Ere he can see his own abomination.
While lust is in his pride, no exclamation
Can curb his heat, or rein his rash desire,
Till, like a jade, self-will himself doth tire ".

8

And then with lank and lean discolour'd cheek,
With heavy eye, knit brow, and strengthless pace,
Feeble Desire, all recreant, poor, and meek,
Like to a bankrupt beggar wails his case:
The flesh being proud, Desire doth fight with grace,
For there it revels; and when that decays,
The guilty rebel for remission prays.

So fares it with this faultful lord of Rome,
Who this accomplishment so hotly chas'd;
For now against himself he sounds this doom,—
That through the length of times he stands dis-
grac'd:

Besides, his soul's fair temple is defac'd';

To whose weak ruins muster troops of cares,
To ask the spotted princess how she fares.

She says, her subjects with foul insurrection
Have batter'd down her consecrated wall,
And by their mortal fault brought in subjection
Her immortality, and made her thrall

To living death, and pain perpetual:

Which in her prescience she controlled still,
But her fore-sight could not fore-stall their will.

8 Till, like a jade, self-will himself doth tire.] So, in King Henry VIII.:

9

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Anger is like

"A full-hot horse, who being allow'd his way,

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Self-mettle tires him." STEEVENS.

his soul's fair TEMPLE is defac'd;] So, in Macbeth :

"Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope

"The lord's anointed temple, and stole thence

"The life of the building." MALONE.

Even in this thought, through the dark night he

stealeth,

A captive victor, that hath lost in gain1;
Bearing away the wound that nothing healeth,
The scar that will, despite of cure, remain ;
Leaving his spoil 2 perplex'd in greater pain.
She bears the load of lust he left behind,
And he the burthen of a guilty mind.

He, like a thievish dog, creeps sadly thence,
She like a wearied lamb lies panting there;
He scouls, and hates himself for his offence,
She desperate, with her nails her flesh doth tear;
He faintly flies, sweating with guilty fear;

She stays, exclaiming on the direful night;
He runs, and chides his vanish'd, loath'd, delight.

3

4

He thence departs a heavy convertite 3,
She there remains a hopeless cast-away *:
He in his speed looks for the morning light,
She prays she never may behold the day:
For day, quoth she, night's scapes doth open lay';

that hath LOST IN GAIN ;] So, in Romeo and Juliet:
teach me how to lose a winning match—."

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STEEVENS.

2 Leaving his SPOIL-] That is, Lucretia. So, in Troilus and Cressida :

"For sluttish spoils of opportunity,

"And daughters of the game." MALONE.

3 He thence departs a heavy CONVERTITE,] A convertite is a Our author has the same expression in King John: But, since you are a gentle convertite,

convert.

66

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My tongue shall hush again this storm of war."

MALONE.

4- a hopeless CAST-AWAY:] So, in Antony and Cleopatra: "That ever I should call thee cast-away!" STEEVENS. 5 For DAY, quoth she, NIGHT'S SCAPES doth open lay;] So, in King Henry VI. Part II. :

And my true eyes have never practis'd how
To cloke offences with a cunning brow.

They think not but that every eye can see
The same disgrace which they themselves behold;
And therefore would they still in darkness be",
To have their unseen sin remain untold;
For they their guilt with weeping will unfold,
And grave, like water that doth eat in steel,
Upon my cheeks what helpless shame I feel.

Here she exclaims against repose and rest,
And bids her eyes hereafter still be blind".
She wakes her heart by beating on her breast,
And bids it leap from thence, where it may find
Some purer chest, to close so pure a mindR.

Frantick with grief thus breathes she forth her spite

Against the unseen secrecy of night.

"The gaudy, blabbing, and remorseful day." STEEVENS. A passage in The Winter's Tale may serve to ascertain the meaning of night's scapes here; "Mercy on's, a barne! a very pretty barne!-Sure some scape: though I am not very bookish, I can read waiting-gentlewoman in the scape."

Escapium is a barbarous Latin word, signifying what comes by chance or accident. MALONE.

6 in darkness BE,] The octavo 1616, and the modern editions, read, without authority:

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they still in darkness lie." MALONE.

