Thou haft by moon-light at her window fung,
With feigning voice, verfes of feigning love;
And ftol'n the impreffion of her fantasy.

With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nofegays, fweet-meats; meffengers
Of ftrong prevailment in unharden'd youth:
With cunning haft thou filch'd my daughter's heart ;
Turn'd her obedience, which is due to me,
To ftubborn harshness :-And, my gracious duke,
Be it fo, fhe will not here before your grace
Confent to marry with Demetrius,

I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,
As he is mine, I may difpofe of her :
Which fhall be either to this gentleman,,
Or to her death, according to our law,
Immediately provided in that cafe.[1]

The. What fay you, Hermia? be advis'd, fair maid : To you your father fhould be as a God;

One that compos'd your beauties; yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax,

By him imprinted, and within his power
To leave the figure, or disfigure it.
Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.

Her. So is Lyfander.

The. In himself he is:

But in this kind, wanting your father's voice,.
The other must be held the worthier.

Her. I would, my father look'd but with my eyes.
The. Rather your eyes muft with his judgment look.
Her. I do intreat your grace to pardon me :
I know not by what power I am made bold;
Nor how it may concern my modefty,

In fuch a prefence here, to plead my thoughts:
But, I befeech your grace, that I may know
The worft that may befal me in this cafe,

If I refufe to wed Demetrius.

The. Either to die the death[2], or to abjure For ever the fociety of men.

Therefore, fair Hermia, queftion your defires,

[1] By a law of Solon, parents had an abfolute power of life and death over their children. So it fuited the poet's purpofe well enough to fuppofe the Athenians had it before. Or perhaps he neither thought nor knew any thing of the matter. WARB.

[2] Shakespeare employs this fcriptural expreffion in King John; and I meet with it again in the fecond part of the Downfall of Robert Earl of Huntingdon, fáo. STEEV.

Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun;

For aye to be in fhady cloisfter mew'd,
To live a barren fifter all your life,

Chanting faint hymns to the cold, fruitless moon?
Thrice bleffed they, that mafter fo their blood,
To undergo fuch maiden pilgrimage!
But earthlier happy is the rofe diftill'd,
Than that, which with'ring on the virgin-thorn,
Grows, lives, and dies, in fingle bleffedness.

Her. So will I grow, fo live, fo die, my lord,
Ere I will yield my virgin-patent up

Unto his lordship, to whofe unwifh'd yoke

My foul confents not to give fovereignty.

The. Take time to paufe: and, by the next new moon, (The fealing-day betwixt my love and me,

For everlafting bond of fellowship)

Upon that day either prepare to die,
For difobedience to your father's will;
Or elfe to wed Demetrius, as he would;
Or on Diana's altar to protest,

For aye, aufterity and fingle life.

Dem. Relent, fweet Hermia ;-and, Lyfander, yield

Thy crazed title to my certain right.

Lyf. You have her father's love, Demetrius; Let me have Hermia's: do you marry him.

Ege. Scornful Lyfander! true, he hath my love; And what is mine, my love shall render him : And the is mine; and all my right of her

I do eftate unto Demetrius.

Lyf. I am, my lord, as well deriv'd as he,
As well poffefs'd: my love is more than his :
My fortune's every way as fairly rank'd,
If not with vantage, as Demetrius's:

And, which is more than all these boafts can be,
I am belov'd of beauteous Hermia.

Why fhould not I then profecute my right?
Demetrius (I'll avouch it to his head)
Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,

And won her foul; and fhe, fweet lady, dotes,
Devoutly dotés, dotes in idolatry,

Upon this spotted and inconftant man.[3]

[3] As 'fpotlefs' is innocent, fo fpotted' is wicked.

JOHNS.

The. I muft confefs that I have heard fo much, And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;; But, being over-full of felf-affairs,

My mind did lofe it. But, Demetrius, come;
And come, Egeus; you fhall go with me;
I have fome private schooling for you both.
-For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourfelf
To fit your fancies to your father's will;
Or elfe the law of Athens yields you up
(Which by no means we may extenuate)
To death, or to a vow of fingle life.
-Come, my Hippolita; what cheer, my love?
-Demetrius, and Egeus, go along;

I muft employ you in fome bufinefs
Against our nuptial; and confer with you
Of fomething, nearly that concerns yourselves..
Ege. With duty and defire, we follow you.

[Exe. THES. HIP. EGEUS, DEM. and train... Lyf. How now, my love? Why is your cheek fo pale ? How chance the rofes there do fade fo faft?

Her. Belike for want of rain; which I could well Beteem[4] them from the tempeft of mine eyes.

