humanities.lit.authors.shakespeare

Nashe, _Terrors of the Night_

It was said of Catiline, Vultum gestauit in manibus, with the turning
of a hand he could turn and alter his countenance. Far more nimble and
sudden is the devil in shifting his habit; his form he can change and
cog as quick as thought.


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A Source for Nashe's Terrors of the Night, and the Authorship of I
Henry VI
C. G. Harlow

When his edition of the works of Thomas Nashe was almost
finished, R.B. McKerrow found the source of several passages in his
author to be a once notorious, but now almost forgotten, book entitled
_A Defensative against the Poison of Supposed Prophecies_. This long,
learned, and occasionally spirited attack on all forms of prophecy and
divination, published in 1583, was the work of Henry Howard, later
earl of Northampton, the second son of the poet and earl of Surrey who
bore the same name.
(snip)
In the following, no source for Nashe's Latin has hitherto been
found: "It was said of Catiline, Vultum gestauit in manibus, with the
turning of a hand he could turn and alter his countenance" (i.
349.9-11); Howard has the Latin: "though Cateline be sayde, Vultum
gestasse in manibus, to have carried his countenance in his hand...yet
it is certain, that some diseases are woont sooner to discrie theyr
poyson in the visage, then in any other parte..."(X2/2v).

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9. EDOUARUS VEIERUS
per anagramma
AURE SURDUS VIDEO

Auribus hisce licet studio, Fortuna, susurros
Perfidiae et technas efficis esse procul,
Attamen accipio (quae mens horrescit et auris)
Rebus facta malis corpora surda tenus.
Imo etiam cerno Catilinae fraude propinquos 5
Funere solventes fata aliena suo.


9. EDWARD VERE
by an anagram
AURE SURDUS VIDEO (DEAF IN MY EAR, I SEE)

Though by your zeal, Fortune, you keep perfidy's murmurs and schemings
at a distance, nonetheless I learn (at which my mind and ear quake)
that our bodies have been deafened with respect to evil affairs.
Indeed, I perceive men who *come close to Catiline in deception*,
freeing other men's fates by their death.

http://www.philological.bham.ac.uk/anagrams/contents.html
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Perhaps deliberately (licet studio), Fortune, you make sure
(efficis) that the whispers and tricks of treachery are far from
these ears; still I catch (accipio) from the breezes too (et auris)
that at which my mind shudders, which has been made deaf to evils
only as far as the body goes (corpore tenus); no rather (imo etiam)
I can see those close to me (propinquos), through a Catiline's
treachery, by their deaths paying the price of others' crimes
(solventes fata aliena). (Dr. A. Pomeroy)

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Gaius Sallustius Crispus
Conspiracy of Catiline.


10 But when, by perseverance and integrity, the republic had increased
its power; when mighty princes had been vanquished in war; when
barbarous tribes and populous states had been reduced to subjection;
when Carthage, the rival of Rome's dominion, had been utterly
destroyed, and sea and land lay everywhere open to her sway, Fortune
then began to exercise her tyranny, and to introduce universal
innovation. To those who had easily endured toils, dangers, and
doubtful and difficult circumstances, ease and wealth, the objects of
desire to others, became a burden and a trouble. At first the love of
money, and then that of power, began to prevail, and these became, as
it were, the sources of every evil. For avarice subverted honesty,
integrity, and other honorable principles, and, in their stead,
inculcated pride, inhumanity, contempt of religion, and general
venality. Ambition prompted many to become deceitful; to keep one
thing concealed in the breast, and another ready on the tongue; to
estimate friendships and enmities, not by their worth, but according
to interest; and to carry rather a SPECIOUS COUNTENANCE than an honest
heart. These vices at first advanced but slowly, and were sometimes
restrained by correction; but afterwards, when their infection had
spread like a pestilence, the state was entirely changed, and the
government, from being the most equitable and praiseworthy, became
rapacious and insupportable.

http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/sallust/catilinae.html

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<>

specious
adj 1: plausible but false; "specious reasoning"; "the spurious
inferences from obsolescent notions of causality"-
Ethel Albert [syn: spurious]
2: plausible but false; "a specious claim"
3: based on pretense; deceptively pleasing; "the gilded and
perfumed but inwardly rotten nobility"; "meretricious
praise"; "a meretricious argument" [syn: gilded, meretricious]


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<>
Sallust


Jonson, _Discoveries_

Veritas proprium hominis. - Truth is man' s proper good, and the only
immortal thing was given to our mortality to use. No good Christian
or ethnic, if he be honest, can miss it; no statesman or patriot
should. For without truth all the actions of mankind are craft,
malice, or what you will, rather than wisdom. Homer says he hates him
worse than hell-mouth that utters one thing with his tongue and keeps
another in his breast. Which high expression was grounded on divine
reason; for a lying mouth is a stinking pit, and murders with the
contagion it venteth. Beside, nothing is lasting that is feigned; it
will have another FACE than it had, ere long. {41} As Euripides
saith, " No lie ever grows old."


