Of author's pen, or actor's voice; but suited
In like conditions as our argument]
I come here to speak the prologue, and come in armour; not defying the audience, in confidence of either the author's or actor's abilities, but merely in a character suited to the subject, in a dress of war, before a warlike play.
I.i.12 (8,3) And skill-less as unpractis'd infancy] Mr. Dryden, in his alteration of this play, has taken this speech as it stands, except that he has changed skill-less to artless, not for the better, because skill-less refers to skill and skilful.
I.i.58 (10,4) The cignet's down is harsh, and spirit of sense/Hard as the palm of ploughman!] In comparison with Cressid's hand, says he, the spirit of sense, the utmost degree, the most exquisite power of sensibility, which implies a soft hand, since the sense of touching, as Scaliger says in his Exercitations, resides chiefly in the fingers, is hard as the callous and insensible palm of the ploughman. WARBURTON reads,
—SPITE of sense:
HANMER,
—to th' spirit of sense.
It is not proper to make a lover profess to praise his mistress in spite of sense; for though he often does it in spite of the sense of others, his own senses are subdued to his desires.
I.i.66 (10,5) if she be fair, 'tis the better for her; an she be not, she has the mends in her own hands] She may mend her complexion by the assistance of cosmeticks.