Page 71 [71]
OCR
RHETORICAL AND POETICAL CONVENTIONS But if for lacke of naturall and proper terme or worde we take another, neither naturall nor proper and do vntruly applie it to the thing which we would seeme to expresse, and without any iust inconuenience, it is not then spoken by this figure Metaphore or of inuersion as before, but by plaine abuse [...] as ne said very pretily in this verse. J lent my love to losse, and gaged my life in vaine. Whereas this worde lent is properly of mony or some such other thing, as men do commonly borrow, for vse to be repayd againe, and being applied to loue is vtterly abused, and yet very commendably spoken by virtue of this figure. For he that loueth and is not beloued againe, hath no lesse wrong, than he that lendeth and is neuer repayde.?”” As Puttenham highlights, the ideas of money and love are incompatible. Consequently, if Cordelia’s “bond” is used in a manner similar to “lent,” then it calls attention to the abuse of figurative speech itself. Nevertheless, there is one conventional trope that connects love to bond, but it refers to attachments ofa social type, and interestingly enough, this reference failed to catch Freeman’s attention. The trope “bond of charity” was often cited in Early Modern England from the Gospel (Colossians 3:14), and it was used, for example, in sermons in Shakespeare’s days, as it stood for the force of Christian love, which bonds the members of the community into an organic whole. As John Winthrop memorably explained in his Modell of Christian Charity: The deffinition which the Scripture giues us of loue is this. Love is the bond of perfection, first it is a bond or ligament. 2ly it makes the worke perfect. There is noe body but consists of partes and that which knitts these partes together, giues the body its perfection, because it makes eache parte soe contiguous to others as thereby they doe mutually participate with each other, both in strengthe and infirmity, in pleasure and paine.?”® Taking “bond” as an allusion to charity is perfectly in line with the idea proposed above, namely that Cordelia, unlike her sisters, does not define her relationship to Lear in terms of her personal emotions, but rather on the basis of her position within the social structure of the community. This interpretation gains support from the special setting of the 1606 performance on Saint Stephens day celebrating a martyr whose figure embodies the idea of Christian charity. Moreover, Cordelia’s relation to Lear from a societal point of view also represents a subject’s attachment to the head ofthe country and the Church at the same time, due to the political and religious unity of the Church of England. 277 Puttenham: The Arte, 150. 278 John Winthrop: A Modell of Christian Charity, Boston, Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 1838, 40. + 69 +
