1

160. This sorrow's heavenly;] This tenderness, with which I lament the punishment which justice compels me to inflict, is a holy passion.

I wish these two lines could be honestly ejected. It is the fate of Shakspere to counteract his own pathos. JOHNSON.

Perhaps the poet would not have retained both these images had he published the play himself, though in the hurry of composition he threw them both upon paper. The first seems adopted from the fabulous history of the crocodile, the second from a passage in the scripture. STEEVENS.

172. I would not kill thy soul.] Sir W. D'Avenant has borrowed this thought in his Albovine King of Lombardy, 1629:

"I am not fraught with devil's spleen; I would "Not hurt thy soul." STEEVENS.

215. A murder, which I thought a sacrifice.] This line is difficult. Thou hast hardened my heart, and makest me kill thee with the rage of a murderer, when I thought to have sacrificed thee to justice with the calmness of a priest striking a victim.

It must not be omitted, that one of the elder quartos reads, thou dost stone thy heart; which I suspect to be genuine. The meaning then will be, thou forcest me to dismiss thee from the world in the state of the murdered without preparation for death, when I intended that thy punishment should have been a sacrifice atoning for thy crime.

I am glad that I have ended my revisal of this dreadful scene. It is not to be endured. JOHNSON. 227. hath ta'en order for't.] i. e. has taken measures. So, in Holinshed's Reign of King John: " he took such order for him, that he was despoiled of all his goods and benefices," p. 174. STEEVENS. Again, in Dido Queen of Carthage, by Marlowe and Nashe, 1594:

"I will take order for that presently."

MALONE.

229. Had all his hairs been lives,-] This thought appears to have been very common, as it occurs frequently in dramatick performances prior to Shak. spere's Othello.. STEEVENS.

238. Being done,

There is no pause.] The first quarto omits this

speech. STEEVENS. 241. It is too late.] After this speech of Othello, the elder quarto adds an invocation from Desdemona, consisting only of the sacred name, thrice repeated. As this must be supposed to have been uttered while she is yet struggling with death, I think an editor may be excused from inserting such a circumstance of supererogatory horror, especially as it is found in but one of the ancient copies.

This alteration was probably made in consequence of the statute of the 3d of James I. c. 21. which lays a penalty for the profane use of the name of God, &c. in stage plays, interludes, May-games, &c.

TOLLET.

The

The statute was necessary; for not only the ancient moralities, but the plays (those of Chapman in particular) abound with the most wanton and shocking repetitions of a name which never ought to be mentioned in such an irreverent manner on the stage.

STEEVENS.

256. My wife! my wife! what wife?—I have no wife:] "Filium unicum adolescentulum habeo: ah! quid dixi habere me? imo habui, Chreme." Ter. Heautont. STEEVENS.

279. O falsely, falsely murder'd!] It cannot be supposed that a person who had been effectually strangled or smothered, could speak again; for if the power of breathing returned after the instrument of suffocation was removed, no act of violence had in reality taken place by which the conclusion of life could be brought But such is the peculiar fate of Desdemona, that she is supposed to be smothered, revives to acquaint us that she smothered herself, and then dies without any ostensible cause of death. I am of opinion that some theatrical direction has been omitted; and that when Othello says:

on.

Not dead! not yet quite dead!

I, that am cruel, am yet merciful;

I would not have thee linger in thy pain :

After the repetition of wounds, Desdemona might speak again, with propriety, and yet very soon expire; as says Cassio of Roderigo :

-even but now he spake,

After long seeming dead.

The first resolution of Othello was to poison her but from this measure he is dissuaded by the policy of Iago. He is next determined to use the poinard; but, his tenderness awaking, he cannot bear to deform those beauties which he had so often approached with other sensations, and for different purposes. fore, says he

I'll not shed her blood,

There

Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow,

And smooth as monumental alabaster:

And this resolution we are to imagine he would have kept, but that he was averse to employing those means again, which had already appeared to be uncer tain in their effect.

If this apparent want of a play-house direction had occasioned any absurdity in the original representation of the play, probably it is glanced at by Ben Jonson in the Alchemist, act v. "Did'st hear a cry, said'st thou? Yes, sir, like unto a man that had been strangled an hour, and could not speak." STEEVENS. 298. She turn'd to folly, and she was a whore.] Goldsmith hath used the word precisely in the same sense; When lovely woman stoops to folly,

And finds too late that men betray,

What charm can sooth her melancholy,

What art can wash her guilt away ì HENLEY.

goo.

300. false as water.] As water that will support no weight, nor keep any impression. JOHNSON. 315. that told me first ;] The folio reads, "that

told me on her first."

STEEVENS.

319. iteration-] The folio reads-iterance.

STEEVENS.

321. Emil.] The first quarto omits this and the following speech. STEEVENS. -villany has made mocks with love!] Villany has taken advantage to play upon the weakness of a violent passion. JOHNSON. 334. Thou hast not half that power to do me harm, As I have to be hurt.-] She means to say, I have in this cause power to endure more than thou hast power to inflict. JOHNSON.

356. -charm your tongue.] By this expression, Charm your tongue, the poet meant no more than to make Iago say, Apply some power, strong as a charm would be, to your tongue; for nothing less can stop its volubility. So, Henry VI. Part III.

"Peace, wilful boy, or I will charm your tongue." And, Ben Jonson, in Cynthia's Revels:

66 -charm your skipping tongue."

Pliny informs us, that favete linguis was the constant exclamation before any religious charm was applied. From this circumstance the phrase to charm a tongue might have originated. STEEVENS.

357. my mistress, &c.] This line and the following six speeches in this edition, are wanting in the first

quarto.

STEEVENS.