Notes for lines 0-1017 ed. Bernice W. Kliman
| 216 To busines with the King, more then the scope | 1.2.37 |
|---|
179 192 194 216 217 237 2064 2065 1723- mtby2
mtby2: pope
216 To business] Thirlby (1723-) questions why Pope introduces “Of treaty”; though he presumably should have seen the emendation in rowe.
1726 theon
theon: pope1
216 To busines]
Theobald (1726, pp. 7-8): <p. 7> “This [
Of treaty] is a Reading adopted, and of a modern Stamp. as I take it; either from Want of Understanding the Poet’s genuine Words, or on a Supposition of their being too stiff and obsolete. All my old Copies have it, as I think it ought to be restor’d, [quotes 215-6] </p. 7> <p. 8> i.e. to
negotiate, or
transact with him. It is a Licence in our Poet, of his own Authority, to coin new
Verbs both out of
Substantives and
Adjectives; and it is, as we may call it, one of the
Quidlibet audendi’s very familiar with him. I’ll throw in a few Instances of the like kind, and it were very easy, with little Pains, to produce a Croud more.” </p. 8>
Ed. note: There follow five pages of examples, all from other plays.] (8-12) theo1 instituted the restoration with no CN.
HAN’s refusal to restore business is one of the first instances I have seen since THEO1. HAN seems rather a conservative editor. I don’t see signs that he diddles with syllables—yet. Probably the opinion of him is unfair, too. Of course, he did not go back to early texts; he can hardly be blamed for that.
mTHEO3folc.1 [fol c.1 usually inks in the HAN emendations and he does that here
1773 v1773
v1773
216 more then the scope] Johnson (ed. 1773): “More than is comprised in the general design of these articles, which you may explain in a more diffuse and dilated stile. Johnson”
1778 v1778
v1778 = v1773
216 more then the scope]
1785 v1785
v1785 = v1778
216 more then the scope]
1790 mal
mal = v1785
216 more then the scope]
1791- rann
rann ≈ theon
216 To busines] Rann (ed. 1791-): “to negociate, treat with.”
1793 v1793
v1793 = mal
216 more then the scope]
1803 v1803
v1803 = v1793
216 more then the scope]
1805 Seymour
Seymour
216 To busines] Seymour (1805, 2:143): “seems here as if it were a verb; but I rather think the sense is, power for business, or power of business: the prepositions are frequently perverted.
1813 v1813
v1813 = v1803
216 more then the scope]
1819 cald1
cald1 ≈ Seymour
216 To busines] Caldecott (ed. 1819): “power to business]] For the purpose of, to transact, business.”
cald1: mal
216-17 more then the scope . . . allowe] Caldecott (ed. 1819): “The tenor of these articles, set out at large, authorizes.
“The use of the plural verb with a nominative singular, so far from being offensive even to modern ears, seems under the present circumstances, viz. those of a plural genitive intervening, to improve the harmony of the versification, and to constitute an exception to the general rule.
“At any rate, our author would be fully justified by the loose practise of his age, which, even in prose, and where no member of a sentence was interposed between the nominative case and the verb, allowed plural verbs and nouns singular, and vice versa, to be united.
“A similar example occurs in * [2064-5], Player King, where, indeed, it may be said, that this license was used for the convenience of the rhyme: but nothing is more fully understood, than that it was the practise of the learned of these times, of our translators both in prose and verse, and of our highest personages, as well as our greatest scholars and most polished writers, to join noun and verb, without any regard to the singular or plural of either. In her translation of a classic it was done by the sovereign of that day: ‘The cleare daies followes the darck clowdes: the roughest seas insues the greatest calmes.” Queen Elizabeth’s Seneca, given to Sir J. Harrington, 1597. Nugœ Antiq. 12mo. 1779, [2:308]: and, when laying down rules of composition, we find in the works of her learned successor, ‘And birds with all their heavenlie voces cleare Dois make a sweit and heavinly harmony, And fragrant flours dois spring up lustely!’ King James’s reylis and cautelis of Scottis Poesie, 1584. And, whether it was understood or not, that, from the rude state of our language, the ear was then untuned and inattentive to niceties and the modulation of its periods, certainly this was not an age in which it is possible to refer such a practise to the want of a knowledge of the common rules of grammar.
“Such then, from whatever cause arising, being the actual indifference to the application of this rule, even where the verb immediately follows the nominative case, and Shakespeare, as his ear guided, giving occasionally into a practise into which he had been led, and has been followed, by scholars and princes, this departure from rule, or, more properly, such exceptions to it to the present, whatever may be pretended by modern refinements, were then at least warranted; and in familiar dialogue may yet be admitted as judicious.
