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I thought the King had more affected the Duke
of Albany than Cornwall.
It did always seem so to us, but now in
the division of the kingdom, it appears not which
55of the dukes he values most, for equalities are so
weighed that curiosity in neither can make choice
of either’s moiety.
Is not this your son, my lord?
His breeding, sir, hath been at my
1010charge. I have so often blushed to acknowledge
him that now I am brazed to ’t.
I cannot conceive you.
Sir, this young fellow’s mother could,
whereupon she grew round-wombed and had indeed,
1515sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband
for her bed. Do you smell a fault?
I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it
being so proper.
But I have a son, sir, by order of law,
2020some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer in
my account. Though this knave came something
saucily to the world before he was sent for, yet was
his mother fair, there was good sport at his making,
and the whoreson must be acknowledged.—Do you
2525know this noble gentleman, Edmund?
No, my lord.
My lord of Kent. Remember him hereafter
as my honorable friend.
My services to your Lordship.
3030I must love you and sue to know you better.
Sir, I shall study deserving.
He hath been out nine years, and away he
shall again. (Sennet.) The King is coming.
Attend the lords of France and Burgundy,
3535Gloucester.
I shall, my lord.
He exits.
Meantime we shall express our darker purpose.—
Give me the map there.He is handed a map.
Know that we have divided
4040In three our kingdom, and ’tis our fast intent
To shake all cares and business from our age,
Conferring them on younger strengths, while we
Unburdened crawl toward death. Our son of
Cornwall
4545And you, our no less loving son of Albany,
We have this hour a constant will to publish
Our daughters’ several dowers, that future strife
May be prevented now.
The two great princes, France and Burgundy,
5050Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love,
Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn
And here are to be answered. Tell me, my
daughters—
Since now we will divest us both of rule,
5555Interest of territory, cares of state—
Which of you shall we say doth love us most,
That we our largest bounty may extend
Where nature doth with merit challenge. Goneril,
Our eldest born, speak first.
6060Sir, I love you more than word can wield the
matter,
Dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty,
Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare,
No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honor;
6565As much as child e’er loved, or father found;
A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable.
Beyond all manner of so much I love you.
What shall Cordelia speak? Love, and be silent.
Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,
7070With shadowy forests and with champains riched,
With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,
We make thee lady. To thine and Albany’s issue
Be this perpetual.—What says our second
daughter,
7575Our dearest Regan, wife of Cornwall? Speak.
I am made of that self mettle as my sister
And prize me at her worth. In my true heart
I find she names my very deed of love;
Only she comes too short, that I profess
8080Myself an enemy to all other joys
Which the most precious square of sense
possesses,
And find I am alone felicitate
In your dear Highness’ love.
8585Then poor Cordelia!
And yet not so, since I am sure my love’s
More ponderous than my tongue.
To thee and thine hereditary ever
Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom,
9090No less in space, validity, and pleasure
Than that conferred on Goneril.—Now, our joy,
Although our last and least, to whose young love
The vines of France and milk of Burgundy
Strive to be interessed, what can you say to draw
9595A third more opulent than your sisters’? Speak.
Nothing, my lord.
Nothing?
Nothing.
Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again.
100100Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave
My heart into my mouth. I love your Majesty
According to my bond, no more nor less.
How, how, Cordelia? Mend your speech a little,
Lest you may mar your fortunes.
105105Good my lord,
You have begot me, bred me, loved me.
I return those duties back as are right fit:
Obey you, love you, and most honor you.
Why have my sisters husbands if they say
110110They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,
That lord whose hand must take my plight shall
carry
Half my love with him, half my care and duty.
Sure I shall never marry like my sisters,
115115To love my father all.
But goes thy heart with this?
Ay, my good lord.
So young and so untender?
So young, my lord, and true.
120120Let it be so. Thy truth, then, be thy dower,
For by the sacred radiance of the sun,
The mysteries of Hecate and the night,
By all the operation of the orbs
From whom we do exist and cease to be,
125125Here I disclaim all my paternal care,
Propinquity, and property of blood,
And as a stranger to my heart and me
Hold thee from this forever. The barbarous
Scythian,
130130Or he that makes his generation messes
To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom
Be as well neighbored, pitied, and relieved
As thou my sometime daughter.
Good my liege—
135135Peace, Kent.
Come not between the dragon and his wrath.
I loved her most and thought to set my rest
On her kind nursery. To Cordelia. Hence and avoid
my sight!—
140140So be my grave my peace as here I give
Her father’s heart from her.—Call France. Who stirs?
Call Burgundy. An Attendant exits. Cornwall and
Albany,
With my two daughters’ dowers digest the third.
145145Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.
I do invest you jointly with my power,
Preeminence, and all the large effects
That troop with majesty. Ourself by monthly course,
With reservation of an hundred knights
150150By you to be sustained, shall our abode
Make with you by due turn. Only we shall retain
The name and all th’ addition to a king.
The sway, revenue, execution of the rest,
Belovèd sons, be yours, which to confirm,
155155This coronet part between you.
Royal Lear,
Whom I have ever honored as my king,
Loved as my father, as my master followed,
As my great patron thought on in my prayers—
160160The bow is bent and drawn. Make from the shaft.
Let it fall rather, though the fork invade
The region of my heart. Be Kent unmannerly
When Lear is mad. What wouldst thou do, old man?
Think’st thou that duty shall have dread to speak
165165When power to flattery bows? To plainness honor’s
bound
When majesty falls to folly. Reserve thy state,
And in thy best consideration check
This hideous rashness. Answer my life my
170170judgment,
Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least,
Nor are those empty-hearted whose low sounds
Reverb no hollowness.
Kent, on thy life, no more.
175175My life I never held but as a pawn
To wage against thine enemies, nor fear to lose
it,
Thy safety being motive.
Out of my sight!
180180See better, Lear, and let me still remain
The true blank of thine eye.
Now, by Apollo—
Now, by Apollo, king,
Thou swear’st thy gods in vain.
185185O vassal! Miscreant!
Dear sir, forbear.
Kill thy physician, and thy fee bestow
Upon the foul disease. Revoke thy gift,
Or whilst I can vent clamor from my throat,
190190I’ll tell thee thou dost evil.
Hear me, recreant; on thine allegiance, hear me!
That thou hast sought to make us break our vows—
Which we durst never yet—and with strained pride
To come betwixt our sentence and our power,
195195Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,
Our potency made good, take thy reward:
Five days we do allot thee for provision
To shield thee from disasters of the world,
And on the sixth to turn thy hated back
200200Upon our kingdom. If on the tenth day following
Thy banished trunk be found in our dominions,
The moment is thy death. Away! By Jupiter,
This shall not be revoked.
Fare thee well, king. Sith thus thou wilt appear,
205205Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.
To Cordelia. The gods to their dear shelter take
thee, maid,
That justly think’st and hast most rightly said.
To Goneril and Regan. And your large speeches
210210may your deeds approve,
That good effects may spring from words of love.—
Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu.
He’ll shape his old course in a country new.
Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble lord.
215215My lord of Burgundy,
We first address toward you, who with this king
Hath rivaled for our daughter. What in the least
Will you require in present dower with her,
Or cease your quest of love?
220220Most royal Majesty,
I crave no more than hath your Highness offered,
Nor will you tender less.
Right noble Burgundy,
When she was dear to us, we did hold her so,
225225But now her price is fallen. Sir, there she stands.
If aught within that little seeming substance,
Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced
And nothing more, may fitly like your Grace,
She’s there, and she is yours.
230230I know no answer.
Will you, with those infirmities she owes,
Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,
Dowered with our curse and strangered with our
oath,
235235Take her or leave her?
Pardon me, royal sir,
Election makes not up in such conditions.
Then leave her, sir, for by the power that made me
I tell you all her wealth.—For you, great king,
240240I would not from your love make such a stray
To match you where I hate. Therefore beseech you
T’ avert your liking a more worthier way
Than on a wretch whom Nature is ashamed
Almost t’ acknowledge hers.
245245This is most strange,
That she whom even but now was your best
object,
The argument of your praise, balm of your age,
The best, the dearest, should in this trice of time
250250Commit a thing so monstrous to dismantle
So many folds of favor. Sure her offense
Must be of such unnatural degree
That monsters it, or your forevouched affection
Fall into taint; which to believe of her
255255Must be a faith that reason without miracle
Should never plant in me.
I yet beseech your Majesty—
If for I want that glib and oily art
To speak and purpose not, since what I well
260260intend
I’ll do ’t before I speak—that you make known
It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,
No unchaste action or dishonored step
That hath deprived me of your grace and favor,
265265But even for want of that for which I am richer:
A still-soliciting eye and such a tongue
That I am glad I have not, though not to have it
Hath lost me in your liking.
Better thou
270270Hadst not been born than not t’ have pleased me
better.
Is it but this—a tardiness in nature
Which often leaves the history unspoke
That it intends to do?—My lord of Burgundy,
275275What say you to the lady? Love’s not love
When it is mingled with regards that stands
Aloof from th’ entire point. Will you have her?
She is herself a dowry.
Royal king,
280280Give but that portion which yourself proposed,
And here I take Cordelia by the hand,
Duchess of Burgundy.
Nothing. I have sworn. I am firm.
I am sorry, then, you have so lost a father
285285That you must lose a husband.
Peace be with
Burgundy.
Since that respect and fortunes are his love,
I shall not be his wife.
290290Fairest Cordelia, that art most rich being poor;
Most choice, forsaken; and most loved, despised,
Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon,
Be it lawful I take up what’s cast away.
Gods, gods! ’Tis strange that from their cold’st
295295neglect
My love should kindle to enflamed respect.—
Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my
chance,
Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France.
300300Not all the dukes of wat’rish Burgundy
Can buy this unprized precious maid of me.—
Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind.
Thou losest here a better where to find.
Thou hast her, France. Let her be thine, for we
305305Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see
That face of hers again. To Cordelia. Therefore
begone
Without our grace, our love, our benison.—
Come, noble Burgundy.
310310Bid farewell to your sisters.
The jewels of our father, with washed eyes
Cordelia leaves you. I know you what you are,
And like a sister am most loath to call
Your faults as they are named. Love well our
315315father.
To your professèd bosoms I commit him;
But yet, alas, stood I within his grace,
I would prefer him to a better place.
So farewell to you both.
320320Prescribe not us our duty.
Let your study
Be to content your lord, who hath received you
At Fortune’s alms. You have obedience scanted
And well are worth the want that you have wanted.
325325Time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides,
Who covers faults at last with shame derides.
Well may you prosper.
Come, my fair Cordelia.
France and Cordelia exit.
Sister, it is not little I have to say of what
330330most nearly appertains to us both. I think our
father will hence tonight.
That’s most certain, and with you; next month
with us.
You see how full of changes his age is; the
335335observation we have made of it hath not been
little. He always loved our sister most, and with
what poor judgment he hath now cast her off
appears too grossly.
’Tis the infirmity of his age. Yet he hath ever
340340but slenderly known himself.
The best and soundest of his time hath been
but rash. Then must we look from his age to
receive not alone the imperfections of long-engraffed
condition, but therewithal the unruly waywardness
345345that infirm and choleric years bring with
them.
Such unconstant starts are we like to have
from him as this of Kent’s banishment.
There is further compliment of leave-taking
350350between France and him. Pray you, let us sit
together. If our father carry authority with such
disposition as he bears, this last surrender of his will
but offend us.
We shall further think of it.
355355We must do something, and i’ th’ heat.
They exit.
Thou, Nature, art my goddess. To thy law
My services are bound. Wherefore should I
Stand in the plague of custom, and permit
The curiosity of nations to deprive me
5360For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines
Lag of a brother? why “bastard”? Wherefore “base,”
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous and my shape as true
As honest madam’s issue? Why brand they us
10365With “base,” with “baseness,” “bastardy,” “base,”
“base,”
Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality
Than doth within a dull, stale, tired bed
15370Go to th’ creating a whole tribe of fops
Got ’tween asleep and wake? Well then,
Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land.
Our father’s love is to the bastard Edmund
As to th’ legitimate. Fine word, “legitimate.”
20375Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
Shall top th’ legitimate. I grow, I prosper.
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
Kent banished thus? And France in choler parted?
25380And the King gone tonight, prescribed his power,
Confined to exhibition? All this done
Upon the gad?—Edmund, how now? What news?
So please your Lordship, none. He puts a
paper in his pocket.
Why so earnestly seek you to put up that
30385letter?
I know no news, my lord.
What paper were you reading?
Nothing, my lord.
No? What needed then that terrible dispatch
35390of it into your pocket? The quality of nothing
hath not such need to hide itself. Let’s see. Come, if
it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.
I beseech you, sir, pardon me. It is a letter
from my brother that I have not all o’erread; and
40395for so much as I have perused, I find it not fit for
your o’erlooking.
Give me the letter, sir.
I shall offend either to detain or give it. The
contents, as in part I understand them, are to
45400blame.
Let’s see, let’s see.
Edmund gives him the paper.
I hope, for my brother’s justification, he
wrote this but as an essay or taste of my virtue.
This policy and reverence of age
50405makes the world bitter to the best of our times, keeps
our fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish
them. I begin to find an idle and fond bondage in the
oppression of aged tyranny, who sways not as it hath
power but as it is suffered. Come to me, that of this I
55410may speak more. If our father would sleep till I waked
him, you should enjoy half his revenue forever and
live the beloved of your brother. Edgar.
Hum? Conspiracy? “Sleep till I wake him, you
should enjoy half his revenue.” My son Edgar! Had
60415he a hand to write this? A heart and brain to breed it
in?—When came you to this? Who brought it?
It was not brought me, my lord; there’s the
cunning of it. I found it thrown in at the casement
of my closet.
65420You know the character to be your
brother’s?
If the matter were good, my lord, I durst
swear it were his; but in respect of that, I would
fain think it were not.
70425It is his.
It is his hand, my lord, but I hope his heart is
not in the contents.
Has he never before sounded you in this
business?
75430Never, my lord. But I have heard him oft
maintain it to be fit that, sons at perfect age and
fathers declined, the father should be as ward to the
son, and the son manage his revenue.
O villain, villain! His very opinion in the
80435letter. Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish
villain! Worse than brutish!—Go, sirrah, seek
him. I’ll apprehend him.—Abominable villain!—
Where is he?
I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please
85440you to suspend your indignation against my brother
till you can derive from him better testimony of his
intent, you should run a certain course; where, if
you violently proceed against him, mistaking his
purpose, it would make a great gap in your own
90445honor and shake in pieces the heart of his obedience.
I dare pawn down my life for him that he hath
writ this to feel my affection to your Honor, and to
no other pretense of danger.
Think you so?
95450If your Honor judge it meet, I will place you
where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an
auricular assurance have your satisfaction, and that
without any further delay than this very evening.
He cannot be such a monster.
100455Nor is not, sure.