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Specious Countenance

http://mysite.du.edu/~showard/LM1.jpg

Deus in creaturis. - Man is read in his face; God in His creatures --
Jonson, _Discoveries_

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COME,
wrong not the quality of your desert, with looking
downward, Couz; but hold up your Head, so: and
let the IDEA of what you are, be portray'd i' your FACE,
that Men may read i' your Physnomy, (Here, within
this place is to be seen the true, rare, and accomplish'd MONSTER, or
MIRACLE of Nature, which is all one.) (Jonson, _EMIHH_)

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meretricious
adj 1: (archaic) like or relating to a prostitute; "meretricious
relationships"
2: tastelessly showy; "a flash car"; "a flashy ring"; "garish
colors"; "a gaudy costume"; "loud sport shirts"; "a
meretricious yet stylish book"; "tawdry ornaments" [syn:
brassy,
cheap, flash, flashy, garish, gaudy, gimcrack,
loud, tacky, tatty, tawdry, trashy]
3: based on pretense; deceptively pleasing; "the gilded and
perfumed but inwardly rotten nobility"; "meretricious
praise"; "a meretricious argument" [syn: gilded, specious]


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Meretricious Praise

To draw no envy, SHAKSPEARE, on thy name,
Am I thus ample to thy book and fame ;
While I confess thy writings to be such,
As neither Man nor Muse can praise too much.
'Tis true, and all men's suffrage. But these ways
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise ;
For seeliest ignorance on these may light,
Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right ;
Or blind affection, which doth ne'er advance
The truth, but gropes, and urgeth all by chance ;
Or crafty malice might pretend this praise,
And think to ruin where it seemed to raise.
These are, as some infamous bawd or whore
Should praise a matron ; what could hurt her more ?

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Gild \Gild\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Gilded or Gilt (?); p. pr.
& vb. n. Gilding.] [AS. gyldan, from gold gold. [root]234.
See Gold.]
1. To overlay with a thin covering of gold; to cover with a
golden color; to cause to look like gold. ``Gilded
chariots.'' --Pope.

No more the rising sun shall gild the morn. --Pope.

2. To make attractive; to adorn; to brighten.

Let oft good humor, mild and gay, Gild the calm
evening of your day. --Trumbull.

3. To give a fair but deceptive outward appearance to; to
embellish; as, to gild a lie. --Shak.

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gilded
adj 1: having the deep slightly brownish color of gold; "long
aureate (or golden) hair"; "a gold carpet" [syn: aureate,
gilt, gold, golden]
2: based on pretense; deceptively pleasing; "the gilded and
perfumed but inwardly rotten nobility"; "meretricious
praise"; "a meretricious argument" [syn: meretricious,
specious]

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Look how the father's FACE
Lives in his issue, even so the race
Of Shakspeare's mind and manners brightly SHINES
In his well TURNED and true FILED lines;
In each of which he seems to shake a lance,
As brandisht at the EYES of ignorance.

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=46rom Michael O'Connell, _The Idolatrous Eye - Iconoclasm and Theatre
in
Early-Modern England_,pp.116-117.

Any reader of Elizabethan texts is well aware how this anxiety about
the visual is enacted in suspicion of linguistic ornament: phrases
like "painted shows" or "painted eloquence," "colours of rhetoric,"
"fine polished words" and "filed phrases" convey an at best
ambivalent, and frequently pejorative sense of the appeal to the eye.
The underlying tropological sense of these phrases reflects an unease
about visual art itself, suggesting an identity with the forgery of
cosmetics. Distrust of the visual, while by no means universal, is a
persistent strain in Humanist poetics. Ernest Gilman has described the
ways in which the paragone between the "sister arts" was crossed by
the Reformation rejection of images:

"It is important to realize that "iconoclasm" is something
that can happen to texts and within texts written during this period,
and that the most compelling texts often betray a consciousness of the
image-debate that reflects the process of their own composition. The
scene of such writing is set at the crossroads where a lively
tradition of image making confronts a militantly logocentric theology
armed not only with an overt hostility to "images" in worship but with
a deep suspicion of the idolatrous potential of the fallen mind and
its fallen language." (Gilman)


In comparison with the word, the image may have come to seem coercive
in the response it provokes; its affective power appears to leave no
gap for critical reflection, especially in the mass audience at which
the electronic image is aimed. By contrast the word is frequently
claimed as evocative rather than coercive, as calling forth reflection
and allowing the participation of the listener's (or reader's) own
subjectivities.

