My life I never held but as a pawn
     To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it,
     Thy safety being the motive.

(The first Folio omits ‘a,’ and in the next line reads ‘nere’ for ‘nor.’  Perhaps the first line should read ’My life I ne’er held but as pawn to wage.’)]

[Footnote 174:  See II. ii. 162 to end.  The light-heartedness disappears, of course, as Lear’s misfortunes thicken.]

[Footnote 175:  This difference, however, must not be pressed too far; nor must we take Kent’s retort,

                Now by Apollo, king,
     Thou swear’st thy gods in vain,

for a sign of disbelief.  He twice speaks of the gods in another manner (I. i. 185, III. vi. 5), and he was accustomed to think of Lear in his ‘prayers’ (I. i. 144).]

[Footnote 176:  The ‘clown’ in Antony and Cleopatra is merely an old peasant.  There is a fool in Timon of Athens, however, and he appears in a scene (II. ii.) generally attributed to Shakespeare.  His talk sometimes reminds one of Lear’s fool; and Kent’s remark, ’This is not altogether fool, my lord,’ is repeated in Timon, II. ii. 122, ’Thou art not altogether a fool.’]

[Footnote 177:  [This is no obstacle.  There could hardly be a stage tradition hostile to his youth, since he does not appear in Tate’s version, which alone was acted during the century and a half before Macready’s production.  I had forgotten this; and my memory must also have been at fault regarding an engraving to which I referred in the first edition.  Both mistakes were pointed out by Mr. Archer.]]

[Footnote 178:  In parts of what follows I am indebted to remarks by Cowden Clarke, quoted by Furness on I. iv. 91.]

[Footnote 179:  See also Note T.]

[Footnote 180:  ‘Our last and least’ (according to the Folio reading).  Lear speaks again of ‘this little seeming substance.’  He can carry her dead body in his arms.]

[Footnote 181:  Perhaps then the ‘low sound’ is not merely metaphorical in Kent’s speech in I. i. 153 f.: 

                        answer my life my judgment,
     Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;
     Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound
     Reverbs no hollowness.]

[Footnote 182:  I. i. 80.  ‘More ponderous’ is the reading of the Folios, ‘more richer’ that of the Quartos.  The latter is usually preferred, and Mr. Aldis Wright says ‘more ponderous’ has the appearance of being a player’s correction to avoid a piece of imaginary bad grammar.  Does it not sound more like the author’s improvement of a phrase that he thought a little flat?  And, apart from that, is it not significant that it expresses the same idea of weight that appears in the phrase ’I cannot heave my heart into my mouth’?]

[Footnote 183:  Cf.  Cornwall’s satirical remarks on Kent’s ‘plainness’ in II. ii. 101 ff.,—­a plainness which did no service to Kent’s master. (As a matter of fact, Cordelia had said nothing about ’plainness.’)]