To his father, that so tenderly and entirely
loves him! Heaven and Earth! Edmund, seek him
out; wind me into him, I pray you. Frame the
business after your own wisdom. I would unstate
105460myself to be in a due resolution.
I will seek him, sir, presently, convey the
business as I shall find means, and acquaint you
withal.
These late eclipses in the sun and moon
110465portend no good to us. Though the wisdom of
nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds
itself scourged by the sequent effects. Love cools,
friendship falls off, brothers divide; in cities, mutinies;
in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and
115470the bond cracked ’twixt son and father. This villain
of mine comes under the prediction: there’s son
against father. The King falls from bias of nature:
there’s father against child. We have seen the best of
our time. Machinations, hollowness, treachery, and
120475all ruinous disorders follow us disquietly to our
graves.—Find out this villain, Edmund. It shall
lose thee nothing. Do it carefully.—And the noble
and true-hearted Kent banished! His offense, honesty!
’Tis strange.
125480This is the excellent foppery of the world, that
when we are sick in fortune (often the surfeits of
our own behavior) we make guilty of our disasters
the sun, the moon, and stars, as if we were villains
on necessity; fools by heavenly compulsion; knaves,
130485thieves, and treachers by spherical predominance;
drunkards, liars, and adulterers by an enforced
obedience of planetary influence; and all that we
are evil in, by a divine thrusting on. An admirable
evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish
135490disposition on the charge of a star! My father
compounded with my mother under the Dragon’s
tail, and my nativity was under Ursa Major, so that it
follows I am rough and lecherous. Fut, I should
have been that I am, had the maidenliest star in the
140495firmament twinkled on my bastardizing. Edgar—
Enter Edgar.
and pat he comes like the catastrophe of the old
comedy. My cue is villainous melancholy, with a
sigh like Tom o’ Bedlam.—O, these eclipses do
portend these divisions. Fa, sol, la, mi.
145500How now, brother Edmund, what serious contemplation
are you in?
I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read
this other day, what should follow these eclipses.
Do you busy yourself with that?
150505I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed
unhappily, as of unnaturalness between the
child and the parent, death, dearth, dissolutions of
ancient amities, divisions in state, menaces and
maledictions against king and nobles, needless diffidences,
155510banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts,
nuptial breaches, and I know not what.
How long have you been a sectary
astronomical?
Come, come, when saw you my father last?
160515The night gone by.
Spake you with him?
Ay, two hours together.
Parted you in good terms? Found you no
displeasure in him by word nor countenance?
165520None at all.
Bethink yourself wherein you may have offended
him, and at my entreaty forbear his presence
until some little time hath qualified the heat
of his displeasure, which at this instant so rageth in
170525him that with the mischief of your person it would
scarcely allay.
Some villain hath done me wrong.
That’s my fear. I pray you have a continent
forbearance till the speed of his rage goes slower;
175530and, as I say, retire with me to my lodging, from
whence I will fitly bring you to hear my lord speak.
Pray you go. There’s my key. If you do stir abroad,
go armed.
Armed, brother?
180535Brother, I advise you to the best. I am no
honest man if there be any good meaning toward
you. I have told you what I have seen and heard, but
faintly, nothing like the image and horror of it. Pray
you, away.
185540Shall I hear from you anon?
I do serve you in this business.Edgar exits.
A credulous father and a brother noble,
Whose nature is so far from doing harms
That he suspects none; on whose foolish honesty
190545My practices ride easy. I see the business.
Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit.
All with me’s meet that I can fashion fit.
Did my father strike my gentleman for chiding
of his Fool?
550Ay, madam.
By day and night he wrongs me. Every hour
5He flashes into one gross crime or other
That sets us all at odds. I’ll not endure it.
His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us
555On every trifle. When he returns from hunting,
I will not speak with him. Say I am sick.
10If you come slack of former services,
You shall do well. The fault of it I’ll answer.
He’s coming, madam. I hear him.
560Put on what weary negligence you please,
You and your fellows. I’d have it come to question.
15If he distaste it, let him to my sister,
Whose mind and mine I know in that are one,
Not to be overruled. Idle old man
565That still would manage those authorities
That he hath given away. Now, by my life,
20Old fools are babes again and must be used
With checks as flatteries, when they are seen
abused.
570Remember what I have said.
Well, madam.
25And let his knights have colder looks among you.
What grows of it, no matter. Advise your fellows so.
I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall,
575That I may speak. I’ll write straight to my sister
To hold my very course. Prepare for dinner.
If but as well I other accents borrow
That can my speech diffuse, my good intent
May carry through itself to that full issue
580For which I razed my likeness. Now, banished Kent,
5If thou canst serve where thou dost stand
condemned,
So may it come thy master, whom thou lov’st,
Shall find thee full of labors.
585Let me not stay a jot for dinner. Go get it ready.
An Attendant exits.
10How now, what art thou?
A man, sir.
What dost thou profess? What wouldst thou with
us?
590I do profess to be no less than I seem, to serve
15him truly that will put me in trust, to love him that
is honest, to converse with him that is wise and says
little, to fear judgment, to fight when I cannot
choose, and to eat no fish.
595What art thou?
20A very honest-hearted fellow, and as poor as the
King.
If thou be’st as poor for a subject as he’s for a
king, thou art poor enough. What wouldst thou?
600Service.
25Who wouldst thou serve?
You.
Dost thou know me, fellow?
No, sir, but you have that in your countenance
605which I would fain call master.
30What’s that?
Authority.
What services canst do?
I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a
610curious tale in telling it, and deliver a plain message
35bluntly. That which ordinary men are fit for I
am qualified in, and the best of me is diligence.
How old art thou?
Not so young, sir, to love a woman for singing,
615nor so old to dote on her for anything. I have years
40on my back forty-eight.
Follow me. Thou shalt serve me—if I like thee
no worse after dinner. I will not part from thee
yet.—Dinner, ho, dinner!—Where’s my knave, my
620Fool? Go you and call my Fool hither.
An Attendant exits.
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
45You, you, sirrah, where’s my daughter?
So please you—
He exits.
What says the fellow there? Call the clotpole
back. A Knight exits. Where’s my Fool? Ho! I think
625the world’s asleep.
Enter Knight again.
50How now? Where’s that mongrel?
He says, my lord, your daughter is not well.
Why came not the slave back to me when I
called him?
630Sir, he answered me in the roundest manner,
55he would not.
He would not?
My lord, I know not what the matter is, but to
my judgment your Highness is not entertained
635with that ceremonious affection as you were wont.
60There’s a great abatement of kindness appears as
well in the general dependents as in the Duke
himself also, and your daughter.
Ha? Sayst thou so?
640I beseech you pardon me, my lord, if I be
65mistaken, for my duty cannot be silent when I think
your Highness wronged.
Thou but remembrest me of mine own conception.
I have perceived a most faint neglect of late,
645which I have rather blamed as mine own jealous
70curiosity than as a very pretense and purpose of
unkindness. I will look further into ’t. But where’s
my Fool? I have not seen him this two days.
Since my young lady’s going into France, sir,
650the Fool hath much pined away.
75No more of that. I have noted it well.—Go you
and tell my daughter I would speak with her. An
Attendant exits. Go you call hither my Fool.
Another exits.
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
O you, sir, you, come you hither, sir. Who am I, sir?
655My lady’s father.
80“My lady’s father”? My lord’s knave! You whoreson
dog, you slave, you cur!
I am none of these, my lord, I beseech your
pardon.
660Do you bandy looks with me, you rascal?
Lear strikes him.85I’ll not be strucken, my lord.
Nor tripped neither, you base
football player?
I thank thee, fellow. Thou serv’st me, and I’ll
665love thee.
90Come, sir, arise. Away. I’ll teach you
differences. Away, away. If you will measure your
lubber’s length again, tarry. But away. Go to. Have
you wisdom? So.
670Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee. There’s
95earnest of thy service.
Let me hire him too. To Kent. Here’s my
coxcomb.
How now, my pretty knave, how dost thou?
675Sirrah, you were best take my
100coxcomb.
Why, my boy?
Why? For taking one’s part that’s out of favor.
To Kent. Nay, an thou canst not smile as the
680wind sits, thou ’lt catch cold shortly. There, take my
105coxcomb. Why, this fellow has banished two on ’s
daughters and did the third a blessing against his
will. If thou follow him, thou must needs wear my
coxcomb.—How now, nuncle? Would I had two
685coxcombs and two daughters.
110Why, my boy?
If I gave them all my living, I’d keep my coxcombs
myself. There’s mine. Beg another of thy
daughters.
690Take heed, sirrah—the whip.
115Truth’s a dog must to kennel; he must be
whipped out, when the Lady Brach may stand by th’
fire and stink.
A pestilent gall to me!
695Sirrah, I’ll teach thee a speech.
120Do.
Mark it, nuncle:
Have more than thou showest.
Speak less than thou knowest,
700Lend less than thou owest,
125Ride more than thou goest,
Learn more than thou trowest,
Set less than thou throwest;
Leave thy drink and thy whore
705And keep in-a-door,
130And thou shalt have more
Than two tens to a score.
This is nothing, Fool.
Then ’tis like the breath of an unfee’d lawyer.
710You gave me nothing for ’t.—Can you make no use
135of nothing, nuncle?
Why no, boy. Nothing can be made out of
nothing.
Prithee tell him, so much the rent of his
715land comes to. He will not believe a Fool.
140A bitter Fool!
Dost know the difference, my boy, between a
bitter fool and a sweet one?
No, lad, teach me.
720That lord that counseled thee
145To give away thy land,
Come place him here by me;
Do thou for him stand.
The sweet and bitter fool
725Will presently appear:
150The one in motley here,
The other found out there.
Dost thou call me “fool,” boy?
All thy other titles thou hast given away. That
730thou wast born with.
155This is not altogether fool, my lord.
No, faith, lords and great men will not let me. If
I had a monopoly out, they would have part on ’t.
And ladies too, they will not let me have all the fool
735to myself; they’ll be snatching.—Nuncle, give me
160an egg, and I’ll give thee two crowns.
What two crowns shall they be?
Why, after I have cut the egg i’ th’ middle and eat
up the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou
740clovest thy crown i’ th’ middle and gav’st away
165both parts, thou bor’st thine ass on thy back o’er
the dirt. Thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown
when thou gav’st thy golden one away. If I speak
like myself in this, let him be whipped that first
745finds it so. Sings.
170Fools had ne’er less grace in a year,
For wise men are grown foppish
And know not how their wits to wear,
Their manners are so apish.
750When were you wont to be so full of songs,
175sirrah?
I have used it, nuncle, e’er since thou mad’st thy
daughters thy mothers. For when thou gav’st them
the rod and put’st down thine own breeches,
Sings.
755Then they for sudden joy did weep,
180And I for sorrow sung,
That such a king should play bo-peep
And go the fools among.
Prithee, nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach
760thy Fool to lie. I would fain learn to lie.
185An you lie, sirrah, we’ll have you whipped.
I marvel what kin thou and thy daughters are.
They’ll have me whipped for speaking true, thou ’lt
have me whipped for lying, and sometimes I am
765whipped for holding my peace. I had rather be any
190kind o’ thing than a Fool. And yet I would not be
thee, nuncle. Thou hast pared thy wit o’ both sides
and left nothing i’ th’ middle. Here comes one o’ the
parings.
770How now, daughter? What makes that frontlet on?
195Methinks you are too much of late i’ th’ frown.
Thou wast a pretty fellow when thou hadst no
need to care for her frowning. Now thou art an O
without a figure. I am better than thou art now. I
775am a Fool. Thou art nothing. To Goneril. Yes,
200forsooth, I will hold my tongue. So your face bids
me, though you say nothing.
Mum, mum,
He that keeps nor crust nor crumb,
780Weary of all, shall want some.
He points at Lear.
205That’s a shelled peascod.
Not only, sir, this your all-licensed Fool,
But other of your insolent retinue
Do hourly carp and quarrel, breaking forth
785In rank and not-to-be-endurèd riots. Sir,
210I had thought by making this well known unto you
To have found a safe redress, but now grow fearful,
By what yourself too late have spoke and done,
That you protect this course and put it on
790By your allowance; which if you should, the fault
215Would not ’scape censure, nor the redresses sleep
Which in the tender of a wholesome weal
Might in their working do you that offense,
Which else were shame, that then necessity
795Will call discreet proceeding.
220For you know, nuncle,
The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long,
That it’s had it head bit off by it young.
So out went the candle, and we were left darkling.
800Are you our daughter?
225I would you would make use of your good wisdom,
Whereof I know you are fraught, and put away
These dispositions which of late transport you
From what you rightly are.
805May not an ass know when the cart draws the
230horse? Whoop, Jug, I love thee!
Does any here know me? This is not Lear.
Does Lear walk thus, speak thus? Where are his
eyes?
810Either his notion weakens, his discernings
235Are lethargied—Ha! Waking? ’Tis not so.
Who is it that can tell me who I am?
Lear’s shadow.
I would learn that, for, by the marks of
815sovereignty,
240Knowledge, and reason, I should be false persuaded
I had daughters.
Which they will make an obedient father.
Your name, fair gentlewoman?
820This admiration, sir, is much o’ th’ savor
245Of other your new pranks. I do beseech you
To understand my purposes aright.
As you are old and reverend, should be wise.
Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires,
825Men so disordered, so debauched and bold,
250That this our court, infected with their manners,
Shows like a riotous inn. Epicurism and lust
Makes it more like a tavern or a brothel
Than a graced palace. The shame itself doth speak
830For instant remedy. Be then desired,
255By her that else will take the thing she begs,
A little to disquantity your train,
And the remainders that shall still depend
To be such men as may besort your age,
835Which know themselves and you.
260Darkness and
devils!—
Saddle my horses. Call my train together.
Some exit.
Degenerate bastard, I’ll not trouble thee.
840Yet have I left a daughter.
265You strike my people, and your disordered rabble
Make servants of their betters.
Woe that too late repents!—O, sir, are you
come?
845Is it your will? Speak, sir.—Prepare my horses.
Some exit.
270Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,
More hideous when thou show’st thee in a child
Than the sea monster!
Pray, sir, be patient.
850Detested kite, thou liest.
275My train are men of choice and rarest parts,
That all particulars of duty know
And in the most exact regard support
The worships of their name. O most small fault,
855How ugly didst thou in Cordelia show,
280Which, like an engine, wrenched my frame of
nature
From the fixed place, drew from my heart all love
And added to the gall! O Lear, Lear, Lear!
He strikes his head.
860Beat at this gate that let thy folly in
285And thy dear judgment out. Go, go, my people.
My lord, I am guiltless as I am ignorant
Of what hath moved you.
It may be so, my lord.—
865Hear, Nature, hear, dear goddess, hear!
