MISCELLANEOUS ESSAYS}

authoritatively, as is plain from
Plutarch.

This is very true: but turn to
the tranilation, from the French df.
Amyot, by Thomas North, 1579,
and you will at once fee the origin
of the mifiake.

“ Firfi of all he did efiablifh
Cleopatra queene of Egypt, of
Cyprus, of Lydia, and the lower
Syria. _

Again in the fourth a&:

“ My melTenger

He hath whipt with rods, dares

me to perfonal combat,

Caefar to Anthony. Let the old

ruflian know

I have many ways to die; mean

time,

Laugh at his challenge.”

“ What a reply is this, cries
Mr. Upton: ’tis acknowledging he
ihould fall under the unequal com-
bat. But if we read,

   

 

He hath many otherways to
die; mean time

l laugh at his challenge.”
We have the poignancy and the
very teparteeofCaafar in Plutarch.”

Molt indifputably it is the fenfe
of Plutarch, and given f0 in the
modern tranflations: But Shake-
fpeare was riiifled by the ambi-
guity of the old one, “ Antonius
fent again to challenge Caefar to
fight him. _, Cxfar anfwered thathe

had many other ways to die than
f0.1),

In the third AG of Iulius Caefar,
Anthony, in his well-known ha-
rangue to the people, repeats a
part ofthe emperor’s will :

“ To every Roman citia
zen he gives

To every fev’ral man, feventy.
live drachmasa- '

 

fizrir barter.

“ Let the old rufiian know g

Moreover he hath left you all his
walks,

,His private arbours-, and new
planted orchards,

On this fide Tyber.”
“ Our author certainly wrote,
fays Mr. Theobald, on that fide
TyberF-Tran: Tiéerinr-qorope Cre-
And Plutarch, whom
Shakefpeare very diligently lludied,
exprefsly declares, that he left the
public his gardens and walks be-

’ yond the Tyber.”

But hear again the old tranila-
tion, where Shakefpeare’s iludy
lay: “ he bequeathed unto every
citizen of Rome, feventy- five
drachrnas a man, and he left his
gardens and arbours unto the
people, which he had on this ficle
of the river Tyber.” '

Mr. Farmer proceeds to (how,
that Shakefpeare took many of
the fubjeéts for his plays from Eng-
lifh authors or tranilators, and not
from books in the learned tongue.

But to come nearer to the pur-
pole, what will you fay, (iays he)
ifl can {how you, that Shakefpeare,
when in the favourite phrafe, he
had a Latin claflic in his eye, moft
aflhredly made ufe ofa tranilation.

Profpero in the tempeit begins
the addrefs to his fpirits,

“ Ye elves of hills, of llanding

lakes and groves.”

This fpeech Dr. Warburton
rightly obierves to be borrowed
from Medea’s in Ovid: And it
proves, fays Mr. Holt, beyond cone
ttadifiion, that Shakefpeare was
perfectly acquainted with the fen.
timents of the ancients on the {ub-
jeét of enchantments. The origi.
nal lines are thefe, '

“ Aurwyue, £9’ wenti, nzanteflue,

am g/gue Iaruf M,
P 3 n i g a Diigue

213 ~