With that malignant caufe wherein the honour
Of my dear father's gift stands chief in power,"
I come to tender it, and my appliance,

With all bound humbleness.

King.
We thank you, maiden;
But may not be fo credulous of cure,-
When our most learned doctors leave us and
The congregated college have concluded
That labouring art can never ranfom nature
From her inaidable eftate,-I fay we must not
Softain our judgement, or corrupt our hope,
To proftitute our paft-cure malady
To empiricks; or to diffever fo

Our great felf and our credit, to esteem

A fenfelefs help, when help paft fense we deem.
Hel. My duty then fhall pay me for my pains:
I will no more enforce mine office on you;
Humbly entreating from your royal thoughts
A modest one, to bear me back again.

King. I cannot give thee lefs to be call'd grateful:
Thou thought'ft to help me; and fuch thanks I give,
As one near death to thofe that with him live.:
But, what at full I know, thou know'ft no part;
I knowing all my peril, thou no art.

Hel. What I can do, can do no hurt to try,
Since you fet up your reft 'gainft remedy:
He that of greateft works is finisher,
Oft does them by the weakest minister:

So holy writ in babes hath judgement shown,

When judges have been babes. Great floods have flown
From fimple fources; and great feas have dried,
When miracles have by the greatest been denied.❜
Oft expectation fails, and moft oft there

9 Perhaps we may better read:

wherein the power

Whe re

Of my dear father's gift ftands chief in honour. JoHNSON. 2 The allufion is to St. Matthew's Gofpel, xi. 25. "O father, lord of heaven and earth, I thank thee, because thou haft hid thefe things from the wife and prudent, and revealed them unto babes." See alfo i Cor. i. 27.

MALONE.

3 I do not fee the import or connection of this line. As the next line

ftands

Where most it promifes; and oft it hits,

Where hope is coldeft, and despair most fits.

King. I muft not hear thee; fare thee well, kind maid;
Thy pains, not us'd, muft by thy felf be paid:
Proffers, not took, reap thanks for their reward.
Hel. Infpired merit fo by breath is barr'd:
It is not fo with him that all things knows,
As 'tis with us that square our guefs by shows:
But moft it is prefumption in us, when
The help of heaven we count the act of men.
Dear fir, to my endeavours give consent ;
Of heaven, not me, make an experiment.
I am not an impoftor, that proclaim
Myfelf against the level of mine aim ;4

But know I think, and think I know most sure,
My art is not paft power, nor you paft cure.

King. Art thou fo confident? Within what space

Hop'st thou my cure?

Hel

ftands without a correfpondent rhyme, I fufpect that fomething has been Joft. JOHNSON.

I point the paffage thus: and then I fee no reafon to complain of want of connection:

When judges have been babes. Great floods, &c.

When miracles have by the greatest been denied.

Shakspeare, after alluding to the production of water from a rock, and the drying up of the Red Sea, fays, that miracles had been denied by the GREATEST; or in other words, that the ELDERS of ISRAEL (who juft before, in reference to another text, were ftyled judges) had notwithstanding these miracles, wrought for their own prefervation, refufed that compliance they ought to have yielded. See the Book of Exodus, and particularly Ch. xvii. 5, 6, &c. HENLEY.

So boly writ, &c. alludes to Daniel's judging, when a young youth," the two elders in the ftory of Sufannah. Great floods, i. e. when Mofes fmote the rock in Horeb, Exod. xvii.

great feas bave dry'd

When miracles have by the greatest been deny'd.

Dr. Johnfon did not fee the import or connection of this line. It certainly refers to the children of Ifrael pafting the Red Sea, when miracles had been. denied, or not bearkened to, by Pharaoh. HOLT WHITE.

4 i. e. pretend to greater things than befits the mediocrity of my condition. WARBURTON.

I rather think that the means to fay,—I am not an impoftor that proclaim. one thing and defign another, that proclaim a cure and aim at a fraud; I think what I fpeak. JOHNSON.

Hel.

The greatest grace lending grace,s

Ere twice the horfes of the fun fhall bring
Their fiery torcher his diurnal ring;
Ere twice in murk and occidental damp
Moift Hefperus hath quench'd his fleepy lamp;
Or four and twenty times the pilot's glafs
Hath told the thievish minutes how they pafs;
What is infirm from your found parts fhall fly,.
Health fhall live free, and fickness freely die.
King. Upon thy certainty and confidence,
What dar'ft thou venture?

Hel.

Tax of impudence,

A ftrumpet's boldness, a divulged fhame,—
Traduc'd by odious ballads; my maiden's name
Sear'd otherwife; no worfe of worst extended,
With vileft torture let my life be ended.6

King. Methinks, in thee fome blessed spirit doth speak;
His powerful found, within an organ weak :7
And what impoffibility would flay

8

In common fenfe, fenfe faves another way.
Thy life is dear; for all, that life can rate
Worth name of life, in thee hath estimate ;9
Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, virtue, all

That

5 I fhould have thought the repetition of grace to have been fuperfluous, if the grace of grace had not occurred in the fpeech with which the tragedy of Macbeth concludes. STEEVENS.