“In this case, where, after a genitive plural preceded by a nominative singular, a plural verb, immediately following the genitive plural, forms the sentence, the ear does not only not feel this use of the verb as any way offensive, but, on the contrary, seems to call for it: the sound of the plural s misleads and occasions the ear to refer itself to the plural genitive, as if it were the legitimate nominative case: at the same time it is urged to this expedient for the purpose of avoiding an offensive accumulation and classing of ss; as the plural genitive and verb singular, thus brought so near together invariably produce this consequence.
“To the ear, therefore, it belongs altogether to decide; there can be no question of grammar: of, if such were raised, it ought to be in the plain and common case; as in the quotation from Queen Elizabeth, and the second instance from King James, where the verbs immediately follow the nominative cases; or where, as is frequent in Shakespeare, and is found in the Bible and our best writers of that day, only other members of the sentences, not plural nouns, are interposed.
“But Mr. Malone tells us here (and elsewhere, ‘The voice of all the Gods Make Heav’n drowsy with the harmony.’ [LLL 4.3.342 (1696)] Biron.) that it should be otherwise, and that it is Shakespeare that is in error; although he has there pointed out an instance (‘The number of the names together were about an hundred and twenty.’ Acts I.15.), where there is no clashing of consonants. And this is also the use of Shakespeare, where another branch of a sentence is interposed between the genitive plural and verbs. ‘The venom of such looks, we fairly hope, Have lost their quality.’ [H5 5.2.18 (3005)] Isab.
“And, where other branches of sentences are also interposed, closing with plural nouns in contact with the verb, (as in ‘How oft the sight of means, to do ill deeds, Make all deeds done.’ [Jn 4.2.219 (1944)] K. John), there seems additional reason to insist upon this exception.
“Under these combinations then, this course must have been thought consistent with good taste and good writing; and, as is conceived, is called for more particularly in poetry, where the music of numbers ought to make a part of the consideration: at that day the want of agreement between noun and verb, even where nothing was interposed, was not thought by scholars an indispensable rule of grammar, or barbarous or offensive even to the ear of courtiers: and this violation of it would frequently escape even their ear, though their eye might detect it.
“The courtly Puttenham and the poet Daniel, each of them giving lessons on the subject of their art, afford such examples: ‘Three causes moves us to this figure.’ Arte of English Poesie, 1589, p. 149: and ‘The distribution of giftes are universall, and all seasons hath them in some sort.’ Daniel’s Apologie for Ryme, 1603, in answer to Campion’s Observations in the Arte of English Poesie, 1602; and ‘Superfluous humours destroyeth naturall hete,’ Vulgaria Hormanni 4to. 1530. [sig. I1].
“Closing these instances with a reading of our author, which after the severest scrutiny has been approved as the true one by every critics, except Steevens, from Warburton to Ritson, ‘Masters of passion sways it to the mood.’ &c. [MV 4.1.51 (1956)] Shylock, we shall add, that this usage of a plural for the purpose of giving effect, is carried much further in Macbeth, where it is taken up from the general impression of the dialogue. The Doctor, speaking of Lady Macbeth, says, ‘You see her eyes are open?’ Gent. ‘Ay but their sense are shut.’ [5.1.24 (2117)]. Their senses, i.e., the sense of her eyes, here carried along with that word (which is not more than a pronoun possessive, and wanting that termination of plural nouns that usually affects the ear) a plural image; and the loose grammar of the age allowed the annexation of a plural verb.
“Mr. Malone, in the close of the first scene of the Tempest, where Ariel enters invisible, Reed’s edition, [4:78], says, ‘The plural noun, joined to a verb in the singular number, is to be met with in almost every page of the first folio.’ Such has been shewn to be the case in the pages of his contemporaries. A playwright, bound to copy the manners, has full warrant, without laying any particular ground for it, to use the familiar language of his time: and the poet, who must not neglect the flow and harmony of his numbers, is, for that reason, wherever it shall answer his purpose, called upon to employ it.”
Ed. note: End notes permit verbosity.