290Suspend thy purpose if thou didst intend
To make this creature fruitful.
Into her womb convey sterility.
Dry up in her the organs of increase,
870And from her derogate body never spring
295A babe to honor her. If she must teem,
Create her child of spleen, that it may live
And be a thwart disnatured torment to her.
Let it stamp wrinkles in her brow of youth,
875With cadent tears fret channels in her cheeks,
300Turn all her mother’s pains and benefits
To laughter and contempt, that she may feel
How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is
To have a thankless child.—Away, away!
880Now, gods that we adore, whereof comes this?
305Never afflict yourself to know more of it,
But let his disposition have that scope
As dotage gives it.
What, fifty of my followers at a clap?
885Within a fortnight?
310What’s the matter, sir?
I’ll tell thee. To Goneril. Life and death! I am
ashamed
That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus,
890That these hot tears, which break from me perforce,
315Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon
thee!
Th’ untented woundings of a father’s curse
Pierce every sense about thee! Old fond eyes,
895Beweep this cause again, I’ll pluck you out
320And cast you, with the waters that you loose,
To temper clay. Yea, is ’t come to this?
Ha! Let it be so. I have another daughter
Who, I am sure, is kind and comfortable.
900When she shall hear this of thee, with her nails
325She’ll flay thy wolvish visage. Thou shalt find
That I’ll resume the shape which thou dost think
I have cast off forever.
Do you mark that?
905I cannot be so partial, Goneril,
330To the great love I bear you—
Pray you, content.—What, Oswald, ho!—
You, sir, more knave than Fool, after your master.
Nuncle Lear, Nuncle Lear, tarry. Take the Fool
910with thee.
335A fox, when one has caught her,
And such a daughter,
Should sure to the slaughter,
If my cap would buy a halter.
915So the Fool follows after.
340This man hath had good counsel. A hundred
knights!
’Tis politic and safe to let him keep
At point a hundred knights! Yes, that on every
920dream,
345Each buzz, each fancy, each complaint, dislike,
He may enguard his dotage with their powers
And hold our lives in mercy.—Oswald, I say!
Well, you may fear too far.
925Safer than trust too far.
350Let me still take away the harms I fear,
Not fear still to be taken. I know his heart.
What he hath uttered I have writ my sister.
If she sustain him and his hundred knights
930When I have showed th’ unfitness—
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
355How now, Oswald?
What, have you writ that letter to my sister?
Ay, madam.
Take you some company and away to horse.
935Inform her full of my particular fear,
360And thereto add such reasons of your own
As may compact it more. Get you gone,
And hasten your return. Oswald exits. No, no, my
lord,
940This milky gentleness and course of yours,
365Though I condemn not, yet, under pardon,
You are much more at task for want of wisdom
Than praised for harmful mildness.
How far your eyes may pierce I cannot tell.
945Striving to better, oft we mar what’s well.
370Nay, then—
Well, well, th’ event.
They exit.
Go you before to Gloucester with these
letters. Acquaint my daughter no further with anything
950you know than comes from her demand out of
the letter. If your diligence be not speedy, I shall be
5there afore you.
I will not sleep, my lord, till I have delivered
your letter.
955If a man’s brains were in ’s heels, were ’t not in
danger of kibes?
10Ay, boy.
Then, I prithee, be merry; thy wit shall not go
slipshod.
960Ha, ha, ha!
Shalt see thy other daughter will use thee kindly,
15for, though she’s as like this as a crab’s like an
apple, yet I can tell what I can tell.
What canst tell, boy?
965She will taste as like this as a crab does to a crab.
Thou canst tell why one’s nose stands i’ th’ middle
20on ’s face?
No.
Why, to keep one’s eyes of either side ’s nose,
970that what a man cannot smell out he may spy into.
I did her wrong.
25Canst tell how an oyster makes his shell?
No.
Nor I neither. But I can tell why a snail has a
975house.
Why?
30Why, to put ’s head in, not to give it away to his
daughters and leave his horns without a case.
I will forget my nature. So kind a father!—Be
980my horses ready?
Thy asses are gone about ’em. The reason why
35the seven stars are no more than seven is a pretty
reason.
Because they are not eight.
985Yes, indeed. Thou wouldst make a good Fool.
To take ’t again perforce! Monster ingratitude!
40If thou wert my Fool, nuncle, I’d have thee
beaten for being old before thy time.
How’s that?
990Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst
been wise.
45O, let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!
Keep me in temper. I would not be mad!
Enter Gentleman.
How now, are the horses ready?
995Ready, my lord.
Come, boy.
50She that’s a maid now and laughs at my departure,
Shall not be a maid long, unless things be cut
shorter.
1000Save thee, Curan.
And you, sir. I have been with your father and
given him notice that the Duke of Cornwall and
Regan his duchess will be here with him this night.
5How comes that?
1005Nay, I know not. You have heard of the news
abroad?—I mean the whispered ones, for they are
yet but ear-kissing arguments.
Not I. Pray you, what are they?
10Have you heard of no likely wars toward ’twixt
1010the dukes of Cornwall and Albany?
Not a word.
You may do, then, in time. Fare you well, sir.
He exits.
The Duke be here tonight? The better, best.
15This weaves itself perforce into my business.
1015My father hath set guard to take my brother,
And I have one thing of a queasy question
Which I must act. Briefness and fortune work!—
Brother, a word. Descend. Brother, I say!
Enter Edgar.
20My father watches. O sir, fly this place!
1020Intelligence is given where you are hid.
You have now the good advantage of the night.
Have you not spoken ’gainst the Duke of Cornwall?
He’s coming hither, now, i’ th’ night, i’ th’ haste,
25And Regan with him. Have you nothing said
1025Upon his party ’gainst the Duke of Albany?
Advise yourself.
I am sure on ’t, not a word.
I hear my father coming. Pardon me.
30In cunning I must draw my sword upon you.
1030Draw. Seem to defend yourself. Now, quit you
well.They draw.
Yield! Come before my father! Light, hoa, here!
Aside to Edgar. Fly, brother.—Torches, torches!
35—So, farewell.Edgar exits.
1035Some blood drawn on me would beget opinion
Of my more fierce endeavor. I have seen drunkards
Do more than this in sport.He wounds his arm.
Father, father!
40Stop, stop! No help?
1040Now, Edmund, where’s the
villain?
Here stood he in the dark, his sharp sword out,
Mumbling of wicked charms, conjuring the moon
45To stand auspicious mistress.
1045But where is he?
Look, sir, I bleed.
Where is the villain,
Edmund?
50Fled this way, sir, when by no means he could—
1050Pursue him, ho! Go after. Servants exit. By no
means what?
Persuade me to the murder of your Lordship,
But that I told him the revenging gods
55’Gainst parricides did all the thunder bend,
1055Spoke with how manifold and strong a bond
The child was bound to th’ father—sir, in fine,
Seeing how loathly opposite I stood
To his unnatural purpose, in fell motion
60With his preparèd sword he charges home
1060My unprovided body, lanced mine arm;
And when he saw my best alarumed spirits,
Bold in the quarrel’s right, roused to th’ encounter,
Or whether ghasted by the noise I made,
65Full suddenly he fled.
1065Let him fly far!
Not in this land shall he remain uncaught,
And found—dispatch. The noble duke my master,
My worthy arch and patron, comes tonight.
70By his authority I will proclaim it
1070That he which finds him shall deserve our thanks,
Bringing the murderous coward to the stake;
He that conceals him, death.
When I dissuaded him from his intent
75And found him pight to do it, with curst speech
1075I threatened to discover him. He replied
“Thou unpossessing bastard, dost thou think
If I would stand against thee, would the reposal
Of any trust, virtue, or worth in thee
80Make thy words faithed? No. What I should
1080deny—
As this I would, though thou didst produce
My very character—I’d turn it all
To thy suggestion, plot, and damnèd practice.
85And thou must make a dullard of the world
1085If they not thought the profits of my death
Were very pregnant and potential spurs
To make thee seek it.”
O strange and fastened villain!
90Would he deny his letter, said he?
1090I never got him.Tucket within.
Hark, the Duke’s trumpets. I know not why he
comes.
All ports I’ll bar. The villain shall not ’scape.
95The Duke must grant me that. Besides, his picture
1095I will send far and near, that all the kingdom
May have due note of him. And of my land,
Loyal and natural boy, I’ll work the means
To make thee capable.
100How now, my noble friend? Since I came hither,
1100Which I can call but now, I have heard strange
news.
If it be true, all vengeance comes too short
Which can pursue th’ offender. How dost, my
105lord?
1105O madam, my old heart is cracked; it’s cracked.
What, did my father’s godson seek your life?
He whom my father named, your Edgar?
O lady, lady, shame would have it hid!
110Was he not companion with the riotous knights
1110That tended upon my father?
I know not, madam. ’Tis too bad, too bad.
Yes, madam, he was of that consort.
No marvel, then, though he were ill affected.
115’Tis they have put him on the old man’s death,
1115To have th’ expense and waste of his revenues.
I have this present evening from my sister
Been well informed of them, and with such cautions
That if they come to sojourn at my house
120I’ll not be there.
1120Nor I, assure thee, Regan.—
Edmund, I hear that you have shown your father
A childlike office.
It was my duty, sir.
125He did bewray his practice, and received
1125This hurt you see striving to apprehend him.
Is he pursued?
Ay, my good lord.
If he be taken, he shall never more
130Be feared of doing harm. Make your own purpose,
1130How in my strength you please.—For you, Edmund,
Whose virtue and obedience doth this instant
So much commend itself, you shall be ours.
Natures of such deep trust we shall much need.
135You we first seize on.
1135I shall serve you, sir,
Truly, however else.
For him I thank your Grace.
You know not why we came to visit you—
140Thus out of season, threading dark-eyed night.
1140Occasions, noble Gloucester, of some poise,
Wherein we must have use of your advice.
Our father he hath writ, so hath our sister,
Of differences, which I best thought it fit
145To answer from our home. The several messengers
1145From hence attend dispatch. Our good old friend,
Lay comforts to your bosom and bestow
Your needful counsel to our businesses,
Which craves the instant use.
150I serve you, madam.
1150Your Graces are right welcome.
Good dawning to thee, friend. Art of this
house?
Ay.
Where may we set our horses?
51155I’ th’ mire.
Prithee, if thou lov’st me, tell me.
I love thee not.
Why then, I care not for thee.
If I had thee in Lipsbury pinfold, I would make
101160thee care for me.
Why dost thou use me thus? I know thee not.
Fellow, I know thee.
What dost thou know me for?
A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats; a
151165base, proud, shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound,
filthy worsted-stocking knave; a lily-livered,
action-taking, whoreson, glass-gazing, superserviceable,
finical rogue; one-trunk-inheriting
slave; one that wouldst be a bawd in way of good
201170service, and art nothing but the composition of a
knave, beggar, coward, pander, and the son and heir
of a mongrel bitch; one whom I will beat into
clamorous whining if thou deny’st the least syllable
of thy addition.
251175Why, what a monstrous fellow art thou thus
to rail on one that is neither known of thee nor
knows thee!
What a brazen-faced varlet art thou to deny thou
knowest me! Is it two days ago since I tripped up
301180thy heels and beat thee before the King? He draws
his sword. Draw, you rogue, for though it be night,
yet the moon shines. I’ll make a sop o’ th’ moonshine
of you, you whoreson, cullionly barbermonger.
Draw!
351185Away! I have nothing to do with thee.
Draw, you rascal! You come with letters against
the King and take Vanity the puppet’s part against
the royalty of her father. Draw, you rogue, or I’ll so
carbonado your shanks! Draw, you rascal! Come
401190your ways.
Help, ho! Murder! Help!
Strike, you slave! Stand, rogue! Stand, you neat
slave! Strike!
Help, ho! Murder, murder!
Enter Bastard Edmund, with his rapier drawn,451195How now, what’s the matter? Part!
With you, goodman boy, if you please. Come, I’ll
flesh you. Come on, young master.
Weapons? Arms? What’s the matter here?
Keep peace, upon your lives! He dies that
501200strikes again. What is the matter?
The messengers from our sister and the King.
What is your difference? Speak.
I am scarce in breath, my lord.
No marvel, you have so bestirred your valor.
551205You cowardly rascal, nature disclaims in thee; a
tailor made thee.
Thou art a strange fellow. A tailor make a
man?
A tailor, sir. A stonecutter or a painter could not
601210have made him so ill, though they had been but two
years o’ th’ trade.
Speak yet, how grew your quarrel?
This ancient ruffian, sir, whose life I have
spared at suit of his gray beard—
651215Thou whoreson zed, thou unnecessary letter!
—My lord, if you will give me leave, I will tread
this unbolted villain into mortar and daub the wall
of a jakes with him.—Spare my gray beard, you
wagtail?
701220Peace, sirrah!
You beastly knave, know you no reverence?
Yes, sir, but anger hath a privilege.
Why art thou angry?
That such a slave as this should wear a sword,
751225Who wears no honesty. Such smiling rogues as
these,
Like rats, oft bite the holy cords atwain
Which are too intrinse t’ unloose; smooth every
passion
801230That in the natures of their lords rebel—
Being oil to fire, snow to the colder moods—
Renege, affirm, and turn their halcyon beaks
With every gale and vary of their masters,
Knowing naught, like dogs, but following.—
851235A plague upon your epileptic visage!
Smile you my speeches, as I were a fool?
Goose, if I had you upon Sarum plain,
I’d drive you cackling home to Camelot.
What, art thou mad, old fellow?
901240How fell you out? Say that.
No contraries hold more antipathy
Than I and such a knave.
Why dost thou call him “knave”? What is his fault?
His countenance likes me not.
951245No more, perchance, does mine, nor his, nor hers.
Sir, ’tis my occupation to be plain:
I have seen better faces in my time
Than stands on any shoulder that I see
Before me at this instant.
1001250This is some fellow
Who, having been praised for bluntness, doth affect
A saucy roughness and constrains the garb
Quite from his nature. He cannot flatter, he.
An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth!
1051255An they will take it, so; if not, he’s plain.
These kind of knaves I know, which in this
plainness
Harbor more craft and more corrupter ends
Than twenty silly-ducking observants
1101260That stretch their duties nicely.
Sir, in good faith, in sincere verity,
Under th’ allowance of your great aspect,
Whose influence, like the wreath of radiant fire
On flick’ring Phoebus’ front—
1151265What mean’st by this?
To go out of my dialect, which you discommend
so much. I know, sir, I am no flatterer. He that
beguiled you in a plain accent was a plain knave,
which for my part I will not be, though I should
1201270win your displeasure to entreat me to ’t.
What was th’ offense you gave
him?
I never gave him any.
It pleased the King his master very late
1251275To strike at me, upon his misconstruction;
When he, compact, and flattering his displeasure,
Tripped me behind; being down, insulted, railed,
And put upon him such a deal of man
That worthied him, got praises of the King
1301280For him attempting who was self-subdued;
And in the fleshment of this dread exploit,
Drew on me here again.
