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2. LORD. Let it flow this way, my good lord.

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Flow this way! A brave fellow!-he keeps his tides well. Timon Those healths will make thee, and thy state, look

ill.

Here's that, which is too weak to be a sinner, Honest water, which ne'er left man i'the mire: This, and my food, are equals; there's no odds. Feasts are too proud to give thanks to the gods.

APEMANTUS'S GRACE.

Immortal gods, I crave no pelf:
I pray for no man but myself:
Grant I may never prove fo fond,
To trust man on his oath or bond;
Or a harlot, for her weeping;
Or a dog, that feems a sleeping;
Or a keeper with my freedom;
Or my friends, if I should need'em.
Amen. So fall to't :

Rich men fin and I eat root.

[Eats and drinks.

Much good dich thy good heart, Apemantus!

Again, in Love's Labour's Loft, Act V. fc. ii:
Doft thou not wish in heart,

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"The chain were longer, and the letter short?"

Timon

STEEVENS.

Those healths-) This speech, except the concluding couplet, is printed as profe in the old copy; nor could it be exhibited as verse but by transferring the word Timon, which follows-look ill, to its prefent place. The transposition was made by Mr. Capell. The word might have been an interlineation, and fo have been misplaced. Yet, after all, I suspect many of the speeches in this play, which the modern editors have exhibited in a loose kind of metre, were intended by the author as profe; in which form they appear in the old copy. MALONE.

$ Rich men fin,] Dr. Farmer proposes to read-fing. REED.

TIM. Captain Alcibiades, your heart's in the field now

ALCIB. My heart is ever at your service, my lord. TIM. You had rather be at a breakfast of enemies, than a dinner of friends.

ALCIB. So they were bleeding-new, my lord, there's no meat like them; I could wish my beft friend at fuch a feast.

APEM. 'Would all those flatterers were thine enemies then; that then thou might'st kill 'em, and bid me to 'em.

1. LORD. Might we but have that happiness, my lord, that you would once use our hearts, whereby we might express some part of our zeals, we should think ourselves for ever perfect.

6

TIM. O, no doubt, my good friends, but the gods themselves have provided that I shall have much help from you: How had you been my friends else? why have you that charitable title from thoufands, did you not chiefly belong to my heart? I

6-for ever perfect.] That is, arrived at the perfection of happiness. JOHNSON. So, in Macbeth:

" Then comes my fit again; I had else been perfe&;-."

STEEVENS.

How had you been my friends elfe? why have you that charitable title from thousands, did you not chiefly belong to my heart?] Charitable fignifies, dear, endearing. So, Milton:

"Relations dear, and all the charities
"Of father, son, and brother-."

Alms, in English, are called charities, and from thence we may collect that our ancestors knew well in what the virtue of almsgiving confifted; not in the act, but in the difpofition.

WARBURTON.

The meaning is probably this:- Why are you diftinguished from thoufands by that title of endearment, was there not a particular connection and intercourse of tenderness between you and me? JOHNSON.

:

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have told more of you to myself, than you can with modefty fpeak in your own behalf; and thus far I confirm you. O, you gods, think I, what need we have any friends, if we should never have need of them? they were the most needless creatures living, should we ne'er have use for them: and would most resemble sweet instruments hung up in cafes, that keep their founds to themselves. Why, I have often wish'd myself poorer, that I might come nearer to you. We are born to do benefits: and what better or properer can we call our own, than the riches of our friends? O, what a precious comfort 'tis, to have fo many, like brothers, commanding one another's fortunes! O joy, e'en made away ere it can be born! Mine eyes cannot hold out water, methinks:' to forget their faults, I drink to you.

2

8 I confirm you.] I fix your characters firmly in my own mind. JOHNSON. 9they were the most needless creatures living, should we ne'er bave use for them: and) This passage I have restored from the old copy. STEEVENS.

2 O joy, e'en made away ere it can be born!] Tears being the effect both of joy and grief, fupplied our author with an opportunity of conceit, which he feldom fails to indulge. Timon, weeping with a kind of tender pleasure, cries out, O joy, e'en made away, destroyed, turned to tears, before it can be born, before it can be fully poffefsed. JOHNSON.

