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with a kind of religious addresse; it hath bin the height of our care, who are the Presenters, to make the present worthy of yovr H. H. by the perfection. But, there we must also craue our abilities to be considered, my Lords. We cannot go beyond our owne powers. Country hands reach foorth milke, creame, fruites, or what they haue: and many Nations, (we haue heard,) that had not gummes and incense, obtained their requests with a leauened Cake. It was no fault to approch their Gods, by what meanes they could: And the most, though meanest, of things are made more precious, when they are dedicated to Temples. In that name therefore, we most humbly consecrate to your H. H. these remaines of your seruant SHAKESPEARE; that what delight is in them, may be euer your L. L. the reputation his, & the faults ours, if any be committed, by a payre so carefull to shew their gratitude both to the liuing, and the dead, as is

Your Lordshippes most bounden,

IOHN HEMINGE.
HENRY CONDELL.

TO THE GREAT VARIETY OF READERS,'

From the most able, to him that can but spell: There you are number'd. We had rather you were weighd. Especially, when the fate of all Bookes depends vpon your capacities: and not of your heads alone, but of your purses. Well! It is now publique, and you wil stand for your priviledges wee know: to read, and censure. Do so, but buy it first. That doth best commend a Booke, the Stationer saies. Then, how odde soeuer your braines be, or your wisedomes, make your licence the same, and spare not. Iudge your sixepen'orth, your shillings worth, your fiue shillings worth at a time, or higher, so as you rise to the iust rates, and welcome. But, whatever you do, Buy. Censure will not driue a Trade, or make the Iacke go. And though you be a Magistrate of wit, and sit on the Stage at Black-Friers, or the Cock-pit, to arraigne Playes dailie, know, these Playes haue had their triall alreadie, and stood out all Appeales; and do now come forth quitted rather by a Decree of Court, then any purchas'd Letters of commendation.

It had bene a thing, we confesse, worthie to haue bene wished, that the Author himselfe had liu'd to haue

1 We give the Address to the "variety of Readers," and the Dedication, which follows it, precisely as they stand in the origi nal, to the observation of the most minute point. The Dedication was omitted in the folio of 1664, but inserted again in the folio of 1685. This address also precedes the folio of 1623. Malone and others have conjectured that it was written by Ben Jonson, and it is certainly much in his style. 92

set forth, and ouerseen his owne writings; But since it hath bin ordain'd otherwise, and he by death departed from that right, we pray you doe not envie his Friends, the office of their care, and paine, to have collected and publish'd them; and so to haue publish'd them, as where (before) you were abus'd with divers stolne, and surreptitious copies, maimed, and deformed by the frauds and stealthes of iniurious impostors, that expos'd them: even those, are now offer'd to your view cur'd. and perfect of their limbes; and all the rest, absolute in their numbers, as he conceiued the: Who, as he was a happie imitator of Nature, was a most gentle expresser of it. His mind and hand went together: And what he thought, he vttered with that easinesse, that wee haue scarse receiued from him a blot in his papers. But it is not our prouince, who onely gather his works, and give them you, to praise him. It is yours that reade him. And there we hope, to your diuers capacities, you will finde enough, both to draw, and hold you: for his wit can no more lie hid, then it could be lost. Reade him, therefore; and againe, and againe: And if then you doe not like him, surely you are in some manifest danger, not to vnderstand him. And so we leaue you to other of his Friends, whom if you need, can bee your guides: if you neede them not, you can leade your selues, and others. wish him.

And such Readers we

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COMMENDATORY VERSES,

PREFIXED TO THE FOLIO OF 1623.

To the Memory of the deceased Author, Master William Shakespeare.

Shake-speare, at length thy pious fellows give
The world thy works; thy works, by which outlive
Thy tomb thy name must: when that stone is rent,
And time dissolves thy Stratford monument,
Here we alive shall view thee still: this book,
When brass and marble fade, shall make thee look
Fresh to all ages; when posterity

Shall loath what's new, think all is prodigy
That is not Shake-speare's, every line, each verse,
Here shall revive, redeem thee from thy herse.
Nor fire, nor cankering age, as Naso said
Of his, thy wit-fraught book shall once invade:
Nor shall I e'er believe or think thee dead,
(Though miss'd) until our bankrout stage be sped
(Impossible) with some new strain t' out-do
Passions of Juliet, and her Romeo;

Or till I hear a scene more nobly take,

Than when thy half-sword parleying Romans spake:'
Till these, till any of thy volume's rest,

Shall with more fire, more feeling, be express'd,
Be sure, our Shake-speare, thou canst never die,
But, crown'd with laurel, live eternally.