None of these rogues and cowards
But Ajax is their fool.
1351285Fetch forth the stocks.—
You stubborn ancient knave, you reverent braggart,
We’ll teach you.
Sir, I am too old to learn.
Call not your stocks for me. I serve the King,
1401290On whose employment I was sent to you.
You shall do small respect, show too bold
malice
Against the grace and person of my master,
Stocking his messenger.
1451295Fetch forth the stocks.—As I have life and honor,
There shall he sit till noon.
Till noon? Till night, my lord, and all night, too.
Why, madam, if I were your father’s dog,
You should not use me so.
1501300Sir, being his knave, I will.
This is a fellow of the selfsame color
Our sister speaks of.—Come, bring away the stocks.
Let me beseech your Grace not to do so.
His fault is much, and the good king his master
1551305Will check him for ’t. Your purposed low correction
Is such as basest and contemned’st wretches
For pilf’rings and most common trespasses
Are punished with. The King must take it ill
That he, so slightly valued in his messenger,
1601310Should have him thus restrained.
I’ll answer that.
My sister may receive it much more worse
To have her gentleman abused, assaulted
For following her affairs.—Put in his legs.
1651315Come, my good lord, away.
All but Gloucester and Kent exit.
I am sorry for thee, friend. ’Tis the Duke’s
pleasure,
Whose disposition all the world well knows
Will not be rubbed nor stopped. I’ll entreat for thee.
1701320Pray, do not, sir. I have watched and traveled hard.
Some time I shall sleep out; the rest I’ll whistle.
A good man’s fortune may grow out at heels.
Give you good morrow.
The Duke’s to blame in this. ’Twill be ill taken.
1751325Good king, that must approve the common saw,
Thou out of heaven’s benediction com’st
To the warm sun.He takes out a paper.
Approach, thou beacon to this under globe,
That by thy comfortable beams I may
1801330Peruse this letter. Nothing almost sees miracles
But misery. I know ’tis from Cordelia,
Who hath most fortunately been informed
Of my obscurèd course, and shall find time
From this enormous state, seeking to give
1851335Losses their remedies. All weary and o’erwatched,
Take vantage, heavy eyes, not to behold
This shameful lodging.
Fortune, good night. Smile once more; turn thy
wheel.
1340I heard myself proclaimed,
And by the happy hollow of a tree
Escaped the hunt. No port is free; no place
That guard and most unusual vigilance
5Does not attend my taking. Whiles I may ’scape,
1345I will preserve myself, and am bethought
To take the basest and most poorest shape
That ever penury in contempt of man
Brought near to beast. My face I’ll grime with filth,
10Blanket my loins, elf all my hairs in knots,
1350And with presented nakedness outface
The winds and persecutions of the sky.
The country gives me proof and precedent
Of Bedlam beggars who with roaring voices
15Strike in their numbed and mortifièd arms
1355Pins, wooden pricks, nails, sprigs of rosemary,
And, with this horrible object, from low farms,
Poor pelting villages, sheepcotes, and mills,
Sometime with lunatic bans, sometime with prayers,
20Enforce their charity. “Poor Turlygod! Poor Tom!”
1360That’s something yet. “Edgar” I nothing am.
’Tis strange that they should so depart from home
And not send back my messenger.
As I learned,
The night before there was no purpose in them
51365Of this remove.
Hail to thee, noble master.
Ha?
Mak’st thou this shame thy pastime?
No, my lord.
101370Ha, ha, he wears cruel garters. Horses are tied
by the heads, dogs and bears by th’ neck, monkeys
by th’ loins, and men by th’ legs. When a man’s
overlusty at legs, then he wears wooden
netherstocks.
151375What’s he that hath so much thy place mistook
To set thee here?
It is both he and she,
Your son and daughter.
No.
201380Yes.
No, I say.
I say yea.
By Jupiter, I swear no.
By Juno, I swear ay.
251385They durst not do ’t.
They could not, would not do ’t. ’Tis worse than
murder
To do upon respect such violent outrage.
Resolve me with all modest haste which way
301390Thou might’st deserve or they impose this usage,
Coming from us.
My lord, when at their home
I did commend your Highness’ letters to them,
Ere I was risen from the place that showed
351395My duty kneeling, came there a reeking post,
Stewed in his haste, half breathless, panting forth
From Goneril his mistress salutations;
Delivered letters, spite of intermission,
Which presently they read; on whose contents
401400They summoned up their meiny, straight took
horse,
Commanded me to follow and attend
The leisure of their answer, gave me cold looks;
And meeting here the other messenger,
451405Whose welcome, I perceived, had poisoned mine,
Being the very fellow which of late
Displayed so saucily against your Highness,
Having more man than wit about me, drew.
He raised the house with loud and coward cries.
501410Your son and daughter found this trespass worth
The shame which here it suffers.
Winter’s not gone yet if the wild geese fly that
way.
Fathers that wear rags
551415Do make their children blind,
But fathers that bear bags
Shall see their children kind.
Fortune, that arrant whore,
Ne’er turns the key to th’ poor.
601420But, for all this, thou shalt have as many dolors for
thy daughters as thou canst tell in a year.
O, how this mother swells up toward my heart!
Hysterica passio, down, thou climbing sorrow!
Thy element’s below.—Where is this daughter?
651425With the Earl, sir, here within.
Follow me not. Stay
here.
Made you no more offense but what you speak of?
None.
701430How chance the King comes with so small a number?
An thou hadst been set i’ th’ stocks for that
question, thou ’dst well deserved it.
Why, Fool?
We’ll set thee to school to an ant to teach thee
751435there’s no laboring i’ th’ winter. All that follow
their noses are led by their eyes but blind men, and
there’s not a nose among twenty but can smell him
that’s stinking. Let go thy hold when a great wheel
runs down a hill lest it break thy neck with following;
801440but the great one that goes upward, let him
draw thee after. When a wise man gives thee better
counsel, give me mine again. I would have none but
knaves follow it, since a Fool gives it.
That sir which serves
85 and seeks for gain,
8514451445And follows but for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain
And leave thee in the storm.
But I will tarry; the Fool will stay,
90And let the wise man fly.
9014501450The knave turns fool that runs away;
The Fool no knave, perdie.
Where learned you this, Fool?
Not i’ th’ stocks, fool.
Enter Lear and Gloucester.
95Deny to speak with me? They are sick? They are
9514551455weary?
They have traveled all the night? Mere fetches,
The images of revolt and flying off.
Fetch me a better answer.
100My dear lord,
10014601460You know the fiery quality of the Duke,
How unremovable and fixed he is
In his own course.
Vengeance, plague, death, confusion!
105“Fiery”? What “quality”? Why Gloucester,
10514651465Gloucester,
I’d speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife.
Well, my good lord, I have informed them so.
“Informed them”? Dost thou understand me,
110man?
11014701470Ay, my good lord.
The King would speak with Cornwall. The dear
father
Would with his daughter speak, commands, tends
115service.
11514751475Are they “informed” of this? My breath and
blood!
“Fiery”? The “fiery” duke? Tell the hot duke that—
No, but not yet. Maybe he is not well.
120Infirmity doth still neglect all office
12014801480Whereto our health is bound. We are not ourselves
When nature, being oppressed, commands the mind
To suffer with the body. I’ll forbear,
And am fallen out with my more headier will,
125To take the indisposed and sickly fit
12514851485For the sound man. Noticing Kent again. Death on
my state! Wherefore
Should he sit here? This act persuades me
That this remotion of the Duke and her
130Is practice only. Give me my servant forth.
13014901490Go tell the Duke and ’s wife I’d speak with them.
Now, presently, bid them come forth and hear me,
Or at their chamber door I’ll beat the drum
Till it cry sleep to death.
135I would have all well betwixt you.
He exits.
13514951495O me, my heart, my rising heart! But down!
Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels
when she put ’em i’ th’ paste alive. She knapped
’em o’ th’ coxcombs with a stick and cried “Down,
140wantons, down!” ’Twas her brother that in pure
14015001500kindness to his horse buttered his hay.
Good morrow to you both.
Hail to your Grace.
Kent here set at liberty.I am glad to see your Highness.
145Regan, I think you are. I know what reason
14515051505I have to think so: if thou shouldst not be glad,
I would divorce me from thy mother’s tomb,
Sepulch’ring an adult’ress. To Kent. O, are you
free?
150Some other time for that.—Belovèd Regan,
15015101510Thy sister’s naught. O Regan, she hath tied
Sharp-toothed unkindness, like a vulture, here.
I can scarce speak to thee. Thou ’lt not believe
With how depraved a quality—O Regan!
155I pray you, sir, take patience. I have hope
15515151515You less know how to value her desert
Than she to scant her duty.
Say? How is that?
I cannot think my sister in the least
160Would fail her obligation. If, sir, perchance
16015201520She have restrained the riots of your followers,
’Tis on such ground and to such wholesome end
As clears her from all blame.
My curses on her.
165O sir, you are old.
16515251525Nature in you stands on the very verge
Of his confine. You should be ruled and led
By some discretion that discerns your state
Better than you yourself. Therefore, I pray you
170That to our sister you do make return.
17015301530Say you have wronged her.
Ask her forgiveness?
Do you but mark how this becomes the house:
He kneels.
“Dear daughter, I confess that I am old.
175Age is unnecessary. On my knees I beg
17515351535That you’ll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.”
Good sir, no more. These are unsightly tricks.
Return you to my sister.
Never, Regan.
180She hath abated me of half my train,
18015401540Looked black upon me, struck me with her tongue
Most serpentlike upon the very heart.
All the stored vengeances of heaven fall
On her ingrateful top! Strike her young bones,
185You taking airs, with lameness!
18515451545Fie, sir, fie!
You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames
Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,
You fen-sucked fogs drawn by the powerful sun
190To fall and blister!
19015501550O, the blest gods! So will you wish on me
When the rash mood is on.
No, Regan, thou shalt never have my curse.
Thy tender-hefted nature shall not give
195Thee o’er to harshness. Her eyes are fierce, but
19515551555thine
Do comfort and not burn. ’Tis not in thee
To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train,
To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes,
200And, in conclusion, to oppose the bolt
20015601560Against my coming in. Thou better know’st
The offices of nature, bond of childhood,
Effects of courtesy, dues of gratitude.
Thy half o’ th’ kingdom hast thou not forgot,
205Wherein I thee endowed.
20515651565Good sir, to th’ purpose.
Tucket within.
Who put my man i’ th’ stocks?
What trumpet’s that?
I know ’t—my sister’s. This approves her letter,
210That she would soon be here.
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
21015701570Is your lady come?
This is a slave whose easy-borrowed pride
Dwells in the fickle grace of her he follows.—
Out, varlet, from my sight!
215What means your Grace?
21515751575Who stocked my servant? Regan, I have good hope
Thou didst not know on ’t.
Enter Goneril.
Who comes here? O heavens,
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
220Allow obedience, if you yourselves are old,
22015801580Make it your cause. Send down and take my part.
To Goneril. Art not ashamed to look upon this
beard?Regan takes Goneril’s hand.
O Regan, will you take her by the hand?
225Why not by th’ hand, sir? How have I offended?
22515851585All’s not offense that indiscretion finds
And dotage terms so.
O sides, you are too tough!
Will you yet hold?—How came my man i’ th’
230stocks?
23015901590I set him there, sir, but his own disorders
Deserved much less advancement.
You? Did you?
I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.
235If till the expiration of your month
23515951595You will return and sojourn with my sister,
Dismissing half your train, come then to me.
I am now from home and out of that provision
Which shall be needful for your entertainment.
240Return to her? And fifty men dismissed?
24016001600No! Rather I abjure all roofs, and choose
To wage against the enmity o’ th’ air,
To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,
Necessity’s sharp pinch. Return with her?
245Why the hot-blooded France, that dowerless took
24516051605Our youngest born—I could as well be brought
To knee his throne and, squire-like, pension beg
To keep base life afoot. Return with her?
Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter
250To this detested groom.
25016101610At your choice, sir.
I prithee, daughter, do not make me mad.
I will not trouble thee, my child. Farewell.
We’ll no more meet, no more see one another.
255But yet thou art my flesh, my blood, my daughter,
25516151615Or, rather, a disease that’s in my flesh,
Which I must needs call mine. Thou art a boil,
A plague-sore or embossèd carbuncle
In my corrupted blood. But I’ll not chide thee.
260Let shame come when it will; I do not call it.
26016201620I do not bid the thunder-bearer shoot,
Nor tell tales of thee to high-judging Jove.
Mend when thou canst. Be better at thy leisure.
I can be patient. I can stay with Regan,
265I and my hundred knights.
26516251625Not altogether so.
I looked not for you yet, nor am provided
For your fit welcome. Give ear, sir, to my sister,
For those that mingle reason with your passion
270Must be content to think you old, and so—
27016301630But she knows what she does.
Is this well spoken?
I dare avouch it, sir. What, fifty followers?
Is it not well? What should you need of more?
275Yea, or so many, sith that both charge and danger
27516351635Speak ’gainst so great a number? How in one house
Should many people under two commands
Hold amity? ’Tis hard, almost impossible.
Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance
280From those that she calls servants, or from mine?
28016401640Why not, my lord? If then they chanced to slack
you,
We could control them. If you will come to me
(For now I spy a danger), I entreat you
285To bring but five-and-twenty. To no more
28516451645Will I give place or notice.
I gave you all—
And in good time you gave it.
Made you my guardians, my depositaries,
290But kept a reservation to be followed
29016501650With such a number. What, must I come to you
With five-and-twenty? Regan, said you so?
And speak ’t again, my lord. No more with me.
Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favored
295When others are more wicked. Not being the worst
29516551655Stands in some rank of praise. To Goneril. I’ll go
with thee.
Thy fifty yet doth double five-and-twenty,
And thou art twice her love.
300Hear me, my lord.
30016601660What need you five-and-twenty, ten, or five,
To follow in a house where twice so many
Have a command to tend you?
What need one?
305O, reason not the need! Our basest beggars
30516651665Are in the poorest thing superfluous.
Allow not nature more than nature needs,
Man’s life is cheap as beast’s. Thou art a lady;
If only to go warm were gorgeous,
310Why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear’st,
31016701670Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true
need—
You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!
You see me here, you gods, a poor old man
315As full of grief as age, wretched in both.
31516751675If it be you that stirs these daughters’ hearts
Against their father, fool me not so much
To bear it tamely. Touch me with noble anger,
And let not women’s weapons, water drops,
320Stain my man’s cheeks.—No, you unnatural hags,
32016801680I will have such revenges on you both
That all the world shall—I will do such things—
What they are yet I know not, but they shall be
The terrors of the Earth! You think I’ll weep.