So, in Romeo and Juliet:

"These violent delights have violent ends,
"And in their triumph die."

The old copy has-joys. It was corrected by Mr. Rowe.

MALONE.

3 Mine eyes cannot bold out water, methinks:) In the original edition the words stand thus: Mine eyes cannot bold out water, methinks. To forget their faults I drink to you. Perhaps the true reading is this: Mine eyes cannot hold out; they water. Methinks, to forget their faults, I will drink to you. Or it may be explained without any change. Mine eyes cannot bold out water, that is, cannot keep water from breaking in upon them. JOHNSON.

APEM. Thou weep'st to make them drink, Ti

mon.

2. LORD. Joy had the like conception in our eyes, And, at that instant, like a babes sprung up. APEM. Ho, ho! I laugh to think that babe a bastard.

3. LORD. I promise you, my lord, you mov'd me much.

APEM. Much!'

[Tucket founded.

4 to make them drink,] Sir T. Hanmer reads:-to make them drink thee; and is followed by Dr. Warburton, I think, without fufficient reason. The covert sense of Apemantus is, what thou lofeft, they get. JOHNSON.

5

- like a babe-] That is, a weeping babe. JOHNSON.

I question if Shakspeare meant the propriety of allufion to be carried quite so far. To look for babies in the eyes of another, is no uncommon expreffion.

So, in Love's Mistress, by Heywood, 1636:

"Joy'd in his looks, look'd babies in his eyes."

Again, in The Christian turn'd Turk, 1612:

"She makes him sing songs to her, looks fortunes in his fists, and babies in his eyes."

Again, in Churchyard's Tragicall discours of a dolorous Gentlewoman, 1593:

"Men will not looke for babes in hollowd eyen."

STEEVENS.

Does not Lucullus dwell on Timon's metaphor by referring to circumstances preceding the birth, and means joy was conceived in their eyes, and sprung up there, like the motion of a babe in the womb? TOLLET.

We

The word conception, in the preceding line, shows, I think, that Mr. Tollet's interpretation of this passage is the true one. have a fimilar imagery in Troilus and Creffida:

-and, almost like the gods,

"Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles." MALONE. • Much!] Apemantus means to say, That's extraordinary. Much was formerly an expression of admiration. See Vol. VI. p. 136, n. 3. MALONE.

Much! is frequently used, as here, ironically, and with fome indication of contempt. STEEVENS.

TIM. What means that trump? How now?

Enter a Servant.

SERV. Please you, my lord, there are certain ladies most defirous of admittance.

TIM. Ladies? What are their wills?

SERV. There comes with them a forerunner, my lord, which bears that office, to fignify their pleafures.

TIM. I pray, let them be admitted.

Enter CUPID.

Cup. Hail to thee, worthy Timon; and to all That of his bounties taste! -The five best senses Acknowledge thee their patron; and come freely To gratulate thy plenteous bofom: The ear, Taste, touch, smell, all pleas'd from thy table rise; '

1 The ear, &c.] In former copies:

There tafte, touch, all pleas'd from thy table rife,
They only now.

The five senses are talked of by Cupid, but three of them only are made out; and those in a very heavy unintelligible manner. It is plain therefore we should read:

Th' ear, tafte, touch, smell, pleas'd from thy table rife,
These only now, &c.

i. e. the five senses, Timon, acknowledge thee their patron; four of them, viz. the hearing, taste, touch, and smell, are all feasted at thy board; and these ladies come with me to entertain your fight in a masque. Massinger, in his Duke of Millaine, copied the passage from Shakspeare; and apparently before it was thus corrupted; where, speaking of a banquet, he says:

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- All that may be had

"To please the eye, the ear, taste, touch, or smell,
"Are carefully provided." WARBURTON.

Dr. Warburton and the subsequent editors omit the word-all; but omiffion is the most dangerous mode of emendation. The

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