L. DIGGES.

1 Leonard Digges prefixed a long copy of verses to the edition of Shakespeare's Poems in 1640, octavo, in which he makes this passage, referring to JULIUS CAESAR, more distinct; he also there speaks of the audiences Shakespeare's plays at that time drew, in comparison with Ben Jonson's. This is the only part of his production worth adding in a note.

"So have I seen, when Cæsar would appear,
And on the stage at half-sword parley were
Brutus and Cassius, O, how the audience

Were ravish'd! with what wonder they went thence!
When, some new day, they would not brook a line
Of tedious, though well-labour'd Catiline;

Sejanus too, was irksome: they priz'd more

· Honest' lago, or the jealous Moor.

And though the Fox and subtil Alchymist,

Long intermitted, could not quite be mist,

Though these have sham'd all th' ancients, and might raise
Their author's merit with a crown of bays,
Yet these sometimes, even at a friend's desire,
Acted, have scarce defray'd the sea-coal fire,
And door-keepers: when, let but Falstaff come,
Hal, Poins, the rest,-you scarce shall have a room,
All is so pester'd let but Beatrice

And Benedick be seen, lo! in a trice

The cock-pit, galleries, boxes, all are full,

To hear Malvolio, that cross-garter'd gull.

Brief, there is nothing in his wit-fraught book,

Whose sound we would not hear, on whose worth look." etc.

To the Memory of M. W. Shake-speare. We wonder'd, Shake-speare, that thou went'st so soon From the world's to the grave's tiring-room: We thought thee dead; but this thy printed worth Tells thy spectators, that thou went'st but forth To enter with applause. An actor's art Can die, and live to act a second part: That's but an exit of mortality, This a re-entrance to a plaudite.

I. M.'

To the Memory of my beloved, the Author, Mr. William
Shakespeare, and what he hath left us.

To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name.
Am I thus ample to thy book, and fame;
While I confess thy writings to be such,
As neither man, nor muse, can praise too much;
"Tis true, and all men's suffrage; but these ways
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise:
For seeliest ignorance on these may light,
Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right;
Or blind affection, which doth ne'er advance
The truth, but gropes, and urgeth all by chance;
Or crafty malice might pretend this praise,
And think to ruin, where it seem'd to raise :
These are, as some infamous bawd, or whore,
Should praise a matron; what could hurt her more?
But thou art proof against them; and, indeed,
Above th' ill fortune of them, or the need.
I. therefore, will begin:-Soul of the age,
The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage,
My Shakespeare, rise! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spenser; or bid Beaumont lie
A little further, to make thee a room:2
Thou art a monument without a tomb;
And art alive still, while thy book doth live,
And we have wits to read, and praise to give
That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses;
I mean, with great but disproportion'd muses:
For, if I thought my judgment were of years,
I should commit thee surely with thy peers;
And tell how far thou didst our Lyly outshine,
Or sporting Kyd, or Marlowe's mighty line:

1 Perhaps the initials of John Marston.

2 Referring to lines by William Basse, then circulating in MS., and not printed (as far as is now known) until 1633, when they were falsely imputed to Dr. Donne in the edition of his poems in that year. All the MSS. of the lines, now extant, differ in minute particulars.

