NOTES.
WHAT IS THE MEANING OF "DELIGHTED," AS SOMETIMES USED BY SHAKSPEARE.
I wish to call attention to the peculiar use of a word, or rather to a peculiar word, in Shakspeare, which I do not recollect to have met with in any other writer. I say a "peculiar word," because, although the verb To delight is well known, and of general use, the word, the same in form, to which I refer, is not only of different meaning, but, as I conceive, of distinct derivation the non-recognition of which has led to a misconception of the meaning of one of the finest passages in Shakspeare. The first passage in which it occurs, that I shall quote, is the well known one from Measure for Measure:
"Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;
To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot,
This sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice;