All Chapters of The Tempest / The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.]: Chapter 11 - Chapter 20

Now my charms are all o’erthrown,And what strength I have’s mine own,Which is most faint: now, ’tis true,I must be here confined by you,5 Or sent to Naples. Let me not,Since I have my dukedom got,And pardon’d the deceiver, dwellIn this bare island by your spell;But release me from my bands10 With the help of your good hands:Gentle breath of yours my sailsMust fill, or else my project fails,Which was to please. Now I wantSpirits to enforce, art to enchant;15 And my ending is despair,Unless I be relieved by prayer,Which pierces so, that it assaultsMercy itself, and frees all faults.As you from crimes would pardon’d be,20 Let your indulgence set me free.

I. 1. 57-59. Mercy on us!—we split, &c. It may be doubtful whether the printer of the first folio intended these broken speeches to express ‘a confused noise within.’ Without question such was the author’s meaning. Rowe, however, and subsequent editors, printed them as part of Gonzalo’s speech. Capell was the first editor who gave the true arrangement.

I. 2. 298. The metre of this line, as well as of lines 301, 302, is defective, but as no mode of correction can be regarded as completely satisfactory we have in accordance with our custom left the lines as they are printed in the Folio. The defect, indeed, in the metre of line 298 has not been noticed except by Hanmer, who makes a line thus:‘Do so, and after two days I’ll discharge thee.’Possibly it ought to be printed thus:‘Do so; andAfter two daysI will discharge thee.’There is a broken line, also of four syllables, 253 of the same scene, another of seven, 235.There is no reason to doubt that the words are as Shakespeare wrote them, for, although the action of the play terminates in less than four hours (I. 2. 240 and V. 1. 186), yet Ariel’s ministry is not to end till the voyage to Naples shall be over. Prospero, too, repeats his promise, and marks his contentment by further shortening the time of servitude, ‘within two days,’ I. 2. 420. Possibly ‘Invisible’ (301) sho

I. 2. 443. I fear you have done yourself some wrong. See this phrase used in a similar sense, Measure for Measure, I. 11. 39.

II. 1. 157. Of its own kind. There is no doubt, as Dr Guest has shewn, that ‘it,’ which is the reading of the 1st and 2nd folios, was commonly used as a genitive in Shakespeare’s time, as it is still in some provincial dialects. ‘Its,’ however, was coming into use. One instance occurs in this play, I. 11. 95, ‘in its contrary.’