Page:Some Textual Difficulties in Shakespeare.djvu/27

Rh

Lovers can see to do their amorous rites,

And by their own beauties;

Which is to say, without eyes or the help of light. But deeper in her consciousness than this natural reticence, is the feeling that she is deserting that which has been the standard of her whole life—a standard of Madonna-like maidenhood which has been her whole mode of existence and which has been instilled into Italian womanhood especially for generations. It is quite a step to take, in her case as in Diana's. She is a runaway; and may not the meaning be as luminous in one place as the other? The wording is essentially the same and the cases are parallel.

We have now found two passages, each of which throws light on this one line, and which, considered in combination, give this line complete and consistent sense so far as it may be considered separately. Accepting this meaning theoretically we must now put it to the actual and conclusive test. It must fit the whole context. If we have found the meaning, then that meaning, being Shakespeare's, will fall in with and illuminate the whole passage.

Not only this, but every word of the passage, having that unity and continual reference to the central idea which is characteristic of Shakespeare's longer and more elaborate comparisons, will focus its light on this one word and show it as having the very idea we have conjectured.