This night you shall behold him at our feast: And see how one another lends content; This precious book of love, this unbound lover, The fish lives in the sea; and 'tis much pride That book, in many's eyes, doth share the glory, By having him, making yourself no less. Nurse. No less?-nay, bigger; women grow by men. After this, the lady ventures to repeat her question in a more peremptory form Speak briefly, can you like of Paris' love? But still her daughter, notwithstanding the absolute subjection in which she has been trained, feels that within her breast which tells her she cannot promise, even to her commanding mother, to love a man whom she has never seen: I'll look to like, if looking liking move. But no more deep will I endart mine eye Than your consent gives strength to make it fly. However, the terms in which Capulet himself invites Paris to his entertainment, the words of Lady Capulet above-quoted, and those with which she closes this scene, in obeying the summons to the supper and the company that are waiting, "Juliet, the County stays,"-leave no doubt that the gentleman alluded to in Romeo's first line at the masking scene which follows What lady's that, which doth enrich the hand Of yonder knight?— is Paris himself, introduced to Juliet as her first suitor, with all those advantages of favourable prepossession which her approving parents have so studiously bestowed upon him. To Romeo we must now return, since the first distinct indications that we find in the poet's text, as to the character and the transcendence of Juliet's beauty, are given us in those admiring exclamations of Romeo at the masquerade, which describe the impression he receives on first beholding her. The scene between him and his cheerful friends Benvolio and Mercutio which immediately precedes that of the revelling at Capulet's house, carries on the same desponding strain in himself regarding his hopeless passion, which we have traced already through the earlier scenes:— Rom. Give me a torch-I am not for this ambling; Mer. Nay, gentle Romeo, we must have you dance. So stakes me to the ground, I cannot move, &c. In order to judge aright of his deportment in the following scene, and avoid imputing to him a levity from which the poet has made his character as remote as that of Juliet herself, it should be carefully borne in mind that Romeo is hardly less "a stranger in the world" of mixed society than Juliet is. He is yet but in the opening flower of manhood. In the early part of the piece we find all who know him calling him, by distinction, "the young Romeo ;" and the same fact respecting him is conveyed in his father's beautiful comparison of his drooping son to the bud bit with an envious worm, Ere he can spread his sweet leaves to the air, Or dedicate his beauty to the sun. As for his first passion, it is clearly the impulse of a sensitive, ardent, and imaginative youth, coming fresh into the world, with infinite capabilities of affection, admiration, and enjoyment, towards the first handsome woman whom he has had an opportunity of contemplating at leisure. His friend Benvolio has shown us this where he says― You saw her fair, none else being by, &c. How little "young Romeo" can hitherto have been in company, appears very plainly also from the fact that this "old-accustomed feast" of Capulet's gives him the first opportunity of comparing "the fair Rosaline" with "all the admired beauties of Verona." Hitherto he had seen only Herself pois'd with herself, in either eye. And to the masquerade itself he goes with the sole and express purpose of admiring this cold and silent idol of his hopeless adoration. But that remedy, of comparison, which Benvolio had so earnestly prescribed to him, takes rapid effect; and we see at once that his immediate aspiration towards Juliet is in the opposite case to that which his kinsman has stated to us regarding his passion for Rosaline. He admires Juliet, not for want, but as the result, of comparison with "all the admired beauties of Verona :" So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows, So much for the comparative impression which he receives from her external charms: the positive one he gives us thus: Oh, she doth teach the torches to burn bright! Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! After the truly and highly poetical temperament which we have already seen developed in Romeo, we may trust his judgment as to the exaltedly ideal character of Juliet's beauty; respecting which it seems important here to remark, that although delicate grace is the most essential quality of it thus indicated, yet a softly bright complexion is no less clearly pointed out -exceedingly different from that peculiarly Italian aspect and temperament which so much acting and so much criticism have concurred in attributing to this heroine. The ordinary mistake in this matter at the outset, whether made by reader and critic on the one hand, or by performer and auditor on the other, entails throughout the piece a degrading misinterpretation of the dramatist's most essential meaning. The intensity of passion in his heroine, even as in his hero, results not from any peculiar vehemence of the blood, but from keenly exquisite sensibility stimulating a powerful imagination. With all that healthy vigour of character which her peculiar trials so rapidly unfold, yet every personal indication respecting Juliet that Shakespeare himself has left us, implies, both in her spirit and her aspect, all that nobly tender grace and that brightly delicate softness which alone could draw from an observer like Romeo the exclamation last cited Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear! and could make him so instantly come to the decision— The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand, Before we consider the brief ensuing dialogue between them, so decisive as to the leading feature of their fate, let us turn once more to examine the previous associations of Juliet, and the consequent state of feeling in which this unexpected interview comes upon her. We have seen how little her finer qualities could possibly be appreciated by either of the only two female connexions with whom she had been trained, her haughty mother and her vulgar-minded nurse. How utterly insensible her father must have been to the peculiar delicacy of nature and dignity of spirit in his daughter, we shall have to shew abundantly in a later scene. Her only other male acquaintance has plainly been her cousin Tybalt; who, since she has no brother of her own, has supplied the place of one in her childish and youthful associations, being the sole object upon which her vast capability of sisterly affection has had any opportunity of ex pending itself. But how far from being sympathetic with her own character, if it be not absolutely antipathetic, is that of her "dear-loved cousin," we also find by his deportment in this very scene, and those which immediately follow. Nothing, surely, can be much more remote in nature than "the furious Tybalt” from the "tender Juliet." The uneasy consciousness of imperfect sympathy which must hence have grown within her youthful breast, and which her now rapidly unfolding womanhood must have been rendering daily more oppressive, was another reason which could little disincline her to obey her lady mother's injunction— Read o'er the volume of young Paris' face, &c. She might well hope and long to find, in the aspect and deportment of this much-commended suitor, some promise of that for which her young heart was pining more and more, a truly sympathising friend. But the livelier her hope on this occasion, the keener its disappointment. The handsome, all-accomplished young noble interests her not. His character, we shall see, comes out so fully in his subsequent conduct and language, as to leave no mystery in his failing to touch the heart of Juliet. No wonder that this selfish and self-complacent, though most unexceptionable young gentleman, should at once have been felt by her to be perfectly indifferent, if not positively repulsive, to her own sympathetic, generous, and imaginative nature. Poor Juliet-she is still as far to seek as ever for a friend!-and now, more than ever, must she feel the "aching void" within her bosom. At this critical moment-her heart yearning for sympathy as even it had never yearned before-she is accosted by the dejected-looking stranger youth "that would not dance;" and the pretty, self-satisfied nothings addressed to her by her noble suitor, are followed, with harmonising and reverential tenderness of look, and tone, and touch, by those words of warmly delicate devotion |