Host. ... the musick likes you not.
i. e. pleases, in which sense it is used by Chaucer. This is the genuine Saxon meaning of the word, however it might have been corrupted in early times from its Latin original licet. In the next speech Julietta plays upon the word.
Scene 2. Page 258.
Sil. What is your will?
Pro. That I may compass yours.
Sil. You have your wish; my will is even this;—
On which Dr. Johnson observes, "The word will is here ambiguous. He wishes to gain her will; she tells him, if he wants her will he has it." The learned critic seems to have mistaken the sense of the word compass, when he says it means to gain. If it did, his remark would be just. But to compass in this place signifies, to perform, accomplish, take measures for doing a thing. Thus in Twelfth night, Act I. Scene 2, "that were hard to compass;" and in 1 Hen. VI. Act V. Scene 5, "You judge it impossible to compass wonders." Accordingly Sylvia proceeds to instruct Proteus how he may perform her will. Wish and will are here used, as in many other places, though inaccurately, as synonymous. If however Shakspeare really designed to make Proteus say that he was desirous of gaining Sylvia's good will, she must be supposed, in her reply, purposely to mistake his meaning.
Scene 2. Page 260.
Sil. But since your falshood shall become you well
To worship shadows, and adore false shapes.
Dr. Johnson objects to the sense of this passage, and the other commentators offer conjectural interpretations; yet surely nothing is more clear than the sense, and even the grammar may be defended. It is simply, "since your falsehood shall adapt or render you fit to worship shadows." Become here answers to the Latin convenire, and is used according to its genuine Saxon meaning.