King Lear

1I thought the king had more affected the Duke of

2Albany than Cornwall.

3It did always seem so to us: but now, in the

4division of the kingdom, it appears not which of

5the dukes he values most; for equalities are so

6weighed, that curiosity in neither can make choice

7of either's moiety.

8Is not this your son, my lord?

9His breeding, sir, hath been at my charge: I have

10so often blushed to acknowledge him, that now I am

11brazed to it.

12I cannot conceive you.

13Sir, this young fellow's mother could: whereupon

14she grew round-wombed, and had, indeed, sir, a son

15for her cradle ere she had a husband for her bed.

16Do you smell a fault?

17I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it

18being so proper.

19But I have, sir, a son by order of law, some year

20elder than this, who yet is no dearer in my account:

21though this knave came something saucily into the

22world before he was sent for, yet was his mother

23fair; there was good sport at his making, and the

24whoreson must be acknowledged. Do you know this

25noble gentleman, Edmund?

26No, my lord.

27My lord of Kent: remember him hereafter as my

28honourable friend.

29My services to your lordship.

30I must love you, and sue to know you better.

31Sir, I shall study deserving.

32He hath been out nine years, and away he shall

33again. The king is coming.

34Attend the lords of France and Burgundy, Gloucester.

35I shall, my liege.

36Meantime we shall express our darker purpose.

37Give me the map there. Know that we have divided

38In three our kingdom: and 'tis our fast intent

39To shake all cares and business from our age;

40Conferring them on younger strengths, while we

41Unburthen'd crawl toward death. Our son of Cornwall,

42And you, our no less loving son of Albany,

43We have this hour a constant will to publish

44Our daughters' several dowers, that future strife

45May be prevented now. The princes, France and Burgundy,

46Great rivals in our youngest daughter's love,

47Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn,

48And here are to be answer'd. Tell me, my daughters,--

49Since now we will divest us both of rule,

50Interest of territory, cares of state,--

51Which of you shall we say doth love us most?

52That we our largest bounty may extend

53Where nature doth with merit challenge. Goneril,

54Our eldest-born, speak first.

55Sir, I love you more than words can wield the matter;

56Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty;

57Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;

58No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;

59As much as child e'er loved, or father found;

60A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable;

61Beyond all manner of so much I love you.

62[Aside] What shall Cordelia do?

63Love, and be silent.

64Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,

65With shadowy forests and with champains rich'd,

66With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,

67We make thee lady: to thine and Albany's issue

68Be this perpetual. What says our second daughter,

69Our dearest Regan, wife to Cornwall? Speak.

70Sir, I am made

71Of the self-same metal that my sister is,

72And prize me at her worth. In my true heart

73I find she names my very deed of love;

74Only she comes too short: that I profess

75Myself an enemy to all other joys,

76Which the most precious square of sense possesses;

77And find I am alone felicitate

78In your dear highness' love.

79[Aside] Then poor Cordelia!

80And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love's

81More richer than my tongue.

82To thee and thine hereditary ever

83Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom;

84No less in space, validity, and pleasure,

85Than that conferr'd on Goneril. Now, our joy,

86Although the last, not least; to whose young love

87The vines of France and milk of Burgundy

88Strive to be interess'd; what can you say to draw

89A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.

90Nothing, my lord.

91Nothing!

92Nothing.

93Nothing will come of nothing: speak again.

94Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

95My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty

96According to my bond; nor more nor less.

97How, how, Cordelia! mend your speech a little,

98Lest it may mar your fortunes.

99Good my lord,

100You have begot me, bred me, loved me: I

101Return those duties back as are right fit,

102Obey you, love you, and most honour you.

103Why have my sisters husbands, if they say

104They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,

105That lord whose hand must take my plight shall carry

106Half my love with him, half my care and duty:

107Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters,

108To love my father all.

109But goes thy heart with this?

110Ay, good my lord.

111So young, and so untender?

112So young, my lord, and true.

113Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower:

114For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,

115The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;

116By all the operation of the orbs

117From whom we do exist, and cease to be;

118Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

119Propinquity and property of blood,

120And as a stranger to my heart and me

121Hold thee, from this, for ever. The barbarous Scythian,

122Or he that makes his generation messes

123To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom

124Be as well neighbour'd, pitied, and relieved,

125As thou my sometime daughter.

126Good my liege,--

127Peace, Kent!

128Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

129I loved her most, and thought to set my rest

130On her kind nursery. Hence, and avoid my sight!

131So be my grave my peace, as here I give

132Her father's heart from her! Call France; who stirs?

133Call Burgundy. Cornwall and Albany,

134With my two daughters' dowers digest this third:

135Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.

136I do invest you jointly with my power,

137Pre-eminence, and all the large effects

138That troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course,

139With reservation of an hundred knights,

140By you to be sustain'd, shall our abode

141Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain

142The name, and all the additions to a king;

143The sway, revenue, execution of the rest,

144Beloved sons, be yours: which to confirm,

145This coronet part betwixt you.

146Royal Lear,

147Whom I have ever honour'd as my king,

148Loved as my father, as my master follow'd,

149As my great patron thought on in my prayers,--

150The bow is bent and drawn, make from the shaft.

151Let it fall rather, though the fork invade

152The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly,

153When Lear is mad. What wilt thou do, old man?

154Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak,

155When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bound,

156When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom;

157And, in thy best consideration, cheque

158This hideous rashness: answer my life my judgment,

159Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;

160Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sound

161Reverbs no hollowness.

162Kent, on thy life, no more.

163My life I never held but as a pawn

164To wage against thy enemies; nor fear to lose it,

165Thy safety being the motive.

166Out of my sight!

167See better, Lear; and let me still remain

168The true blank of thine eye.

169Now, by Apollo,--

170Now, by Apollo, king,

171Thou swear'st thy gods in vain.

172O, vassal! miscreant!

173Dear sir, forbear.

174Do:

175Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow

176Upon thy foul disease. Revoke thy doom;

177Or, whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,

178I'll tell thee thou dost evil.

179Hear me, recreant!

180On thine allegiance, hear me!

181Since thou hast sought to make us break our vow,

182Which we durst never yet, and with strain'd pride

183To come between our sentence and our power,

184Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,

185Our potency made good, take thy reward.

186Five days we do allot thee, for provision

187To shield thee from diseases of the world;

188And on the sixth to turn thy hated back

189Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day following,

190Thy banish'd trunk be found in our dominions,

191The moment is thy death. Away! by Jupiter,

192This shall not be revoked.

193Fare thee well, king: sith thus thou wilt appear,

194Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.

195The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,

196That justly think'st, and hast most rightly said!

197And your large speeches may your deeds approve,

198That good effects may spring from words of love.

199Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu;

200He'll shape his old course in a country new.

201Here's France and Burgundy, my noble lord.

202My lord of Burgundy.

203We first address towards you, who with this king

204Hath rivall'd for our daughter: what, in the least,

205Will you require in present dower with her,

206Or cease your quest of love?

207Most royal majesty,

208I crave no more than what your highness offer'd,

209Nor will you tender less.

210Right noble Burgundy,

211When she was dear to us, we did hold her so;

212But now her price is fall'n. Sir, there she stands:

213If aught within that little seeming substance,

214Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced,

215And nothing more, may fitly like your grace,

216She's there, and she is yours.

217I know no answer.

218Will you, with those infirmities she owes,

219Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,

220Dower'd with our curse, and stranger'd with our oath,

221Take her, or leave her?

222Pardon me, royal sir;

223Election makes not up on such conditions.

224Then leave her, sir; for, by the power that made me,

225I tell you all her wealth.

226For you, great king,

227I would not from your love make such a stray,

228To match you where I hate; therefore beseech you

229To avert your liking a more worthier way

230Than on a wretch whom nature is ashamed

231Almost to acknowledge hers.

232This is most strange,

233That she, that even but now was your best object,

234The argument of your praise, balm of your age,

235Most best, most dearest, should in this trice of time

236Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle

237So many folds of favour. Sure, her offence

238Must be of such unnatural degree,

239That monsters it, or your fore-vouch'd affection

240Fall'n into taint: which to believe of her,

241Must be a faith that reason without miracle

242Could never plant in me.

243I yet beseech your majesty,--

244If for I want that glib and oily art,

245To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend,

246I'll do't before I speak,--that you make known

247It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,

248No unchaste action, or dishonour'd step,

249That hath deprived me of your grace and favour;

250But even for want of that for which I am richer,

251A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue

252As I am glad I have not, though not to have it

253Hath lost me in your liking.

254Better thou

255Hadst not been born than not to have pleased me better.

256Is it but this,--a tardiness in nature

257Which often leaves the history unspoke

258That it intends to do? My lord of Burgundy,

259What say you to the lady? Love's not love

260When it is mingled with regards that stand

261Aloof from the entire point. Will you have her?

262She is herself a dowry.

263Royal Lear,

264Give but that portion which yourself proposed,

265And here I take Cordelia by the hand,

266Duchess of Burgundy.

