V.ii.1 (499,4) It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul;--/Let me not name it] The abruptness of this soliloquy makes it obscure. The meaning, I think, is this: "I am here (says Othello in his mind) overwhelmed with horror. What is the reason of this perturbation? Is it want of resolution to do justice? Is it the dread of shedding blood? No; it is not the action that shocks me, but _it is the cause, it is the cause, my soul; let me not name it to you, ye chaste stars; it is the cause_." V.ii.20 (500,7) I must weep, But they are cruel tears: this sorrel's heavenly; It strikes, where it doth love.--She wakes--] This tenderness, with which I lament the punishment which justice compels me to inflict, is a holy passion. I wish these two lines could be honestly ejected. It is the fate of Shakespeare to counteract his own pathos. V.ii.65 (502,8) A murder, which I thought a sacrifice] This line is difficult. _Thou hast hardened my heart, and makest me_ kill thee with the rage of a _murderer_, when _I thought to have sacrificed_ thee to justice with the calmness of a priest striking a victim. It must not be omitted, that one of the elder quartos reads, _thou dost stone_ thy _heart_; which I suspect to be genuine. The meaning then will be, _thou forcest me_ to dismiss thee from the world in the state of the _murdered_ without preparation for death, _when I intended_ that thy punishment should have been a _sacrifice_ atoning for thy crime. I am glad that I have ended my revisal of this dreadful scene. It is not to be endured. V.ii.134 (505,3) false as water] As water that will support no weight, nor keep any impression. V.ii.151 (506,4) villainy has made mocks with love] _Villainy_ has taken advantage to _play upon_ the weakness of a violent passion. V.ii.162 (506,5) Thou hast not half that power to do me harm, /As I have to be hurt] [Hamner: to bear hurt] The Oxford Editor saw well the meaning of his author, but weakened his expression. She means to say, _I have in this cause power to endure more than thou hast power to inflict_. V.ii.183 (507, 6) charm your tongue] I know not whether I have read, or whether my own thoughts hare suggested, an alteration of this passage. It seems to me not improbable, that Shakespeare wrote _clam_ your tongue; to _clam_ a bell, is to cover the clapper with felt, which drowns the blow, and hinders the sound. V.ii.211 (509,7) she with Cassio had the act of shame/A thousand times committed] This is another passage which seems to suppose a longer space comprised in the action of this play than the scenes include. V.ii.253 (512,2) It was a sword of Spain, the ice-brook's temper] [In the first edition it is, _Isebroke's temper_. Thence corrupted to _Ice-brook's_.--_Ebro's temper_; the waters of that river of Spain are particularly famous for tempering of steel. POPE.] I believe the old reading changed to _ice-brook_ is right. Steel is hardened by being put red hot into very cold water.