Page 319 - King Lear: The Cambridge Dover Wilson Shakespeare

244 NOTE S 4.6.
11-22. how fearful...so high. Despite Addison's
praise of this passage, J. wrote:
I am far from thinking it wrought to the utmost excellence
of poetry. He that looks from a precipice finds himself
assailed by one great and dreadful image of irresistible
destruction. But this overwhelming idea is dissipated and
enfeebled from the instant that the mind can restore itself
to the observation of particulars and diffuse its attention to
distinct objects.
Brilliant psychology, as ever with J., but here non ad
rem because as C. Knight observed:
The mode in which Edg. describes the cliff is for the
special information of the blind Glouc,—one who could
not 'look from a precipice*. The crows and choughs, the
samphire gatherer, the fisherman, the bark, the surge that
is seen but not heard,—each of these, incidental to the place,
is selected as a standard by which Glouc. can measure the
altitude of the cliff. Transpose the description into generali-
ties ... and the dramatic propriety at least is utterly destroyed.
The height of the cliff is then only presented by an image
to Gkmc.'s mind upon the vague assertion of his conductor
[ap Furn.].
For Sh.'s description of a cliff to a man with eyes, see
Ham. I. 4. 69-78. J.C.M. compares Spenser's in
F.Q. in.x. 56-7; esp. 57,11.4-6, with 11. 49-52 below.
15. samphire (Q) F 'Sampire'. Cf. Dray ton, Poly-
Olbion, XVIII, 763-4, 'Dovers neighbouring Cleeves
[=cliffs, cf. 1. 57, n.j of Sampyre'.
17. walk (Q 'walke') F 'walk'd'.
?,l. unnumb're"d=innumerable. pebble (F, Q)
Collective, Q 2 (+Camb.) 'pebbles'.
24. Topple...headlong sc. taking me with it.
27. leap upright 'Even if he jumped straight up in
the air he would be in grave danger of toppling over the
edge' (Muir). 28. another Cf. 4. 1. 63.
29. Fairies K. refers to a popular superstition that