THE

PLAYS

OF

WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

VOLUME THE FOURTEENTH.

CONTAINING

KING LEAR.

ROMEO AND JULIET.

NFORD LIBRARY

LONDON:

Printed for T. Longman, B. Law and Son, C. Dilly, J. Robson, J. Johnson,
T. Vernor, G. G. J. and J. Robinson, T. Cadell, J. Murray, R. Baldwin,
H. L. Gardner, J. Sewell, J. Nicholls, F. and C. Rivington, W. Goldsmith,
T. Payne, Jun. S. Hayes, R. Faulder, W. Lowndes, B. and J. White,
G. and T. Wilkie, J. and J. Taylor, Scatcherd and Whitaker, T. and J.
Egerton, E. Newbery, J. Barker, J. Edwards, Ogilvy and Speare,
J. Cuthell, J. Lackington, J. Deighton, and W. Miller.

M. DCC. XCIII.

LOCKED STACKS

272630

KING LEA R.*

*KING LEAR.] The ftory of this tragedy had found its way into many ballads and other metrical pieces; yet Shakspeare seems to have been more indebted to The True Chronicle Hiftory of King Leir and his Three Daughters, Gonorill, Ragan, and Cordella, 1605, (which I have already published at the end of a collection of the quarto copies) than to all the other performances together. It appears from the books at Stationers' Hall, that fome play on this fubject was entered by Edward White, May 14, 1594. "A booke entituled, The mofte famous Chronicle Hyftorie of Leire King of England, and his three Daughters." A piece with the fame title is entered again, May 8, 1605; and again Nov. 26, 1607. See the extracts from these Entries at the end of the Prefaces, &c. Vol. I. From The Mirror of Magiftrates, 1587, Shakspeare has, however, taken the hint for the behaviour of the Steward, and the reply of Cordelia to her father concerning her future marriage. The episode of Glofter and his fons must have been borrowed from Sidney's Arcadia, as I have not found the least trace of it in any other work. I have referred to these pieces, wherever our author seems more immediately to have followed them, in the course of my notes on the play. For the firft King Lear, fee likewife Six old Plays on which Shakspeare founded, &c. published for S. Leacroft, CharingCrofs.

The reader will alfo find the ftory of K. Lear, in the second book and 1oth canto of Spenfer's Faery Queen, and in the 15th chapter of the third book of Warner's Albion's England, 1602.

The whole of this play, however, could not have been written till after 1603. Harfnet's pamphlet to which it contains fo many references, (as will appear in the notes) was not published till that year. STEEVENS.

Camden, in his Remains, (p. 306. ed. 1674,) tells a fimilar ftory to this of Leir or Lear, of Ina king of the West Saxons; which, if the thing ever happened, probably was the real origin of the fable. See under the head of Wife Speeches. PERCY.

The story told by Camden in his Remaines, 4to. 1605, is this: "Ina, king of Weft Saxons, had three daughters, of whom upon a time he demanded whether they did love him, and fo would do during their lives, above all others: the two elder fware deeply they would; the youngeft, but the wifeft, told her father flatly, without flattery, that albeit she did love, honour, and reverence him, and fo would whilft fhe lived, as much as nature and daughterly dutie at the uttermoft could expect, yet she did think that one day it would come to paffe that he should affect another more fervently, meaning her husband, when she were married; who being made one flesh with her, as God by commandement had told, and nature had taught her, fhe was to cleave fast to, forfaking father and

mother, kiffe and kinne. [Anonymous.] One referreth this to the daughters of king Leir."

It is, I think, more probable that Shakspeare had this paffage in his thoughts, when he wrote Cordelia's reply concerning her future marriage, than The Mirrour for Magiftrates, as Camden's book was published recently before he appears to have compofed this play, and that portion of it which is entitled Wife Speeches, where the foregoing paffage is found, furnished him with a hint in Coriolanus.

The ftory of King Leir and his three daughters was originally told by Geoffrey of Monmouth, from whom Holinfhed tranfcribed it; and in his Chronicle Shakspeare had certainly read it, as it occurs not far from that of Cymbeline; though the old play on the fame fubject probably firft fuggefted to him the idea of making it the ground-work of a tragedy.

Geoffrey of Monmouth fays, that Leir, who was the eldest fon of Bladud, "nobly governed his country for fixty years." According to that hiftorian, he died about 800 years before the birth of Chrift.

The name of Leir's youngest daughter, which in Geoffrey's hiftory, in Holinshed, The Mirrour for Magiftrates, and the old anonymous play, is Cordeilla, Cordila, or Cordella, Shakspeare found foftened into Cordelia by Spenfer in his Second Book, Canto X. The names of Edgar and Edmund were probably fuggefted by Holinfhed. See his Chronicle, Vol. I. p. 122: " Edgar, the fon of Edmund, brother of Athelftane," &c.

This tragedy, I believe, was written in 1605. See An Attempt to afcertain the order of Shakspeare's plays, Vol. I.

As the episode of Glofter and his fons is undoubtedly formed on the ftory of the blind king of Paphlagonia in Sidney's Arcadia, I fhall fubjoin it, at the end of the play. MALONE.