325No, I’ll not weep.
32516851685I have full cause of weeping, but this heart
Storm and tempest.
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws
Or ere I’ll weep.—O Fool, I shall go mad!
Let us withdraw. ’Twill be a storm.
330This house is little. The old man and ’s people
33016901690Cannot be well bestowed.
’Tis his own blame hath put himself from rest,
And must needs taste his folly.
For his particular, I’ll receive him gladly,
335But not one follower.
33516951695So am I purposed. Where is my lord of Gloucester?
Followed the old man forth.
Enter Gloucester.
He is returned.
The King is in high rage.
340Whither is he going?
34017001700He calls to horse, but will I know not whither.
’Tis best to give him way. He leads himself.
My lord, entreat him by no means to stay.
Alack, the night comes on, and the high winds
345Do sorely ruffle. For many miles about
34517051705There’s scarce a bush.
O sir, to willful men
The injuries that they themselves procure
Must be their schoolmasters. Shut up your doors.
350He is attended with a desperate train,
35017101710And what they may incense him to, being apt
To have his ear abused, wisdom bids fear.
Shut up your doors, my lord. ’Tis a wild night.
My Regan counsels well. Come out o’ th’ storm.
Who’s there, besides foul weather?
1715One minded like the weather, most unquietly.
I know you. Where’s the King?
Contending with the fretful elements;
5Bids the wind blow the earth into the sea
Or swell the curlèd waters ’bove the main,
1720That things might change or cease; tears his white
hair,
Which the impetuous blasts with eyeless rage
10Catch in their fury and make nothing of;
Strives in his little world of man to outscorn
1725The to-and-fro conflicting wind and rain.
This night, wherein the cub-drawn bear would
couch,
15The lion and the belly-pinchèd wolf
Keep their fur dry, unbonneted he runs
1730And bids what will take all.
But who is with him?
None but the Fool, who labors to outjest
20His heart-struck injuries.
Sir, I do know you
1735And dare upon the warrant of my note
Commend a dear thing to you. There is division,
Although as yet the face of it is covered
25With mutual cunning, ’twixt Albany and Cornwall,
Who have—as who have not, that their great stars
1740Throned and set high?—servants, who seem no less,
Which are to France the spies and speculations
Intelligent of our state. From France there comes
3030a power
Into this scattered kingdom, who already,
17451745Wise in our negligence, have secret feet
In some of our best ports and are at point
To show their open banner. Now to you:
3535If on my credit you dare build so far
To make your speed to Dover, you shall find
17501750Some that will thank you, making just report
Of how unnatural and bemadding sorrow
The King hath cause to plain: what hath been seen,
4040Either in snuffs and packings of the dukes,
Or the hard rein which both of them hath borne
17551755Against the old kind king, or something deeper,
Whereof perchance these are but furnishings.
I am a gentleman of blood and breeding,
45And from some knowledge and assurance offer
This office to you.
1760I will talk further with you.
No, do not.
For confirmation that I am much more
50Than my outwall, open this purse and take
What it contains.
Kent hands him a purse and a ring.
1765If you shall see Cordelia
(As fear not but you shall), show her this ring,
And she will tell you who that fellow is
55That yet you do not know. Fie on this storm!
I will go seek the King.
1770Give me your hand. Have you no more to say?
Few words, but, to effect, more than all yet:
That when we have found the King—in which your
60pain
That way, I’ll this—he that first lights on him
1775Holla the other.
Blow winds, and crack your cheeks! Rage, blow!
You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout
Till you have drenched our steeples, drowned the
cocks.
51780You sulph’rous and thought-executing fires,
Vaunt-couriers of oak-cleaving thunderbolts,
Singe my white head. And thou, all-shaking
thunder,
Strike flat the thick rotundity o’ th’ world.
101785Crack nature’s molds, all germens spill at once
That makes ingrateful man.
O nuncle, court holy water in a dry house is
better than this rainwater out o’ door. Good nuncle,
in. Ask thy daughters’ blessing. Here’s a night
151790pities neither wise men nor fools.
Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! Spout, rain!
Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire are my daughters.
I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness.
I never gave you kingdom, called you children;
201795You owe me no subscription. Then let fall
Your horrible pleasure. Here I stand your slave,
A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man.
But yet I call you servile ministers,
That will with two pernicious daughters join
251800Your high-engendered battles ’gainst a head
So old and white as this. O, ho, ’tis foul!
He that has a house to put ’s head in has a good
headpiece.
The codpiece that will house
301805Before the head has any,
The head and he shall louse;
So beggars marry many.
The man that makes his toe
What he his heart should make,
351810Shall of a corn cry woe,
And turn his sleep to wake.
For there was never yet fair woman but she made
mouths in a glass.
No, I will be the pattern of all patience.
401815I will say nothing.
Who’s there?
Marry, here’s grace and a codpiece; that’s a
wise man and a fool.
Alas, sir, are you here? Things that love night
451820Love not such nights as these. The wrathful skies
Gallow the very wanderers of the dark
And make them keep their caves. Since I was man,
Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder,
Such groans of roaring wind and rain I never
501825Remember to have heard. Man’s nature cannot carry
Th’ affliction nor the fear.
Let the great gods
That keep this dreadful pudder o’er our heads
Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch,
551830That hast within thee undivulgèd crimes
Unwhipped of justice. Hide thee, thou bloody hand,
Thou perjured, and thou simular of virtue
That art incestuous. Caitiff, to pieces shake,
That under covert and convenient seeming
601835Has practiced on man’s life. Close pent-up guilts,
Rive your concealing continents and cry
These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man
More sinned against than sinning.
Alack,
651840bareheaded?
Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel.
Some friendship will it lend you ’gainst the tempest.
Repose you there while I to this hard house—
More harder than the stones whereof ’tis raised,
701845Which even but now, demanding after you,
Denied me to come in—return and force
Their scanted courtesy.
My wits begin to turn.—
Come on, my boy. How dost, my boy? Art cold?
751850I am cold myself.—Where is this straw, my fellow?
The art of our necessities is strange
And can make vile things precious. Come, your
hovel.—
Poor Fool and knave, I have one part in my heart
801855That’s sorry yet for thee.
He that has and a little tiny wit,
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
Must make content with his fortunes fit,
Though the rain it raineth every day.
851860True, my good boy.—Come, bring us to this hovel.
This is a brave night to cool a courtesan. I’ll
speak a prophecy ere I go:
When priests are more in word than matter,
When brewers mar their malt with water,
901865When nobles are their tailors’ tutors,
No heretics burned but wenches’ suitors,
When every case in law is right,
No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;
When slanders do not live in tongues,
951870Nor cutpurses come not to throngs,
When usurers tell their gold i’ th’ field,
And bawds and whores do churches build,
Then shall the realm of Albion
Come to great confusion;
1001875Then comes the time, who lives to see ’t,
That going shall be used with feet.
This prophecy Merlin shall make, for I live before
his time.
Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this
1880unnatural dealing. When I desired their leave that I
might pity him, they took from me the use of mine
own house, charged me on pain of perpetual
5displeasure neither to speak of him, entreat for
him, or any way sustain him.
1885Most savage and unnatural.
Go to; say you nothing. There is division
between the dukes, and a worse matter than that. I
10have received a letter this night; ’tis dangerous to
be spoken; I have locked the letter in my closet.
1890These injuries the King now bears will be revenged
home; there is part of a power already footed. We
must incline to the King. I will look him and privily
15relieve him. Go you and maintain talk with the
Duke, that my charity be not of him perceived. If he
1895ask for me, I am ill and gone to bed. If I die for it, as
no less is threatened me, the King my old master
must be relieved. There is strange things toward,
20Edmund. Pray you, be careful.
This courtesy forbid thee shall the Duke
1900Instantly know, and of that letter too.
This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me
That which my father loses—no less than all.
25The younger rises when the old doth fall.
Here is the place, my lord. Good my lord, enter.
1905The tyranny of the open night ’s too rough
For nature to endure.
Let me alone.
5Good my lord, enter here.
Wilt break my heart?
1910I had rather break mine own. Good my lord, enter.
Thou think’st ’tis much that this contentious storm
Invades us to the skin. So ’tis to thee.
10But where the greater malady is fixed,
The lesser is scarce felt. Thou ’dst shun a bear,
1915But if thy flight lay toward the roaring sea,
Thou ’dst meet the bear i’ th’ mouth. When the
mind’s free,
15The body’s delicate. This tempest in my mind
Doth from my senses take all feeling else
1920Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude!
Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand
For lifting food to ’t? But I will punish home.
20No, I will weep no more. In such a night
To shut me out? Pour on. I will endure.
1925In such a night as this? O Regan, Goneril,
Your old kind father whose frank heart gave all!
O, that way madness lies. Let me shun that;
25No more of that.
Good my lord, enter here.
1930Prithee, go in thyself. Seek thine own ease.
This tempest will not give me leave to ponder
On things would hurt me more. But I’ll go in.—
30In, boy; go first.—You houseless poverty—
Nay, get thee in. I’ll pray, and then I’ll sleep.
Fool exits.
1935Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
35Your looped and windowed raggedness defend
you
1940From seasons such as these? O, I have ta’en
Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp.
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
40That thou may’st shake the superflux to them
And show the heavens more just.
1945Fathom and half, fathom and half!
Poor Tom!
Come not in here, nuncle; here’s a spirit. Help
45me, help me!
Give me thy hand. Who’s there?
1950A spirit, a spirit! He says his name’s Poor Tom.
What art thou that dost grumble there i’ th’
straw? Come forth.
50Away. The foul fiend follows me. Through the
sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind. Hum! Go to
1955thy cold bed and warm thee.
Didst thou give all to thy daughters? And art thou
come to this?
55Who gives anything to Poor Tom, whom the
foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame,
1960through ford and whirlpool, o’er bog and quagmire;
that hath laid knives under his pillow and
halters in his pew, set ratsbane by his porridge,
60made him proud of heart to ride on a bay trotting
horse over four-inched bridges to course his own
1965shadow for a traitor? Bless thy five wits! Tom’s
a-cold. O, do de, do de, do de. Bless thee from
whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking! Do Poor Tom
65some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There
could I have him now, and there—and there again
1970—and there.
Has his daughters brought him to this pass?—
Couldst thou save nothing? Wouldst thou give ’em
70all?
Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all
1975shamed.
Now all the plagues that in the pendulous air
Hang fated o’er men’s faults light on thy daughters!
75He hath no daughters, sir.
Death, traitor! Nothing could have subdued nature
1980To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.
Is it the fashion that discarded fathers
Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?
80Judicious punishment! ’Twas this flesh begot
Those pelican daughters.
1985Pillicock sat on Pillicock Hill. Alow, alow, loo,
loo.
This cold night will turn us all to fools and
85madmen.
Take heed o’ th’ foul fiend. Obey thy parents,
1990keep thy word’s justice, swear not, commit not with
man’s sworn spouse, set not thy sweet heart on
proud array. Tom’s a-cold.
90What hast thou been?
A servingman, proud in heart and mind, that
1995curled my hair, wore gloves in my cap, served the
lust of my mistress’ heart and did the act of
darkness with her, swore as many oaths as I spake
95words and broke them in the sweet face of heaven;
one that slept in the contriving of lust and waked to
2000do it. Wine loved I deeply, dice dearly, and in
woman out-paramoured the Turk. False of heart,
light of ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in
100stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in
prey. Let not the creaking of shoes nor the rustling
2005of silks betray thy poor heart to woman. Keep thy
foot out of brothels, thy hand out of plackets, thy
pen from lenders’ books, and defy the foul fiend.
105Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind;
says suum, mun, nonny. Dolphin my boy, boy, sessa!
2010Let him trot by.
Thou wert better in a grave than to answer with
thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies.—Is
110man no more than this? Consider him well.—Thou
ow’st the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep
2015no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha, here’s three on ’s
are sophisticated. Thou art the thing itself; unaccommodated
man is no more but such a poor, bare,
115forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings!
Come, unbutton here.
2020Prithee, nuncle, be contented. ’Tis a naughty
night to swim in. Now, a little fire in a wild field
were like an old lecher’s heart—a small spark, all
120the rest on ’s body cold.
Enter Gloucester, with a torch.
Look, here comes a walking fire.
2025This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet. He begins
at curfew and walks till the first cock. He
gives the web and the pin, squints the eye, and
125makes the harelip, mildews the white wheat, and
hurts the poor creature of earth.
2030Swithold footed thrice the ’old,
He met the nightmare and her ninefold,
Bid her alight,
130And her troth plight,
And aroint thee, witch, aroint thee.
2035How fares your Grace?
What’s he?
Who’s there? What is ’t you seek?
135What are you there? Your names?
Poor Tom, that eats the swimming frog, the
2040toad, the tadpole, the wall newt, and the water;
that, in the fury of his heart, when the foul fiend
rages, eats cow dung for sallets, swallows the old
140rat and the ditch-dog, drinks the green mantle of
the standing pool; who is whipped from tithing to
2045tithing, and stocked, punished, and imprisoned;
who hath had three suits to his back, six shirts to
his body,
145Horse to ride, and weapon to wear;
But mice and rats and such small deer
2050Have been Tom’s food for seven long year.
Beware my follower. Peace, Smulkin! Peace, thou
fiend!
150What, hath your Grace no better company?
The Prince of Darkness is a gentleman. Modo
2055he’s called, and Mahu.
Our flesh and blood, my lord, is grown so vile
That it doth hate what gets it.
155Poor Tom’s a-cold.
Go in with me. My duty cannot suffer
2060T’ obey in all your daughters’ hard commands.
Though their injunction be to bar my doors
And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you,
160Yet have I ventured to come seek you out
And bring you where both fire and food is ready.
2065First let me talk with this philosopher.
To Edgar. What is the cause of thunder?
Good my lord, take his offer; go into th’ house.
165I’ll talk a word with this same learnèd Theban.—
What is your study?
2070How to prevent the fiend and to kill vermin.
Let me ask you one word in private.
They talk aside.
Importune him once more to go, my lord.
170His wits begin t’ unsettle.
Canst thou blame him?
Storm still.
2075His daughters seek his death. Ah, that good Kent!
He said it would be thus, poor banished man.
Thou sayest the King grows mad; I’ll tell thee,
175friend,
I am almost mad myself. I had a son,
2080Now outlawed from my blood. He sought my life
But lately, very late. I loved him, friend,
No father his son dearer. True to tell thee,
180The grief hath crazed my wits. What a night’s this!
—I do beseech your Grace—
2085O, cry you mercy, sir.
To Edgar. Noble philosopher, your company.
Tom’s a-cold.
185In fellow, there, into th’ hovel. Keep thee warm.
Come, let’s in all.
2090This way, my lord.
With him.
I will keep still with my philosopher.
190Good my lord, soothe him. Let him take the fellow.
