1773 v1773

v1773=JOHN

1778 v1778

1731 grunt] Steevens (ed. 1778): This word occurs in The Death of Zoroas, a fragment in blank verse, printed at the end of Lord Surry’s Poems: ‘--none the charge could give;

Here grunts; here grones; echwhere strong youth is spent.’ And Stanybarst in his translation of Virgil, 1582, for supremum congemuit gives us: “--for fighting it grunts.”

1783 RITSON

1731 grunt] RITSON (1783, p. 200): “Dr. Johnson is for or against Shakspeares own words just as it suits his purpose or inclination: if grunt (the reading of all the old copies) be to be changed to groan merely because (as he says) it can scarcely be borne by modern ears, Shakspeare may be so transmografyed (how do your ears bear that, dr. Johnson?) and frittered away, by his friendly editors, in the course of a few years, that, if he were to rise from the dead, he could not possibly know his own work.”

1790 MAL

To grunt and sweat vnder a wearie life] MALONE (ed. 1790): “I apprehend that it is the duty of an editor to exhibit what his authour wrote, and not to substitute what may appear to the present age preferable: and Dr. Johnson was of the same opinion. See his note on the word hugger-mugger, Act IV. fc. v. I have therefore, though with some reluctance, adhered to the old copies, however unpleasing this word may be to the ear. On the stage, without doubt, an actor is at liberty to substitute a less offensive word. To the ears of our ancestors it probably conveyed no unpleasing sound; for we find it used by Chaucer and others: ‘But never gront he at no stroke but on, Or elles at two, but if his storie lie.’ The Monkes Tale, v. 14627, Tyrwhitt’s edit. Again, in Wily Beguil’d, written before 1596: ’She’s never well, but grunting in a corner.’”

1791 SJC

1731 grunt] Anon. (St. James’s Chr. no. 4780 [12-15 Nov. 1791]: 4): “Mistakes are sometimes very laughable—A writer in the Universal Magazine, in transcribing Hamlet’s soliloquy, ‘To be or not to be,’ &tc. instead of ‘to groan and sweat,’ has written ‘to grunt and sweat,’—transforming man into a hog.”

1731 grunt] Anon. (St. James’s Chr. no. 4783 [19-22 Nov. 1791]: 4): “I hope you will have the justice to inform your readers, that the word—grunt, in Hamlet’s soliloquy, was declared to be the true reading by Dr. Johnson, in his edition 1765, Vol. VIII. p. 209; and was afterwards justified by Mr. Steevens, who produced examples of the same phraseology, in his edition 1778, Vol. X. p. 278. The ‘celebrated text’ of Mr. Malone, on the present occasion, can therefore only boast of having admitted a reading sufficiently established by his predecessors.

“Should any pendantick actor, however, restore this proprium porcorum to the Stage, I may venture to prophesy that such a universal grunt from the audience will reward his restoration, that, Mr. Baldwin, (as Juvenal expresses it) you would suppose ‘cum remigibus grunniffe Elpenora porcis.’ In English ‘that Pig Elpinor, you would swear, With all his grunting shipmates, grunted there’.”

1731 grunt] Philo-Shakespeare (St. James’s Chr. no. 4785 [24-26 Nov. 1791]: 4): “When your Correspondent made the animadversion on the writer of the Soliloquy of Shakespeare in the Universal Magazine, he did not consider the English taste and state of the language, at the time that authour wrote; or he would not hastily have accused the modern writer of misquoting the word “Grunt for Groan; particularly if he had taken the trouble of reading the old editions of Shakespeare, which (admidst all the beauties with which the work abounds) are interspersed with ideas and expressions too gross for an audience of the present day.

“If you will turn to the second folio edition of Shakespeare printed in 1632 you will find the Soliloquy alluded to, “To grunt and sweat under a weary life,” which more modern writers have altered to To groan”

1731 grunt] W. B. (St. James’s Chr. no. 4782 [17-19 Nov. 1791]: 4): “I hope you will have the justice to inform the witty and very liberal author of a paragraph in your last postscript, respecting a quotation from the soliloquy in Hamlet, in the Universal Magazine, that the quotation, as it stands in that publication, is literally so in the celebrated text of Mr. Malone, and vindicated by him in a longer note: ‘Who would fardel bear, To grunt and sweat under a weary life’ (See Malone’s Shakespeare, Vol. X. p. 290).”

