Act I. sc. 1.
'Oli'. What, boy!
'Orla'. Come, come, elder brother, you are too young in this.
'Oli'. Wilt thou lay hands on me, villain?
There is a beauty here. The word 'boy' naturally provokes and awakens in Orlando the sense of his manly powers; and with the retort of 'elder brother,' he grasps him with firm hands, and makes him feel he is no boy.
Ib.
'Oli'. Farewell, good Charles.—Now will I stir this gamester: I
hope, I shall see an end of him; for my soul, yet I know not why,
hates nothing more than him. Yet he's gentle; never school'd, and yet
learn'd; full of noble device; of all sorts enchantingly beloved! and,
indeed, so much in the heart of the world, and especially of my own
people, who best know him, that I am altogether misprized: but it
shall not be so long; this wrestler shall clear all.
This has always appeared to me one of the most un-Shakspearian speeches in all the genuine works of our poet; yet I should be nothing surprized, and greatly pleased, to find it hereafter a fresh beauty, as has so often happened to me with other supposed defects of great men. (1810).
It is too venturous to charge a passage in Shakspeare with want of truth to nature; and yet at first sight this speech of Oliver's expresses truths, which it seems almost impossible that any mind should so distinctly, so livelily, and so voluntarily, have presented to itself, in connection with feelings and intentions so malignant, and so contrary to those which the qualities expressed would naturally have called forth. But I dare not say that this seeming unnaturalness is not in the nature of an abused wilfulness, when united with a strong intellect. In such characters there is sometimes a gloomy self-gratification in making the absoluteness of the will ('sit pro ratione voluntas!') evident to themselves by setting the reason and the conscience in full array against it. (1818).
Ib. sc. 2.
'Celia'. If you saw yourself with your eyes, or knew yourself with
your judgment, the fear of your adventure would counsel you to a
more equal enterprise.
Surely it should be 'our eyes' and 'our judgment.'
'Ib.' sc. 3.
'Cel'. But is all this for your father?
'Ros'. No, some of it is for my child's father.
Theobald restores this as the reading of the older editions. It may be so; but who can doubt that it is a mistake for 'my father's child,' meaning herself? According to Theobald's note, a most indelicate anticipation is put into the mouth of Rosalind without reason;—and besides, what a strange thought, and how out of place, and unintelligible!
Act iv. sc. 2.
Take thou no scorn
To wear the horn, the lusty horn;
It was a crest ere thou wast born.
I question whether there exists a parallel instance of a phrase, that like this of 'horns' is universal in all languages, and yet for which no one has discovered even a plausible origin.