Take him you on.
2095Sirrah, come on: go along with us.
Come, good Athenian.
No words, no words. Hush.
195Child Rowland to the dark tower came.
His word was still “Fie, foh, and fum,
2100I smell the blood of a British man.”
I will have my revenge ere I depart his
house.
How, my lord, I may be censured, that nature
thus gives way to loyalty, something fears me to
52105think of.
I now perceive it was not altogether your
brother’s evil disposition made him seek his death,
but a provoking merit set awork by a reprovable
badness in himself.
102110How malicious is my fortune that I must
repent to be just! This is the letter he spoke of,
which approves him an intelligent party to the
advantages of France. O heavens, that this treason
were not, or not I the detector.
152115Go with me to the Duchess.
If the matter of this paper be certain, you
have mighty business in hand.
True or false, it hath made thee Earl of
Gloucester. Seek out where thy father is, that he
202120may be ready for our apprehension.
If I find him comforting the King, it
will stuff his suspicion more fully.—I will persevere
in my course of loyalty, though the conflict be sore
between that and my blood.
252125I will lay trust upon thee, and thou shalt
find a dearer father in my love.
Here is better than the open air. Take it
thankfully. I will piece out the comfort with what
addition I can. I will not be long from you.
2130All the power of his wits have given way to his
5impatience. The gods reward your kindness!
Frateretto calls me and tells me Nero is an
angler in the lake of darkness. Pray, innocent, and
beware the foul fiend.
2135Prithee, nuncle, tell me whether a madman be a
10gentleman or a yeoman.
A king, a king!
No, he’s a yeoman that has a gentleman to his
son, for he’s a mad yeoman that sees his son a
2140gentleman before him.
15To have a thousand with red burning spits
Come hissing in upon ’em!
The foul fiend bites my back.
He’s mad that trusts in the tameness of a wolf, a
2145horse’s health, a boy’s love, or a whore’s oath.
20It shall be done. I will arraign them straight.
To Edgar. Come, sit thou here, most learnèd
justice.
To Fool. Thou sapient sir, sit here. Now, you
2150she-foxes—
25Look where he stands and glares!—Want’st
thou eyes at trial, madam?
Sings.Come o’er the burn, Bessy, to me—
Her boat hath a leak,
2155And she must not speak
30Why she dares not come over to thee.
The foul fiend haunts Poor Tom in the voice of
a nightingale. Hoppedance cries in Tom’s belly for
two white herring.—Croak not, black angel. I have
2160no food for thee.
35How do you, sir? Stand you not so amazed.
Will you lie down and rest upon the cushions?
I’ll see their trial first. Bring in their evidence.
To Edgar. Thou robèd man of justice, take thy
2165place,
40To Fool. And thou, his yokefellow of equity,
Bench by his side. To Kent. You are o’ th’
commission;
Sit you, too.
2170Let us deal justly.
Sings.45Sleepest or wakest, thou jolly shepherd?
Thy sheep be in the corn.
And for one blast of thy minikin mouth,
Thy sheep shall take no harm.
2175Purr the cat is gray.
50Arraign her first; ’tis Goneril. I here take my oath
before this honorable assembly, kicked the poor
king her father.
Come hither, mistress. Is your name Goneril?
2180She cannot deny it.
55Cry you mercy, I took you for a joint stool.
And here’s another whose warped looks proclaim
What store her heart is made on. Stop her there!
Arms, arms, sword, fire! Corruption in the place!
2185False justicer, why hast thou let her ’scape?
60Bless thy five wits!
O pity! Sir, where is the patience now
That you so oft have boasted to retain?
My tears begin to take his part so much
2190They mar my counterfeiting.
65The little dogs and all,
Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me.
Tom will throw his head at them.—Avaunt, you
curs!
2195Be thy mouth or black or white,
70Tooth that poisons if it bite,
Mastiff, greyhound, mongrel grim,
Hound or spaniel, brach, or lym,
Bobtail tike, or trundle-tail,
2200Tom will make him weep and wail;
75For, with throwing thus my head,
Dogs leapt the hatch, and all are fled.
Do de, de, de. Sessa! Come, march to wakes
and fairs and market towns. Poor Tom, thy horn
2205is dry.
80Then let them anatomize Regan; see what breeds
about her heart. Is there any cause in nature that
make these hard hearts? To Edgar. You, sir, I
entertain for one of my hundred; only I do not like
2210the fashion of your garments. You will say they are
85Persian, but let them be changed.
Now, good my lord, lie here and rest awhile.
Make no noise, make no noise.
Draw the curtains. So, so, we’ll go to supper i’ th’
2215morning.
90And I’ll go to bed at noon.
Enter Gloucester.
Come hither, friend. Where is the King my master?
Here, sir, but trouble him not; his wits are gone.
Good friend, I prithee, take him in thy arms.
2220I have o’erheard a plot of death upon him.
95There is a litter ready; lay him in ’t,
And drive toward Dover, friend, where thou shalt
meet
Both welcome and protection. Take up thy master.
2225If thou shouldst dally half an hour, his life,
100With thine and all that offer to defend him,
Stand in assurèd loss. Take up, take up,
And follow me, that will to some provision
Give thee quick conduct.
2230Oppressèd nature sleeps.
105This rest might yet have balmed thy broken sinews,
Which, if convenience will not allow,
Stand in hard cure. To the Fool. Come, help to
bear thy master.
2235Thou must not stay behind.
110Come, come away.
All but Edgar exit, carrying Lear.
When we our betters see bearing our woes,
We scarcely think our miseries our foes.
Who alone suffers suffers most i’ th’ mind,
2240Leaving free things and happy shows behind.
115But then the mind much sufferance doth o’erskip
When grief hath mates and bearing fellowship.
How light and portable my pain seems now
When that which makes me bend makes the King
2245bow!
120He childed as I fathered. Tom, away.
Mark the high noises, and thyself bewray
When false opinion, whose wrong thoughts defile
thee,
2250In thy just proof repeals and reconciles thee.
125What will hap more tonight, safe ’scape the King!
Lurk, lurk.
Post speedily to my lord your
husband. Show him this letter. He gives her a
paper. 2255The army of France is landed.—Seek out
the traitor Gloucester.
5Hang him instantly.
Pluck out his eyes.
Leave him to my displeasure.—Edmund,
2260keep you our sister company. The revenges we are
bound to take upon your traitorous father are not
10fit for your beholding. Advise the Duke, where you
are going, to a most festinate preparation; we are
bound to the like. Our posts shall be swift and
2265intelligent betwixt us.—Farewell, dear sister.—
Farewell, my lord of Gloucester.
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
15How now? Where’s the King?
My lord of Gloucester hath conveyed him hence.
Some five- or six-and-thirty of his knights,
2270Hot questrists after him, met him at gate,
Who, with some other of the lord’s dependents,
20Are gone with him toward Dover, where they boast
To have well-armèd friends.
Get horses for your mistress.
Oswald exits.2275Farewell, sweet lord, and sister.
Edmund, farewell.Goneril and Edmund exit.
25Go seek the traitor Gloucester.
Pinion him like a thief; bring him before us.
Some Servants exit.
Though well we may not pass upon his life
2280Without the form of justice, yet our power
Shall do a court’sy to our wrath, which men
30May blame but not control.
Enter Gloucester and Servants.
Who’s there? The
traitor?
2285Ingrateful fox! ’Tis he.
Bind fast his corky arms.
35What means your Graces? Good my friends,
consider
You are my guests; do me no foul play, friends.
2290Bind him, I say.
Hard, hard. O filthy traitor!
40Unmerciful lady as you are, I’m none.
To this chair bind him.Servants bind Gloucester.
Villain, thou shalt find—
2295By the kind gods, ’tis most ignobly done
To pluck me by the beard.
45So white, and such a traitor?
Naughty lady,
These hairs which thou dost ravish from my chin
2300Will quicken and accuse thee. I am your host;
With robber’s hands my hospitable favors
50You should not ruffle thus. What will you do?
Come, sir, what letters had you late from France?
Be simple-answered, for we know the truth.
2305And what confederacy have you with the traitors
Late footed in the kingdom?
55To whose hands
You have sent the lunatic king. Speak.
I have a letter guessingly set down
2310Which came from one that’s of a neutral heart,
And not from one opposed.
60Cunning.
And false.
Where hast thou sent the King?
2315To Dover.
Wherefore to Dover? Wast thou not charged at
65peril—
Wherefore to Dover? Let him answer that.
I am tied to th’ stake, and I must stand the course.
2320Wherefore to Dover?
Because I would not see thy cruel nails
70Pluck out his poor old eyes, nor thy fierce sister
In his anointed flesh stick boarish fangs.
The sea, with such a storm as his bare head
2325In hell-black night endured, would have buoyed up
And quenched the stellèd fires;
75Yet, poor old heart, he holp the heavens to rain.
If wolves had at thy gate howled that stern time,
Thou shouldst have said “Good porter, turn the
2330key.”
All cruels else subscribe. But I shall see
80The wingèd vengeance overtake such children.
See ’t shalt thou never.—Fellows, hold the chair.—
Upon these eyes of thine I’ll set my foot.
2335He that will think to live till he be old,
Give me some help!
As Servants hold the chair, Cornwall forces out
one of Gloucester’s eyes.
85O cruel! O you gods!
One side will mock another. Th’ other too.
If you see vengeance—
2340Hold your hand,
my lord.
90I have served you ever since I was a child,
But better service have I never done you
Than now to bid you hold.
2345How now, you dog?
If you did wear a beard upon your chin,
95I’d shake it on this quarrel. What do you mean?
My villain?
Draw and fight.
Nay, then, come on, and take the chance of anger.
2350Give me thy sword. A peasant stand up thus?
O, I am slain! My lord, you have one eye left
100To see some mischief on him. O!
Lest it see more, prevent it. Out, vile jelly!
Forcing out Gloucester’s other eye.
Where is thy luster now?
2355All dark and comfortless! Where’s my son
Edmund?—
105Edmund, enkindle all the sparks of nature
To quit this horrid act.
Out, treacherous villain!
2360Thou call’st on him that hates thee. It was he
That made the overture of thy treasons to us,
110Who is too good to pity thee.
O my follies! Then Edgar was abused.
Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him.
2365Go thrust him out at gates, and let him smell
His way to Dover.
Some Servants exit with Gloucester.
115How is ’t, my lord? How look you?
I have received a hurt. Follow me, lady.—
Turn out that eyeless villain. Throw this slave
2370Upon the dunghill.—Regan, I bleed apace.
Untimely comes this hurt. Give me your arm.
120I’ll never care what wickedness I do
If this man come to good.
If she live long
2375And in the end meet the old course of death,
Women will all turn monsters.
125Let’s follow the old earl and get the Bedlam
To lead him where he would. His roguish madness
Allows itself to anything.
2380Go thou. I’ll fetch some flax and whites of eggs
To apply to his bleeding face. Now heaven help him!
Yet better thus, and known to be contemned,
Than still contemned and flattered. To be worst,
The lowest and most dejected thing of Fortune,
2385Stands still in esperance, lives not in fear.
5The lamentable change is from the best;
The worst returns to laughter. Welcome, then,
Thou unsubstantial air that I embrace.
The wretch that thou hast blown unto the worst
2390Owes nothing to thy blasts. But who comes here?
Enter Gloucester and an old man.
10My father, poorly led? World, world, O world,
But that thy strange mutations make us hate thee,
Life would not yield to age.
O my good lord, I have been your tenant
2395And your father’s tenant these fourscore years.
15Away, get thee away. Good friend, begone.
Thy comforts can do me no good at all;
Thee they may hurt.
You cannot see your way.
2400I have no way and therefore want no eyes.
20I stumbled when I saw. Full oft ’tis seen
Our means secure us, and our mere defects
Prove our commodities. O dear son Edgar,
The food of thy abusèd father’s wrath,
2405Might I but live to see thee in my touch,
25I’d say I had eyes again.
How now? Who’s there?
O gods, who is ’t can say “I am at the worst”?
I am worse than e’er I was.
2410’Tis poor mad Tom.
30And worse I may be yet. The worst is not
So long as we can say “This is the worst.”
Fellow, where goest?
Is it a beggar-man?
2415Madman and beggar too.
35He has some reason, else he could not beg.
I’ th’ last night’s storm, I such a fellow saw,
Which made me think a man a worm. My son
Came then into my mind, and yet my mind
2420Was then scarce friends with him. I have heard
40more since.
As flies to wanton boys are we to th’ gods;
They kill us for their sport.
How should this be?
2425Bad is the trade that must play fool to sorrow,
45Ang’ring itself and others.—Bless thee, master.
Is that the naked fellow?
Ay, my lord.
Then, prithee, get thee away. If for my sake
2430Thou wilt o’ertake us hence a mile or twain
50I’ th’ way toward Dover, do it for ancient love,
And bring some covering for this naked soul,
Which I’ll entreat to lead me.
Alack, sir, he is mad.
2435’Tis the time’s plague when madmen lead the blind.
55Do as I bid thee, or rather do thy pleasure.
Above the rest, begone.
I’ll bring him the best ’parel that I have,
Come on ’t what will.
2440Sirrah, naked fellow—
60Poor Tom’s a-cold. Aside. I cannot daub it further.
Come hither, fellow.
And yet I must.—Bless thy sweet eyes, they bleed.
Know’st thou the way to Dover?
2445Both stile and gate, horseway and footpath.
65Poor Tom hath been scared out of his good wits.
Bless thee, good man’s son, from the foul fiend.
Five fiends have been in Poor Tom at once: of lust,
as Obidicut; Hobbididance, prince of dumbness;
2450Mahu, of stealing; Modo, of murder; Flibbertigibbet,
70of mopping and mowing, who since possesses
chambermaids and waiting women. So, bless
thee, master.
Here, take this purse, thou whom the heavens’
2455plagues
75Have humbled to all strokes. That I am wretched
Makes thee the happier. Heavens, deal so still:
Let the superfluous and lust-dieted man,
That slaves your ordinance, that will not see
2460Because he does not feel, feel your power quickly.
80So distribution should undo excess
And each man have enough. Dost thou know Dover?
Ay, master.
There is a cliff, whose high and bending head
2465Looks fearfully in the confinèd deep.
85Bring me but to the very brim of it,
And I’ll repair the misery thou dost bear
With something rich about me. From that place
I shall no leading need.
2470Give me thy arm.
90Poor Tom shall lead thee.
Welcome, my lord. I marvel our mild husband
Not met us on the way.
Enter Oswald, the Steward.
Now, where’s your master?
2475Madam, within, but never man so changed.
5I told him of the army that was landed;
He smiled at it. I told him you were coming;
His answer was “The worse.” Of Gloucester’s
treachery
2480And of the loyal service of his son
10When I informed him, then he called me “sot”
And told me I had turned the wrong side out.