1821 v1821
v1821 = v1813
216 more then the scope]
1826 sing1
sing1: mal; v1793, cald1 without attribution
216-17 more then the scope . . . allowe] Singer (ed. 1826): “Malone says, ‘the poet should have written allows:’ but the grammar and practice of Shakspeare’s age was not strict in the concordance of plural and singular in noun and verb; and numerous examples might be adduced from his contemporaries to prove this. The question is, Are the writers of that time to be tried by modern rules of grammar, with which they were not acquainted? Steevens [v1793], with a sweeping assertion, which no one conversant with the MSS. of the time will allow, would attribute all such inaccuracies to illiterate transcribers or printers. We have Malone’s assertion, that such errors are to be met with in almost every page of the first folio. The first quarto reads:—‘— no further personal power To business with the king Than those related articles do shew.’
1832 cald2
cald2 = cald1 + in magenta underlined
216 To busines]
Caldecott (ed. 1832): “
power to business]] i.e. for the purpose of,
commission to transact, business.”
cald2 = cald1+ in magenta underlined; minus deletions, struck thru
216-7 more then the scope . . .
allowe]
Caldecott (ed. 1832): “. . . . In her translation of a classic it was done by the sovereign of that day: ‘The cleare
daies followes the darck clowdes: the roughest
seas insues the greatest calmes.”
Queen Elizabeth’s Seneca, given to Sir J. Harrington, 1597.
Nugœ Antiq. 12mo. 1779, [2:308]:
as she did in a letter to her learned successor. Mar. 6, 1592 ‘a guilty conscience skills more to shift than ten wiser heads knowes how to win.’ Archœolog. [19.11.] 4to. 1821: as he also himself and, when laying down rules of composition, we find in the works of her learned successor, ‘And
birds with all their heavenlie voces cleare
Dois make a sweit and heavinly harmony, And fragrant
flours dois spring up lustely!’
King James’
s reylis and cautelis of Scottis Poesie, 1584.
“ . . . . [T]his was not an age in which it is possible to refer such a practise to the want of a knowledge of the common rules of grammar.
“Further towards the close of Charles’s reign, in Hermippus Anglo-latinus, 12mo. 1639, an elaborate and learned grammatical work, which commences with inculcating, that in translating or construing in these languages, it is necessary to the purity of the style, that the utmost care should be taken to ‘reserve to each idiom its own propriety,’ the author proceeds, and without noticing it any way anomalous, in exact conformity with the phraseology of the text, ‘where the analogy of both tongues goe by one rule, the danger is the lesse’ [sig. A3b]: but faterwards amongst his Syntaxeos Anomalia, where he states the general use of the singular with the plural, he instances also in the Latin combinations, that give the singular noun a pplural, character [sig. F10] as ‘Rhemus cum fratre quirino Jura dabant.’ Virg. But it is ‘Cana fides et Vesta, Remo,’ &c. Æn. [1.296], and therefore irrelevant: the instance is of course more satisfactory, Ipse cum fratre adesse jussi sumus.’ Cic.
“Such then . . . consequence.
“To the ear, therefore, it belongs altogether to decide; there can be no question of grammar: of, if such were raised, it ought to be in the plain and common case; as in the quotation from Queen Elizabeth, and the second of the two instances from King James, where the verbs immediately follow the nominative cases; or where, as is frequent in Shakespeare, and is found in the Bible and our best writers of that day, only other members of the sentences, not plural nouns, are interposed.
“But Mr. Malone tells us here (and elsewhere, ‘The voice of all the Gods Make Heav’n drowsy with the harmony.’ [LLL 4.3.342 (1696)] Biron.) that it should be otherwise, and that it is Shakespeare that is in error; although he has there pointed out an instance (‘The number of the names together were about an hundred and twenty.’ Acts I.15.), where there is no clashing of consonants. And in [LLL 4.3.] Bir. edit. 1821, he also supplies an instance directly to our point from Marlow’s Hero and Leander, ‘The outside of her garments were of lawn.’ And this is also the use of Shakespeare, where another branch of a sentence is interposed between the genitive plural and verbs. ‘The venom of such looks, we fairly hope, Have lost their quality.’ [H5 5.2.18 (3005)] Isab.
“Under these combinations then, this course must have been thought consistent with good taste and good writing; and, as is conceived, is called for more particularly in poetry, where the music of numbers ought to make a part of the consideration: at that day the want of agreement between noun and verb, even where nothing was interposed, was not thought by scholars an indispensable rule of grammar, or barbarous or offensive even to the ear of courtiers: and this violation of it would frequently escape even their ear, though their eye might detect it. ‘It was upon Shakespere (says H. Tooke, Diversions of Purley [2: 52]) that the charge of ignorance of the rudiments of grammar was to be fixed.’ But his ear caught the idiomatic phraseology, and he had a mind capable of comprehending the genius, of his native tongue.