267Nothing: I have sworn; I am firm.

268I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father

269That you must lose a husband.

270Peace be with Burgundy!

271Since that respects of fortune are his love,

272I shall not be his wife.

273Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich, being poor;

274Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised!

275Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon:

276Be it lawful I take up what's cast away.

277Gods, gods! 'tis strange that from their cold'st neglect

278My love should kindle to inflamed respect.

279Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance,

280Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France:

281Not all the dukes of waterish Burgundy

282Can buy this unprized precious maid of me.

283Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind:

284Thou losest here, a better where to find.

285Thou hast her, France: let her be thine; for we

286Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see

287That face of hers again. Therefore be gone

288Without our grace, our love, our benison.

289Come, noble Burgundy.

290Bid farewell to your sisters.

291The jewels of our father, with wash'd eyes

292Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are;

293And like a sister am most loath to call

294Your faults as they are named. Use well our father:

295To your professed bosoms I commit him

296But yet, alas, stood I within his grace,

297I would prefer him to a better place.

298So, farewell to you both.

299Prescribe not us our duties.

300Let your study

301Be to content your lord, who hath received you

302At fortune's alms. You have obedience scanted,

303And well are worth the want that you have wanted.

304Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides:

305Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.

306Well may you prosper!

307Come, my fair Cordelia.

308Sister, it is not a little I have to say of what

309most nearly appertains to us both. I think our

310father will hence to-night.

311That's most certain, and with you; next month with us.

312You see how full of changes his age is; the

313observation we have made of it hath not been

314little: he always loved our sister most; and

315with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off

316appears too grossly.

317'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever

318but slenderly known himself.

319The best and soundest of his time hath been but

320rash; then must we look to receive from his age,

321not alone the imperfections of long-engraffed

322condition, but therewithal the unruly waywardness

323that infirm and choleric years bring with them.

324Such unconstant starts are we like to have from

325him as this of Kent's banishment.

326There is further compliment of leavetaking

327between France and him. Pray you, let's hit

328together: if our father carry authority with

329such dispositions as he bears, this last

330surrender of his will but offend us.

331We shall further think on't.

332We must do something, and i' the heat.

1Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law

2My services are bound. Wherefore should I

3Stand in the plague of custom, and permit

4The curiosity of nations to deprive me,

5For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon-shines

6Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base?

7When my dimensions are as well compact,

8My mind as generous, and my shape as true,

9As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us

10With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?

11Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take

12More composition and fierce quality

13Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,

14Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops,

15Got 'tween asleep and wake? Well, then,

16Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:

17Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund

18As to the legitimate: fine word,--legitimate!

19Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,

20And my invention thrive, Edmund the base

21Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper:

22Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

23Kent banish'd thus! and France in choler parted!

24And the king gone to-night! subscribed his power!

25Confined to exhibition! All this done

26Upon the gad! Edmund, how now! what news?

27So please your lordship, none.

28Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter?

29I know no news, my lord.

30What paper were you reading?

31Nothing, my lord.

32No? What needed, then, that terrible dispatch of

33it into your pocket? the quality of nothing hath

34not such need to hide itself. Let's see: come,

35if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.

36I beseech you, sir, pardon me: it is a letter

37from my brother, that I have not all o'er-read;

38and for so much as I have perused, I find it not

39fit for your o'er-looking.

40Give me the letter, sir.

41I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The

42contents, as in part I understand them, are to blame.

43Let's see, let's see.

44I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote

45this but as an essay or taste of my virtue.

46[Reads] 'This policy and reverence of age makes

47the world bitter to the best of our times; keeps

48our fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish

49them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage

50in the oppression of aged tyranny; who sways, not

51as it hath power, but as it is suffered. Come to

52me, that of this I may speak more. If our father

53would sleep till I waked him, you should half his

54revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your

55brother, EDGAR.'

56Hum--conspiracy!--'Sleep till I waked him,--you

57should enjoy half his revenue,'--My son Edgar!

58Had he a hand to write this? a heart and brain

59to breed it in?--When came this to you? who

60brought it?

61It was not brought me, my lord; there's the

62cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the

63casement of my closet.

64You know the character to be your brother's?

65If the matter were good, my lord, I durst swear

66it were his; but, in respect of that, I would

67fain think it were not.

68It is his.

69It is his hand, my lord; but I hope his heart is

70not in the contents.

71Hath he never heretofore sounded you in this business?

72Never, my lord: but I have heard him oft

73maintain it to be fit, that, sons at perfect age,

74and fathers declining, the father should be as

75ward to the son, and the son manage his revenue.

76O villain, villain! His very opinion in the

77letter! Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested,

78brutish villain! worse than brutish! Go, sirrah,

79seek him; I'll apprehend him: abominable villain!

80Where is he?

81I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please

82you to suspend your indignation against my

83brother till you can derive from him better

84testimony of his intent, you shall run a certain

85course; where, if you violently proceed against

86him, mistaking his purpose, it would make a great

87gap in your own honour, and shake in pieces the

88heart of his obedience. I dare pawn down my life

89for him, that he hath wrote this to feel my

90affection to your honour, and to no further

91pretence of danger.

92Think you so?

93If your honour judge it meet, I will place you

94where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an

95auricular assurance have your satisfaction; and

96that without any further delay than this very evening.

97He cannot be such a monster--

98Nor is not, sure.

99To his father, that so tenderly and entirely

100loves him. Heaven and earth! Edmund, seek him

101out: wind me into him, I pray you: frame the

102business after your own wisdom. I would unstate

103myself, to be in a due resolution.

104I will seek him, sir, presently: convey the

105business as I shall find means and acquaint you withal.

106These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend

107no good to us: though the wisdom of nature can

108reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself

109scourged by the sequent effects: love cools,

110friendship falls off, brothers divide: in

111cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in

112palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt son

113and father. This villain of mine comes under the

114prediction; there's son against father: the king

115falls from bias of nature; there's father against

116child. We have seen the best of our time:

117machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all

118ruinous disorders, follow us disquietly to our

119graves. Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall

120lose thee nothing; do it carefully. And the

121noble and true-hearted Kent banished! his

122offence, honesty! 'Tis strange.

123This is the excellent foppery of the world, that,

124when we are sick in fortune,--often the surfeit

125of our own behavior,--we make guilty of our

126disasters the sun, the moon, and the stars: as

127if we were villains by necessity; fools by

128heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, and

129treachers, by spherical predominance; drunkards,

130liars, and adulterers, by an enforced obedience of

131planetary influence; and all that we are evil in,

132by a divine thrusting on: an admirable evasion

133of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish

134disposition to the charge of a star! My

135father compounded with my mother under the

136dragon's tail; and my nativity was under Ursa

137major; so that it follows, I am rough and

138lecherous. Tut, I should have been that I am,

139had the maidenliest star in the firmament

140twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar--

141And pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old

142comedy: my cue is villanous melancholy, with a

143sigh like Tom o' Bedlam. O, these eclipses do

144portend these divisions! fa, sol, la, mi.

145How now, brother Edmund! what serious

146contemplation are you in?

147I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read

148this other day, what should follow these eclipses.

149Do you busy yourself about that?

150I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed

151unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child

152and the parent; death, dearth, dissolutions of

153ancient amities; divisions in state, menaces and

154maledictions against king and nobles; needless

155diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation

156of cohorts, nuptial breaches, and I know not what.

157How long have you been a sectary astronomical?

158Come, come; when saw you my father last?

159Why, the night gone by.

160Spake you with him?

161Ay, two hours together.

162Parted you in good terms? Found you no

163displeasure in him by word or countenance?

164None at all.

165Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended

166him: and at my entreaty forbear his presence

167till some little time hath qualified the heat of

168his displeasure; which at this instant so rageth

169in him, that with the mischief of your person it

170would scarcely allay.

171Some villain hath done me wrong.

172That's my fear. I pray you, have a continent

173forbearance till the spied of his rage goes

174slower; and, as I say, retire with me to my

175lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to

176hear my lord speak: pray ye, go; there's my key:

177if you do stir abroad, go armed.

178Armed, brother!

179Brother, I advise you to the best; go armed: I

180am no honest man if there be any good meaning

181towards you: I have told you what I have seen

182and heard; but faintly, nothing like the image

183and horror of it: pray you, away.

184Shall I hear from you anon?

185I do serve you in this business.

186A credulous father! and a brother noble,

187Whose nature is so far from doing harms,

188That he suspects none: on whose foolish honesty

189My practises ride easy! I see the business.

190Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit:

191All with me's meet that I can fashion fit.

1Did my father strike my gentleman for chiding of his fool?

2Yes, madam.

3By day and night he wrongs me; every hour

4He flashes into one gross crime or other,

5That sets us all at odds: I'll not endure it:

6His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us

7On every trifle. When he returns from hunting,

8I will not speak with him; say I am sick:

9If you come slack of former services,

10You shall do well; the fault of it I'll answer.