1791 STANLEY

1731 To...life] STANLEY (Gent. Mag. 61 pt. 2 (Dec. 1791]: 1098-1101): <p. 1098> “Mr. Urban,

A few days ago, in one of the papers to which we are every morning indebted for so much sound criticism, and judicious observation on men, manners, and books, a sensible writer remarked, that Mr. Malone had shewn but little taste in altering a line in Hamlet, ‘To groan and sweat under a weary life;’ and substituting in its place, ‘To grunt and sweat under a weary life.’

Soon afterwards, some stupid, purblind Antiquary, as it should seem, inserted the following answer to this very just observation: ‘It has been long since judiciously observed, that it would be well for the world, if those who presume to instruct the publick would read before they write. If this sensible rule had been attended to by the critick who remarked a few days ago, that Mr. Malone had shewn but little taste in altering the following line of Shakspeare, ‘To groan and sweat under a weary life,’ he would have known, that there is no such line in Shakspeare as he quotes; and that Mr. Malone has altered nothing; but, with his usual accuracy and fidelity, exhibited the line as it is found in the authentic copies of the play of Hamlet; the first quarto printed in 1604, and the folio of 1623.— If words, whenever they grow uncouth by disuse, or gross by vulgarity, are to be ejected from the text of our antient authors, the history of our language, as Dr. Johnson has justly observed, will soon be lost.’

In the same idle strain is Mr. Malone’s note on the line already quoted, in his late edition of Shakspeare: ‘I apprehend that it is the duty of an Editor to exhibit what his author wrote, </p. 1098><p. 1099> and not to substitute what may appear to the present age preferable; and Dr. Johnson was of the same opinion. See his note on the word hugger-mugger, act iv. sc. v. I have therefore, though with some reluctance, adhered to the old copies, however unpleasing this word may be to the ear. On the stage, without doubt, an actor is at liberty to substitute a less offensive word. To the ears of our ancestors it probably conveyed no unpleasing sound, for we find it used by Chaucer and others.’

Dr. Johnson’s note in act. iv. is, I find, as follows: ‘In hugger-mugger to enter him.]— All the modern editions that I have consulted, give it, ‘In private to enter him.’ That the words now re-placed are better, I do not undertake to prove; it is sufficient that they are Shakspeare’s. If phraseology is to be changed as words grow uncouth by disuse, or gross by vulgarity, the history of every language will be lost: we shall no longer have the words of any author; and, as these alterations will be often unskilfully made, we shall in time have very little of his meaning.’

To this Mr. Malone has subjoined: ‘On this just observation I ground the restoration of a gross and unpleasing word in a preceding passage, for which Mr. Pope substituted groan.— The alteration in the present instance was made by the same editor.’

Now, Mr. Urban, can any thing be more shallow and trifling than all this?— The publick, in my opinion, is much indebted to the modern Editors of Shakspeare antecedent to Mr. Malone; who, in other instances beside that abovementioned, have very properly been regulated by the principle of the courtly Dean, ‘Who never mention’d hell to ears polite,’ and have taken care to substitute pleasing and fashionable words, instead of the obsolete and gross terms which sometimes occur in that admirable author. Thus, in this very play of Hamlet, they have given us let e’en for beteem, that strange word which the old copies furnish; and o’er-grows for o’er-crows, a word that might sound well enough in a cock-pit, but which, I suppose, was never heard in any polite assembly. In the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet they have, with great propriety and a due sense of decorum, entirely omitted two lines, which, however they might have been endured in Queen Bess’s days, are certainly very improper to be retained in a book which is now found in every parlour. These lines, because forsooth they appear in all the authentic copies’ Mr. Malone has restored, from a strange and ridiculous notion which he seems to have adopted, that no Editor has a right to modernize antient authors, and to exhibit them in that elegant and fashionable dress which can alone entitle them to be admitted into good company.

