stance as her mother's love.
Had she no child she would
be ambitious for herself. Having one, she is more vehe mently ambitious for him, and indirectly for herself. The tenderness of love alone would have led her to shun conten
tion and to withdraw her child from danger; as Andromache sought to withhold her husband from the field of honour with unalloyed womanly apprehension. But love influenced by ambition, and ambition stimulated by love, produced that compound passion which incurred all risks, braved all dangers.
Combined passions are weak or strong, according to their perfection of union, and singleness of purpose. If con current desires are but half of one mind, they pull diverse ways, and give rise to the weakness of inconsistency; but if they are thoroughly of one accord, chemically combined as it were, the product acquires new and irresistible strength. This force of compound emotion is finely developed in Con stance, in contrast with the other female characters of the
drama. Ambitious without love, she would have possessed the hard vigour of Elinor; loving without ambition, she would have been tenderly devoted like Blanch. Under the lash of the combined passion she is a fury, whom her bound less love and her deep woe barely suffice to redeem from our horror.
The first words of Constance are those of prudent advice, the suggestion of a strong vehement nature against the first move in the dread game of war. They contrast well with the ready boasts of coward Austria and feeble France : “Stay for an answer to your embassy, Lest unadvis'd you stain your swords with blood.” It is the only tranquil speech which the poor woman is permitted to utter. The scolding match into which she immediately precipitates herself with Queen Elinor develops the irritability and vehemence of her temper. To Elinor's taunt of unchastity she replies with acrid tu quoque invective.