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GILD
3. To give a fair but deceptive outward appearance to; to
EMBELLISH; as, to gild a lie. --Shak.

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embellish
v 1: add details to [syn: embroider, pad, lard, aggrandize,
aggrandise, blow up, dramatize, dramatise]
2: be beautiful to look at; "Flowers adorned the tables
everywhere" [syn: deck, adorn, decorate, grace, beautify]
3: make more attractive by adding ornament, colour, etc.;
"Decorate the room for the party"; "beautify yourself for
the special day" [syn: decorate, adorn, grace, ornament,
beautify]
4: make more beautiful [syn: BEAUTIFY, prettify] [ant: uglify]

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Greene, _Groatsworth_


Base minded men all three of you, if by my miserie you be not warnd:
for vnto none of you (like mee) sought those burres to cleaue: those
Puppets (I meane) that spake from our mouths, those Anticks garnisht
in our colours. Is it not strange, that I, to whom they all haue beene
beholding: is it not like that you, to whome they all haue beene
beholding, shall (were yee in that case as I am now) bee both at once
of them forsaken? Yes trust them not: for there is an vpstart Crow,
BEAUTIFIED with our feathers, that with his Tygers hart wrapt in a
Players hyde, supposes he is as well able to BOMBAST out a blanke
verse as the best of you: and beeing an absolute Iohannes fac totum,
is in his owne conceit the onely Shake-scene in a countrey. O that I
might intreat your rare wits to be imploied in more profitable
courses: & let those Apes imitate your past excellence, and neuer more
acquaint them with your admired inuentions. I knowe the best husband
of you all will neuer proue an Vsurer, and the kindest of them all
will neuer proue a kind nurse: yet whilest you may, seeke you better
Maisters; for it is pittie men of such rare wits, should be subject to
the pleasure of such rude groomes.

In this I might insert two more, that both haue writ against these
buckram Gentlemen: but lette their owne workes serue to witnesse
against their owne wickednesse, it they perseuere to maintaine any
more such peasants. For other new-commers, I leaue them to the mercie
of these PAINTED MONSTERS, who (I doubt not) will driue the best
minded to despise them: for the rest, it skils not though they make a
ieast at them.

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Bronswerdus

35. TO RICHARD LUCY

If the Muses of ancient bards are to be trusted, an idle donkey,
dressing himself in the shaggy skin of a beast of Massyla, caused a
great panic in the district of Cyme, and he is said to have laid the
livestock prostrate on the ground with fear, monstrously roaring and
threatening. But, betrayed by the evidence of a floppy ear, this novel
actor provided sport and laughter for the inhabitants and paid his
penalty. Thus whatever rascal imposes on the unlettered people (evilly
wearing the mask of an honest man), and gives it the fig in its folly,
him all-seeing and vigilant time finally will reveal as a laughing-
stock for young years. Thus (Phoebus thus getting his revenge) time
revealed the long ears of the Phrygian tyrant very uncouth, shaggy and
boorish, as soon as the East wind ruffled the light croppings of his
chatty barber. Aesop's bird, fair-haired Minerva's companion, was
vexed by its lot. A bird waxed proud in feathers stolen from the
others, and was pleased with its trick. After time betrayed it, its
thieving tricks were soon revealed and, with each bird seeking to
retrieve its clothing, it raised a laugh for the feathered flock.
Falsehoods do not long flourish and thrive, nor does a trick strike
its root deep. If you seek substantial glory that never fears
annulment, avoid deceptions more than an obscene dog and a viper, and
the unspeakable arts of the STYGIAN JOVE, who wears the very bright,
pleasant and attractive face of a shining character while working harm
on the unwary with his silent venom. Remember to measure yourself by
your own foot, and feather your nest with moderation. This is the
purpose of what I write, farewell, and, taking care to bring to
perfection the responsibility which is your lot, be the man you
yourself wish to seem.

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Pluto or Dis was a chthonian god of wealth and the Underworld, the
world of the dead. His name all mean "Rich One" and Dis Pater means
"Rich Father". He was often referred to as the "Stygian Jupiter" or
"STYGIAN JOVE", meaning he was the "Jupiter of the Underworld".

Pluto was equated with Hades, the god of the dead, and his consort was
Proserpina (Greek Persephone). As Orcus, he was the brother of Jupiter
(Zeus).

