V.ii.3 (247,1) fortune's knave] The _servant_ of fortune.
V.ii.4 (247,2)
it is great
To do that thing, that ends all other deeds;
Which shackles accidents, and bolts up change;
Which sleeps, and never palates more the dung,
The beggar's nurse, and Caesar's]
[Warburton added a whole line and emended "dung" to "dugg"] I cannot
perceive the loss of a line, or the need of an emendation. The
commentator seems to have entangled his own ideas; his supposition that
_suicide_ is called _the beggar's nurse and Caesar's_, and his
concession that the position is _intelligible_, show, I think, a mind
not intent upon the business before it. The difficulty of the passage,
if any difficulty there be, arises only from this, that the act of
suicide, and the state which is the effect of suicide are confounded.
Voluntary death, says she, is an act _which bolts up change_; it
produces a state,
_Which sleeps, and never palates more the dung,
The beggar's nurse, and Caesar's_.
Which has no longer need of the gross and terrene sustenance, in the use
of which Caesar and the beggar are on a level.
The speech is abrupt, but perturbation in such a state is surely
natural.
V.ii.29 (249,4) I am his fortune's vassal, and I send him/The greatness
he has got] I allow him to be my conqueror; I own his superiority with
complete submission.
V.ii.34 (249,5) You see how easily she may be surpriz'd] This line in
the first edition is given not to Charuian, but to Proculeius; and to
him it certainly belongs, though perhaps misplaced.
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