A Select Collection of Old English Plays Volume I Part 85

242. i.e., _Thrive_.

243. _Fonge_, Sax, take. It is here used in the sense of _depart_.

244. Promise.

245. Orig. reads _all_.

246. Certainly, _securely_.

247. Market.

248. i.e., _Out_ or _off_.

249. _Blessed_, in a bad sense.

250. Thrift.

251. Or _meinie_, alluding to the audience.

252. Plead.

253. Ministereth.

254. A proverbial expression of contempt.

255. Same.

256. i.e., Covenant or agreement.

257. Probably the earliest mention of this proverb.

258. Generally bankers, but perhaps here merely city-men.

259. A game at dice.

260. _Infere_, i.e., in company.

261. List, like.

262. Seek.

263. Original has _creature_.

264. i.e., Together.

265. _Borwe_, Sax., is pledge or security, and _to borrow_ is to secure.

266. Unto.

267. A symbol of submission or agreement.

268. Usually spelt _route_, from the Fr., to roar or snore.

269. Stagger.

270. Fetched.

271. The word _fro_ or _from_ in original is too much, and has been inserted by error: the sense is, "And to all folks he called me shame."

272. Orig. has _So_.

273. Or creed.

274. Was called.

275. The colophon is: Here endeth the Interlude of Mundus & Infans.

Imprynted at London in Fletestrete at the sygne of ye Sonne by me Wynkin de worde. The yere of our Lorde M.CCCCC. and xxij. The xvij. daye of July.

276. The greater part of this quotation is torn off in the only copy known with certainty to exist, as well as the date and printer's name, if any were ever appended.--_Collier_.

277. It is said by Mr Wallis, in "The Natural History and Antiquities of Northumberland," 4to, vol. ii. p. 390, that John Bale lived and studied at the Abbey of Hulme in that county, of which society he was a member.

[See Cooper's "Athenae," i. 225.]

278. Mr A. Chalmers, in his "Biographical Dictionary," says that Bale was of Jesus College, Cambridge.--_Collier_.

279. The writer of art. _Bale_ in the "Biographia Britannica" hath fallen into a mistake, a.s.serting him to have been of St John's College, Oxford.

Bale's own words are these: "In omni literarum barbarie ac mentis coecitate illic et _Cantabrigiae_ pervagabar, nullum habens tutorem aut Mecaenatem; donec, lucente Dei verbo, ecclesiae revocari coep.i.s.sent ad verae theologiae purissimos fontes." Dr. Berkenhout hath adopted the same error.--_Reed_.

280. See his "Vocacyon."

281. Mr A. Chalmers gives the date of Bale's consecration, February 2, 1553, and not the 20th of March. The former is correct.--_Collier_.

282. Five centuries of writers seem to have been printed at Wesel in 1549, under the following t.i.tle: "_Ill.u.s.trium Majoris Britaniae Scriptorum, hoc est Angliae, Cambriae, et Scotiae, Summarium_." The most complete and enlarged edition was printed at Basil by Oporinus in 1559.-- _Collier_.

283. Not including his "King Johan," printed by Collier, 1838. Of these and his other works, see a very copious list in Cooper's "Athenae," i.

227-30. See also Hazlitt's "Handbook," v. Bale. The list given in the former edition of Dodsley was so imperfect and unsatisfactory as not to appear worth retention.

284. But in Dodsley's own edition, 1744, occurs the following interesting notice omitted in that of 1825: "This antient piece I found in the Harleian Collection of Old Plays, consisting of between 600 and 700, which are now in my possession." Very probably, Garrick was partly indebted to Dodsley for his dramatic rarities.

285. It will be seen that the design of the author necessarily divided itself into seven ages or periods, for the seven promises by the Creator to Adam, Noah, Abraham, Moses, David, Esaias, and John the Baptist.-- _Collier_.

286. This list of characters is not in the old copy, but was made out from the mention of persons in the progress of the piece.--_Collier_.

287. The old copy from which this dramatic piece was first reprinted by Dodsley, and subsequently by Mr Reed, having been damaged, and a part of the leaf lost, it was not possible to ascertain exactly the last word of this line: it was therefore supplied by conjecture, and not very happily: the line has till now stood--

"Without whose knowledge no man to the truth can _come_."

But the form of the stanza, and the rhyme in the next line, shows decidedly that this is wrong. In Davenport's "City Night Cap," Act 3, we meet with a not very dissimilar use of the word _fall_.