🚀 go-pugleaf

On Mar 9, 9:07 am, "Peter Farey" <pete...@rey.prestel.co.uk> wrote:
> "Peter Farey" wrote:
>
> > <benli...@ihug.co.nz> wrote:
>
> >> elizabeth wrote:
>
> >> > O was bawdy Elizabethan for orgasm.
>
> >> You have some evidence of this? It seems unlikely, given
> >> that OED does not record "orgasm" at all in English until
> >> some decades after Shakespeare's death, and then only in
> >> the sense of a violent spasm.
>
> > You must understand that, being English, we refrained from
> > any such practice until someone like Bob Grumman invented
> > a word for it. Had we nevertheless shame-facedly contrived
> > to produce any such condition we would naturally have
> > referred to it onomatopoeically.
>
> Or, a tad more seriously, from the OED:
>
> O n3.
> 1. The figure or symbol zero, 0; nought;  
>
> nought a.
> 1.c Morally wrong, immoral; (with reference to sexual behaviour)
> promiscuous. Obs.
>
> nought n.
> 3.b b. Wickedness, evil, moral wrong; (also) promiscuity, indecency.
>
> From Richard III (not in OED)
>
> GLOUCESTER
>    We say that Shore's wife hath a pretty foot,
>    A cherry lip,
>    A bonny eye, a passing pleasing tongue,
>    And that the Queen's kin are made gentlefolks.
>    How say you, sir? Can you deny all this?
> BRACKENBURY
>    With this, my lord, myself have naught to do.
> GLOUCESTER
>    Naught to do with Mrs Shore? I tell thee, fellow:
>    He that doth naught with her - excepting one -
>    Were best to do it secretly alone.
> BRACKENBURY  
>    What one, my lord?
> GLOUCESTER
>    Her husband, knave. Wouldst thou betray me?
>
> I think this may be what Elizabeth had in mind.
>
> Peter F.
> <pete...@rey.prestel.co.uk>
> <http://www2.prestel.co.uk/rey/index.htm>- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

Shakespeare must be alluding to lustful thoughts, IMO.   We claim we
are doing nothing,, while looking at a tempting human form with lust
in mind.  The Bible says that "You've already sinned."  He implies
that our thoughts could be surprising to others, that's why he
recommends to entertain them in solitude.  Another implication is that
the Master and God knows all our thoughts, however sinful they might
be.  Yes, that might be what Elizabeth had in mind.

Michael Martin