i fome Greek expreffions." Indeed!" We have one in Coriolanus: It is held That valour is the chiefeft virtue, and Moft dignifies the baver." and another in Macbeth, where Banquo addresses the weird fifters: My noble partner You greet with prefent grace, and great prediction • Of noble having.' Gr. Ἔχεια.—and πρὸς τὸν Ἔχοντα, to the haver." This was the common language of Shakspeare's time. Lye in a water-bearer's house!" fays Mafter Mathew of Bobadil, "a gentleman of his bavings!" Thus likewife John Davies in his Pleafant Defcant upon English Proverbs, printed with his Scourge of Folly, about 1612: "Do well and have well!-neyther fo ftill: "For fome are good doers, whofe havings are ill." and Daniel the hiftorian ufes it frequently. Having seems to be fynonymous with behaviour in Gawin Douglas and the elder Scotch writers. Haver, in the fenfe of poffeffor, is every where met with: though unfortunately the πρὸς τὸν Ἔχοντα of Sophocles produced as an authority for it, is 7 It is very remarkable, that the bishop is called by his countryman, Sir David Lindsey, in his Complaint of our Souerane Lardis Papingo, "In our Inglifche rethorick the rofe." And Dunbar hath a fimilar expreffion in his beautiful poem of The fufpected by Kufter, as good a critick in these matters, to have abfolutely a different meaning. But what fhall we fay to the learning of the Clown in Hamlet, "Ay, tell me that, and unyoke?" alluding to the Brλuros of the Greeks: and Homer and his fcholiaft are quoted accordingly! If it be not fufficient to fay, with Dr. Warburton, that the phrase might have been taken from husbandry, without much depth of reading; we may produce it from a Dittie of the workmen of Dover, preferved in the additions to Holinfbed, P. 1546: "My bow is broke, I would anyoke, 66 My foot is fore, I can worke no more." An expreffion of my Dame Quickly is next faftened upon, which the modern text; fhe calls fome of the pretended you may look for in vain in fairies in The Merry Wives of Windfor: Orphan heirs of fixed Destiny." "And how elegant is this," quoth Mr. Upton, fuppofing the word to be used, as a Grecian would 8 Ariftophanis Comœdiæ undecim. Gr. & Lat. Amft. 1710. Fol. p. 596. 9 Dr. Warburton corrects orphan to ouphen; and not without plaufibility, as the word ouphes occurs both before and afterward. But I fancy, in acquiefcence to the vulgar doctrine, the addrefs in this line is to a part of the troop, as mortals by birth, but adopted by the fairies: orphans with refpect to their real parents, and now only dependant on Deftiny herself. A few lines from Spenfer will fufficiently illuftrate the paffage: "The man whom heauens have ordayn'd to bee "The fpoufe of Britomart, is Arthegall: "He wonneth in the land of fayeree, Yet is no fary borne, ne fib at all "To elfes, but fprong of feed terrestriall, away, Whyles yet in infant cradle he did crall," &c. Edit. 1590, Book III. c. iii. ft. 26. have used it?" og¤¤vòs ab ógQvòs—acting in darkness and obfcurity." Mr. Heath affures us, that the bare mention of fuch an interpretation, is a fufficient refutation of it: and his critical word will be rather taken in Greek than in English: in the fame hands therefore I will venture to leave all our author's knowledge of the old comedy, and his etymological learning in the word, Desdemona." Surely poor Mr. Upton was very little acquainted with fairies, notwithstanding his laborious study of Spenfer. The laft authentick account of them is from our countryman William Lilly; and it by no means agrees with the learned interpretation: for the angelical creatures appeared in his Hurft wood in a moft illuftrious glory,-" and indeed, (says the fage,) it is not given to many perfons to endure their glorious afpecls." The only use of transcribing these things, is to fhew what abfurdities men for ever run into, when they lay down an hypothefis, and afterward feek for arguments in the fupport of it. What else could induce this man, by no means a bad scholar, to doubt whether Truepenny might not be derived from Τρύπανον; and quote upon us with much pa rade an old fcholiaft on Ariftophanes?