And though thou hadst small Latin, and less Greek,
From thence to honour thee, I would not seek
For names; but call forth thundering Eschylus,
Euripides, and Sophocles, to us,

Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead,

To life again, to hear thy buskin tread

And shake a stage: or, when thy socks were on,
Leave thee alone, for the comparison

Of all that insolent Greece, or haughty Rome,
Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come.
Triumph, my Britain! thou hast one to show,
To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
He was not of an age, but for all time;
And all the muses still were in their prime,
When like Apollo he came forth to warm
Our ears, or like a Mercury to charm.
Nature herself was proud of his designs,
And joy'd to wear the dressing of his lines;
Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit,
As since she will vouchsafe no other wit.
The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes,
Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please;
But antiquated and deserted lie,
As they were not of Nature's family.
Yet must I not give Nature all; thy art,
My gentle Shakespeare, must enjoy a part:
For though the poet's matter nature be,
His art doth give the fashion; and that he,
Who casts to write a living line, must sweat,
(Such as thine are,) and strike the second heat
Upon the muses' anvil; turn the same,
(And himself with it,) that he thinks to frame;
Or for the laurel he may gain a scorn,
For a good poet's made, as well as born:

And such wert thou. Look, how the father's face
Lives in his issue; even so the race

Of Shakespeare's mind, and manners, brightly shines In his well-torned and true-filed lines;

In each of which he seems to shake a lance,

As brandish'd at the eyes of ignorance.
Sweet Swan of Avon, what a sight it were,

To see thee in our waters yet appear;

And make those flights upon the banks of Thames,
That so did take Eliza, and our James!
But stay; I see thee in the hemisphere
Advanc'd, and made a constellation there :

Shine forth, thou star of poets; and with rage,

Or influence, chide, or cheer, the drooping stage:

Which, since thy flight from hence, hath mourn'd like

night,

And despair's day, but for thy volume's light!

BEN IONSON.

Upon the Lines, and Life, of the famous Scenic Poet, Master William Shakespeare.

Those hands which you so clapp'd, go now and wring,

You Britons brave; for done are Shakespeare's days: His days are done that made the dainty plays,

Which made the Globe of heaven and earth to ring. Dried is that vein, dried is the Thespian spring, Turn'd all to tears, and Phoebus clouds his rays; That corpse, that coffin, now bestick those bays, Which crown'd him poet first, then poet's king. If tragedies might any prologue have,

All those he made would scarce make one to this; Where fame, now that he gone is to the grave,

(Death's public tiring-house,) the Nuntius is: For, though his line of life went soon about, The life yet of his lines shall never out.

HUGH HOLLAND.

COMMENDATORY VERSES,

PREFIXED TO THE FOLIO OF 1632.1

Upon the Effigies of my worthy Friend, the Author,
Master William Shakespeare, and his Works.
Spectator, this life's shadow is :-to see

This truer image, and a livelier he,
Turn reader. But observe his comick vein,
Laugh; and proceed next to a tragick strain,
Then weep: so,-when thou find'st two contraries,
Two different passions from thy rapt soul rise,-
Say, (who alone effect such wonders could,)
Rare Shake-speare to the life thou dost behold.

An Epitaph on the admirable Dramatic Poet, W. Shakespeare.

What needs my Shakespeare for his honour'd bones, The labour of an age in piled stones;

1 In addition to those in the folio of 1623, also reprinted in 1632. The folios of 1664 and 1685 contain no others.

2 These lines, like the preceding, have no name appended to them in the folio, 1632, but the authorship is ascertained by the publication of them as Milton's, in the edition of his Poems in 1645, octavo. We give them as they stand there, because it is evident that

Or that his hallow'd reliques should be hid
Under a star-ypointing pyramid?

Dear son of memory, great heir of fame,

What need'st thou such weak witness of thy name?
Thou, in our wonder and astonishment,
Hast built thyself a live-long monument:

For whilst, to the shame of slow-endeavouring art,
Thy easy numbers flow; and that each heart
Hath, from the leaves of thy unvalued book,
Those Delphic lines with deep impression took;
Then thou, our fancy of itself bereaving,
Doth make us marble with too much conceiving;
And, so sepulcher'd, in such pomp dost lie,
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.

they were then printed from a copy corrected by the author: the variations are interesting, and Malone pointed out only one, and that certainly the least important. Instead of "weak witness" in line 6, the folio, 1632 has "dull witness:" instead of "live-long monument," in line 8, the folio has "lasting monument:" instead of "heart," in line 10, the folio has "part," an evident misprint: and instead of "itself bereaving," in line 13, the folio has "herself bereaving."

