It is the pasture lards the rother's sides,
The want that makes him lean. Who dares, who dares.
In purity of manhood stand upright
And say 'This man's a flatterer'? if one be,
So are they all: for every grise of fortune
Is smooth'd by that below: the learned pate
Ducks to the golden fool: all is oblique;
There's nothing level in our cursed natures,
But direct villany.
The reader may wish to know whether metrical tests throw any light on
the chronological position of _Timon_; and he will find such information
as I can give in Note BB. But he will bear in mind that results arrived
at by applying these tests to the whole play can have little value,
since it is practically certain that Shakespeare did not write the whole
play. It seems to consist (1) of parts that are purely Shakespearean
(the text, however, being here, as elsewhere, very corrupt); (2) of
parts untouched or very slightly touched by him; (3) of parts where a
good deal is Shakespeare's but not all (_e.g._, in my opinion, III. v.,
which I cannot believe, with Mr. Fleay, to be wholly, or almost wholly,
by another writer). The tests ought to be applied not only to the whole
play but separately to (1), about which there is little difference of
opinion.
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