11He's coming, madam; I hear him.

12Put on what weary negligence you please,

13You and your fellows; I'll have it come to question:

14If he dislike it, let him to our sister,

15Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,

16Not to be over-ruled. Idle old man,

17That still would manage those authorities

18That he hath given away! Now, by my life,

19Old fools are babes again; and must be used

20With cheques as flatteries,--when they are seen abused.

21Remember what I tell you.

22Well, madam.

23And let his knights have colder looks among you;

24What grows of it, no matter; advise your fellows so:

25I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall,

26That I may speak: I'll write straight to my sister,

27To hold my very course. Prepare for dinner.

1If but as well I other accents borrow,

2That can my speech defuse, my good intent

3May carry through itself to that full issue

4For which I razed my likeness. Now, banish'd Kent,

5If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn'd,

6So may it come, thy master, whom thou lovest,

7Shall find thee full of labours.

8Let me not stay a jot for dinner; go get it ready.

9How now! what art thou?

10A man, sir.

11What dost thou profess? what wouldst thou with us?

12I do profess to be no less than I seem; to serve

13him truly that will put me in trust: to love him

14that is honest; to converse with him that is wise,

15and says little; to fear judgment; to fight when I

16cannot choose; and to eat no fish.

17What art thou?

18A very honest-hearted fellow, and as poor as the king.

19If thou be as poor for a subject as he is for a

20king, thou art poor enough. What wouldst thou?

21Service.

22Who wouldst thou serve?

23You.

24Dost thou know me, fellow?

25No, sir; but you have that in your countenance

26which I would fain call master.

27What's that?

28Authority.

29What services canst thou do?

30I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious

31tale in telling it, and deliver a plain message

32bluntly: that which ordinary men are fit for, I am

33qualified in; and the best of me is diligence.

34How old art thou?

35Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing, nor

36so old to dote on her for any thing: I have years

37on my back forty eight.

38Follow me; thou shalt serve me: if I like thee no

39worse after dinner, I will not part from thee yet.

40Dinner, ho, dinner! Where's my knave? my fool?

41Go you, and call my fool hither.

42You, you, sirrah, where's my daughter?

43So please you,--

44What says the fellow there? Call the clotpoll back.

45Where's my fool, ho? I think the world's asleep.

46How now! where's that mongrel?

47He says, my lord, your daughter is not well.

48Why came not the slave back to me when I called him.

49Sir, he answered me in the roundest manner, he would

50not.

51He would not!

52My lord, I know not what the matter is; but, to my

53judgment, your highness is not entertained with that

54ceremonious affection as you were wont; there's a

55great abatement of kindness appears as well in the

56general dependants as in the duke himself also and

57your daughter.

58Ha! sayest thou so?

59I beseech you, pardon me, my lord, if I be mistaken;

60for my duty cannot be silent when I think your

61highness wronged.

62Thou but rememberest me of mine own conception: I

63have perceived a most faint neglect of late; which I

64have rather blamed as mine own jealous curiosity

65than as a very pretence and purpose of unkindness:

66I will look further into't. But where's my fool? I

67have not seen him this two days.

68Since my young lady's going into France, sir, the

69fool hath much pined away.

70No more of that; I have noted it well. Go you, and

71tell my daughter I would speak with her.

72Go you, call hither my fool.

73O, you sir, you, come you hither, sir: who am I,

74sir?

75My lady's father.

76'My lady's father'! my lord's knave: your

77whoreson dog! you slave! you cur!

78I am none of these, my lord; I beseech your pardon.

79Do you bandy looks with me, you rascal?

80I'll not be struck, my lord.

81Nor tripped neither, you base football player.

82I thank thee, fellow; thou servest me, and I'll

83love thee.

84Come, sir, arise, away! I'll teach you differences:

85away, away! if you will measure your lubber's

86length again, tarry: but away! go to; have you

87wisdom? so.

88Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee: there's

89earnest of thy service.

90Let me hire him too: here's my coxcomb.

91How now, my pretty knave! how dost thou?

92Sirrah, you were best take my coxcomb.

93Why, fool?

94Why, for taking one's part that's out of favour:

95nay, an thou canst not smile as the wind sits,

96thou'lt catch cold shortly: there, take my coxcomb:

97why, this fellow has banished two on's daughters,

98and did the third a blessing against his will; if

99thou follow him, thou must needs wear my coxcomb.

100How now, nuncle! Would I had two coxcombs and two daughters!

101Why, my boy?

102If I gave them all my living, I'ld keep my coxcombs

103myself. There's mine; beg another of thy daughters.

104Take heed, sirrah; the whip.

105Truth's a dog must to kennel; he must be whipped

106out, when Lady the brach may stand by the fire and stink.

107A pestilent gall to me!

108Sirrah, I'll teach thee a speech.

109Do.

110Mark it, nuncle:

111Have more than thou showest,

112Speak less than thou knowest,

113Lend less than thou owest,

114Ride more than thou goest,

115Learn more than thou trowest,

116Set less than thou throwest;

117Leave thy drink and thy whore,

118And keep in-a-door,

119And thou shalt have more

120Than two tens to a score.

121This is nothing, fool.

122Then 'tis like the breath of an unfee'd lawyer; you

123gave me nothing for't. Can you make no use of

124nothing, nuncle?

125Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing.

126[To KENT] Prithee, tell him, so much the rent of

127his land comes to: he will not believe a fool.

128A bitter fool!

129Dost thou know the difference, my boy, between a

130bitter fool and a sweet fool?

131No, lad; teach me.

132That lord that counsell'd thee

133To give away thy land,

134Come place him here by me,

135Do thou for him stand:

136The sweet and bitter fool

137Will presently appear;

138The one in motley here,

139The other found out there.

140Dost thou call me fool, boy?

141All thy other titles thou hast given away; that

142thou wast born with.

143This is not altogether fool, my lord.

144No, faith, lords and great men will not let me; if

145I had a monopoly out, they would have part on't:

146and ladies too, they will not let me have all fool

147to myself; they'll be snatching. Give me an egg,

148nuncle, and I'll give thee two crowns.

149What two crowns shall they be?

150Why, after I have cut the egg i' the middle, and eat

151up the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou

152clovest thy crown i' the middle, and gavest away

153both parts, thou borest thy ass on thy back o'er

154the dirt: thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown,

155when thou gavest thy golden one away. If I speak

156like myself in this, let him be whipped that first

157finds it so.

158Fools had ne'er less wit in a year;

159For wise men are grown foppish,

160They know not how their wits to wear,

161Their manners are so apish.

162When were you wont to be so full of songs, sirrah?

163I have used it, nuncle, ever since thou madest thy

164daughters thy mothers: for when thou gavest them

165the rod, and put'st down thine own breeches,

166Then they for sudden joy did weep,

167And I for sorrow sung,

168That such a king should play bo-peep,

169And go the fools among.

170Prithee, nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach

171thy fool to lie: I would fain learn to lie.

172An you lie, sirrah, we'll have you whipped.

173I marvel what kin thou and thy daughters are:

174they'll have me whipped for speaking true, thou'lt

175have me whipped for lying; and sometimes I am

176whipped for holding my peace. I had rather be any

177kind o' thing than a fool: and yet I would not be

178thee, nuncle; thou hast pared thy wit o' both sides,

179and left nothing i' the middle: here comes one o'

180the parings.

181How now, daughter! what makes that frontlet on?

182Methinks you are too much of late i' the frown.

183Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no need to

184care for her frowning; now thou art an O without a

185figure: I am better than thou art now; I am a fool,

186thou art nothing.

187Yes, forsooth, I will hold my tongue; so your face

188bids me, though you say nothing. Mum, mum,

189He that keeps nor crust nor crum,

190Weary of all, shall want some.

191That's a shealed peascod.

192Not only, sir, this your all-licensed fool,

193But other of your insolent retinue

194Do hourly carp and quarrel; breaking forth

195In rank and not-to-be endured riots. Sir,

196I had thought, by making this well known unto you,

197To have found a safe redress; but now grow fearful,

198By what yourself too late have spoke and done.

199That you protect this course, and put it on

200By your allowance; which if you should, the fault

201Would not 'scape censure, nor the redresses sleep,

202Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal,

203Might in their working do you that offence,

204Which else were shame, that then necessity

205Will call discreet proceeding.

206For, you trow, nuncle,

207The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long,

208That it's had it head bit off by it young.

209So, out went the candle, and we were left darkling.

210Are you our daughter?

211Come, sir,

212I would you would make use of that good wisdom,

213Whereof I know you are fraught; and put away

214These dispositions, that of late transform you

215From what you rightly are.

216May not an ass know when the cart

217draws the horse? Whoop, Jug! I love thee.

218Doth any here know me? This is not Lear:

219Doth Lear walk thus? speak thus? Where are his eyes?

220Either his notion weakens, his discernings

221Are lethargied--Ha! waking? 'tis not so.

222Who is it that can tell me who I am?