Lyf. Ah, me! for aught that ever I could read,, Could ever hear by tale or hiftory,

The course of true love never did run fmooth.
But, either it was different in blood ;-

Her. O crofs! too high to be enthrall'd to low!
Lyf. Or elfe, mifgraffed in respect of years;—
Her. O fpight! too old to be engag'd to young!
Lyf. Or elfe it ftood upon the choice of friends ;-
Her. O hell! to choose love by another's eye!
Lyf. Or, if there were a fympathy in choice,
War, death, or ficknefs did lay fiege to it;
Making it momentany as a found,

Swift as a fhadow, fhort as any dream;
Brief as the lightning in the colly'd night,[5]
That, in a spleen,[6] unfolds both heaven and earth,

[4] Give them, beftow upon them. The word is used by Spenfer. JOHN. [6] 'Collied,' i. e. black, fmutted with coal, a word still used in the midland counties. STEEV.

[5] Though the word 'fpleen' be here employed oddly enough, yet I believe it right. Shakespeare, always hurried on by the grandeur and multitude of his ideas, affumes every now and then an uncommon licenfe iu. the use of his words. Particularly in complex moral modes it is ufual with him to employ one, only to exprefs a very few ideas of that number of which it is compofed. Thus wanting here to exprefs the ideas-of a fud

And ere a man hath power to fay, Behold!
The jaws of darkness do devour it up :
So quick bright things come to confufion.

Her. If then true lovers have been ever crofs'd,
It stands as an edict in deftiny :

Then let us teach our trial patience;
Because it is a cuftomary cross,

As due to love, as thoughts and dreams, and fighs,
Wishes and tears, poor fancy's followers!

Lyf. A good perfuafion;-therefore hear me, Hermia. I have a widow aunt, a dowager

Of great revenue, and the hath no child :
From Athens is her house remote feven leagues;
And the refpects me as her only fon.

There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;
And to that place the sharp Athenian law
Cannot purfue us: If thou lov'ft me then,
Steal forth thy father's houfe to-morrow night;
And, in the wood, a league without the town,
Where I did meet thee once with Helena,
To do obfervance to a morn of May,
There will I ftay for thee.

Her. My good Lyfander!

I fwear to thee, by Cupid's ftrongest bow ;[7]
By his best arrow with the golden head;
By the fimplicity of Venus' doves;

By that which knitteth fouls, and profpers loves;
And by that fire which burn'd the Carthage queen,
When the falfe Trojan under fail was feen;
By all the vows that ever men have broke,
In number more than ever women spoke ;-
In that fame place thou haft appointed me,
To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.

Lys. Keep promife, love :-Look, here comes Helena.

den, or-in a trice, he ufes the word 'fpleen'; which, partially confidered, fignifying a hafty, fudden fit, is enough for him, and he never troubles himfelf about the further or fuller fignification of the word. Here, he uses the word 'fpleen' for a fudden hafty fit; fo juft the contrary, in the Two Gentlemen of Verona, he uses 'fudden' for 'fpleenatic-fudden quips.' And it must be owned, this fort of converfation adds a force to the diction. WARB.

[7] Lyfander does but juft propofe her running away from her father at midnight, and straight she is at her oaths that the will meet him at the place of rendezvous. Not one doubt or hesitation, not one condition of affurance for Lyfander's conftancy. Either the was naufeoufly coming; or the had before jilted him; and he could not believe her without a thousand oaths.

WARB.

Enter HELENA.

Her. God fpeed fair Helena! Whither away?
Hel. Call you me fair? that fair again unfay.
Demetrius loves you, fair; O happy fair!

Your eyes are lode-ftars ;[8] and your tongue's fweet air
More tuneable than lark to fhepherd's ear,
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
Sickness is catching; O, were favour so!
Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go ;
My ear fhould catch your voice, my eye your eye;
My tongue should catch your tongue's fweet melody.
Were the world mine, Demetrius being 'bated,
The reft I'll give, to be to you tranflated.
O, teach me how you look; and with what art
You fway the motion of Demetrius' heart.

Her. I frown upon him, yet he loves me ftill.
Hel. Oh, that your frowns would teach my smiles
fuch skill!

Her. I give him curfes, yet he gives me love.
Hel. Oh, that my prayers could fuch affection move!
Her. The more I hate, the more he follows me.
Hel. The more I love, the more he hateth me.
Her. His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
Hel. None, but your beauty; Would that fault
were mine!

Her. Take comfort; he no more fhall fee my face;
Lyfander and myself will fly this place.-
Before the time I did Lyfander fee,[9]
Seem'd Athens like a paradife to me:

O then, what graces in my love do dwell,

That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell!

Lyf. Helen, to you our minds we will unfold ::
To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
Her filver vifage in the watry glass,

Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grafs,

[8] This was a compliment not unfrequent among the old poets. The lode-ftar is the leading or guiding ftar, that is, the pole-ttar. The magnet is, for the fame reaton, called the lode-ftone, either because it leads iron, or because it guides the failor. Davies calls Elizabeth, lode-ftone to hearts, and lode-ftone to all eyes. JOHNS.

[9]. Perhaps every reader may not difcover the propriety of thefe lines. Hermia is willing to comfort Helena, and to avoid all appearance of triumph over her. She therefore bids her not to confider the power of pleafing as an advantage to be much envied or much defired, fince Hermia, whom the confiders as poffeffing it in the fupreme degree, has found no other effect of it than the lofs of happiness. JOHNS.