Give me leave, however, Mr. Urban, to add, that, though Mr. Pope, and the other modern Editors preceding Mr. Malone, have very properly dismissed the word grunt from the line already quoted, notwithstanding all the authentic copies of Hamlet concur in that reading, they have done their work but by halves, and have by no means laid the axe to the root of the evil. It is well known that, for some time past, neither man, woman, nor child, in Great Britain or Ireland, of any rank or fashion, has been subject to that gross kind of exsudation which was formerly known by the name of sweat; and that now every mortal, except carters, coal-heavers, and Irish chairmen, (animals all sui generis, and therefore not included within the general description of other British subjects,) merely perspires. Now, as the word sweat has for these twenty years past been gradually becoming more and more odious, and has indeed almost died out of our language, it is absolutely certain that Shakspeare could never have used that obsolete and disgustful term, which, doubtless, was as disagreeable in his days as it is now. I suppose it will readily be granted me, that fashions, manners, and phraseology, are in some respects at least permanent and immutable. Whatever is uncouth or gross to-day, will be gross and uncouth to-morrow, and must have been so at all times; and therefore (for I will not keep the reader longer in suspence) it is demonstrably clear, that the true reading of the line in Hamlet is, ‘To groan, perspire, under a weary life.’

This very happy emendation, as I am confident it must appear at once to every reader, I sent to the last Editor of our great Dramatic Poet; but, to my great surprize, he did not adopt, or even mention it. </p. 1099><p. 1100></p. 1100><p. 1101> Willm Stanley. New-Hall, near Birmingham, Nov. 30.

P.S. Four skilful compositors, who were originally employed in the very useful copper coinage of the great commercial town near which I live, and afterwards worked for the ingenious Mr. Baskerville, are, I hear, engaged to print the work above-mentioned; and the choice of them must be allowed to be extremely proper. Tractant fabrilia fabri. Having been long used to a nice and curious imitation of the genuine coin of the realm, they will execute with spirit and accuracy an undertaking of a similar nature; the object of which is not, as some may maliciously represent, to adulterate Shakspeare, but to renovate the old bard, and to exhibit him as he himself would wish to be exhibited, were he now living.” </p. 1101>

1791- RANN

RANN

1731 grunt] Rann (ed. 1791-): “—To grunt.”

1792 STANLEY

STANLEY=MAL. JOHN

1731 grunt] Stanley (St. James’s Chr. no. 4808 [17-19 Jan. 1792]: 2): “It is well known that for some time past, neither man, woman, nor child, in Great Britain or Ireland, of any rank or fashion, has been subject to that gross kind of exfudation which was formerly known by the name of sweat; and that now every mortal except carters, coal-heavers, and Irish chairmen merely perspires. Now, as the word sweat has for these twenty years past been gradually becoming more and more odious, and has indeed almost died out of our language, it is absolutely certain that Shakespeare could never have used that obsolete and disgusting term, which, doubtless, was as disagreeable in his days, as it is now. I suppose it will readily be granted me, that fashions, manners, and phraseology are, in some respects at least, permanent and immutable. What is uncouth or gross to-day will be gross and uncouth to-morrow, and must have been so at all times; and therefore (for I will not keep the reader longer in suspense) it is demonstrably clear that the true reading of the line in Hamlet is, ‘To groan, perspire, under a weary life.’

“This very happy emendation, as I am confident it must appear at once to every reader, I sent to the last editor of our great Dramatick Poet; but, to my great surprize, he did not adopt, or even mention it.”

1793 v1793

v1793=v1785, mal

v1793-

1731 grunt] Steevens (ms. notes, ed. 1793): “Again in Turbervile’s translation of Ovid’s Epistle from Carace to Maecareus: ‘What might I miser doo? greefe forst me grunt.’ Again in the same translator’s Hypermnestra to Lynceus: -’-round about I heard Of dying men the grunts.’”