On worthy Master Shakespeare, and his Poems.1
A mind reflecting ages past, whose clear
And equal surface can make things appear,
Distant a thousand years, and represent
Them in their lively colours, just extent:
To outrun hasty time, retrieve the fates,

Roll back the heavens, blow ope the iron gates

Of death and Lethe, where confused lie
Great heaps of ruinous mortality:

In that deep dusky dungeon to discern

A royal ghost from churls; by art to learn
The physiognomy of shades, and give
Them sudden birth, wondering how oft they live;
What story coldly tells, what poets feign
At second hand, and picture without brain,
Senseless and soul-less shows: to give a stage
(Ample, and true with life) voice, action, age,
As Plato's year, and new scene of the world,
Them unto us, or us to them had hurl'd:
To raise our ancient sovereigns from their herse,
Make kings his subjects; by exchanging verse
Enlive their pale trunks, that the present age
Joys in their joy, and trembles at their rage:
Yet so to temper passion, that our ears
Take pleasure in their pain, and eyes in tears
Both weep and smile; fearful at plots so sad,
Then laughing at our fear; abus'd, and glad
To be abus'd; affected with that truth
Which we perceive is false, pleas'd in that ruth
At which we start, and, by elaborate play,
Tortur'd and tickl'd; by a crab-like way
Time past made pastime, and in ugly sort
Disgorging up his ravin for our sport:-
-While the plebeian imp, from lofty throne,
Creates and rules a world, and works upon
Mankind by secret engines: now to move
A chilling pity, then a rigorous love;

1 These lines are subscribed I. M. S. in the folio 1632, "probably Jasper Mayne," says Malone. Most probably not, because Mayne has left nothing behind him to lead us to suppose that he could have produced this surpassing tribute. I. M. S. may possibly be Iohn Milton, Student, and no name may have been appended to the other copy of verses by him prefixed to the folio of 1632, in order that his initials should stand at the end of the present. We know of no other poet of the time capable of writing the ensuing lines. We feel morally certain that they are by Milton.

To strike up and stroke down, both joy and ire;
To steer th' affections; and by heavenly fire
Mold us anew, stoln from ourselves:-

This, and much more, which cannot be express'd
But by himself, his tongue, and his own breast,
Was Shakespeare's freehold; which his cunning brain
Improv'd by favour of the nine-fold train;

The buskin'd muse, the comick queen, the grand
And louder tone of Clio, nimble hand
And nimbler foot of the melodious pair,
The silver-voiced lady, the most fair
Calliope, whose speaking silence daunts,

And she whose praise the heavenly body chants;
These jointly woo'd him, envying one another,
(Obey'd by all as spouse, but lov'd as brother)
And wrought a curious robe, of sable grave,
Fresh green, and pleasant yellow, red most brave,
And constant blue, rich purple, guiltless white,
The lowly russet, and the scarlet bright:
Branch'd and embroider'd like the painted spring;
Each leaf match'd with a flower, and each string
Of golden wire, each line of silk: there run
Italian works, whose thread the sisters spun;
And there did sing, or seem to sing, the choice
Birds of a foreign note and various voice:
Here hangs a mossy rock; there plays a fair
But chiding fountain, purled: not the air,
Nor clouds, nor thunder, but were living drawn;
Not out of common tiffany or lawn,

But fine materials, which the muses know,
And only know the countries where they grow.

Now, when they could no longer him enjoy,
In mortal garments pent,-death may destroy,
They say his body; but his verse shall live,
And more than nature takes our hands shall give:
In a less volume, but more strongly bound,
Shakespeare shall breathe and speak; with laure!

crown'd,

Which never fades; fed with ambrosian meat,

In a well-lin'd vesture, rich, and neat.

So with this robe they clothe him, bid him wear it; For time shall never stain, nor envy tear it.

The friendly admirer of his endowments,

I. M. S.

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SHAKESPEARE'S NAME AND AUTOGRAPHS.