What most he should dislike seems pleasant to him;
What like, offensive.
2485Then shall you go no further.
15It is the cowish terror of his spirit,
That dares not undertake. He’ll not feel wrongs
Which tie him to an answer. Our wishes on the way
May prove effects. Back, Edmund, to my brother.
2490Hasten his musters and conduct his powers.
20I must change names at home and give the distaff
Into my husband’s hands. This trusty servant
Shall pass between us. Ere long you are like to
hear—
2495If you dare venture in your own behalf—
25A mistress’s command. Wear this; spare speech.
She gives him a favor.
Decline your head. She kisses him. This kiss, if it
durst speak,
Would stretch thy spirits up into the air.
2500Conceive, and fare thee well.
30Yours in the ranks of death.
My most dear
Gloucester!
O, the difference of man and man!
2505To thee a woman’s services are due;
35My fool usurps my body.
Madam, here comes my lord.
He exits.Enter Albany.
I have been worth the whistle.
O Goneril,
2510You are not worth the dust which the rude wind
40Blows in your face. I fear your disposition.
That nature which contemns its origin
Cannot be bordered certain in itself.
She that herself will sliver and disbranch
2515From her material sap perforce must wither
45And come to deadly use.
No more. The text is foolish.
Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile.
Filths savor but themselves. What have you done?
2520Tigers, not daughters, what have you performed?
50A father, and a gracious agèd man,
Whose reverence even the head-lugged bear would
lick,
Most barbarous, most degenerate, have you
2525madded.
55Could my good brother suffer you to do it?
A man, a prince, by him so benefited!
If that the heavens do not their visible spirits
Send quickly down to tame these vile offenses,
2530It will come:
60Humanity must perforce prey on itself,
Like monsters of the deep.
Milk-livered man,
That bear’st a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs;
2535Who hast not in thy brows an eye discerning
65Thine honor from thy suffering; that not know’st
Fools do those villains pity who are punished
Ere they have done their mischief. Where’s thy
drum?
2540France spreads his banners in our noiseless land,
70With plumèd helm thy state begins to threat,
Whilst thou, a moral fool, sits still and cries
“Alack, why does he so?”
See thyself, devil!
2545Proper deformity shows not in the fiend
75So horrid as in woman.
O vain fool!
Thou changèd and self-covered thing, for shame
Bemonster not thy feature. Were ’t my fitness
2550To let these hands obey my blood,
80They are apt enough to dislocate and tear
Thy flesh and bones. Howe’er thou art a fiend,
A woman’s shape doth shield thee.
Marry, your manhood, mew—
2555What news?
85O, my good lord, the Duke of Cornwall’s dead,
Slain by his servant, going to put out
The other eye of Gloucester.
Gloucester’s eyes?
2560A servant that he bred, thrilled with remorse,
90Opposed against the act, bending his sword
To his great master, who, thereat enraged,
Flew on him and amongst them felled him dead,
But not without that harmful stroke which since
2565Hath plucked him after.
95This shows you are above,
You justicers, that these our nether crimes
So speedily can venge. But, O poor Gloucester,
Lost he his other eye?
2570Both, both, my lord.—
100This letter, madam, craves a speedy answer.
Giving her a paper.
’Tis from your sister.
One way I like this well.
But being widow and my Gloucester with her
2575May all the building in my fancy pluck
105Upon my hateful life. Another way
The news is not so tart.—I’ll read, and answer.
Where was his son when they did take his eyes?
Come with my lady hither.
2580He is not here.
110No, my good lord. I met him back again.
Knows he the wickedness?
Ay, my good lord. ’Twas he informed against him
And quit the house on purpose, that their punishment
2585Might have the freer course.
115Gloucester, I live
To thank thee for the love thou show’d’st the King,
And to revenge thine eyes.—Come hither, friend.
Tell me what more thou know’st.
2590Why the King of France is so suddenly gone
back know you no reason?
Something he left imperfect in the state,
which since his coming forth is thought of, which
5imports to the kingdom so much fear and danger
2595that his personal return was most required and
necessary.
Who hath he left behind him general?
The Marshal of France, Monsieur La Far.
10Did your letters pierce the Queen to any demonstration
2600of grief?
Ay, sir, she took them, read them in my
presence,
And now and then an ample tear trilled down
15Her delicate cheek. It seemed she was a queen
2605Over her passion, who, most rebel-like,
Fought to be king o’er her.
O, then it moved her.
Not to a rage. Patience and sorrow strove
20Who should express her goodliest. You have seen
2610Sunshine and rain at once; her smiles and tears
Were like a better way. Those happy smilets
That played on her ripe lip seemed not to know
What guests were in her eyes, which parted thence
25As pearls from diamonds dropped. In brief,
2615Sorrow would be a rarity most beloved
If all could so become it.
Made she no verbal question?
Faith, once or twice she heaved the name of
30“father”
2620Pantingly forth, as if it pressed her heart;
Cried “Sisters, sisters, shame of ladies, sisters!
Kent, father, sisters! What, i’ th’ storm, i’ th’ night?
Let pity not be believed!” There she shook
35The holy water from her heavenly eyes,
2625And clamor moistened. Then away she started,
To deal with grief alone.
It is the stars.
The stars above us govern our conditions,
40Else one self mate and make could not beget
2630Such different issues. You spoke not with her
since?
No.
Was this before the King returned?
45No, since.
2635Well, sir, the poor distressèd Lear’s i’ th’ town,
Who sometime in his better tune remembers
What we are come about, and by no means
Will yield to see his daughter.
50Why, good sir?
2640A sovereign shame so elbows him—his own
unkindness,
That stripped her from his benediction, turned her
To foreign casualties, gave her dear rights
55To his dog-hearted daughters—these things sting
2645His mind so venomously that burning shame
Detains him from Cordelia.
Alack, poor gentleman!
Of Albany’s and Cornwall’s powers you heard not?
60’Tis so. They are afoot.
2650Well, sir, I’ll bring you to our master Lear
And leave you to attend him. Some dear cause
Will in concealment wrap me up awhile.
When I am known aright, you shall not grieve
65Lending me this acquaintance. I pray you, go
2655Along with me.
Alack, ’tis he! Why, he was met even now
As mad as the vexed sea, singing aloud,
Crowned with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds,
With hardocks, hemlock, nettles, cuckooflowers,
52660Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow
In our sustaining corn. A century send forth.
Search every acre in the high-grown field
And bring him to our eye.Soldiers exit.
What can man’s wisdom
102665In the restoring his bereavèd sense?
He that helps him take all my outward worth.
There is means, madam.
Our foster nurse of nature is repose,
The which he lacks. That to provoke in him
152670Are many simples operative, whose power
Will close the eye of anguish.
All blest secrets,
All you unpublished virtues of the earth,
Spring with my tears. Be aidant and remediate
202675In the good man’s distress. Seek, seek for him,
Lest his ungoverned rage dissolve the life
That wants the means to lead it.
News, madam.
The British powers are marching hitherward.
252680’Tis known before. Our preparation stands
In expectation of them.—O dear father,
It is thy business that I go about.
Therefore great France
My mourning and importuned tears hath pitied.
302685No blown ambition doth our arms incite,
But love, dear love, and our aged father’s right.
Soon may I hear and see him.
But are my brother’s powers set forth?
Ay, madam.
2690Himself in person there?
Madam, with much ado.
5Your sister is the better soldier.
Lord Edmund spake not with your lord at home?
No, madam.
2695What might import my sister’s letter to him?
I know not, lady.
10Faith, he is posted hence on serious matter.
It was great ignorance, Gloucester’s eyes being out,
To let him live. Where he arrives he moves
2700All hearts against us. Edmund, I think, is gone,
In pity of his misery, to dispatch
15His nighted life; moreover to descry
The strength o’ th’ enemy.
I must needs after him, madam, with my letter.
2705Our troops set forth tomorrow. Stay with us.
The ways are dangerous.
20I may not, madam.
My lady charged my duty in this business.
Why should she write to Edmund? Might not you
2710Transport her purposes by word? Belike,
Some things—I know not what. I’ll love thee much—
25Let me unseal the letter.
Madam, I had rather—
I know your lady does not love her husband;
2715I am sure of that; and at her late being here,
She gave strange eliads and most speaking looks
30To noble Edmund. I know you are of her bosom.
I, madam?
I speak in understanding. Y’ are; I know ’t.
2720Therefore I do advise you take this note:
My lord is dead; Edmund and I have talked,
35And more convenient is he for my hand
Than for your lady’s. You may gather more.
If you do find him, pray you, give him this,
2725And when your mistress hears thus much from you,
I pray, desire her call her wisdom to her.
40So, fare you well.
If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor,
Preferment falls on him that cuts him off.
2730Would I could meet him, madam. I should show
What party I do follow.
45Fare thee well.
They exit.
When shall I come to th’ top of that same hill?
You do climb up it now. Look how we labor.
2735Methinks the ground is even.
Horrible steep.
5Hark, do you hear the sea?
No, truly.
Why then, your other senses grow imperfect
2740By your eyes’ anguish.
So may it be indeed.
10Methinks thy voice is altered and thou speak’st
In better phrase and matter than thou didst.
You’re much deceived; in nothing am I changed
2745But in my garments.
Methinks you’re better spoken.
15Come on, sir. Here’s the place. Stand still. How
fearful
And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low!
2750The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles. Halfway down
20Hangs one that gathers samphire—dreadful trade;
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head.
The fishermen that walk upon the beach
2755Appear like mice, and yond tall anchoring bark
Diminished to her cock, her cock a buoy
25Almost too small for sight. The murmuring surge
That on th’ unnumbered idle pebble chafes
Cannot be heard so high. I’ll look no more
2760Lest my brain turn and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.
30Set me where you stand.
Give me your hand. You are now within a foot
Of th’ extreme verge. For all beneath the moon
2765Would I not leap upright.
Let go my hand.
35Here, friend, ’s another purse; in it a jewel
Well worth a poor man’s taking. Fairies and gods
Prosper it with thee.He gives Edgar a purse.
2770Go thou further off.
Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going.
40Now fare you well, good sir.
With all my heart.
Why I do trifle thus with his despair
2775Is done to cure it.
O you mighty gods!He kneels.
45This world I do renounce, and in your sights
Shake patiently my great affliction off.
If I could bear it longer, and not fall
2780To quarrel with your great opposeless wills,
My snuff and loathèd part of nature should
50Burn itself out. If Edgar live, O, bless him!—
Now, fellow, fare thee well.
Gone, sir. Farewell.—
2785And yet I know not how conceit may rob
The treasury of life, when life itself
55Yields to the theft. Had he been where he thought,
By this had thought been past. Alive or dead?—
Ho you, sir! Friend, hear you. Sir, speak.—
2790Thus might he pass indeed. Yet he revives.—
What are you, sir?
60Away, and let me die.
Hadst thou been aught but gossamer, feathers, air,
So many fathom down precipitating,
2795Thou ’dst shivered like an egg; but thou dost
breathe,
65Hast heavy substance, bleed’st not, speak’st, art
sound.
Ten masts at each make not the altitude
2800Which thou hast perpendicularly fell.
Thy life’s a miracle. Speak yet again.
70But have I fall’n or no?
From the dread summit of this chalky bourn.
Look up a-height. The shrill-gorged lark so far
2805Cannot be seen or heard. Do but look up.
Alack, I have no eyes.
75Is wretchedness deprived that benefit
To end itself by death? ’Twas yet some comfort
When misery could beguile the tyrant’s rage
2810And frustrate his proud will.
Give me your arm.
He raises Gloucester.
80Up. So, how is ’t? Feel you your legs? You stand.
Too well, too well.
This is above all strangeness.
2815Upon the crown o’ th’ cliff, what thing was that
Which parted from you?
85A poor unfortunate beggar.
As I stood here below, methought his eyes
Were two full moons; he had a thousand noses,
2820Horns whelked and waved like the enragèd sea.
It was some fiend. Therefore, thou happy father,
90Think that the clearest gods, who make them
honors
Of men’s impossibilities, have preserved thee.
2825I do remember now. Henceforth I’ll bear
Affliction till it do cry out itself
95“Enough, enough!” and die. That thing you speak of,
I took it for a man. Often ’twould say
“The fiend, the fiend!” He led me to that place.
2830Bear free and patient thoughts.
Enter Lear.
But who comes here?
100The safer sense will ne’er accommodate
His master thus.
No, they cannot touch me for coining. I am the
2835King himself.
O, thou side-piercing sight!
105Nature’s above art in that respect. There’s your
press-money. That fellow handles his bow like a
crowkeeper. Draw me a clothier’s yard. Look, look,
2840a mouse! Peace, peace! This piece of toasted cheese
will do ’t. There’s my gauntlet; I’ll prove it on a
110giant. Bring up the brown bills. O, well flown, bird!
I’ th’ clout, i’ th’ clout! Hewgh! Give the word.
Sweet marjoram.
2845Pass.
I know that voice.
115Ha! Goneril with a white beard? They flattered
me like a dog and told me I had the white hairs in
my beard ere the black ones were there. To say “ay”
2850and “no” to everything that I said “ay” and “no” to
was no good divinity. When the rain came to wet me
120once and the wind to make me chatter, when the
thunder would not peace at my bidding, there I
found ’em, there I smelt ’em out. Go to. They are
2855not men o’ their words; they told me I was everything.
’Tis a lie. I am not ague-proof.
125The trick of that voice I do well remember.
Is ’t not the King?
Ay, every inch a king.
2860When I do stare, see how the subject quakes.
I pardon that man’s life. What was thy cause?
130Adultery? Thou shalt not die. Die for adultery? No.
The wren goes to ’t, and the small gilded fly does
lecher in my sight. Let copulation thrive, for
2865Gloucester’s bastard son was kinder to his father
than my daughters got ’tween the lawful sheets. To
135’t, luxury, pell-mell, for I lack soldiers. Behold yond
simp’ring dame, whose face between her forks
presages snow, that minces virtue and does shake
2870the head to hear of pleasure’s name. The fitchew
nor the soiled horse goes to ’t with a more riotous
140appetite. Down from the waist they are centaurs,
though women all above. But to the girdle do the
gods inherit; beneath is all the fiend’s. There’s hell,
2875there’s darkness, there is the sulphurous pit; burning,
scalding, stench, consumption! Fie, fie, fie, pah,
145pah! Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary;
sweeten my imagination. There’s money for thee.
O, let me kiss that hand!
2880Let me wipe it first; it smells of mortality.
O ruined piece of nature! This great world
150Shall so wear out to naught. Dost thou know me?
I remember thine eyes well enough. Dost thou
squinny at me? No, do thy worst, blind Cupid, I’ll
2885not love. Read thou this challenge. Mark but the
penning of it.
155Were all thy letters suns, I could not see.
