew of youth
Contagious blaftments are most imminent.
Be wary then, best safety lies in fear ;
Youth to itself rebels, though none else near.

Oph. I shall th’ effects of this good leffon keep
As watchman to my heart. But, good my brother,
Do not, as some ungracious pastors do,
Shew me the steep and thorny way to heav'n ;
5 Whilst, like a puft and careless libertine,

Himself

-keep within the rear, &c.] Whilft he, a puft and reckless That is, do not advance so far libertine, as your affection would lead The first impression of these plays you.

being taken from the play-house 5 Whilf; LIKE a puft and care- cop es, and those, for the better

less libertine.] This reading direction of the actors, being gives us a fense to this effe&t, Do written as they were pronounced, not you be like an ungracious these circumftances have occali preacher, who is like a careless oned innumerable errors, libertine. And there we find, for he that he who is so like a careless -'a was a goodly King, libertine, is the careless libertine 'A was a man take him for all himself. This could not come

in all. from Shakespear. The old quarto I warn't it will, reads,

for 1 warrant. This should be Whiles a puft and reckless lic well attended to in correcting bertine,

Shakespear.

WARBURTON. which directs us to the right read- The emendation is not amils, ing,

every where,

Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, slyng it Andrecks not his own read.

rice Laer. Oh, fear me not.

1.

11

Enter Poloniųs.
I stay too long ;ti-but here my father comes :
A double blessing is a double grace;
Occasion smiles upon a second leave.

Pol. Yet here, Laertes ! aboard, aboard for shame;
The wind sits in the shoulder of your sail,
And you are staid for. There; -
My Blessing with you ;

[Laying his hand on Laertes's head. And these few precepts in thy memory See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue, Nor any unproportion'd thought his act . Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar; The friends thou hast, and their adoption try'd, Grapple them to thy soul with hooks of steel, 7 But do not dull thy palm with entertainment Of each new-hatch'd, unfledg'd comrade. Beware Of Entrance to a quarrel, but being in,

Bear't that th’ opposer may beware of thee...pasts
Give ev'ry man thine ear ; but few thy voice.
Take each man's censure; but referve thy judgment.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expreft in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man,
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are most select and generous, chief in That.
Neither a borrower, nor a lender be;
For Loan oft lofes both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of Husbandry.
This above all; to thine own self be true;

And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man,

8

& And it must follow, as the abfurdity. This being premised,

NIGHT the Day.] The sepse let us see what the text says, here requires, that the fimilitude And it must follow as the night should give an image not of two

the Day, effe:7s of different natures, that In this we are so far from being follow one another alternately, presented with an effe et following but of a carfe and effet, where a cause by a physical neceflity, the efft Et follows the cause by a that there is no cause at all: but physical necesity. For the affer- only two different effeets, pro. tion is. Be true to thyself, and ceeding from twodifferent causes, then thou must necesarily be true and succeeding one another alto others. Truth to himself ternately. Shakespear, therefore, then was the cause, truth to without question wrote, others, the effect. To illustrate And it must follow as the this necefsity, the speaker em- LIGHT the Day. ploys a fimilitude: But no fimi. As much as to say, Truth to thy litude can illustrate it but what self, and truth to others, are iria presents an image of a cause and separable, the latter depending effekt ; and such a cause as that, “necessarily on the former, as light where the effect follows by a phy- depends upon the day! where it is fical, not a moral deceflity; for to be observed, that day is used it only, by a moral necessity the figuratively for the Sun. The thing illufiraling would not be ignorance of which, I suppose, more certain than the thing il contributed to mislead che edififtrated; which would be a great tors.

WARBURTON,

Farewel

Farewel ; ' my Bleffing season this in thee!

Laer. Most humbly do I take my leave, my lord. Pol. The time invites you; go, your fervants

tend.
Laer. Farewel, Ophelia, and remember well
What I have said.

Oph. Tis in my mem'ry lock't,
And you * yourself fhall keep the key of it.
Laer. Farewel.

[Exit Laer. Pol. What is't, Opbelio, he hath faid to you? Opb. So please you, fomething touching the lord

Hamlet. Pol. Marry, well bethought ! 'Tis told me, he hath very oft of late Given private time to you; and you yourself Have of your audience been most free and bounteous, If it be fo, as so 'tis put on me, And that in way of caution, I muft tell you, , You do not understand yourself so clearly, As it behoves my daughter, and your honour. What is between you ? Give me up the truth. Oph. He hath, my Lord, of late, made many

tenders Of his Affection to me.

Pol. Affection ! puh! you speak like a green girl,

19.my Bleffing season this in which possesses the elder quarto's: thee!] Season, for infuse.

The time invefts you ; WARBURTON. i.e. besieges, presses upon you It is more than to infuse, it is on every side. To invest a town, to infix it in such a manner as is the military phrase from which that it never may wear out,

our author borrowed his metaThe time invites you ;) This phor.

THEOBALD. reading is as old as the first folio ; -yourself ftall keep the key however I fufpect it to have been of it.) That is, By thinksubstituted by the players, who ing on you, I hall think on your did not understand the term leffons,

2

Unfifted

pay;?.?

$ Unfifted in such perilous circumstance. y 1
Do you believe his tenders, as you call them ?
Oph. I do not know, my Lord, what I should
think.

!! av 1 Polo Marry, I'll teach you. Think yourfelf'a baby,

23.76 sylve 18 That you have ta’en his tenders for true pay, Which are not sterling. * Tender yourself more dearly,

ont reste

pt Or (not to crack the wind of the poor phrase,

diging Wronging it thus) you'll tender'me a fool.

Oph. My Lord, he hath importun'd me with love,
In honourable fashion.

Pol. Ay, s fashion you may callt: Go to, go to.
Oph. And hath giv'n count'nance to his speech, my

Lord,
With almost all the holy vows of heav'n.

Pol. Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do

know,

mer.

3 Ungfred in fucb perilous cir- I believe the word wronging

cumstance. ] Unfifted, for un- has reference, not to the phrase, tried. Untried fignifies either but to Ophelia; if you go on not templed, or not refined; un- wronging it thus, that is, if you fified, signifies the latter only, continue to go on thus wrong, This though the sense requires the far- is a mode of speaking perhaps

WARBURTON. not very grammatical, but very 4 --Tender yourself more dearly; common, nor have the best wriOr (not to crack the wind of ters refused it. the poor phrase)

To finner it or faint ito 28 Wronging it thus, you'll tender is in Pope. And Rowe me a fool.) The parentbeffs

Thus to coy its is clos’d at the wrong place; and To one who knows you toa. ** we must make likewise a slight The folio has it, correction in the last verse. Po

-roaming it thus, lonius is racking and playing on That is, leiting yourself loofe to the word tender, 'till he thinks Juch improper liberty. But wrongproper to correct himself for the ing seems to be more propera w licence ; and then he would say 's falhion you may call it :) —not farther to crack the wind She uses fashion for manner, and of the phrase, by twisting and he for a transient practice. contorting it, as I have done. WARBURTON.

When