Hazlitt on English Literature: An Introduction to the Appreciation of LiteratureHazlitt, William
History
Hazlitt on English Literature: An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature
Hazlitt, William
English literature -- History and criticism
In her journey thus disguised to Milford-Haven, she loses her guide and
her way; and unbosoming her complaints, says beautifully--
----"My dear lord,
Thou art one of the false ones; now I think on thee,
My hunger's gone; but even before, I was
At point to sink for food."
She afterwards finds, as she thinks, the dead body of Posthumus, and
engages herself as a foot-boy to serve a Roman officer, when she has done
all due obsequies to him whom she calls her former master--
----"And when
With wild wood-leaves and weeds I ha' strew'd his grave,
And on it said a century of pray'rs,
Such as I can, twice o'er, I'll weep and sigh,
And leaving so his service, follow you,
So please you entertain me."
Now this is the very religion of love. She all along relies on her
personal charms, which she fears may have been eclipsed by some painted
Jay of Italy; she relies on her merit, and her merit is in the depth of
her love, her truth and constancy. Our admiration of her beauty is excited
with as little consciousness as possible on her part. There are two
delicious descriptions given of her, one when she is asleep, and one when
she is supposed dead. Arviragus thus addresses her--
----"With fairest flowers,
While summer lasts, and I live here, Fidele,
I'll sweeten thy sad grave; thou shalt not lack
The flow'r that's like thy face, pale primrose, nor
The azur'd hare-bell, like thy veins, no, nor
The leaf of eglantine, which not to slander,
Out-sweeten'd not thy breath."
The yellow Iachimo gives another thus, when he steals into her
bedchamber:--
----"Cytherea,
How bravely thou becom'st thy bed! Fresh lily,
And whiter than the sheets! That I might touch--
But kiss, one kiss--'Tis her breathing that
Perfumes the chamber thus: the flame o' th' taper
Bows toward her, and would under-peep her lids
To see th' enclosed lights now canopied
Under the windows, white and azure, laced
With blue of Heav'ns own tinct--on her left breast
A mole cinque-spotted, like the crimson drops
I' th' bottom of a cowslip."
There is a moral sense in the proud beauty of this last image, a rich
surfeit of the fancy,--as that well-known passage beginning, "Me of my
lawful pleasure she restrained, and prayed me oft forbearance," sets a
keener edge upon it by the inimitable picture of modesty and self-denial.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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