‘Illam quidquid agit, quoquo vestigia movit
Componit furtim subsequiturque decor.’
‘Then took his Muse at once and dipt her
Full in the middle of the Scripture.’
Gay, ‘Verses to be placed under the Picture of Sir Richard Blackmore, England’s Arch-Poet, etc.’
Much Ado About Nothing, Act III. Scene 5.
CHARACTERISTICS
[360]. The wish is often ‘father to the thought.’ Henry IV., Part II. Act IV. Scene 5. [364]. ‘Some trick not worth an egg.’ Coriolanus, Act IV. Scene 4. [365]. ‘Spy abuses.’ ‘It is my nature’s plague to spy into abuses.’ Othello, Act III. Scene 3. Emery’s acting. John Emery (1777–1822). See Hazlitt’s Dramatic Essays, where he speaks of Emery in similar terms. [366]. ‘Fools rush in where angels fear to tread.’ Pope’s Essay on Criticism, l. 625. [367]. ‘A jest’s prosperity,’ etc. Love’s Labour’s Lost, Act V. Scene 2. ‘Quite chop-fallen.’ Hamlet, Act V. Scene 1. [368]. Russell. Samuel Thomas Russell (1769?–1845), famous for his acting of Jerry Sneak in Foote’s Mayor of Garratt (1763), a part created by Thomas Weston (1737–1776). Edward Shuter (1728?–1776), whom Garrick described as the greatest comic genius he had ever seen. For Joseph Shepherd Munden (1758–1832), John Bannister (1760–1836), and John Liston (1776?–1846), see the volume containing Hazlitt’s Dramatic Criticisms. [368]. ‘Men of no mark or likelihood.’ Henry IV., Part I. Act III. Scene 2. [369]. ‘Bare to weather.’ Cymbeline, Act III. Scene 3. ‘Poison in jest.’ Hamlet, Act III. Scene 2. [370]. ‘A soul supreme,’ etc. Epistle to Robert, Earl of Oxford, ll. 23–26. ‘Lay the flattering unction to their souls.’ Hamlet, Act III. Scene 4. The author of ‘Waverley.’ Scott publicly acknowledged his authorship at a dinner on behalf of the Theatrical Fund on Feb. 23, 1827. See Lockhart (ix. 79–84). [371]. ‘In conscience and tender heart.’ ‘Al was conscience and tendre heart.’—Chaucer, Prologue, 150. [372]. Mandeville. Bernard Mandeville (1670?–1733), author of ‘The Fable of the Bees’ (1714). [377]. ‘To snatch a grace,’ etc. Pope’s Essay on Criticism, l. 153. [378]. Video meliora, etc. Ovid’s Metamorphoses, 7, 21. [382]. ‘Minute drops from off the eaves.’
Cf. ‘His tears run down his beard, like winter’s drops
From eaves of reeds.’ Tempest, Act V. Scene 1.