This comedy, (which is evidently the production of a scholar, many lines of Greek being introduced into it,) appears to have been written after Ben Jonfon's Every Man out of his Humour, (1599,) to which it contains a reference; but I have not discovered the precife time when it was composed. If it were ascertained, it might be fome guide to us in fixing the date of our author's Timon of Athens, which, on the grounds that have been already ftated, I fuppofe to have been pofterior to this anonymous play.

The great plagues of 1593 and 1603 must have made fuch an impreffion upon Shakspeare, that no inference can be fafely drawn from that dreadful malady being more than once alluded to in Timon of Athens. However, it is poffible that the following paffages were fuggefted by the more immediate recollection of the plague which raged in 1609.

I thank them," fays Timon, "and would fend them back the plague, could I but catch it for them."

Again :

Be as a planetary plague, when Jove.
"Will o'er fome high-vic'd city hang his poison
"I'the fick air."

Cominius, in the panegyrick which he pronounces on Coriolanus, fays,

66

In the brunt of feventeen battles fince

"He lurch'd all fwords of the garland."

In Ben Jonfon's Silent Woman, A& V. sc. last,

8 Page 186.

U

we find (as Mr. Steevens has obferved) the fame phrafeology: "You have lurch'd your friends of the better half of the garland."

I formerly thought this a fneer at Shakspeare; but have lately met with nearly the fame phrase in a pamphlet written by Thomas Nashe, and suppose it to have been a common phrase of that time.

This play is afcertained to have been written after the publication of Camden's Remaines, in 1605, by a speech of Menenius in the first act, in which he endeavours to convince the feditious populace of their unreafonablenefs by the wellknown apologue of the members of the body rebelling against the belly. This tale Shakspeare certainly found in the Life of Coriolanus as tranflated by North, and in general he has followed it as it is there given: but the fame tale is alfo told of Adrian the Fourth by Camden, in his Remaines, p. 199, under the head of Wife Speeches, with more particularity; and one or two of the expreffions, as well as the enumeration of the functions. performed by each of the members of the body, appear to have been taken from that book.

" all

"On a time," fays Menenius in Plutarch, the members of man's body dyd rebel against the bellie, complaining of it that it only remained in the mideft of the bodie without doing any thing, neither dyd bear any labour to the maintenaunce of the reft whereas all other partes and members dyd labour paynefully, and was veri careful to fatisfy the appetites and defiers of the bodie. And fo the bellie, all this notwithstanding, laughed at their follie, and fayde, it is true, I firft receyve all meates that norifle mans bodie; but afterwardes

I fend it againe to the norifhment of other partes of the fame. Even fo (qd. he) a you, my masters and citizens of Rome," &c.

In Camden the tale runs thus: "All the members of the body confpired against the ftomach, as against the fwallowing gulfe of all their labours; for whereas the eies beheld, the eares heard, the handes laboured, the feete travelled, the tongue fpake, and all partes performed their functions; onely the ftomache lay ydle and confumed all. Hereuppon they joyntly agreed al to forbeare their labours, and to pine away their lazie and publike enemy. One day paffed over, the fecond followed very tedious, but the third day was fo grievous to them all, that they called a common counfel. The eyes waxed dimme, the feete could not fupport the body; the armes waxed lazie, the tongue faltered, and could not lay open the matter. Therefore they all with one accord defired the advice of the heart. There Reafon layd open before them," &c.

So, Shakspeare:

"There was a time when all the body's members
"Rebell'd against the belly; thus accus'd it:

"That only like a gulph it did remain

"In the midft of the body, idle and unactive,

"Still cupboarding the viand, never bearing

"Like labour with the reft; where the other inftruments

"Did fee and hear, devife, inftruct, walk, feel,
"And mutually participate did minifter
"Unto the appetite and affection common
"Of the whole body. The belly answered
"True it is, my incorporate friends, quoth he,
That I receive the general food at first;

But, if you do remember, "I fend it through the rivers of the blood,

Even to the court, the heart, to the feat o'the brain,"

The heart is called by one of the citizens, "the counfellor-heart;" and in making the counfellorheart the feat of the brain or underftanding, where Reafon fits enthroned, Shakspeare has certainly followed Camden.

The late date which I have affigned to Coriolanus, derives likewife fome fupport from Volumnia's exhortation to her fon, whom fhe advifes to addrefs the Roman people

now humble as the ripeft mulberry, "Which cannot bear the handling."

In a preceding page I have observed that mulberries were not much known in England before the year 1609. Some few mulberry-trees however had been brought from France and planted before that period, and Shakspeare, we find, had seen fome of the fruit in a flate of maturity before he

wrote Coriolanus."

33. OTHELLO, 1611.

Dr. Warburton thinks that there is in this tragedy a fatirical allufion to the inflitution of the order of Baronets, which dignity was created by King James I. in the year 1611:

The hearts of old gave hands,

"But our new heraldry is hands, not hearts."

Othello, A& III. fc. iv.

I have fome doubts concerning the concluding remark on the date of this play. The tree which is fit for breeding filk-worms, is the white mulberry, of which great numbers were imported into England in the year 1609: but perhaps we had the other fpecies, which produces the best fruit, before that time. If that was the cafe, my hypothefis concerning the time when our poet planted the celebrated mulberry tree, may be controverted. Valeat quantum valere poffit.

፡፡

Amongst their other prerogatives of honour," (fays that commentator,) they [the new-created baronets] had an addition to their paternal arms, of an hand gules in an efcutcheon argent. And we are not to doubt but that this was the new heraldry alluded to by our author; by which he infinuates, that fome then created had hands indeed, but not hearts; that is, money to pay for the creation, but no virtue to purchase the honour."

But by

Such is the observation of this critick. what chymiftry can the fenfe which he has affixed to this paffage, be extracted from it?

Or is it

probable, that Shakspeare, who has more than once condefcended to be the encomiaft of the unworthy founder of the order of Baronets, who had been perfonally honoured by a letter from his majefty, and fubftantially benefited by the royal licence granted to him and his fellow-comedians, fhould have been fo impolitick, as to fatirize the king, or to depretiate his new-created dignity?

Thefe lines appear to me to afford an obvious meaning, without fuppofing them to contain fuch a multitude of allufions:

Cf old, (fays Othello,) in matrimonial alliances, the heart diclated the union of hands; but our modern junctions are thofe of hands, not of hearts.

On every marriage the arms of the wife are, united to thofe of the husband. This circumflance, I believe, it was, that fuggefled heraldry, in this place, to our author. I know not whether a heart was ever used as an armorial enfign, nor is it, I conceive, neceffary to inquire. It was the office of the herald to join, or, to speak technically, to quarter