

LIBRARY OF OLD AUTHORS. 319 



" For sin and shame are ever tied together 

 With Gordian knots of such a strong thread spun, 

 They cannot without violence be undone." 



" One whose mind 



Appears more like a ceremonious chapel 

 Full of sweet music, than a thronging presence." 



"What is death? 



The safest trench i' th' world to keep man free 

 From Fortune's gunshot." 



" It has ever been my opinion 

 That there are none love perfectly indeed, 

 But those that hang or drown themselves for love," 



says Julio, anticipating Butler's 



" But he that drowns, or blows out 's brains, 

 The Devil's in him, If he feigns." 



He also anticipated La Rochefoucauld and Byron in their 

 apophthegm concerning woman's last love. In " The 

 Devil's Law-Case," Leonora says, 



" For, as we love our youngest children best, 

 So the last fruit of our affection, 

 Wherever we bestow it, is most strong, 

 Most violent, most unresistible; 

 Since 't is, indeed, our latest harvest-home, 

 Last merriment 'fore winter." 



In editing Webster, Mr. Hazlitt had the advantage 

 (except in a single doubtful play) of a predecessor in the 

 Rev. Alexander Dyce, beyond all question the best living 

 scholar of the literature of the times of Elizabeth and 

 James I. If he give no proof of remarkable fitness for 

 his task, he seems, at least, to have been diligent and 

 painstaking. His notes are short and to the point, and 

 which we consider a great merit at the foot of the 

 page. If he had added a glossarial index, we should 

 have been still better pleased. Mr. Hazlitt seems to 

 have read over the text with some care, and he has had 

 the good sense to modernize the orthography, or, as he 

 says, has "observed the existing standard of spelling 



