KING LEAR. LITERARY AND HISTORICAL NOTICE. THE subject of this interesting tragedy, which was probably written in 1605, is derived from an old historical ballad, founded on a story in Holinshed's Chronicles, and originally told by Geoffery of Monmouth. "Leir (says the Welsh historian) was the eldest son of Bladud, nobly governed his country for sixty years, and died about 800 years before Christ." Camden tells a similar story of Isra, king of the West Saxons, and his three daughters.The episode of Gloster and his sons is taken from Sidney's Arcadia. Tate, the laureat, greatly altered, and in a degree polished this play, inserting new scenes or passages, and transposing or omitting others in particular, he avoided its original heart-rending catastrophe, by which the virtue of Cordelia was suffered to perish in a just cause, contrary to the natural ideas of justice, to the hope of the reader, and to the facts of the ancient narrative. He also introduced Edgar to the audience as the suitor of Cordelia, cancelling the excellent scene in which, after being rejected as dowerless, by Burgundy, her misfortunes and her goodness recommend her to the love of the king of France. Yet the restauration of the king, and the final happiness of Cordelia, have been ceasured (in the Spectator especially) as at variance with true tragic feeling and poetical beauty: although it may fairly be presumed, since mankind naturally love justice, that an attention to its dictates will never make a play worse, and that an audience will generally rise more satisfied where persecuted virtue is rewarded and triumphant. Lear's struggles against his accumu lated injuries, and his own strong feelings of sorrow and indignation, are exquisitely drawn. The daughters severally working him up to madness, and his finally falling a martyr to that malady, is a more deep and skilful combination of dramatic portraiture than can be found in any other writer. "There is no play (says Dr. Johnson,) which keeps the attention so constantly fixed; which so much agitates our passions and interests our curiosity." The celebrated Dr. Warton, who minutely criticised this play in the Adventurer, objected to the instances of cruelty, as too savage and too shocking. But Johnson observes, that the barbarity of the daughters is an historical fact, to which Shakspeare has added little, although he cannot so readily apologize for the extrusion of Gloster's eyes, which is too horrid an act for dramatic exhibition, and such as must always compel the mind to relieve its distresses by incredulity. Colman, as well as Tate, re-modelled this celebrated Drama, but it is acted, with trifling variations, on the original plan of the latter. Kent. Is not this your son, my lord? SCENE 1.-A Room of State in King LEAR's charge: I have so often blush'd to acknowledge Palace. him, that now I am brazed to it. Glo. Sir, this young fellow's mother could: whereupon she grew round-wombed; and had, indeed, Sir, a son for her cradle, ere she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a fault? Kent. I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it being so proper. Glo. But I have, Sir, a son, by order of law, some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer • Handsome. In my account: though this knave came some- | No less in space, validity, and pleasure, what saucily into the world before he was sent Than that confirm'd on Goneril.-Now, our joy, for, yet his mother was fair; there was good Although the last, not least; to whose young sport at his making, and the whoreson must be love acknowledged.-Do you know this noble gentleman, Edmund ? Edm. No, my lord. The vines of France, and milk of Burgundy, Strive to be interess'd: what can you say, to draw Glo. My lord of Kent: remember him here- A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak. after as my honourable friend. Edm. My services to your lordship. Kent. I must love you, and sue to know you better. Edm. Sir, I shall study deserving. Glo. He hath been out nine years, and away he shall again :-The king is coming. [Trumpets sound within Enter LEAR, CORNWALL, ALBANY, GONERIL, REGAN, CORDELIA, and Attendants. Lear. Attend the lords of France and BurGloster. [gundy, Glo. I shall, my liege. [Exeunt GLOSTER and EDMUND. Lear. Meantime we shall express our darker purpose. Give me the map there.-Know, that we have divided, In three, our kingdom: and 'tis our fast intent And you, our no less loving son of Albany, May be prevented now. The princes, France and Burgundy, Great rivals in our youngest daughter's love, Which of you, shall we say, doth love us most ? Gon. Sir, I [matter Cor. Nothing, my lord. Lear. Nothing? Cor. Nothing. Lear. Nothing can come of nothing: speak again. Cor. Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave Lest it may mar your fortunes. You have begot me, bred me, lov'd me: I Do love you more than words can wield the honour : Half my love with him, half my care, and duty: Lear. But goes this with thy heart? Lear. So young, and so untender? Lear. Let it be so.-Thy truth then be thy dower : For, by the sacred radiance of the sun; Or he that makes his generation || messes Kent. Good my liege,- Come not between the dragon and his wrath: lov'd her most, and thought to set my rest On her kind nursery.-Hence, and avoid my sight[To CORDELIA. So be my grave my peace, as here I give Her father's heart from her !-Call France ;Who stirs ? Call Burgundy,-Cornwall and Albany, With my two daughter's dowers digest this third: Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her. do invest you jointly with my power, Pre-eminence, and all the large effects That troop with majesty.