223Lear's shadow.

224I would learn that; for, by the

225marks of sovereignty, knowledge, and reason,

226I should be false persuaded I had daughters.

227Which they will make an obedient father.

228Your name, fair gentlewoman?

229This admiration, sir, is much o' the savour

230Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you

231To understand my purposes aright:

232As you are old and reverend, you should be wise.

233Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires;

234Men so disorder'd, so debosh'd and bold,

235That this our court, infected with their manners,

236Shows like a riotous inn: epicurism and lust

237Make it more like a tavern or a brothel

238Than a graced palace. The shame itself doth speak

239For instant remedy: be then desired

240By her, that else will take the thing she begs,

241A little to disquantity your train;

242And the remainder, that shall still depend,

243To be such men as may besort your age,

244And know themselves and you.

245Darkness and devils!

246Saddle my horses; call my train together:

247Degenerate bastard! I'll not trouble thee.

248Yet have I left a daughter.

249You strike my people; and your disorder'd rabble

250Make servants of their betters.

251Woe, that too late repents,--

252O, sir, are you come?

253Is it your will? Speak, sir. Prepare my horses.

254Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,

255More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child

256Than the sea-monster!

257Pray, sir, be patient.

258[To GONERIL] Detested kite! thou liest.

259My train are men of choice and rarest parts,

260That all particulars of duty know,

261And in the most exact regard support

262The worships of their name. O most small fault,

263How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show!

264That, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature

265From the fix'd place; drew from heart all love,

266And added to the gall. O Lear, Lear, Lear!

267Beat at this gate, that let thy folly in,

268And thy dear judgment out! Go, go, my people.

269My lord, I am guiltless, as I am ignorant

270Of what hath moved you.

271It may be so, my lord.

272Hear, nature, hear; dear goddess, hear!

273Suspend thy purpose, if thou didst intend

274To make this creature fruitful!

275Into her womb convey sterility!

276Dry up in her the organs of increase;

277And from her derogate body never spring

278A babe to honour her! If she must teem,

279Create her child of spleen; that it may live,

280And be a thwart disnatured torment to her!

281Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth;

282With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks;

283Turn all her mother's pains and benefits

284To laughter and contempt; that she may feel

285How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is

286To have a thankless child! Away, away!

287Now, gods that we adore, whereof comes this?

288Never afflict yourself to know the cause;

289But let his disposition have that scope

290That dotage gives it.

291What, fifty of my followers at a clap!

292Within a fortnight!

293What's the matter, sir?

294I'll tell thee:

295Life and death! I am ashamed

296That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus;

297That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,

298Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon thee!

299The untented woundings of a father's curse

300Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond eyes,

301Beweep this cause again, I'll pluck ye out,

302And cast you, with the waters that you lose,

303To temper clay. Yea, it is come to this?

304Let is be so: yet have I left a daughter,

305Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable:

306When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails

307She'll flay thy wolvish visage. Thou shalt find

308That I'll resume the shape which thou dost think

309I have cast off for ever: thou shalt,

310I warrant thee.

311Do you mark that, my lord?

312I cannot be so partial, Goneril,

313To the great love I bear you,--

314Pray you, content. What, Oswald, ho!

315You, sir, more knave than fool, after your master.

316Nuncle Lear, nuncle Lear, tarry and take the fool

317with thee.

318A fox, when one has caught her,

319And such a daughter,

320Should sure to the slaughter,

321If my cap would buy a halter:

322So the fool follows after.

323This man hath had good counsel:--a hundred knights!

324'Tis politic and safe to let him keep

325At point a hundred knights: yes, that, on every dream,

326Each buzz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,

327He may enguard his dotage with their powers,

328And hold our lives in mercy. Oswald, I say!

329Well, you may fear too far.

330Safer than trust too far:

331Let me still take away the harms I fear,

332Not fear still to be taken: I know his heart.

333What he hath utter'd I have writ my sister

334If she sustain him and his hundred knights

335When I have show'd the unfitness,--

336How now, Oswald!

337What, have you writ that letter to my sister?

338Yes, madam.

339Take you some company, and away to horse:

340Inform her full of my particular fear;

341And thereto add such reasons of your own

342As may compact it more. Get you gone;

343And hasten your return.

344No, no, my lord,

345This milky gentleness and course of yours

346Though I condemn not, yet, under pardon,

347You are much more attask'd for want of wisdom

348Than praised for harmful mildness.

349How far your eyes may pierce I can not tell:

350Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

351Nay, then--

352Well, well; the event.

1Go you before to Gloucester with these letters.

2Acquaint my daughter no further with any thing you

3know than comes from her demand out of the letter.

4If your diligence be not speedy, I shall be there afore you.

5I will not sleep, my lord, till I have delivered

6your letter.

7If a man's brains were in's heels, were't not in

8danger of kibes?

9Ay, boy.

10Then, I prithee, be merry; thy wit shall ne'er go

11slip-shod.

12Ha, ha, ha!

13Shalt see thy other daughter will use thee kindly;

14for though she's as like this as a crab's like an

15apple, yet I can tell what I can tell.

16Why, what canst thou tell, my boy?

17She will taste as like this as a crab does to a

18crab. Thou canst tell why one's nose stands i'

19the middle on's face?

20No.

21Why, to keep one's eyes of either side's nose; that

22what a man cannot smell out, he may spy into.

23I did her wrong--

24Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?

25No.

26Nor I neither; but I can tell why a snail has a house.

27Why?

28Why, to put his head in; not to give it away to his

29daughters, and leave his horns without a case.

30I will forget my nature. So kind a father! Be my

31horses ready?

32Thy asses are gone about 'em. The reason why the

33seven stars are no more than seven is a pretty reason.

34Because they are not eight?

35Yes, indeed: thou wouldst make a good fool.

36To take 't again perforce! Monster ingratitude!

37If thou wert my fool, nuncle, I'ld have thee beaten

38for being old before thy time.

39How's that?

40Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst

41been wise.

42O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven

43Keep me in temper: I would not be mad!

44How now! are the horses ready?

45Ready, my lord.

46Come, boy.

47She that's a maid now, and laughs at my departure,

48Shall not be a maid long, unless things be cut shorter.

1Save thee, Curan.

2And you, sir. I have been with your father, and

3given him notice that the Duke of Cornwall and Regan

4his duchess will be here with him this night.

5How comes that?

6Nay, I know not. You have heard of the news abroad;

7I mean the whispered ones, for they are yet but

8ear-kissing arguments?

9Not I pray you, what are they?

10Have you heard of no likely wars toward, 'twixt the

11Dukes of Cornwall and Albany?

12Not a word.

13You may do, then, in time. Fare you well, sir.

14The duke be here to-night? The better! best!

15This weaves itself perforce into my business.

16My father hath set guard to take my brother;

17And I have one thing, of a queasy question,

18Which I must act: briefness and fortune, work!

19Brother, a word; descend: brother, I say!

20My father watches: O sir, fly this place;

21Intelligence is given where you are hid;

22You have now the good advantage of the night:

23Have you not spoken 'gainst the Duke of Cornwall?

24He's coming hither: now, i' the night, i' the haste,

25And Regan with him: have you nothing said

26Upon his party 'gainst the Duke of Albany?

27Advise yourself.

28I am sure on't, not a word.

29I hear my father coming: pardon me:

30In cunning I must draw my sword upon you

31Draw; seem to defend yourself; now quit you well.

32Yield: come before my father. Light, ho, here!

33Fly, brother. Torches, torches! So, farewell.

34Some blood drawn on me would beget opinion.

35Of my more fierce endeavour: I have seen drunkards

36Do more than this in sport. Father, father!

37Stop, stop! No help?

38Now, Edmund, where's the villain?

39Here stood he in the dark, his sharp sword out,

40Mumbling of wicked charms, conjuring the moon

41To stand auspicious mistress,--

42But where is he?

43Look, sir, I bleed.

44Where is the villain, Edmund?

45Fled this way, sir. When by no means he could--

46Pursue him, ho! Go after.

47By no means what?

48Persuade me to the murder of your lordship;

49But that I told him, the revenging gods

50'Gainst parricides did all their thunders bend;

51Spoke, with how manifold and strong a bond

52The child was bound to the father; sir, in fine,

53Seeing how loathly opposite I stood

54To his unnatural purpose, in fell motion,

55With his prepared sword, he charges home

56My unprovided body, lanced mine arm:

57But when he saw my best alarum'd spirits,

58Bold in the quarrel's right, roused to the encounter,

59Or whether gasted by the noise I made,

60Full suddenly he fled.

61Let him fly far:

62Not in this land shall he remain uncaught;

63And found--dispatch. The noble duke my master,

64My worthy arch and patron, comes to-night:

65By his authority I will proclaim it,

66That he which finds him shall deserve our thanks,

67Bringing the murderous coward to the stake;

68He that conceals him, death.