-I will not ftop to confute him: nor take any notice of two or three more expreffions, in which he was pleased to fuppofe fome learned meaning or other; all which he might have found in every writer of the time, or still more eafily in the vulgar tranflation of the Bible, by confulting the Concordance of Alexander Cruden. Revifal, p. 75, 323, and 561. 3 Hiftory of his Life and Times, p. 102, preferved by his dupe, Mr. Afhmole. But whence have we the plot of Timon, except from the Greek of Lucian?-The editors and criticks have been never at a greater lofs than in their enquiries of this fort; and the fource of a tale hath been often in vain fought abroad, which might easily have been found at home: my good friend, the very ingenious editor of the Reliques of Ancient English Poetry, hath fhewn our author to have been fometimes contented with a legendary ballad. The story of the mijanthrope is told in almost every collection of the time; and particularly in two books, with which Shakspeare was intimately acquainted; the Palace of Pleafure, and the English Plutarch. Indeed from a paffage in an old play, called Jack Drum's Entertainment, I conjecture that he had before made his appearance on the ftage. Were this a proper place for fuch a difquifition, I could give you many cafes of this kind. We are fent for inftance to Cinthio for the plot of Meafure for Meafure, and Shakspeare's judgement hath been attacked for fome deviations from him in the conduct of it: when probably all he knew of the matter was from madam Ifabella in the Heptameron of Whetstone. Arifto. is continually quoted for the fable of Much ado about nothing; but I fufpect our poet to have been satisfied with the Geneura of Turberville. As you like it was certainly borrowed, if we believe Dr. Grey, and Mr. Upton, from the 4 Lond. 4to. 158z. She reports in the fourth dayes exercise, the rare Hiftorie of Promos and Caffandra. A marginal note informs us, that Whetitone was the author of the Commedie on that fubject; which likewife might have fallen into the hands of Shakspeare. "The tale is a pretie comicall matter, and hath bin written in English verfe fome few years paft, learnedly and with good grace, by M. George Turberuil." Harrington's Arifto, fol. 1591, P.39. Coke's Tale of Gamelyn; which by the way was not printed till a century afterward: when in truth the old bard, who was no hunter of MSS. contented himself folely with Lodge's Rofalynd, or Euphues' Golden Legacye, quarto, 1590. The story of All's well that ends well, or, as I fuppofe it to have been fometimes called, Love's Labour Wonne, is originally indeed the property of Boccace," but it came immediately to Shakspeare from Painter's Giletta of Narbon. Mr. Langbaine could not conceive, whence the story of Pericles could be taken, "not meeting in hiftory with any fuch Prince of Tyre;" yet his legend may be found at large in old Gower, under the name of Appolynus." Pericles is one of the plays omitted in the latter editions, as well as the early folios, and not improperly; though it was published many years before the death of Shakspeare, with his name in the title-page. Aulus Gellius informs us, that fome plays are afcribed abfolutely to Plautus, which he 6 See Meres's Wits Treafury, 1598, p. 282. 7 Our ancient poets are under greater obligations to Boccace, than is generally imagined. Who would fufpect, that Chaucer hath borrowed from an Italian the facetious tale of the Miller of Trumpington? Mr. Dryden obferves on the epick performance, Palamon and Arcite, a poem little inferior in his opinion to the Iliad or the Eneid, that the name of its author is wholly loft, and Chaucer is now become the original. But he is mistaken: this too was the work of Boccace, and printed at Ferrara in folio, con il commento di Andrea Baff, 1475. I have feen a copy of it, and a translation into modern Greek, in the noble library of the very learned and communicative Dr. Afkew. It is likewife to be met with in old French, under the title of La Thefeide de jean Boccace, contenant les belles & chaites amours de deux jeunes Chevaliers Thebains Arcite Palemon. In the first Vol. of the Palace of Pleasure, 4to. 1566. • Confeffio Amantis, printed by T. Berthelet, fol. 1532, p. 175, &c. |