7 Here she exclaims against REPOSE and REST,

And bids her EYES hereafter still be BLIND.] This passage will serve to confirm the propriety of Dr. Johnson's emendation in Cymbeline, Act III. Sc. IV. vol, xiii. p. 121, n. 3:

"I'll wake mine eye-balls blind first." STEEVENS.

8 She wakes her HEART by beating on her BREAST, And bids it leap from thence, where it may find

Some purer CHEST, to close so pure a mind.] So, in King Richard II.:

"A jewel in a ten-times-barr'd-up chest

"Is a bold spirit in a loyal breast." MALONE.

O, comfort-killing night, image of hell ".!
Dim register and notary of shame!

Black stage for tragedies and murders fell'!
Vast sin-concealing chaos! nurse of blame!
Blind muffled bawd! dark harbour for defame!
Grim cave of death, whispering conspirator
: With close-tongu'd treason and the ravisher!

O, hateful, vaporous, and foggy night,
Since thou art guilty of my cureless crime,
Muster thy mists to meet the eastern light,
Make war against proportion'd course of time!
Or if thou wilt permit the sun to climb

His wonted height, yet ere he go to bed,
Knit poisonous clouds about his golden head.

With rotten damps ravish the morning air;
Let their exhal'd unwholesome breaths make sick
The life of purity, the supreme fair 2,

3

Ere he arrive his weary noon-tide prick3;
And let thy misty vapours march so thick,

9 O comfort-killing NIGHT! IMAGE OF HELL!] So, in King Henry V.:

"Never sees horrid night, the child of hell." STEEvens. 1 BLACK stage for tragedies-] In our author's time, I believe, the stage was hung with black, when tragedies were performed. The hanging however was, I suppose, no more than one piece of black baize placed at the back of the stage, in the room of the tapestry which was the common decoration when comedies were acted. See the Account of the Ancient English Theatres, vol. iii. MALONE.

2 Let their EXHAL'D UNWHOLESOME BREATHS make sick The life of purity, the supreme FAIR,] So, in King Lear :

3

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infect her beauty,

"Ye fen-suck'd fogs-." STEEVENS.

noon-tide prick ;] So, in King Henry VI. Part III.:
"And made an evening at the noon-tide prick.”

i.e. the point of noon. Again, in Damon and Pythias, 1571 :
"It pricketh fast upon noon." STEEVENS.

Again, in Acolastus his After-witte, 1600:

"Scarce had the sun attain'd his noon-tide prick."

MALONE.

That in their smoky ranks his smother'd light
May set at noon, and make perpetual night.

Were Tarquin night, (as he is but night's child',)
The silver-shining queen he would distain o;
Her twinkling handmaids' too, by him defil'd,
Through night's black bosom should not peep again®:
So should I have copartners in my pain:
And fellowship in woe doth woe assuage

As palmers' chat makes short their pilgrimage'.

And let thy MISTY vapours march so thick,] The quarto, by an evident error of the press, reads-musty. The subsequent copies have-misty. So, before:

"Muster thy mists to meet the eastern light."

Again :

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misty night

"Covers the shame that follows such delight." MALONE. s(as he is but NIGHT'S CHILD,)] The wicked, in scriptural language, are called the children of darkness. STEevens.

he would DISTAIN;] Thus all the copies before that of 1616, which reads:

"The silver-shining queen he would disdain."

Dr. Sewell, unwilling to print nonsense, altered this tohim would disdain." MALONE.

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7 Her twinkling HANDMAIDS-] That is, the stars. So, in Troilus and Cressida :

"By all Diana's waiting-women yonder,

"And by herself, I will not tell you whose." Malone.

8 Through NIGHT'S BLACK BOSOM should not PEEP again :] So, in Macbeth:

"Nor heaven peep through the blanket of the dark,
"To cry, hold, hold." MALONE.

9 And FELLOWSHIP in WOE doth woe assuage,] So, in King Lear:

"But then the mind much sufferance doth o'er-skip,
"When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship."

Again, in Romeo and Juliet:

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or if sour woe delight in fellowship—.”

So Chaucer, Troilus and Creseide, b. i.:

"Men saie, to wretch is consolation,

"To have another fellow in his paine." MALONE.
Solamen miseris socios habuisse doloris.

I believe this is a line of Cato's distichs. It is found in a common school book; Synopsis Communium Locorum. STEEVENS. As palmers' CHAT makes short their pilgrimage.] This is the