69When I dissuaded him from his intent,

70And found him pight to do it, with curst speech

71I threaten'd to discover him: he replied,

72'Thou unpossessing bastard! dost thou think,

73If I would stand against thee, would the reposal

74Of any trust, virtue, or worth in thee

75Make thy words faith'd? No: what I should deny,--

76As this I would: ay, though thou didst produce

77My very character,--I'ld turn it all

78To thy suggestion, plot, and damned practise:

79And thou must make a dullard of the world,

80If they not thought the profits of my death

81Were very pregnant and potential spurs

82To make thee seek it.'

83Strong and fasten'd villain

84Would he deny his letter? I never got him.

85Hark, the duke's trumpets! I know not why he comes.

86All ports I'll bar; the villain shall not 'scape;

87The duke must grant me that: besides, his picture

88I will send far and near, that all the kingdom

89May have the due note of him; and of my land,

90Loyal and natural boy, I'll work the means

91To make thee capable.

92How now, my noble friend! since I came hither,

93Which I can call but now, I have heard strange news.

94If it be true, all vengeance comes too short

95Which can pursue the offender. How dost, my lord?

96O, madam, my old heart is crack'd, it's crack'd!

97What, did my father's godson seek your life?

98He whom my father named? your Edgar?

99O, lady, lady, shame would have it hid!

100Was he not companion with the riotous knights

101That tend upon my father?

102I know not, madam: 'tis too bad, too bad.

103Yes, madam, he was of that consort.

104No marvel, then, though he were ill affected:

105'Tis they have put him on the old man's death,

106To have the expense and waste of his revenues.

107I have this present evening from my sister

108Been well inform'd of them; and with such cautions,

109That if they come to sojourn at my house,

110I'll not be there.

111Nor I, assure thee, Regan.

112Edmund, I hear that you have shown your father

113A child-like office.

114'Twas my duty, sir.

115He did bewray his practise; and received

116This hurt you see, striving to apprehend him.

117Is he pursued?

118Ay, my good lord.

119If he be taken, he shall never more

120Be fear'd of doing harm: make your own purpose,

121How in my strength you please. For you, Edmund,

122Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant

123So much commend itself, you shall be ours:

124Natures of such deep trust we shall much need;

125You we first seize on.

126I shall serve you, sir,

127Truly, however else.

128For him I thank your grace.

129You know not why we came to visit you,--

130Thus out of season, threading dark-eyed night:

131Occasions, noble Gloucester, of some poise,

132Wherein we must have use of your advice:

133Our father he hath writ, so hath our sister,

134Of differences, which I least thought it fit

135To answer from our home; the several messengers

136From hence attend dispatch. Our good old friend,

137Lay comforts to your bosom; and bestow

138Your needful counsel to our business,

139Which craves the instant use.

140I serve you, madam:

141Your graces are right welcome.

1Good dawning to thee, friend: art of this house?

2Ay.

3Where may we set our horses?

4I' the mire.

5Prithee, if thou lovest me, tell me.

6I love thee not.

7Why, then, I care not for thee.

8If I had thee in Lipsbury pinfold, I would make thee

9care for me.

10Why dost thou use me thus? I know thee not.

11Fellow, I know thee.

12What dost thou know me for?

13A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a

14base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited,

15hundred-pound, filthy, worsted-stocking knave; a

16lily-livered, action-taking knave, a whoreson,

17glass-gazing, super-serviceable finical rogue;

18one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a

19bawd, in way of good service, and art nothing but

20the composition of a knave, beggar, coward, pandar,

21and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch: one whom I

22will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deniest

23the least syllable of thy addition.

24Why, what a monstrous fellow art thou, thus to rail

25on one that is neither known of thee nor knows thee!

26What a brazen-faced varlet art thou, to deny thou

27knowest me! Is it two days ago since I tripped up

28thy heels, and beat thee before the king? Draw, you

29rogue: for, though it be night, yet the moon

30shines; I'll make a sop o' the moonshine of you:

31draw, you whoreson cullionly barber-monger, draw.

32Away! I have nothing to do with thee.

33Draw, you rascal: you come with letters against the

34king; and take vanity the puppet's part against the

35royalty of her father: draw, you rogue, or I'll so

36carbonado your shanks: draw, you rascal; come your ways.

37Help, ho! murder! help!

38Strike, you slave; stand, rogue, stand; you neat

39slave, strike.

40Help, ho! murder! murder!

41How now! What's the matter?

42With you, goodman boy, an you please: come, I'll

43flesh ye; come on, young master.

44Weapons! arms! What 's the matter here?

45Keep peace, upon your lives:

46He dies that strikes again. What is the matter?

47The messengers from our sister and the king.

48What is your difference? speak.

49I am scarce in breath, my lord.

50No marvel, you have so bestirred your valour. You

51cowardly rascal, nature disclaims in thee: a

52tailor made thee.

53Thou art a strange fellow: a tailor make a man?

54Ay, a tailor, sir: a stone-cutter or painter could

55not have made him so ill, though he had been but two

56hours at the trade.

57Speak yet, how grew your quarrel?

58This ancient ruffian, sir, whose life I have spared

59at suit of his gray beard,--

60Thou whoreson zed! thou unnecessary letter! My

61lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread this

62unbolted villain into mortar, and daub the wall of

63a jakes with him. Spare my gray beard, you wagtail?

64Peace, sirrah!

65You beastly knave, know you no reverence?

66Yes, sir; but anger hath a privilege.

67Why art thou angry?

68That such a slave as this should wear a sword,

69Who wears no honesty. Such smiling rogues as these,

70Like rats, oft bite the holy cords a-twain

71Which are too intrinse t' unloose; smooth every passion

72That in the natures of their lords rebel;

73Bring oil to fire, snow to their colder moods;

74Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks

75With every gale and vary of their masters,

76Knowing nought, like dogs, but following.

77A plague upon your epileptic visage!

78Smile you my speeches, as I were a fool?

79Goose, if I had you upon Sarum plain,

80I'ld drive ye cackling home to Camelot.

81Why, art thou mad, old fellow?

82How fell you out? say that.

83No contraries hold more antipathy

84Than I and such a knave.

85Why dost thou call him a knave? What's his offence?

86His countenance likes me not.

87No more, perchance, does mine, nor his, nor hers.

88Sir, 'tis my occupation to be plain:

89I have seen better faces in my time

90Than stands on any shoulder that I see

91Before me at this instant.

92This is some fellow,

93Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect

94A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb

95Quite from his nature: he cannot flatter, he,

96An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth!

97An they will take it, so; if not, he's plain.

98These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness

99Harbour more craft and more corrupter ends

100Than twenty silly ducking observants

101That stretch their duties nicely.

102Sir, in good sooth, in sincere verity,

103Under the allowance of your great aspect,

104Whose influence, like the wreath of radiant fire

105On flickering Phoebus' front,--

106What mean'st by this?

107To go out of my dialect, which you

108discommend so much. I know, sir, I am no

109flatterer: he that beguiled you in a plain

110accent was a plain knave; which for my part

111I will not be, though I should win your displeasure

112to entreat me to 't.

113What was the offence you gave him?

114I never gave him any:

115It pleased the king his master very late

116To strike at me, upon his misconstruction;

117When he, conjunct and flattering his displeasure,

118Tripp'd me behind; being down, insulted, rail'd,

119And put upon him such a deal of man,

120That worthied him, got praises of the king

121For him attempting who was self-subdued;

122And, in the fleshment of this dread exploit,

123Drew on me here again.

124None of these rogues and cowards

125But Ajax is their fool.

126Fetch forth the stocks!

127You stubborn ancient knave, you reverend braggart,

128We'll teach you--

129Sir, I am too old to learn:

130Call not your stocks for me: I serve the king;

131On whose employment I was sent to you:

132You shall do small respect, show too bold malice

133Against the grace and person of my master,

134Stocking his messenger.

135Fetch forth the stocks! As I have life and honour,

136There shall he sit till noon.

137Till noon! till night, my lord; and all night too.

138Why, madam, if I were your father's dog,

139You should not use me so.

140Sir, being his knave, I will.

141This is a fellow of the self-same colour

142Our sister speaks of. Come, bring away the stocks!

143Let me beseech your grace not to do so:

144His fault is much, and the good king his master

145Will cheque him for 't: your purposed low correction

146Is such as basest and contemned'st wretches

147For pilferings and most common trespasses

148Are punish'd with: the king must take it ill,

149That he's so slightly valued in his messenger,

150Should have him thus restrain'd.

151I'll answer that.

152My sister may receive it much more worse,

153To have her gentleman abused, assaulted,

154For following her affairs. Put in his legs.

155Come, my good lord, away.

156I am sorry for thee, friend; 'tis the duke's pleasure,

157Whose disposition, all the world well knows,

158Will not be rubb'd nor stopp'd: I'll entreat for thee.

159Pray, do not, sir: I have watched and travell'd hard;

160Some time I shall sleep out, the rest I'll whistle.

161A good man's fortune may grow out at heels:

162Give you good morrow!