THE right orthography of the great Poet's name has been, for the last sixty years, as disputed and doubtful a question as any other of the many points which have perplexed and divided his editors and critics. Shake-speare, Shakespeare, Shakspeare, Schackspeere, Shaxspeare, Shakspear, Shakespear, Shakspere, Shaxpere, are among the variations, of more or less authority; besides one or two others, like Shaxbred, which are evidently blunders of a careless or ignorant scribe. More recent and minutely accurate researches seem to me to have proved, from the evidence of deeds, parish-registers, town-records, etc., (see the various extracts in Collier's "Life,") that the family name was Shakspere, with some varieties of spelling, such as might occur among illiterate persons in an uneducated age. The evidence that the Poet himself considered this as his family name, (which before seemed most probable,) has been, within a few years, confirmed by the discovery of his undoubted autograph, in a copy of the first edition of Florio's translation of Montaigne, in folio—a book, of his familiarity || with which there are many traces in his later works, and which he has used in the way of direct imitation, and almost of transcription, in the TEMPEST-act ii. scene 1. (See the notes in this edition.) I, therefore, fully agree with Sir Frederick Madden, in his tract on this point, and with Mr. Knight, in his Biography and Pictorial edition of Shakespeare, that the Poet's legal and habitual signature was William Shakspere. Yet I, nevertheless, concur with Dr. Nares, (Glossary,) Mr. Collier, Mr. Dyce, and others, in retaining the old orthography of "SHAKESPEARE," by which the Poet was alone known as an author, in his own day and long after. The following reasons seem to me conclusive: Whether from the inconvenience of the Stratford mode of spelling the name not corresponding, in London, with its fixed pronunciation, or for some other reason, the Poet, at an early period of his literary and dramatic career, adopted, for all public purposes, the orthography of Shakespeare. His name appears thus spelled in the first edition of his VENUS AND ADONIS, (1593,) where the dedication of the first heir of his invention" to the Earl of Southampton, is subscribed at full length, William Shakespeare." This very popular poem passed through at least six editions, during the author's lifetime, between 1593 and 1606, and several more within a few years after his death, in all of which the same spelling is preserved. This was followed, in 1594, by his poem of LUCRECE, where the same orthography is preserved, in the signature to the dedication to the same noble friend and patron. All the preceding editions, of which there were at least four during the

66

author's life, retain the same orthography. Again, in his Sonnets, first printed in 1609, we have nearly the same orthography, it differing only in printing the name Shake-speare.

All the editions of Shakespeare's several poems differ from those of his plays published during his life in that typographical accuracy which denotes an author's own care, while the contemporary old quarto editions of his plays, published separately, commonly swarm with gross errors either of the printer or the copyist. Again, all those editions of his genuine plays, thus published during his life, as well as others falsely ascribed to him, concur in the same mode of spelling the name-it being given invariably either Shake-speare, or Shakespeare. His name appears thus in at least sixty title-pages, of single plays, published by different printers, during his own life. Finally, in the folio collection of 1623, made by his friends Heminge and Condell, we find the same orthography, not only in the title and dedication, and list of performers, but in the verses prefixed by the Poet's personal friends, Ben Jonson, Holland, Digges― the only variance being that the editors and Ben Jonson write "Shakespeare," and Digges has the name "Shake-speare." All the succeeding folios retain the same mode, and two at least of those were published while many of the Poet's contemporaries still lived. Moreover, all the Poet's literary contemporaries, who have left his name in print, give it in the same way, as Ben Jonson, several times; Drayton, Meares, (in his often quoted list of Shakespeare's works written before 1598;) Allot, (in his collection called the "English Parnassus ;")-with several others.

So again, in the next generation, we find the same mode universally retained,—as, for example, by Milton, by Davenant, who was certainly the Poet's godson, and who seems to have been willing to pass for his illegitimate son; and by the pains-taking Fuller. The last writer, in his notice of Shakespeare, in his "Worthies of England," refers to "the warlike sound of his surname, (whence some may conjecture him of a mili tary extraction,) Hasti-vibrans, or Shake-speare."

The heraldic grant of armorial bearing confirmed to the Poet, in his ancestors' right, bearing the crest of a Falcon, supporting (or brandishing) a spear, etc., seems to be founded on the very same signification and pronunciation of the name. Thus Shakespeare remained the only name of their great dramatist known to the English public, from 1593, for almost two centuries after, until, in the last half of the last century, the authority of Malone and his fellow-commentators substituted, in popular use, Shakspeare-a version of the

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