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Jonson, A Speech according to Horace

hence, away,
I may no longer on these PICTURES stay,
These carcasses of honour; tailor's blocks,
Covered with tissue, whose prosperity mocks
The fate of things: whilst tottered virtue holds
Her broken arms up, to their empty moulds (97-102)

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Jonson,_Discoveries_

De vere argutis. - I do hear them say often some men are not witty,
because they are not everywhere witty; than which nothing is more
foolish. If an eye or a nose be an excellent part in the face,
therefore be all eye or nose! I think the eyebrow, the forehead, the
cheek, chin, lip, or any part else are as necessary and natural in the
place. But now nothing is good that is natural; right and natural
language seems to have least of the wit in it; that which is writhed
and tortured is counted the more exquisite. Cloth of bodkin or tissue
must be embroidered; as if no face were fair that were not powdered or
painted! no beauty to be had but in wresting and writhing our own
tongue! Nothing is fashionable till it be deformed; and this is to
write like a gentleman. All must be affected and preposterous as our
gallants' clothes, sweet-bags, and night-dressings, in which you would
think our men lay in, like ladies, it is so curious.

(snip)

De mollibus et effminatis. - There is nothing valiant or solid to be
hoped for from such as are always kempt and perfumed, and every day
smell of the tailor; the exceedingly curious that are wholly in
mending such an imperfection in the face, in taking away the morphew
in the neck, or bleaching their hands at midnight, gumming and
bridling their beards, or making the waist small, binding it with
hoops, while the mind runs at waste; too much pickedness is not
manly. Not from those that will jest at their own outward
imperfections, but hide their ulcers within, their pride, lust, envy,
ill-nature, with all the art and authority they can. These persons
are in danger, for whilst they think to justify their ignorance by
impudence, and their persons by clothes and outward ornaments, they
use but a commission to deceive themselves: where, if we will look
with our understanding, and not our senses, we may behold virtue and
beauty (though covered with rags) in their brightness; and vice and
deformity so much the fouler, in having all the splendour of riches to
gild them, or the false light of honour and power to help them. Yet
this is that wherewith the world is taken, and runs mad to gaze on -
clothes and titles, the birdlime of fools.

De stultiti=E2. - What petty things they are we wonder at, like children
that esteem every trifle, and prefer a fairing before their fathers!
What difference is between us and them but that we are dearer fools,
coxcombs at a higher rate? They are pleased with cockleshells,
whistles, hobby-horses, and such like; we with statues, marble
pillars, pictures, gilded roofs, where underneath is lath and lime,
perhaps loam. Yet we take pleasure in the lie, and are glad we can
cozen ourselves. Nor is it only in our walls and ceilings, but all
that we call happiness is mere painting and gilt, and all for money.
What a thin membrane of honour that is! and how hath all true
reputation fallen, since money began to have any! Yet the great herd,
the multitude, that in all other things are divided, in this alone
conspire and agree - to love money. They wish for it, they embrace
it, they adore it, while yet it is possessed with greater stir and
torment than it is gotten.

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Gaius Sallustius Crispus
Conspiracy of Catiline.


10 But when, by perseverance and integrity, the republic had increased
its power; when mighty princes had been vanquished in war; when
barbarous tribes and populous states had been reduced to subjection;
when Carthage, the rival of Rome's dominion, had been utterly
destroyed, and sea and land lay everywhere open to her sway, Fortune
then began to exercise her tyranny, and to introduce universal
innovation. To those who had easily endured toils, dangers, and
doubtful and difficult circumstances, ease and wealth, the objects of
desire to others, became a burden and a trouble. At first the love of
money, and then that of power, began to prevail, and these became, as
it were, the sources of every evil. For avarice subverted honesty,
integrity, and other honorable principles, and, in their stead,
inculcated pride, inhumanity, contempt of religion, and general
venality. Ambition prompted many to become deceitful; to keep one
thing concealed in the breast, and another ready on the tongue; to
estimate friendships and enmities, not by their worth, but according
to interest; and to carry rather a SPECIOUS COUNTENANCE than an honest
heart. These vices at first advanced but slowly, and were sometimes
restrained by correction; but afterwards, when their infection had
spread like a pestilence, the state was entirely changed, and the
government, from being the most equitable and praiseworthy, became
rapacious and insupportable.

http://www.forumromanum.org/literature/sallust/catilinae.html

*************************************

Dennis




















Any reader of Elizabethan texts is well aware how this anxiety about
the visual is enacted in suspicion of linguistic ornament: phrases
like "painted shows" or "painted eloquence," "colours of rhetoric,"
"fine polished words" and "filed phrases" convey an at best
ambivalent, and frequently pejorative sense of the appeal to the eye.
The underlying tropological sense of these phrases reflects an unease
about visual art itself, suggesting an identity with the forgery of
cosmetics.