163The duke's to blame in this; 'twill be ill taken.

164Good king, that must approve the common saw,

165Thou out of heaven's benediction comest

166To the warm sun!

167Approach, thou beacon to this under globe,

168That by thy comfortable beams I may

169Peruse this letter! Nothing almost sees miracles

170But misery: I know 'tis from Cordelia,

171Who hath most fortunately been inform'd

172Of my obscured course; and shall find time

173From this enormous state, seeking to give

174Losses their remedies. All weary and o'erwatch'd,

175Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold

176This shameful lodging.

177Fortune, good night: smile once more: turn thy wheel!

1I heard myself proclaim'd;

2And by the happy hollow of a tree

3Escaped the hunt. No port is free; no place,

4That guard, and most unusual vigilance,

5Does not attend my taking. Whiles I may 'scape,

6I will preserve myself: and am bethought

7To take the basest and most poorest shape

8That ever penury, in contempt of man,

9Brought near to beast: my face I'll grime with filth;

10Blanket my loins: elf all my hair in knots;

11And with presented nakedness out-face

12The winds and persecutions of the sky.

13The country gives me proof and precedent

14Of Bedlam beggars, who, with roaring voices,

15Strike in their numb'd and mortified bare arms

16Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary;

17And with this horrible object, from low farms,

18Poor pelting villages, sheep-cotes, and mills,

19Sometime with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers,

20Enforce their charity. Poor Turlygod! poor Tom!

21That's something yet: Edgar I nothing am.

1'Tis strange that they should so depart from home,

2And not send back my messenger.

3As I learn'd,

4The night before there was no purpose in them

5Of this remove.

6Hail to thee, noble master!

7Ha!

8Makest thou this shame thy pastime?

9No, my lord.

10Ha, ha! he wears cruel garters. Horses are tied

11by the heads, dogs and bears by the neck, monkeys by

12the loins, and men by the legs: when a man's

13over-lusty at legs, then he wears wooden

14nether-stocks.

15What's he that hath so much thy place mistook

16To set thee here?

17It is both he and she;

18Your son and daughter.

19No.

20Yes.

21No, I say.

22I say, yea.

23No, no, they would not.

24Yes, they have.

25By Jupiter, I swear, no.

26By Juno, I swear, ay.

27They durst not do 't;

28They could not, would not do 't; 'tis worse than murder,

29To do upon respect such violent outrage:

30Resolve me, with all modest haste, which way

31Thou mightst deserve, or they impose, this usage,

32Coming from us.

33My lord, when at their home

34I did commend your highness' letters to them,

35Ere I was risen from the place that show'd

36My duty kneeling, came there a reeking post,

37Stew'd in his haste, half breathless, panting forth

38From Goneril his mistress salutations;

39Deliver'd letters, spite of intermission,

40Which presently they read: on whose contents,

41They summon'd up their meiny, straight took horse;

42Commanded me to follow, and attend

43The leisure of their answer; gave me cold looks:

44And meeting here the other messenger,

45Whose welcome, I perceived, had poison'd mine,--

46Being the very fellow that of late

47Display'd so saucily against your highness,--

48Having more man than wit about me, drew:

49He raised the house with loud and coward cries.

50Your son and daughter found this trespass worth

51The shame which here it suffers.

52Winter's not gone yet, if the wild-geese fly that way.

53Fathers that wear rags

54Do make their children blind;

55But fathers that bear bags

56Shall see their children kind.

57Fortune, that arrant whore,

58Ne'er turns the key to the poor.

59But, for all this, thou shalt have as many dolours

60for thy daughters as thou canst tell in a year.

61O, how this mother swells up toward my heart!

62Hysterica passio, down, thou climbing sorrow,

63Thy element's below! Where is this daughter?

64With the earl, sir, here within.

65Follow me not;

66Stay here.

67Made you no more offence but what you speak of?

68None.

69How chance the king comes with so small a train?

70And thou hadst been set i' the stocks for that

71question, thou hadst well deserved it.

72Why, fool?

73We'll set thee to school to an ant, to teach thee

74there's no labouring i' the winter. All that follow

75their noses are led by their eyes but blind men; and

76there's not a nose among twenty but can smell him

77that's stinking. Let go thy hold when a great wheel

78runs down a hill, lest it break thy neck with

79following it: but the great one that goes up the

80hill, let him draw thee after. When a wise man

81gives thee better counsel, give me mine again: I

82would have none but knaves follow it, since a fool gives it.

83That sir which serves and seeks for gain,

84And follows but for form,

85Will pack when it begins to rain,

86And leave thee in the storm,

87But I will tarry; the fool will stay,

88And let the wise man fly:

89The knave turns fool that runs away;

90The fool no knave, perdy.

91Where learned you this, fool?

92Not i' the stocks, fool.

93Deny to speak with me? They are sick? they are weary?

94They have travell'd all the night? Mere fetches;

95The images of revolt and flying off.

96Fetch me a better answer.

97My dear lord,

98You know the fiery quality of the duke;

99How unremoveable and fix'd he is

100In his own course.

101Vengeance! plague! death! confusion!

102Fiery? what quality? Why, Gloucester, Gloucester,

103I'ld speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife.

104Well, my good lord, I have inform'd them so.

105Inform'd them! Dost thou understand me, man?

106Ay, my good lord.

107The king would speak with Cornwall; the dear father

108Would with his daughter speak, commands her service:

109Are they inform'd of this? My breath and blood!

110Fiery? the fiery duke? Tell the hot duke that--

111No, but not yet: may be he is not well:

112Infirmity doth still neglect all office

113Whereto our health is bound; we are not ourselves

114When nature, being oppress'd, commands the mind

115To suffer with the body: I'll forbear;

116And am fall'n out with my more headier will,

117To take the indisposed and sickly fit

118For the sound man. Death on my state! wherefore

119Should he sit here? This act persuades me

120That this remotion of the duke and her

121Is practise only. Give me my servant forth.

122Go tell the duke and 's wife I'ld speak with them,

123Now, presently: bid them come forth and hear me,

124Or at their chamber-door I'll beat the drum

125Till it cry sleep to death.

126I would have all well betwixt you.

127O me, my heart, my rising heart! but, down!

128Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels

129when she put 'em i' the paste alive; she knapped 'em

130o' the coxcombs with a stick, and cried 'Down,

131wantons, down!' 'Twas her brother that, in pure

132kindness to his horse, buttered his hay.

133Good morrow to you both.

134Hail to your grace!

135I am glad to see your highness.

136Regan, I think you are; I know what reason

137I have to think so: if thou shouldst not be glad,

138I would divorce me from thy mother's tomb,

139Sepulchring an adultress.

140O, are you free?

141Some other time for that. Beloved Regan,

142Thy sister's naught: O Regan, she hath tied

143Sharp-tooth'd unkindness, like a vulture, here:

144I can scarce speak to thee; thou'lt not believe

145With how depraved a quality--O Regan!

146I pray you, sir, take patience: I have hope.

147You less know how to value her desert

148Than she to scant her duty.

149Say, how is that?

150I cannot think my sister in the least

151Would fail her obligation: if, sir, perchance

152She have restrain'd the riots of your followers,

153'Tis on such ground, and to such wholesome end,

154As clears her from all blame.

155My curses on her!

156O, sir, you are old.

157Nature in you stands on the very verge

158Of her confine: you should be ruled and led

159By some discretion, that discerns your state

160Better than you yourself. Therefore, I pray you,

161That to our sister you do make return;

162Say you have wrong'd her, sir.

163Ask her forgiveness?

164Do you but mark how this becomes the house:

165'Dear daughter, I confess that I am old;

166Age is unnecessary: on my knees I beg

167That you'll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.'

168Good sir, no more; these are unsightly tricks:

169Return you to my sister.

170[Rising] Never, Regan:

171She hath abated me of half my train;

172Look'd black upon me; struck me with her tongue,

173Most serpent-like, upon the very heart:

174All the stored vengeances of heaven fall

175On her ingrateful top! Strike her young bones,

176You taking airs, with lameness!

177Fie, sir, fie!

178You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames

179Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,

180You fen-suck'd fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,

181To fall and blast her pride!

182O the blest gods! so will you wish on me,

183When the rash mood is on.

184No, Regan, thou shalt never have my curse:

185Thy tender-hefted nature shall not give

186Thee o'er to harshness: her eyes are fierce; but thine

187Do comfort and not burn. 'Tis not in thee

188To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train,

189To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes,

190And in conclusion to oppose the bolt

191Against my coming in: thou better know'st

192The offices of nature, bond of childhood,

193Effects of courtesy, dues of gratitude;

194Thy half o' the kingdom hast thou not forgot,

195Wherein I thee endow'd.

196Good sir, to the purpose.

197Who put my man i' the stocks?

198What trumpet's that?

199I know't, my sister's: this approves her letter,

200That she would soon be here.

201Is your lady come?

