Ib.
'Gon.' Do you mark that, my lord?
'Alb.' I cannot be so partial, Goneril,
To the great love I bear you.
'Gon'. Pray you content, &c.
Observe the baffled endeavour of Goneril to act on the fears of Albany, and yet his passiveness, his 'inertia'; he is not convinced, and yet he is afraid of looking into the thing. Such characters always yield to those who will take the trouble of governing them, or for them. Perhaps, the influence of a princess, whose choice of him had royalized his state, may be some little excuse for Albany's weakness. 'Ib.' sc. 5.
'Lear'. O let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!
Keep me in temper! I would not be mad!—
The mind's own anticipation of madness! The deepest tragic notes are often struck by a half sense of an impending blow. The Fool's conclusion of this act by a grotesque prattling seems to indicate the dislocation of feeling that has begun and is to be continued. Act ii. sc. 1. Edmund's speech:—
He replied, Thou unpossessing bastard! &c.
Thus the secret poison in Edmund's own heart steals forth; and then observe poor Gloster's—
Loyal and natural boy!
as if praising the crime of Edmund's birth!
'Ib.' Compare Regan's—