Page:The Psychology of Shakespeare.pdf/189

174 Blind Gloster's reflection upon the ruin of such intellect is truly grand; for what is the inert world that it should outlast

the spirit which dwelleth therein What is thre beauty of nature without eyes to behold it, or its harmony without mind to rejoice in it ! “Glo. O ruined piece of nature. This great world Shall so wear out to nought. Dost thou know me? Lear. I remember thine eyes well enough— Dost thou squiny at me !

No, do thy worst, blind cupid, I’ll not love— Read thou this challenge; mark but the penning of it.” Stark madness again, instantly following reasoning elo quence; the eyeless orbits of an old friend but the occasion of an incoherent jest. The thoughts are now the mere sport of the suggestive faculty. Any slight circumstance may give rise to the most earnest, any impressive object or terrible incident may give rise to the most trivial or wayward notions. His old friend's great calamity is lost in his own, and does but suggest absurd comparisons and empty quibbles.

The quibble on seeing without eyes induces the comments on the justice and thief, and the dog in office, beginning prosaically,, rising into the grand poetic climax, and then ending in mere incoherence. “None does offend, none, I say, none; I'll able 'em :

Take that of me, my friend, who have the power To seal the accuser's lips. Get thee glass eyes; And, like a scurvy politician, seem

To see the things thou dost not.—Now, now, now, now : Pull off my boots:–harder, harder; so. Edg. O, matter and impertinency mix'd : Reason in madness

Lear. If thou wilt weep my fortunes, take my eyes. I know thee well enough ; thy name is Gloster: Thou must be patient; we came crying hither. Thou know'st, the first time that we smell the air,

We wawl, and cry:-I will preach to thee; mark. Glo. Alack, alack the day !