202This is a slave, whose easy-borrow'd pride

203Dwells in the fickle grace of her he follows.

204Out, varlet, from my sight!

205What means your grace?

206Who stock'd my servant? Regan, I have good hope

207Thou didst not know on't. Who comes here? O heavens,

208If you do love old men, if your sweet sway

209Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,

210Make it your cause; send down, and take my part!

211Art not ashamed to look upon this beard?

212O Regan, wilt thou take her by the hand?

213Why not by the hand, sir? How have I offended?

214All's not offence that indiscretion finds

215And dotage terms so.

216O sides, you are too tough;

217Will you yet hold? How came my man i' the stocks?

218I set him there, sir: but his own disorders

219Deserved much less advancement.

220You! did you?

221I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.

222If, till the expiration of your month,

223You will return and sojourn with my sister,

224Dismissing half your train, come then to me:

225I am now from home, and out of that provision

226Which shall be needful for your entertainment.

227Return to her, and fifty men dismiss'd?

228No, rather I abjure all roofs, and choose

229To wage against the enmity o' the air;

230To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,--

231Necessity's sharp pinch! Return with her?

232Why, the hot-blooded France, that dowerless took

233Our youngest born, I could as well be brought

234To knee his throne, and, squire-like; pension beg

235To keep base life afoot. Return with her?

236Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter

237To this detested groom.

238At your choice, sir.

239I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad:

240I will not trouble thee, my child; farewell:

241We'll no more meet, no more see one another:

242But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter;

243Or rather a disease that's in my flesh,

244Which I must needs call mine: thou art a boil,

245A plague-sore, an embossed carbuncle,

246In my corrupted blood. But I'll not chide thee;

247Let shame come when it will, I do not call it:

248I do not bid the thunder-bearer shoot,

249Nor tell tales of thee to high-judging Jove:

250Mend when thou canst; be better at thy leisure:

251I can be patient; I can stay with Regan,

252I and my hundred knights.

253Not altogether so:

254I look'd not for you yet, nor am provided

255For your fit welcome. Give ear, sir, to my sister;

256For those that mingle reason with your passion

257Must be content to think you old, and so--

258But she knows what she does.

259Is this well spoken?

260I dare avouch it, sir: what, fifty followers?

261Is it not well? What should you need of more?

262Yea, or so many, sith that both charge and danger

263Speak 'gainst so great a number? How, in one house,

264Should many people, under two commands,

265Hold amity? 'Tis hard; almost impossible.

266Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance

267From those that she calls servants or from mine?

268Why not, my lord? If then they chanced to slack you,

269We could control them. If you will come to me,--

270For now I spy a danger,--I entreat you

271To bring but five and twenty: to no more

272Will I give place or notice.

273I gave you all--

274And in good time you gave it.

275Made you my guardians, my depositaries;

276But kept a reservation to be follow'd

277With such a number. What, must I come to you

278With five and twenty, Regan? said you so?

279And speak't again, my lord; no more with me.

280Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favour'd,

281When others are more wicked: not being the worst

282Stands in some rank of praise.

283I'll go with thee:

284Thy fifty yet doth double five and twenty,

285And thou art twice her love.

286Hear me, my lord;

287What need you five and twenty, ten, or five,

288To follow in a house where twice so many

289Have a command to tend you?

290What need one?

291O, reason not the need: our basest beggars

292Are in the poorest thing superfluous:

293Allow not nature more than nature needs,

294Man's life's as cheap as beast's: thou art a lady;

295If only to go warm were gorgeous,

296Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear'st,

297Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true need,--

298You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!

299You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,

300As full of grief as age; wretched in both!

301If it be you that stir these daughters' hearts

302Against their father, fool me not so much

303To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger,

304And let not women's weapons, water-drops,

305Stain my man's cheeks! No, you unnatural hags,

306I will have such revenges on you both,

307That all the world shall--I will do such things,--

308What they are, yet I know not: but they shall be

309The terrors of the earth. You think I'll weep

310No, I'll not weep:

311I have full cause of weeping; but this heart

312Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws,

313Or ere I'll weep. O fool, I shall go mad!

314Let us withdraw; 'twill be a storm.

315This house is little: the old man and his people

316Cannot be well bestow'd.

317'Tis his own blame; hath put himself from rest,

318And must needs taste his folly.

319For his particular, I'll receive him gladly,

320But not one follower.

321So am I purposed.

322Where is my lord of Gloucester?

323Follow'd the old man forth: he is return'd.

324The king is in high rage.

325Whither is he going?

326He calls to horse; but will I know not whither.

327'Tis best to give him way; he leads himself.

328My lord, entreat him by no means to stay.

329Alack, the night comes on, and the bleak winds

330Do sorely ruffle; for many miles a bout

331There's scarce a bush.

332O, sir, to wilful men,

333The injuries that they themselves procure

334Must be their schoolmasters. Shut up your doors:

335He is attended with a desperate train;

336And what they may incense him to, being apt

337To have his ear abused, wisdom bids fear.

338Shut up your doors, my lord; 'tis a wild night:

339My Regan counsels well; come out o' the storm.

1Who's there, besides foul weather?

2One minded like the weather, most unquietly.

3I know you. Where's the king?

4Contending with the fretful element:

5Bids the winds blow the earth into the sea,

6Or swell the curled water 'bove the main,

7That things might change or cease; tears his white hair,

8Which the impetuous blasts, with eyeless rage,

9Catch in their fury, and make nothing of;

10Strives in his little world of man to out-scorn

11The to-and-fro-conflicting wind and rain.

12This night, wherein the cub-drawn bear would couch,

13The lion and the belly-pinched wolf

14Keep their fur dry, unbonneted he runs,

15And bids what will take all.

16But who is with him?

17None but the fool; who labours to out-jest

18His heart-struck injuries.

19Sir, I do know you;

20And dare, upon the warrant of my note,

21Commend a dear thing to you. There is division,

22Although as yet the face of it be cover'd

23With mutual cunning, 'twixt Albany and Cornwall;

24Who have--as who have not, that their great stars

25Throned and set high?--servants, who seem no less,

26Which are to France the spies and speculations

27Intelligent of our state; what hath been seen,

28Either in snuffs and packings of the dukes,

29Or the hard rein which both of them have borne

30Against the old kind king; or something deeper,

31Whereof perchance these are but furnishings;

32But, true it is, from France there comes a power

33Into this scatter'd kingdom; who already,

34Wise in our negligence, have secret feet

35In some of our best ports, and are at point

36To show their open banner. Now to you:

37If on my credit you dare build so far

38To make your speed to Dover, you shall find

39Some that will thank you, making just report

40Of how unnatural and bemadding sorrow

41The king hath cause to plain.

42I am a gentleman of blood and breeding;

43And, from some knowledge and assurance, offer

44This office to you.

45I will talk further with you.

46No, do not.

47For confirmation that I am much more

48Than my out-wall, open this purse, and take

49What it contains. If you shall see Cordelia,--

50As fear not but you shall,--show her this ring;

51And she will tell you who your fellow is

52That yet you do not know. Fie on this storm!

53I will go seek the king.

54Give me your hand: have you no more to say?

55Few words, but, to effect, more than all yet;

56That, when we have found the king,--in which your pain

57That way, I'll this,--he that first lights on him

58Holla the other.

1Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!

2You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout

3Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the cocks!

4You sulphurous and thought-executing fires,

5Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts,

6Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,

7Smite flat the thick rotundity o' the world!

8Crack nature's moulds, an germens spill at once,

9That make ingrateful man!

10O nuncle, court holy-water in a dry

11house is better than this rain-water out o' door.

12Good nuncle, in, and ask thy daughters' blessing:

13here's a night pities neither wise man nor fool.

14Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain!

15Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters:

16I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness;

17I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children,

18You owe me no subscription: then let fall

19Your horrible pleasure: here I stand, your slave,

20A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man:

21But yet I call you servile ministers,

22That have with two pernicious daughters join'd

23Your high engender'd battles 'gainst a head

24So old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul!

25He that has a house to put's head in has a good

26head-piece.

27The cod-piece that will house

28Before the head has any,

29The head and he shall louse;

30So beggars marry many.

31The man that makes his toe

32What he his heart should make

33Shall of a corn cry woe,

34And turn his sleep to wake.

35For there was never yet fair woman but she made

36mouths in a glass.

37No, I will be the pattern of all patience;

38I will say nothing.

39Who's there?

40Marry, here's grace and a cod-piece; that's a wise

41man and a fool.

42Alas, sir, are you here? things that love night

43Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies

44Gallow the very wanderers of the dark,

45And make them keep their caves: since I was man,

46Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,

47Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never

48Remember to have heard: man's nature cannot carry

49The affliction nor the fear.

50Let the great gods,

51That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads,

52Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch,

53That hast within thee undivulged crimes,

54Unwhipp'd of justice: hide thee, thou bloody hand;

55Thou perjured, and thou simular man of virtue

56That art incestuous: caitiff, to pieces shake,

57That under covert and convenient seeming

58Hast practised on man's life: close pent-up guilts,

59Rive your concealing continents, and cry

60These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man

61More sinn'd against than sinning.

