"
Supposing for a moment that Shakspeare used delight_ed_ for
delight_ing_, the sense of the passages would, I presume, be in _Measure
for Measure_, "the spirit affording delight;" in _Othello_, "if virtue
want no beauty affording delight;" in _Cymbeline_, "the gifts delighting
more from being delayed." Here we have a simple, and, in the last two
instances, I think, a more satisfactory meaning than Mr. Hickson's sense
of _lightened_, _disencumbered_, affords, even could it be more
unquestionably established.
I have, however, met with a passage in Sir Philip Sidney's _Arcadia_
(ed. 1598, p. 294.) which might lead to a different interpretation of
_delighted_ in these passages, and which would not, perhaps, be less
startling than that of Mr. Hickson.
"All this night (in despite of darknesse) he held his eyes open;
and in the morning, when the _delight_ began to restore to each
body his colour, then with curtains bar'd he himselfe from the
enjoying of it; neither willing to feele the comfort of the day,
nor the ease of the night."
Here, _delight_ is apparently used for _the return of light_, and the
prefix _de_ is probably only intensive. Now, presuming that Shakspeare
also used _delighted_ for _lighted_, _illuminated_ the passage in
_Measure for Measure_ would bear this interpretation: "the delighted
spirit, i.e., the spirit _restored to light_," freed from "that dark
house in which it long was pent." In _Othello_, "if virtue lack no
delighted beauty," i.
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