-Ourself, by monthly with reservation of a hundred knights, course, By you to be sustain'd, shall our abode [retain Make with you by due turns. Only we still The name, and all the additions ¶ to a king; The sway, Revenue, execution of the rest, [Giving the Crown. Whom I have ever honour'd as my king, Kent. Royal Lear, Lov'd as my father, as my master follow'd, As my great patron thought on in my prayers,— Lear. The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft. Kent. Let it fall rather, though the fork in- | If aught within that little seeming substance, The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly, [speak, Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bound, [doom; When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy And, in thy best consideration, check This hideous rashness: judgment, answer my life, my Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; Lear. Kent, on thy life, no more. Kent. My life I never held but as a pawn Thy safety being the motive. Kent. See better, Lear; and let me still re The true blank + of thine eye. Lear. Now, by Apollo,Kent. Now, by Apollo, king, Thou swear'st thy gods in vain. Lear. O vassal miscreant ! [main, [Laying his Hand upon his Sword. Alb. Corn. Dear Sir, forbear. Lear. Hear me, recreant ! On thine allegiance hear me !Since thou hast sought to make us break our [pride, (Which we durst never yet,) and, with strain'd To come betwixt our sentence and our power; (Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,) Our potency make good, take thy reward. Five days we do allot thee, for provision To shield thee from diseases of the world; And, on the sixth, to turn thy hated back Bur. I know no answer. Will you, with those infirmities she owes, Take her, or leave her? Bur. Pardon me, royal Sir; Election makes not up on such conditions. I tell you all her wealth.-For you, great king, I would not from your love make such a stray, To avert your liking a more worthier way, France. This is most strange ! That she, that even but now was your best object, Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle That monsters it, or your fore-vouch'd || affection Cor. I yet beseech your majesty, (If for I want that glib and oily art, [intend, A still-sol iting eye, and such a tongue Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day follow-That I am ad I have not, though not to have it, ing, Thy banish trunk be found in our dominions, Kent. Fare thee well, king: since thus thou Freedom lives bence, and banishment is here.- Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu; Glo. Here's France and Burgundy, my noble lord. Lear. My lord of Burgundy, We first address towards you, who with this [least, Bur. Most royal majesty, Hath lost me in your liking. Lear. Better thou Hadst not been born, than not to have pleas'd me better. France. Is it but this a tardiness in nature, Bur. Royal Lear, [ber ? Give but that portion which yourself propos'd, Lear. Nothing: I have sworn: I am firm. [father, Cor. Peace be with Burgundy! France. Fairest Cordelia, thou art most rich, being poor; Most choice, forsaken; and most lov'd, despis'd: My love should kindle to inflam'd respect. I crave no more than hath your highness offer'd, Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind: Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see Cor. The jewels of our father with wash'd Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are; father: To your professed bosoms I commit him: I would prefer him to a better place. Gon. Prescribe not us our duties. Reg. Let your study Be to content your lord; who hath receiv'd you Cor. Time shall unfold what plaited cun- Who cover faults, at last shame them derides. France. Come, my fair Cordelia. [Exeunt FRANCE and CORDELIA. Gon. Sister, it is not a little I have to say, of what most nearly appertains to us both. 1 think our father will hence to-night. Reg. That's most certain, and with you; next month with us. Gon. You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little he always loved our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off, appears too grossly. Reg. 'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself. Gon. The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long-engrafted condition, but, therewithal, the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them. Reg. Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him, as this of Kent's banishment. Gon. There is further compliment of leavetaking between France and him. Pray you, let us hit together: If our father carry authority with such dispositions as he bears, this last surrender of his will but offend us. Reg. We shall further think of it. Than doth, within a dull, stale, tred bed, Enter GLOSTER. Glo. Kent banish'd thus! And France in choler parted! And the king gone to-night! subscrib'd his Edm. So please your lordship, none. [Putting up the Letter. Glo. Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter? Edm. I know no news, my lord. Glo. What paper were you reading? Glo. No? What needed then that terrible despatch of it into your pocket? the quality of nothing hath not such need to hide itself. Let's see: Come, if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles. Edm. I beseech you, Sir, pardon me: it is a letter from my brother, that I have not all o'erread: for so much as I have perused, I find it not fit for your over-looking. Glo. Give me the letter, Sir. Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The contents, as in part understand them, are to blame. Glo. Let's see, let's see. Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but as an essay or taste of any virtue. Come to Glo. [Reads.] This policy and reverence of age makes the world bitter to the best of our times, keeps cur fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage in the oppression of aged tyranny; who sways, not as it hath power, but as it is suffered. me, that of this I may speak more. If our father would sleep till I waked him, you should enjoy half his revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your brother, Edgar.Humph-Conspiracy!-Sleep till I waked him -you should enjoy half his revenue,-My son Edgar! Had he a hand to write this? a heart and brain to breed it in ?-When came this to you? Who brought it? Edm. It was not brought me, my lord, there's Gon. We must do something, and i'the heat. the cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet. [Exeunt. Enter EDMUND, with a Letter. Edm. Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy My services are bound: Wherefore should I Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base? base? Glo. You know the character to be your brother's? Edm. If the matter were good, my lord, I Edm. It is his hand, my lord; but, I hope his heart is not in the contents. Glo. Hath he never heretofore sounded you in this business? Edm. Never, my lord: But I have often heard him maintain it to be fit, that, sons at perfect age, and fathers declining, the father should be as ward to the son, aud the sou manage his revenue. Glo. O villain, villain!-His very opinion in the letter!-Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! worse than brutish !-Go sirrah, seek him; I'll apprehend him :-Abominable villain !-Where is he? Edm. I do not well know, my lord. If it |