“And we find the principle, acted upon in the text, (that of yielding to the guidance of the ear and sense in defiance of technicalities) carried by elegant and most learned authors much further, when discussing the gravest subjects: where a genitive case with a plural termination is attached to a noun in the singular, immediately following a plural pronoun or adjective: ‘Some will labour to excuse these manner of proceedings, and to colour, &c.’ Dangerous Positions &c. under pretense of Reformation. By Archb. Bancroft, 4to. 1593. p. 13. ‘With these manner of proceedings the King there and the Statem finding great cause of just discontent and danger.’ Ib. p. 22. So direct a violation of a clear rule could not at any time have escaped attention.
“The courtly . . . [sig.I.1].
“Closing these instances with a reading of our author, which after the severest scrutinu has been approved as the true one by every critics, except Steevens, from Warburton to Ritson, ‘Masters of passion sways it to the mood.’ &c. [MV 4.1.51 (1956)] Shylock, we shall add, that this usage of a plural for the purpose of giving effect, is carried much further in Macbeth, where it is taken up from the general impression of the dialogue. The Doctor, speaking of Lady Macbeth, says, ‘You see her eyes are open?’ Gent. ‘Ay but their sense are shut.’ [5.1.24-5 (2117-18)]. Their senses, i.e., the sense of her eyes, here carried along with that word (which is not more than a pronoun possessive, and wanting that termination of plural nouns that usually affects the ear) a plural image; and the loose grammar of the age allowed the annexation of a plural verb. And so fully were we justified in our conceptions upon this point, we fall so naturally into this course, that we find even a stronger instance supplied by Mr. Boswell from the writings of a very elegant scholar and critic of our own day, the author of the History of English Poetry. In a note upon [2H4 3.2] Shal. (Malone’s Shaksp. 8vo. 1821. [17: 133] Mr. Warton says, ‘B. and Fl.’s play contains many satirical strokes against Heywood’s Comedy, the force of which are entirely lost to those, who have not seen that comedy.’
“With the view of establishing. whether this license offended the ear, we have repeatedly read, and given to scholars this passage to read; and upon asking, whether it containe any thing, that called for annotation (and they well knew the attention paid to grammatical accuracy throughout these notes) they uniformyl answered, that it did not; unless perhaps some explanation of the word, dilated, were given, and in correspondent with this impression and feeling all Editions from whatever hands are so printed and pass it over unnoticed.
“Mr. Malone, in the close of the first scene of the Tempest, where Ariel enters invisible, Reed’s edition, [4:78], says, ‘The plural noun, joined to a verb in the singular number, is to be met with in almost every page of the first folio.’ Such has been shewn to be the case in the pages of his contemporaries. A playwright, bound to copy the manners, has full warrant, without laying any particular ground for it, to use the familiar language of his time: and the poet, who must not neglect the flow and harmony of his numbers, is, for that reason, wherever it shall answer his purpose, called upon to employ it. See ‘to keep them living, Johnson and Steevens’s Edit. 1803. [Tmp. 2.1.299 (1002)] Ariel.”
1839 knt1
knt1: cald2 without attribution + in magenta underlined
216-7 more then the scope . . . allowe] Knight (ed. [1839]): “This grammatical impropriety, as we now call it, was a common license of the best authors of Shakspere’s age. The use of the plural verb with the nominative singular, a plural genitive intervening, can scarcely be detected as an error, even by those who consider the peculiar phraseology of the time of Elizabeth as a barbarism, and are apt to call out upon Shakspere as a monstrous violator of grammar. The truth is, that it is only within the last half century that the construction of our language has attained that uniform precision which is now required. We find in all the old dramatists many such lines as this in Marlow:—‘The outside of her garments were of lawn.’ And too many such lines have been corrected by the editors of Shakspere, who have thus obliterated the traces of our tongue’s history, It is remarkable that the very commentators, who were always ready to fix the charge of ignorance of the rudiments of grammar upon Shakspere, have admitted the following passage in a note to Henry IV, Part II., by the elegant modern scholar T. Warton: ‘Beaumont and Fletcher’s play contains many satirical strokes against Heywood’s comedy; the force of which are entirely lost to those who have not seen that comedy.”
