When the blood burns, how prodigal the foul Giving more light than heat, extinct in both, 8 Breathing like fanctified and pious Bonds, The better to beguile. This is for all: ? I would not, in plain terms, from this time forth, 6 Set your intreatmentsIntreatments here means company, converfation, from the French entrétien. 7-larger tether- -] A firing to tye horses. POPE. 8 Breathing like fanctified and pious Bonds.] On which the editor Mr. Theobald remarks, Tho' all the editions b. vefwallowed this reading implicitly, it is certainly corrupt; and I have been furprised how men of genius and learning could let it pass without fome fufpicion. What ideas can we frame to ourselves of a breathing bond, or of its being fanctified and pious, &c. But he was too hafty in framing ideas before he understood thofe alrea dy framed by the poet, and ex Have preffed in very plain words. Do not believe (fays Polonius to his Daughter) Hamlet's amorous vows made to you; which pretend religion in them, (the better to beguile,) like thofe fanctified and pious vows [or bonds] m de to heaven. And why should not this pass without fufpicion? WARBURTON. Theobald for bonds fubftitutes bawds. 9 I would not, in plain terms, ment's leifare,] The humour of this is fine. The fpeaker's character is all affectation. At last he fays he will speak plain, and yet cannot for his life; his plain fpeech of flandering a mo ment's 3 Have you fo flander any moment's leifure, -SCENE VII. [Exeunt. Changes to the Platform before the Palace. Enter Hamlet, Horatio, and Marcellus. Jam TH Ham.HE Air bites fhrewdly; it is very cold. Hor. It is a nipping and an eager ait. Ham. What hour now? Hor. I think, it lacks of twelve. Mar. No, it is ftruck. Hor. I heard it not. It then draws near the season, Wherein the Spirit held his wont to walk. [Noife of warlike mufick within. What does this mean, my Lord? Ham. The King doth wake to night, and takes his rouse, Keeps waffel, and the fwagg'ring up-spring reels; ment's leifure being of the like fultian ftuff with the reft. WARBURTON, Here is another fine paffage, of which I take the beauty to be only imaginary. Polonius fays, in plain terms, that is, not in language less elevated or embellifh ed than before, but in terms that cannot be misunderstood: I would not have you fo difgrace your most idle moments, as not to find better employment for them than Lord Hamlet's converfation. t-the fwagg'ring up-Spring-】 The bluftering upstart. But, But, to my mind, though I am native here, More honour'd in the breach, than the obfervance. 2 Makes us traduc'd, and tax'd of other nations; They clepe us drunkards, and with swinish phrase From our atchievements, though perform'd at height, That for fome vicious mole of nature in them, 2 This heavy-headed revel saft and weft,] i. e. This reveling that obferves no hours, but continues from morning to night, &c. WARB. I fhould not have fufpected this paffage of ambiguity or obfcurity, had I not found my opinion of it differing from that of the learned critick. I conftrue it thus, This, beavy-headed revel makes us traduced east and weft, and taxed of other nations. The pth and marrow of our attribute.] The best and most valuable part of the praife The dram of Bafe Doth that would be otherwise attributed to us. 4 --complexion,] i. e. humour; as fanguine, melancholy, phlegmatic, &c. WARB 5-fortune's fear,] In the old quarto of 1637, it is -fortune's ftar: 7-The dram of Eafe To his own fcandal.] I do not Doth all the noble fubftance of Worth out, To his own fcandal. Enter Ghoft. Hor. Look, my Lord, it comes! Ham. Angels and minifters of grace defend us! Be thou a Spirit of health, or Goblin damn'd, Bring with thee airs from heav'n, or blasts from hell, Be thy intents wicked or charitable, 8 Thou com'ft in fuch a queftionable shape, That I will speak to thee. I'll call thee Hamlet, remember a paffage throughout all our poet's works, more intricate and deprav'd in the text, of lefs meaning to outward appearance, or more likely to baffle the attempts of criticifm in its aid. It is certain, there is neither sense nor grammar as it now stands: yet with a flight alteration, I'll endeavour to cure thofe defects, and give a fentiment too, that fhall make the poet's thought clofe nobly. The dram of Bafe (as I have corrected the text) means the least alloy or baseness or vice. It is very frequent with our poet to use the adjective of quality inftead of the fubftantive fignifying the thing. Befides, I have obferved, that elsewhere, fpeaking of worth, he delights to confider it as a quality that adds weight to a perfon, and connects the word with that idea. THEOBALD. Have Have burft their cearments?] Hamlet here fpeaks with wonder, that he who was dead should rife again and walk. But this, according to the vulgar fuperftition here followed, was no wonder. Their only wonder was, that one who had the rites of fepulture performed to him, fhould walk; the want of which was supposed to be the reason of walking ghofts. Hamlet's wonder then fhould have been placed here: And fo Shakespear placed it, as we shall fee presently. For bearfed is used figuratively to fig 1 Have burst their cearments? Why the fepulchre, Have burft their cearments. It appears, for the two reafons given above, that earth is the true reading. It will further appear for these two other reasons. Firft, From the words, canoniz'd bones; by which is not meant (as one would imagine) a compliment, for, made holy or fainted; but for bones to which the rites of fepulture have been performed; or which were buried according to the canon. For we are told he was murder'd with all his fins fresh upon him, and therefore in no way to be fainted. But if this licentious ufe of the word canonized be allowed, then earth must be the true reading, for inhuming bodies was one of the effential parts of fepulchral rites. Secondly, From the words, barve burft their cearments, which imply the preceding mention of inbuming, but no mention is made of it in the common reading. This enabled the Oxford Editor to improveupon the emendation; fo, he reads, Why thy bones bears'd in cano- That I fuppofe for the fake of harmony, not of fenfe. For tho' the rites of fepulture performed canonizes the body buried; yet it does not canonize the earth in which it is laid, unless every funeral service be a new confecration. WARBURTON. It were too long to examine this note period by period, tho' almost every period feems to me to contain fomething reprehenfible. The critick, in his zeal for change, writes with fo little confideration, as to fay, that Hamlet cannot call his father canoyized, because we are t∙ld he was murdered with all his fins fresh upon him. He was not then told it, and had fo little the power of knowing it, that he was to be told it by an apparition. The long fucceffion of reafons upon reafons prove nothing, but what every reader discovers, that the King had been buried, which is implied by fo many adjuncts of burial, that the direct mention of earth is not neceffary, Hamlet, amazed at an apparition, which, though in all ages credited, has in all ages-been confidered as the most wonderful and moft dreadful operation of fupernatural agency, enquires of the fpectre, in the most emphatick terms, why he treaks the order of nature, by returning from the dead; this he afks in a very confufed circumlocution, M |