1819 CALD1

CALD1=JOHN1+

CALEDCOTT (ed. 1819): “Language is in its nature flux and variable above all things, and of course open to the inroads of fashion and refinement. Were we, because this word, as gripe, crack, &c., has lost its rank and dignity in modern use, to displace and expunge it from the pages of our earlier writers, we should do injury as well to the characters of such author’s style, as to the integrity and history of the language itself.

And Stanyhurst in his Virgil 1512, translates "supremum congemuit," sighing it grunts."

It had been well if Shakespeare’s commentators had uniformly acted upon this maxim.

See "lug the guts," III. 3. Haml., "hedge a king." IV. 5.

King, and "o’ercrows," V. 1. Haml.

1826 SING1

1731 Singer (ed.1826): “Though to grunt has been degraded in modern language, it appears to have conveyed no vulgar or low image to the ear of our ancestors, as many quotations from the old translations of the classics would show. ‘Loke that the places about thee be so in silence that thy corage and mynde gronte nor groudget nat.’ Paynel’s Translation of Erasmus de Contempt. Mundi. The fact seems to be, that to groan and to grunt were convertible terms. ‘Swyne wode for love groyneth.’---Horman’s Vulgaria. And Chaucer in the Monk’s Tale:-- ‘But never gront at no stroke but on.’”

1841 KNT1 (nd)

1731 Knight (ed. 1839): “Grunt. So the originals. The players, in their squeamishness, always give us groan; and, if they had not the terror of the blank verse before them, they would certainly inflict perspire upon us. Grunt is used for loud lament by Turberville, Stonyhurst, and other writers before Shakspere. We have the word direct from the Anglo--Saxon grunan.”

1847 VERP

VERP

1731 To grunt and sweat vnder a wearie life] Verplanck (ed. 1847): “This is the true reading, according to all the old copies; ‘although,’ as Johnson observes, ‘it can scarcely be borne by modern ears.’ On this point, Malone remarks, ‘I apprehend that it is the duty of an editor to [word unintelligible] what his author wrote; and not to substitute what may appear to the present age preferable. I have, therefore, though with some reluctance, adhered to the old copies, however unpleasing this word may be to the ear. On the stage, without doubt, an actor is at liberty to substitute a less offensive word. To the ears of our ancestors it probably conveyed no unpleasing sound, for we find it used by Chaucer and others.’ The same remark applies to many other old English words used by the poets, divines, and scholars of Shakespeare’s age. They had a general sense, which modern use has narrowed down to some ludicrous or coarse meaning. Thus ‘guts’ for ‘entrails,’ and many others.”

1859 STAU

1731 To grunt and sweat Stauton (ed. 1859): “The expression to grunt, though no[t] euphonious to modern ears, was neither disagreeable nor ususual formerly. It addition to the instances of its use before accumulated, we may add the following, perhaps the most pertiment of all, from Armin’s “nest of Ninnies:”— ‘How the fat fooles of this age will gronte and sweate under this massie burden,’ &c.”

1872 CLN1

CLN1

1731 grunt] Clark & Wright (ed. 1872): “groan. Cotgrave (French Dict.) gives ’Gronder . . . to grunt, groane, grumble (with threatning) against a commandement. Compare Julius Caesar, iv. 1. 22: ’To groan and sweat under the business.’ "

1882 ELZE

1731 To grunt and sweat] Elze (ed. 1882): “This seems to have been a standing phrase; the word to grunt, however, early grew ‘uncouth by disuse and gross by vulgarity’ and was therefore superseded by to groan in the later copies; thus we read in Julius Caesar, IV, 1, 22 groan and sweat, whilst most likely the poet’s own wording was grunt and sweat, and the Quarto of 1676, in the present passage, exhibits the same correction. This shows that at that time, and perhaps as early as the time of FA, to grunt was no longer bearable in poetry.”

1899 ARD1

1885 macd

macd

1732 MacDonald (ed. 1885): “—a dread caused by conscience.”

1731 grunt] DOWDEN (ed. 1899): “groan. Steevens quotes Turbervile, Ovid Epist. xiv. : ‘of dying men the grunts.’ Compare Julius Casar, IV. I. 22: ‘To groan and sweat under the business.’”