1843- mLewes
mLewes; knt (licence, Wharton)
216-7 more then the scope . . . allowe] Lewes (ms. notes in Knight, ed. 1843): “Not a licence but a common error and one that is committed by the best authors of our age. Knight thinks it very remarkable that Wharton should have made a similar grammatical error to the one above mentioned; but had he reflected a moment he would have seen that Wharton’s error arose from the same cause as Shakspere’s viz the proximity of the plural substantive to the verb which it does not govern.—it is right to retain such errors in the text.—”
1844 verp
verp: standard; Steevens via cald?; ≈ knt1 without attribution (underlined); ≈ knt1 + in magenta underlined
216-17 scope . . .
allowe]
Verplanck (ed. 1844): “The scope of these articles when dilated
and explained in full. Stevens [sic] pronounces the obvious grammatical impropriety, ‘and all other such defects in our author,’ to be merely the error of illiterate transcribers or printers. It may be often so. But such errors are to be found in the best contemporary writers, and were a common license of that age.
Similar inaccuracies have been remarked in the works of Fuller, one of the most learned as well as original writers of the following age. Mr. Knight observes that [quotes from “The use” through “history.”].”
1854 del2
del2
216 more . . . scope] Delius (ed. 1854): “more ist Wiederholung des verhergehenden farther. Die Gesandten dürfen in ihrer Verhandlung mit dem Norwegischen König nicht über den Spielraum hinausgeben, den ihnen sie schriftlich auseinandergesetzten Vergleuchsartikel verstatten.” [more is a repetition of the earlier farther. The messengers may not exceed the scope of their written orders in their negotiation with the Norwegian king.]
1856 hud1
hud1 ≈ verp; Coleridge n. in 179; +
216-17 more then the scope . . . allowe] Hudson (ed. 1856): “That is, the scope of these articles when dilated or explained in full. Such elliptical expressions are common with the Poet, from his having more thought than space. The rules of modern grammar would require allows instead of allow; but in old writers, when the noun and the verb have a genitive intervening, nothing is more common than for the verb to take the number of the genitive.— ‘In the king’s speech,’ says Coleridge, ‘observe the set and pedantically antithetic form of the sentences when touching that which galled the heel of conscience,—the strain of undignified rhetoricl and yet what follows concerning the public weal, a certain appropriate majesty.’ H.”
This Coleridge remark probably should go at the beginning of the speech, or at least with the beginning of the oxymorons; I put it in 179 now with another ref. at 195. In hud2, the CLR remarks are in 194 without attribution
1862 cham
cham: hud without attribution
216-17 Carruthers & Chambers (ed. 1862): “This is one of the poet’s elliptical expressions, meaning the scope of the articles when they should be dilated or extended.”
1868 c&mc
c&mc: standard on business as verb
216 To busines]
Clarke &
Clarke (ed. 1868): “‘To transact business.’ One of Shakespeare’s forcible verbs framed from a noun.”
1870 Abbott
Abbott
216 To] Abbott (§ 186): “To . . .means motion, ‘with a view to,’ ‘for an end,’ &c. This is of course still common before verbs, but the Elizabethans used to in this sense before nouns . . . [quotes 216] . . . .”
1872 hud2
hud2 = hud1 minus Coleridge; ≈ Coleridge, without attribution, moved to 194
216-17 more then the scope . . . allowe]
1881 hud3
hud3 ≈ Seymour; Abbott + in magenta underlined
216 to busines] Hudson (ed. 1881): “To was often thus used where we should use for. So a little before, in ‘taken to wife [192],’ and a little after in [237] ‘bow them to your gracious leave.’”
hud3 = hud2 minus last clause
216-7 more then the scope . . . delated articles]
1885 mull
mull ≈ cald without attribution
216 to busines] Mull (ed. 1885): “to transact” business.
1939 kit2
kit2 = theon without attribution
216 to business] Kittredge (ed. 1939): "to negotiate."
1958 fol1
fol1: standard
216 To busines] Wright & LaMar (ed. 1958): “to do business.”
1982 ard2
ard2: Abbott; kit2
216 To] Jenkins (ed. 1982): “for (Abbott 186). But Kittredge takes ’to business’ as an infinitive.”
1987 oxf4
oxf4 = Abbott § 186
216 To]
1992 fol2
fol2 = kit2 without attribution
216 To busines] Mowat & Werstine (ed. 1992): “to negotiate“
2006 ard3q2
ard3q2: standard
216 to busines] Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “to do business, i.e. negotiate”
ard3q2: standard
216 then] than Thompson & Taylor (ed. 2006): “All three texts read ’then’, a common spelling of than in sixteenth-century usage.”