The former grace in this paffage, and the latter in Macbeth, evidently fignify divine grace. HENLEY,

6 Tax of impudence, that is, to be charged with having the boldness of a ftrumpet:-a divulged fhame; i. e. to be traduced by odious ballads :— my maiden name's feared otherwife; i. e. to be ftigmatized as a prostitute :no worse of worst extended; i. e. to be fo defamed that nothing feverer can be faid against those who are moft publickly reported to be infamous. HENLEY.

7 The verb, dotb fpeak, in the first line, should be understood to be repeated in the conftruction of the fecond, thus:

His powerful found speaks within a weak organ. HEATH. This, in my opinion, is a very just and happy explanation.

STEEVENS.

8 i. e. and that which, if I trusted to my reason, I should think impoffible, I yet, perceiving thee to be actuated by fome bleffed fpirit, think thee capable of effecting. MALONE.

? May be counted among the gifts enjoyed by thee. JOHNSON.

2

That happiness and prime * can happy call :
Thou this to hazard, needs muft intimate
Skill infinite, or monftrous defperate.
Sweet practifer, thy phyfick I will try;
That minifters thine own death, if I die.
Hel. If I break time, or flinch in property?
Of what I fpoke, unpitied let me die;

And well deferv'd: Not helping, death's my fee;
But, if I help, what do you promise me?

King. Make thy demand.

Hel.

But will you make it even? King. Ay, by my fceptre, and my hopes of heaven.4 Hel. Then fhalt thou give me with thy kingly hand, What husband in thy power I will command:

Exempted be from me the arrogance

To choose from forth the royal blood of France;
My low and humble name to propagate
With any branch or image of thy ftate:5

2 Youth; the spring or morning of life. JOHNSON.

But

Should we not read-pride? Dr. Johnson explains prime to mean youth; and indeed I do not fee any other plaufible interpretation that can be given of it. But how does that fuit with the context? You have all that is worth the name of life; youth, beauty, &c. all, That happiness and youth can happy call.”- Happiness and pride may fignify, I think, the pride of happiness; the proudeft ftate of happiness.

TYRWHITT.

I think, with Dr. Johnfon, that prime is here used as a substantive, but that it means, that sprightly vigour which usually accompanies us in the prime o fe. MALONE.

3 In property feems to be here ufed, with much laxity, for in the due performance. In a fubfequent paffage it feems to mean either a thing poffeffed, or a fubject difcriminated by peculiar qualities. MALONE. 4 The old copy reads:

my hopes of help. STEVENS.

The King could have but a very flight hope of help from her, scarce enough to fwear by: and therefore Helen might fufpect he meant to quivocate with her. Befides, obferve, the greatest part of the fcene is strictly in rhyme and there is no shadow of reason why it should be interrupted here. I rather imagine the poet wrote:

Ay, by my fceptre, and my hopes of heaven. THIRLBY.

5 Shakspeare unquestionably wrote impage, grafting. Impe, a graff, or flip, or fucker: by which the means one of the fons of France. Caxton calls our Prince Arthur, that noble impe of fame. WARBURTON.

Image is furely the true reading, and may mean any representative of thine; e. any one who resembles you as being related to your family,

or

But fuch a one, thy vaffal, whom I know
Is free for me to ask, thee to bestow.

King. Here is my hand; the premises obferv❜d,
Thy will by my performance fhall be ferv'd:
So make the choice of thy own time; for I,
Thy refolv'd patient, on thee ftill rely.
More fhould I question thee, and more I muft;
Though, more to know, could not be more to trust;
From whence thou cam'ft, how tended on,-But reft
Unquestion'd welcome, and undoubted bleft.—
Give me fome help here, ho!-If thou proceed
As high as word, my deed fhall match thy deed.

SCENE II.

Flourish. Exeunt.

Roufillon. A Room in the Countefs's Palace.

Enter Countefs and Clown.

Count. Come, on, fir; I fhall now put you to the height of your breeding.

Cia. I will fhow myself highly fed, and lowly taught: I know my business is but to the court.

Count. To the court! why, what place make you special, when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court! Clo. Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he may eafily put it off at court: he that cannot make a leg, put off 's cap, kifs his hand, and fay rothing, has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and, indeed, fuch a fellow, to fay precifely, were not for the court: but, for me, I have an anfwer will ferve all men.

Count. Marry, that's a bountiful anfwer, that fits all quef tions.

Clo. It is like a barber's chair, that fits all buttocks; the pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any 'buttock.

Count.

or as a prince reflects any part of your ftate and majesty. There is no fuch word as impage; and, as Mr. M. Mafon obferves, were fuch a one coined, it would mean nothing but the art of grafting. Mr. Henley adds, that branch refers to the collateral defcendants of the royal blood, and image to the direct and immediate line. STEEVENS.

This expreffion is proverbial. See Ray's Proverbs, STEEVINS