"One fire drives out one fire; one nail one nail;
Rights by rights fouler, strengths by strengths do fail."
For 'fouler' Dyce reads faulter, Singer foil'd are. We might also conjecture fall, and; the final d in this last not being sounded. Fall and fail come thus together in "Fall Greeks, fail fame; honour or go or stay" (Tr. and Cr. v. 1). It seems, however, safest to read, with Malone, as I have done, founder. We have "All his tricks founder" (H. VIII. iii. 2). What is said of fire in the first line is a favourite idea with our poet. We have it again in Two Gent. ii. 4, K. John, iii. 1. It is an allusion to the homœopathic mode of curing a burn by holding it to the fire. By the fires, etc., he means Coriolanus and himself.
Act V.
Sc. 1.
"It was a bare petition of a State
To one whom they had punish'd."
I do not well understand 'bare' here. Mason read base, which is not quite satisfactory.