62Alack, bare-headed!

63Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel;

64Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest:

65Repose you there; while I to this hard house--

66More harder than the stones whereof 'tis raised;

67Which even but now, demanding after you,

68Denied me to come in--return, and force

69Their scanted courtesy.

70My wits begin to turn.

71Come on, my boy: how dost, my boy? art cold?

72I am cold myself. Where is this straw, my fellow?

73The art of our necessities is strange,

74That can make vile things precious. Come,

75your hovel.

76Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart

77That's sorry yet for thee.

78[Singing]

79He that has and a little tiny wit--

80With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,--

81Must make content with his fortunes fit,

82For the rain it raineth every day.

83True, my good boy. Come, bring us to this hovel.

84This is a brave night to cool a courtezan.

85I'll speak a prophecy ere I go:

86When priests are more in word than matter;

87When brewers mar their malt with water;

88When nobles are their tailors' tutors;

89No heretics burn'd, but wenches' suitors;

90When every case in law is right;

91No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;

92When slanders do not live in tongues;

93Nor cutpurses come not to throngs;

94When usurers tell their gold i' the field;

95And bawds and whores do churches build;

96Then shall the realm of Albion

97Come to great confusion:

98Then comes the time, who lives to see't,

99That going shall be used with feet.

100This prophecy Merlin shall make; for I live before his time.

1Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this unnatural

2dealing. When I desire their leave that I might

3pity him, they took from me the use of mine own

4house; charged me, on pain of their perpetual

5displeasure, neither to speak of him, entreat for

6him, nor any way sustain him.

7Most savage and unnatural!

8Go to; say you nothing. There's a division betwixt

9the dukes; and a worse matter than that: I have

10received a letter this night; 'tis dangerous to be

11spoken; I have locked the letter in my closet:

12these injuries the king now bears will be revenged

13home; there's part of a power already footed: we

14must incline to the king. I will seek him, and

15privily relieve him: go you and maintain talk with

16the duke, that my charity be not of him perceived:

17if he ask for me. I am ill, and gone to bed.

18Though I die for it, as no less is threatened me,

19the king my old master must be relieved. There is

20some strange thing toward, Edmund; pray you, be careful.

21This courtesy, forbid thee, shall the duke

22Instantly know; and of that letter too:

23This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me

24That which my father loses; no less than all:

25The younger rises when the old doth fall.

1Here is the place, my lord; good my lord, enter:

2The tyranny of the open night's too rough

3For nature to endure.

4Let me alone.

5Good my lord, enter here.

6Wilt break my heart?

7I had rather break mine own. Good my lord, enter.

8Thou think'st 'tis much that this contentious storm

9Invades us to the skin: so 'tis to thee;

10But where the greater malady is fix'd,

11The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'ldst shun a bear;

12But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea,

13Thou'ldst meet the bear i' the mouth. When the

14mind's free,

15The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind

16Doth from my senses take all feeling else

17Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude!

18Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand

19For lifting food to't? But I will punish home:

20No, I will weep no more. In such a night

21To shut me out! Pour on; I will endure.

22In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril!

23Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,--

24O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;

25No more of that.

26Good my lord, enter here.

27Prithee, go in thyself: seek thine own ease:

28This tempest will not give me leave to ponder

29On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in.

30In, boy; go first. You houseless poverty,--

31Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll sleep.

32Poor naked wretches, whereso'er you are,

33That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,

34How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,

35Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you

36From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en

37Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp;

38Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,

39That thou mayst shake the superflux to them,

40And show the heavens more just.

41[Within] Fathom and half, fathom and half! Poor Tom!

42Come not in here, nuncle, here's a spirit

43Help me, help me!

44Give me thy hand. Who's there?

45A spirit, a spirit: he says his name's poor Tom.

46What art thou that dost grumble there i' the straw?

47Come forth.

48Away! the foul fiend follows me!

49Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind.

50Hum! go to thy cold bed, and warm thee.

51Hast thou given all to thy two daughters?

52And art thou come to this?

53Who gives any thing to poor Tom? whom the foul

54fiend hath led through fire and through flame, and

55through ford and whirlipool e'er bog and quagmire;

56that hath laid knives under his pillow, and halters

57in his pew; set ratsbane by his porridge; made film

58proud of heart, to ride on a bay trotting-horse over

59four-inched bridges, to course his own shadow for a

60traitor. Bless thy five wits! Tom's a-cold,--O, do

61de, do de, do de. Bless thee from whirlwinds,

62star-blasting, and taking! Do poor Tom some

63charity, whom the foul fiend vexes: there could I

64have him now,--and there,--and there again, and there.

65What, have his daughters brought him to this pass?

66Couldst thou save nothing? Didst thou give them all?

67Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all shamed.

68Now, all the plagues that in the pendulous air

69Hang fated o'er men's faults light on thy daughters!

70He hath no daughters, sir.

71Death, traitor! nothing could have subdued nature

72To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.

73Is it the fashion, that discarded fathers

74Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?

75Judicious punishment! 'twas this flesh begot

76Those pelican daughters.

77Pillicock sat on Pillicock-hill:

78Halloo, halloo, loo, loo!

79This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.

80Take heed o' the foul fiend: obey thy parents;

81keep thy word justly; swear not; commit not with

82man's sworn spouse; set not thy sweet heart on proud

83array. Tom's a-cold.

84What hast thou been?

85A serving-man, proud in heart and mind; that curled

86my hair; wore gloves in my cap; served the lust of

87my mistress' heart, and did the act of darkness with

88her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and

89broke them in the sweet face of heaven: one that

90slept in the contriving of lust, and waked to do it:

91wine loved I deeply, dice dearly: and in woman

92out-paramoured the Turk: false of heart, light of

93ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth,

94wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey.

95Let not the creaking of shoes nor the rustling of

96silks betray thy poor heart to woman: keep thy foot

97out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy pen

98from lenders' books, and defy the foul fiend.

99Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind:

100Says suum, mun, ha, no, nonny.

101Dolphin my boy, my boy, sessa! let him trot by.

102Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer

103with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies.

104Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou

105owest the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep

106no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha! here's three on

107's are sophisticated! Thou art the thing itself:

108unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor bare,

109forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings!

110come unbutton here.

111Prithee, nuncle, be contented; 'tis a naughty night

112to swim in. Now a little fire in a wild field were

113like an old lecher's heart; a small spark, all the

114rest on's body cold. Look, here comes a walking fire.

115This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet: he begins

116at curfew, and walks till the first cock; he gives

117the web and the pin, squints the eye, and makes the

118hare-lip; mildews the white wheat, and hurts the

119poor creature of earth.

120S. Withold footed thrice the old;

121He met the night-mare, and her nine-fold;

122Bid her alight,

123And her troth plight,

124And, aroint thee, witch, aroint thee!

125How fares your grace?

126What's he?

127Who's there? What is't you seek?

128What are you there? Your names?

129Poor Tom; that eats the swimming frog, the toad,

130the tadpole, the wall-newt and the water; that in

131the fury of his heart, when the foul fiend rages,

132eats cow-dung for sallets; swallows the old rat and

133the ditch-dog; drinks the green mantle of the

134standing pool; who is whipped from tithing to

135tithing, and stock- punished, and imprisoned; who

136hath had three suits to his back, six shirts to his

137body, horse to ride, and weapon to wear;

138But mice and rats, and such small deer,

139Have been Tom's food for seven long year.

140Beware my follower. Peace, Smulkin; peace, thou fiend!

141What, hath your grace no better company?

142The prince of darkness is a gentleman:

143Modo he's call'd, and Mahu.

144Our flesh and blood is grown so vile, my lord,

145That it doth hate what gets it.

146Poor Tom's a-cold.

147Go in with me: my duty cannot suffer

148To obey in all your daughters' hard commands:

149Though their injunction be to bar my doors,

150And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you,

151Yet have I ventured to come seek you out,

152And bring you where both fire and food is ready.

153First let me talk with this philosopher.

154What is the cause of thunder?

155Good my lord, take his offer; go into the house.

156I'll talk a word with this same learned Theban.

157What is your study?

158How to prevent the fiend, and to kill vermin.

159Let me ask you one word in private.

160Importune him once more to go, my lord;

161His wits begin to unsettle.

162Canst thou blame him?

163His daughters seek his death: ah, that good Kent!

164He said it would be thus, poor banish'd man!

165Thou say'st the king grows mad; I'll tell thee, friend,

166I am almost mad myself: I had a son,

167Now outlaw'd from my blood; he sought my life,

168But lately, very late: I loved him, friend;

169No father his son dearer: truth to tell thee,

170The grief hath crazed my wits. What a night's this!

171I do beseech your grace,--

172O, cry your mercy, sir.

173Noble philosopher, your company.

174Tom's a-cold.