Some Textual Difficulties in Shakespeare/Ay and No
AY AND NO
Lear. No they cannot touch me for coming. I am the king himself.
Edgar. O thou side-piercing sight.
Lear. Nature's above art in that respect. There's your press-money. That fellow handles his bow like a crow-keeper; draw me a clothier's yard. Look, look, a mouse. Peace, peace; this piece of toasted cheese will do 't. There's my gauntlet; I'll prove it on a giant. Bring up the brown bills. O well flown bird. I' the clout, i' the clout! Hewgh! Give the word.
Edgar. Sweet Marjoram.
Lear. Pass.
Gloucester. I know that voice.
Lear. Ha! Goneril, with a white beard. They flattered me like a dog, and told me I had the white hairs in my beard ere the black ones were there. To say "ay" and "no" to everything that I said! "Ay" and "no" too was no good divinity. When the rain came to wet me once, and the wind to make me chatter; when the thunder would not peace at my bidding; there I found 'em, there I smelt 'em out. Go to, they are not men o' their words; they told me I was everything; 't is a lie, I am not ague-proof.
The trouble in the above passage is the remark, "To say 'ay' and 'no' to everything that I said! 'Ay' and 'no' too was no good divinity." The traditional editorial note which, in lack of anything better, is still doing service in all annotated editions, is "Let your communication be, Yea, yea; Nay, nay." (Matthew 5; 37). What this has to do with the sense here is never touched upon. It is just a conjecture that this is the "allusion"—as if Shakespeare made allusions without any idea.
When we understand Shakespeare's method of depicting insanity throughout his works, it is easy enough to see where Lear got this "ay" and this "no." There had just resounded, in slow impressive tones, on Lear's irresponsible brain, the words—"I—know—that voice."
Shakespeare, in depicting insanity, shows the mind as being the shuttlecock of chance suggestion. The songs of Ophelia have several features which would make an interesting illustration of this way of work; but for our present purpose it will be better to illustrate the point from the passage in which this "ay" and "no" occur.
Lear calls for them to bring up the "brown bills," these being soldiers who carried halberds or bills which were painted brown to keep them from rusting. This "bills" reminds him of a bird, a falcon, and this immediately makes him think of a feathered arrow flying to its mark—"O, well flown bird"—and as the arrow hits the center of the target or clout the imaginary target-tender gives the "word" as to how the arrow flew; but immediately this "word" becomes changed in Lear's mind to the idea of a password, and so, when the wondering and grieved Edgar exclaims "Sweet marjoram," Lear takes it for the call to the sentinel and answers "Pass."
Here is a close-knit, if irrational, succession of ideas; they spring out of one another upon the mere suggestion of words—first one reminder and then another. On the same principle, the "ay and no" conception was started up in Lear's mind by Gloucester's "I—know—that voice." So also the "Peace, peace," reminded him of a "piece" of something which for his present purposes happened to be cheese.
The insane mind, in its highly imaginative form, is the prey of the least suggestion; and like the sane mind it moves easiest along the line of similarities, as in these cases. Next to ideas aroused by mere similarities of words, Lear's mind most easily enlarges upon an idea by thinking of its opposite. "There's your press-money." That moment he is thinking of war; he has enlisted or impressed a soldier, and the soldier does not draw the bow to suit him. Suddenly his mind jumps to "Peace, peace; this piece of toasted cheese will do 't." The very opposite of military power, brute force, is the small shrewdness of catching a mouse. From thinking of war he thought of peace, and the suggested "piece" furnished him with just what he wanted—something quite shrewd and the very opposite of war. Lear had been anything but shrewd all through his life; and the mind always likes to think itself that which it is not. But instantly there is a reaction and he is the old mandatory Lear who knows nothing but power—"there's my gauntlet; I'll prove it on a giant." And finally he ends with thinking himself very shrewd indeed—"when the thunder would not peace at my bidding; there I found 'em, there I smelt 'em out." This passage is a study of mind, character and personal history. The unbalanced mind, as Shakespeare shows it, does not lack idea; it lacks continuity of thought.
What idea, then, are we to get from these words, "To say 'ay' and 'no' to everything that I said! 'Ay' and 'no' too was no good divinity." This is a question which does not seem ever to have been satisfactorily answered. White queries, "Why should his knights say 'ay' and 'no' to everything he said?"
The first Folio has it: "To say I, and no, to every thing that I said: I, and no too, was no good divinity." The first Quarto reads: "saide, I and no toe, was," etc. Inasmuch as our modern reading is an editorial correction of the Folio, which is as usual punctuated at random, I think that if I were editing the play I should not long hesitate to adopt a suggestion made several generations ago: "To say ay and no to everything that I said ay and no to was no good divinity."
Lear's one great lesson had been that his followers were self-seeking flatterers; they did not tell him the truth about himself. A man who will say ay or no to anything whatever, according as his interest lies, is simply a liar; and lying is no good divinity. A "clothier's yard" does not refer to a particular sort of yard as a standard of measurement; it is the distance from the tip of the nose to the end of the thumb when the arm is stretched out sidewise. A bowman who could draw a clothier's yard was one who, when the butt of the shaft was at his nose, had the strength to force the bow out the full length of the arm. While there is such a thing as a "clothier's yard" in measurement, it is no different from any other yard except in the way the yardstick is divided—and this, of course, is not the reference in speaking of the bowman's ability. An archer of size and strength had to have an arrow of such length that he could use it in this way; and so, when the "Ballad of Chevy Chase" (to which commentators refer) speaks of "an arrow of a cloth-yard long" it refers to this ability and not to a standard of measurement. I have added this note because Shakespeare notes and vocabularies seem undecided or evasive regarding the exact meaning. "Clothier's yard—a cloth-yard shaft was a term for the old English arrow." (Globe editors.)