Turn me away; and let the foul'st contempt
Shut door upon me, and so give me up
To the sharpest kind of justice. Please you, fir,
The king, your father, was reputed for
A prince most prudent, of an excellent
And unmatch'd wit and judgment: Ferdinand,
My father, king of Spain, was reckon'd one
The wifeft prince, that there had reign'd by many
A year before: It is not to be question'd
That they had gather'd a wife council to them
Of every realm, that did debate this business,
Who deem'd our marriage lawful: Wherefore I

humbly

Beseech you, fir, to spare me, till I may
Be by my friends in Spain advis'd; whose counsel
I will implore: if not; i'the name of God,
Your pleasure be fulfill'd!

after duty. Mr. M. Mason has justly observed that, with such a punctuation, the sense requires-Towards your facred perfon. A. comma being placed at duty, the conftruction is-If you can report and prove aught against mine honour, my love and duty, or aught against your facred person, &c. but I doubt whether this was our author's intention; for such an arrangement seems to make a breach of her honour and matrimonial bond to be something diftinct from an offence against the king's person, which is not the cafe. Perhaps, however, by the latter words Shakspeare meant, against your life. MALONE.

-- against my honour aught,

My bond to wedlock, or my love and duty

Against your facred person, &c.] The meaning of this passage is fufficiently clear, but the construction of it has puzzled us all. It is evidently erroneous, but may be amended by merely removing the word or from the middle of the second line to the end of it. It will then run thus

against my honour aught,

My bond to wedlock,----my love and duty,-or
Against your facred person, &c.

This flight alteration makes it grammatical, as well as intelligible. M. MASON.

WOL.

You have here, lady,

(And of your choice,) these reverend fathers; men

Of fingular integrity and learning,

Yea, the elect of the land, who are assembled

To plead your cause: It shall be therefore bootless,

That longer you defire the court; 3 as well

For your own quiet, as to rectify

What is unfettled in the king.

Сам.

His grace

Hath spoken well, and justly: Therefore, madam,

It's fit this royal feffion do proceed ;

And that, without delay, their arguments

Be now produc'd, and heard.

Q. KATH.

To you I fpeak.

WOL.

Q. KATH.

Lord cardinal,

Your pleasure, madam ?

Sir,

I am about to weep; 4 but, thinking that
We are a queen, (or long have dream'd so,) certain,
The daughter of a king, my drops of tears

I'll turn to sparks of fire.

WOL.

Be patient yet.

3 That longer you defire the court ;) That you defire to protract the business of the court; that you folicit a more distant feffion and trial. To pray for a longer day, i. e. a more diftant one, when the trial or execution of criminals is agitated, is yet the language of the bar.-In the fourth folio, and all the modern editions, defer is substituted for desire. MALONE.

4 I am about to weep; &c.] Shakspeare has given almost a fimilar sentiment to Hermione, in The Winter's Tale, on an almost similar occafion :

" I am not prone to weeping, as our sex
"Commonly are, &c.--but I have

"That honourable grief lodg'd here, which burns
"Worse than tears drown;" &c. STEEVENS.

Q. KATH. I will, when you are humble; nay,

before,

Or God will punish me. I do believe,
Induc'd by potent circumstances, that
You are mine enemy; and make my challenge,
You shall not be my judge: 5 for it is you
Have blown this coal betwixt my lord and me,-
Which God's dew quench!-Therefore, I say again,
I utterly abhor, yea, from my foul,

Refuse you for my judge; whom, yet once more,
I hold my most malicious foe, and think not

At all a friend to truth.

WOL.

I do profess,

You speak not like yourself; who ever yet
Have ftood to charity, and display'd the effects

Of difpofition gentle, and of wifdom

O'ertopping woman's power. Madam, you do me

wrong:

I have no fpleen against you; nor injustice

For you, or any: how far I have proceeded,

Or how far further shall, is warranted

By a commiffion from the confiftory,

Yea, the whole confiftory of Rome. You charge me,

That I have blown this coal: I do deny it :

5

- and make my challenge,

You shall not be my judge:] Challenge is here a verbum juris, a law term. The criminal, when he refuses a juryman, says-1 challenge him. JOHNSON.

I utterly abhor, yea, from my foul

Refuse you for my judge;] These are not mere words of paffion, but technical terms in the canon law.

Deteftor and Recuso. The former, in the language of canoni fts, fignifies no more, than I protest against. BLACKSTONE.

The words are Holinshed's: "-and therefore openly protested that she did utterly abhor, refuse, and forsake such a judge." MALONE.

The king is present: if it be known to him,
That 1 gainsay my deed, how may he wound,
And worthily, my falsehood? yea, as much
As you have done my truth. But if he know
That I am free of your report, he knows,
I am not of your wrong. Therefore in him
It lies, to cure me: and the cure is, to
Remove these thoughts from you: The which before
His highness shall speak in, I do beseech
You, gracious madam, to unthink your speaking,
And to say so no more.

Q. KATH.

My lord, my lord,

I am a fimple woman, much too weak
To oppose your cunning. You are meek, and hum-

ble-mouth'd;

You fign your place and calling, in full seeming,
With meekness and humility: but your heart
Is cramm'd with arrogancy, spleen, and pride.
You have, by fortune, and his highness' favours,
Gone flightly o'er low steps; and now are mounted
Where powers are your retainers: and your words,

7

gainsay-] i. e. deny. So, in Lord Surrey's tranflation of the fourth Book of the Æneid:

8

" I hold thee not, nor yet gainsay thy words."

STEEVENS.

But if-] The conjunction-But, which is wanting

in the old copy, was supplied, for the fake of meature, by Sir T. Hanmer. STEEVENS.

• You fign your place and calling, Sign, for answer.

WARBURTON.

I think, to fign, must here be to show, to denote. By your outward meekness and humility, you show that you are of an holy order, but, &c. JOHNSON.

So, with a kindred sense, in Julius Cæfar :

"

Sign'd in thy spoil, and crimfon'd in thy lethe."

Domesticks to you, serve your will, as't please
Yourself pronounce their office. I must tell you,
You tender more your person's honour, than
Your high profession spiritual: That again
I do refuse you for my judge; and here,
Before you all, appeal unto the pope,

I

Where powers are your retainers: and your words, Domesticks to your serve your will,] You have now got power at your beck, following in your retinue; and words therefore are degraded to the servile state of performing any office which you thall give them. In humbler and more commott terms: Having now got power, you do not regard your word.

JOHNSON.

The word power, when used in the plural and applied to one person only, will not bear the meaning that Dr. Johnson wishes to give it.

By powers are meant the Emperor and the King of France, in the pay of one or the other of whom Wolsey was conftantly retained; and it is well known that Wolfey entertained some of the nobility of England among his domefticks, and had an absolute power over the rest. M. MASON.

Whoever were pointed at by the word powers, Shakspeare, furely, does not mean to say that Wolfey was retained by them, but that they were retainers, or subservient, to Wolfey.

MALONE.

I believe that-powers, in the present instance, are used merely to express persons in whom power is lodged. The Queen would infinuate that Wolfey had rendered the highest officers of state fubfervient to his will. STEEVENS.

I believe we should read:

Where powers are your retainers, and your wards,
Domesticks to you, &c.

The Queen rises naturally in her description. She paints the powers of government depending upon Wolfey under three images; as his retainers, his wards, his domeftick fervants.

TYRWHITт.

So, in Storer's Life and Death of Thomas Wolfey, Cardinal,

a poem, 1599:

" I must have notice where their wards must dwell;

" I car'd not for the gentry, for I had

"Yong nobles of the land," &C. STEEVENS.