I would not take this from report. It is,
And my heart breaks at it.
2890Read.
What, with the case of eyes?
160O ho, are you there with me? No eyes in your
head, nor no money in your purse? Your eyes are in
a heavy case, your purse in a light, yet you see how
2895this world goes.
I see it feelingly.
165What, art mad? A man may see how this world
goes with no eyes. Look with thine ears. See how
yond justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark in
2900thine ear. Change places and, handy-dandy, which
is the justice, which is the thief? Thou hast seen a
170farmer’s dog bark at a beggar?
Ay, sir.
And the creature run from the cur? There thou
2905might’st behold the great image of authority: a
dog’s obeyed in office.
175Thou rascal beadle, hold thy bloody hand!
Why dost thou lash that whore? Strip thy own back.
Thou hotly lusts to use her in that kind
2910For which thou whipp’st her. The usurer hangs the
cozener.
180Through tattered clothes small vices do appear.
Robes and furred gowns hide all. Plate sin with
gold,
2915And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks.
Arm it in rags, a pygmy’s straw does pierce it.
185None does offend, none, I say, none; I’ll able ’em.
Take that of me, my friend, who have the power
To seal th’ accuser’s lips. Get thee glass eyes,
2920And like a scurvy politician
Seem to see the things thou dost not. Now, now,
190now, now.
Pull off my boots. Harder, harder. So.
O, matter and impertinency mixed,
2925Reason in madness!
If thou wilt weep my fortunes, take my eyes.
195I know thee well enough; thy name is Gloucester.
Thou must be patient. We came crying hither;
Thou know’st the first time that we smell the air
2930We wawl and cry. I will preach to thee. Mark.
Alack, alack the day!
200When we are born, we cry that we are come
To this great stage of fools.—This’ a good block.
It were a delicate stratagem to shoe
2935A troop of horse with felt. I’ll put ’t in proof,
And when I have stol’n upon these son-in-laws,
205Then kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill!
O, here he is. To an Attendant. Lay hand upon
him.—Sir,
2940Your most dear daughter—
No rescue? What, a prisoner? I am even
210The natural fool of Fortune. Use me well.
You shall have ransom. Let me have surgeons;
I am cut to th’ brains.
2945You shall have anything.
No seconds? All myself?
215Why, this would make a man a man of salt,
To use his eyes for garden waterpots,
Ay, and laying autumn’s dust.
2950I will die bravely like a smug bridegroom. What?
I will be jovial. Come, come, I am a king,
220Masters, know you that?
You are a royal one, and we obey you.
Then there’s life in ’t. Come, an you get it, you
2955shall get it by running. Sa, sa, sa, sa.
A sight most pitiful in the meanest wretch,
225Past speaking of in a king. Thou hast a daughter
Who redeems nature from the general curse
Which twain have brought her to.
2960Hail, gentle sir.
Sir, speed you. What’s your will?
230Do you hear aught, sir, of a battle toward?
Most sure and vulgar. Everyone hears that,
Which can distinguish sound.
2965But, by your favor,
How near’s the other army?
235Near and on speedy foot. The main descry
Stands on the hourly thought.
I thank you, sir. That’s all.
2970Though that the Queen on special cause is here,
Her army is moved on.
240I thank you, sir.
Gentleman exits.
You ever-gentle gods, take my breath from me;
Let not my worser spirit tempt me again
2975To die before you please.
Well pray you, father.
245Now, good sir, what are you?
A most poor man, made tame to Fortune’s blows,
Who, by the art of known and feeling sorrows,
2980Am pregnant to good pity. Give me your hand;
I’ll lead you to some biding.
250Hearty thanks.
The bounty and the benison of heaven
To boot, and boot.
2985A proclaimed prize! Most happy!
That eyeless head of thine was first framed flesh
255To raise my fortunes. Thou old unhappy traitor,
Briefly thyself remember; the sword is out
That must destroy thee.
2990Now let thy friendly hand
Put strength enough to ’t.
260Wherefore, bold peasant,
Dar’st thou support a published traitor? Hence,
Lest that th’ infection of his fortune take
2995Like hold on thee. Let go his arm.
Chill not let go, zir, without vurther ’casion.
265Let go, slave, or thou diest!
Good gentleman, go your gait, and let poor
volk pass. An ’chud ha’ bin zwaggered out of my
3000life, ’twould not ha’ bin zo long as ’tis by a vortnight.
Nay, come not near th’ old man. Keep out,
270che vor’ ye, or Ise try whether your costard or my
ballow be the harder. Chill be plain with you.
Out, dunghill.
3005Chill pick your teeth, zir. Come, no matter vor
your foins.
275Slave, thou hast slain me. Villain, take my purse.
If ever thou wilt thrive, bury my body,
And give the letters which thou find’st about me
3010To Edmund, Earl of Gloucester. Seek him out
Upon the English party. O, untimely death! Death!
280I know thee well, a serviceable villain,
As duteous to the vices of thy mistress
As badness would desire.
3015What, is he dead?
Sit you down, father; rest you.
285Let’s see these pockets. The letters that he speaks of
May be my friends. He’s dead; I am only sorry
He had no other deathsman. Let us see.
He opens a letter.
3020Leave, gentle wax, and, manners, blame us not.
To know our enemies’ minds, we rip their hearts.
290Their papers is more lawful.Reads the letter.
Let our reciprocal vows be remembered. You have
many opportunities to cut him off. If your will want
3025not, time and place will be fruitfully offered. There is
nothing done if he return the conqueror. Then am I
295the prisoner, and his bed my jail, from the loathed
warmth whereof deliver me and supply the place for
your labor.
3030Your (wife, so I would say) affectionate servant,
and, for you, her own for venture,Goneril.
300O indistinguished space of woman’s will!
A plot upon her virtuous husband’s life,
And the exchange my brother.—Here, in the sands
3035Thee I’ll rake up, the post unsanctified
Of murderous lechers; and in the mature time
305With this ungracious paper strike the sight
Of the death-practiced duke. For him ’tis well
That of thy death and business I can tell.
3040The King is mad. How stiff is my vile sense
That I stand up and have ingenious feeling
310Of my huge sorrows! Better I were distract.
So should my thoughts be severed from my griefs,
And woes, by wrong imaginations, lose
3045The knowledge of themselves.
Give me your hand.
315Far off methinks I hear the beaten drum.
Come, father, I’ll bestow you with a friend.
O, thou good Kent, how shall I live and work
3050To match thy goodness? My life will be too short,
And every measure fail me.
To be acknowledged, madam, is o’erpaid.
5All my reports go with the modest truth,
Nor more, nor clipped, but so.
3055Be better suited.
These weeds are memories of those worser hours.
I prithee put them off.
10Pardon, dear madam.
Yet to be known shortens my made intent.
3060My boon I make it that you know me not
Till time and I think meet.
Then be ’t so, my good lord.—How does the King?
15Madam, sleeps still.
O, you kind gods,
3065Cure this great breach in his abusèd nature!
Th’ untuned and jarring senses, O, wind up,
Of this child-changèd father!
20So please your Majesty
That we may wake the King? He hath slept
3070long.
Be governed by your knowledge, and proceed
I’ th’ sway of your own will. Is he arrayed?
25Ay, madam. In the heaviness of sleep,
We put fresh garments on him.
3075Be by, good madam, when we do awake him.
I doubt not of his temperance.
Very well.
Music.
30Please you, draw near.—Louder the music there.
O, my dear father, restoration hang
3080Thy medicine on my lips, and let this kiss
Repair those violent harms that my two sisters
Have in thy reverence made.
35Kind and dear princess.
Had you not been their father, these white flakes
3085Did challenge pity of them. Was this a face
To be opposed against the jarring winds?
To stand against the deep dread-bolted thunder,
40In the most terrible and nimble stroke
Of quick cross-lightning? To watch, poor perdu,
3090With this thin helm? Mine enemy’s dog,
Though he had bit me, should have stood that night
Against my fire. And wast thou fain, poor father,
45To hovel thee with swine and rogues forlorn
In short and musty straw? Alack, alack,
3095’Tis wonder that thy life and wits at once
Had not concluded all.—He wakes. Speak to him.
Madam, do you; ’tis fittest.
50How does my royal lord? How fares your Majesty?
You do me wrong to take me out o’ th’ grave.
3100Thou art a soul in bliss, but I am bound
Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears
Do scald like molten lead.
55Sir, do you know me?
You are a spirit, I know. Where did you die?
3105Still, still, far wide.
He’s scarce awake. Let him alone awhile.
Where have I been? Where am I? Fair daylight?
60I am mightily abused; I should e’en die with pity
To see another thus. I know not what to say.
3110I will not swear these are my hands. Let’s see.
I feel this pinprick. Would I were assured
Of my condition!
65O, look upon me, sir,
And hold your hand in benediction o’er me.
3115No, sir, you must not kneel.
Pray do not mock:
I am a very foolish fond old man,
70Fourscore and upward, not an hour more nor less,
And to deal plainly,
3120I fear I am not in my perfect mind.
Methinks I should know you and know this man,
Yet I am doubtful, for I am mainly ignorant
75What place this is, and all the skill I have
Remembers not these garments; nor I know not
3125Where I did lodge last night. Do not laugh at me,
For, as I am a man, I think this lady
To be my child Cordelia.
80And so I am; I am.
Be your tears wet? Yes, faith. I pray, weep not.
3130If you have poison for me, I will drink it.
I know you do not love me, for your sisters
Have, as I do remember, done me wrong.
85You have some cause; they have not.
No cause, no
3135cause.
Am I in France?
In your own kingdom, sir.
90Do not abuse me.
Be comforted, good madam. The great rage,
3140You see, is killed in him, and yet it is danger
To make him even o’er the time he has lost.
Desire him to go in. Trouble him no more
95Till further settling.
Will ’t please your Highness walk?
3145You must bear with me.
Pray you now, forget, and forgive. I am old and
foolish.
100Holds it true, sir, that the Duke of Cornwall
was so slain?
3150Most certain, sir.
Who is conductor of his people?
As ’tis said, the bastard son of Gloucester.
105They say Edgar, his banished son, is with
the Earl of Kent in Germany.
3155Report is changeable. ’Tis time to look about.
The powers of the kingdom approach apace.
The arbitrament is like to be bloody. Fare
110you well, sir.
My point and period will be throughly wrought,
3160Or well, or ill, as this day’s battle’s fought.
Know of the Duke if his last purpose hold,
Or whether since he is advised by aught
To change the course. He’s full of alteration
And self-reproving. Bring his constant pleasure.
53165Our sister’s man is certainly miscarried.
’Tis to be doubted, madam.
Now, sweet lord,
You know the goodness I intend upon you;
Tell me but truly, but then speak the truth,
103170Do you not love my sister?
In honored love.
But have you never found my brother’s way
To the forfended place?
That thought abuses you.
153175I am doubtful that you have been conjunct
And bosomed with her as far as we call hers.
No, by mine honor, madam.
I never shall endure her. Dear my lord,
Be not familiar with her.
203180Fear me not. She and the Duke, her husband.
I had rather lose the battle than that sister
Should loosen him and me.
Our very loving sister, well bemet.—
Sir, this I heard: the King is come to his daughter,
253185With others whom the rigor of our state
Forced to cry out. Where I could not be honest,
I never yet was valiant. For this business,
It touches us as France invades our land,
Not bolds the King, with others whom, I fear,
303190Most just and heavy causes make oppose.
Sir, you speak nobly.
Why is this reasoned?
Combine together ’gainst the enemy,
For these domestic and particular broils
353195Are not the question here.
Let’s then determine
With th’ ancient of war on our proceeding.
I shall attend you presently at your tent.
Sister, you’ll go with us?
403200No.
’Tis most convenient. Pray, go with us.
Oho, I know the riddle.—I will go.
If e’er your Grace had speech with man so poor,
Hear me one word.
453205I’ll overtake you.—Speak.
Before you fight the battle, ope this letter.
If you have victory, let the trumpet sound
For him that brought it. Wretched though I seem,
I can produce a champion that will prove
503210What is avouchèd there. If you miscarry,
Your business of the world hath so an end,
And machination ceases. Fortune love you.
Stay till I have read the letter.
I was forbid it.
553215When time shall serve, let but the herald cry
And I’ll appear again.
Why, fare thee well. I will o’erlook thy paper.
The enemy’s in view. Draw up your powers.
Giving him a paper.
Here is the guess of their true strength and forces
603220By diligent discovery. But your haste
Is now urged on you.
We will greet the time.
He exits.
To both these sisters have I sworn my love,
Each jealous of the other as the stung
653225Are of the adder. Which of them shall I take?
Both? One? Or neither? Neither can be enjoyed
If both remain alive. To take the widow
Exasperates, makes mad her sister Goneril,
And hardly shall I carry out my side,
703230Her husband being alive. Now, then, we’ll use
His countenance for the battle, which, being done,
Let her who would be rid of him devise
His speedy taking off. As for the mercy
Which he intends to Lear and to Cordelia,
753235The battle done and they within our power,
Shall never see his pardon, for my state
Stands on me to defend, not to debate.
Here, father, take the shadow of this tree
For your good host. Pray that the right may thrive.
3240If ever I return to you again,
I’ll bring you comfort.
5Grace go with you, sir.
Edgar exits.Alarum and Retreat within.Enter Edgar.
Away, old man. Give me thy hand. Away.
King Lear hath lost, he and his daughter ta’en.
3245Give me thy hand. Come on.
No further, sir. A man may rot even here.
10What, in ill thoughts again? Men must endure
Their going hence even as their coming hither.
Ripeness is all. Come on.
3250And that’s true too.
They exit.
Some officers take them away. Good guard
Until their greater pleasures first be known
That are to censure them.
We are not the first
53255Who with best meaning have incurred the worst.
For thee, oppressèd king, I am cast down.
Myself could else outfrown false Fortune’s frown.
Shall we not see these daughters and these sisters?
No, no, no, no. Come, let’s away to prison.
103260We two alone will sing like birds i’ th’ cage.
When thou dost ask me blessing, I’ll kneel down
And ask of thee forgiveness. So we’ll live,
And pray, and sing, and tell old tales, and laugh
At gilded butterflies, and hear poor rogues
153265Talk of court news, and we’ll talk with them too—
Who loses and who wins; who’s in, who’s out—
And take upon ’s the mystery of things,
As if we were God’s spies. And we’ll wear out,
In a walled prison, packs and sects of great ones
203270That ebb and flow by th’ moon.
Take them away.
Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia,
The gods themselves throw incense. Have I caught
thee?
253275He that parts us shall bring a brand from heaven
And fire us hence like foxes. Wipe thine eyes.
The good years shall devour them, flesh and fell,
Ere they shall make us weep. We’ll see ’em starved
first.
303280Come.
Come hither, captain. Hark.
Handing him a paper.
Take thou this note. Go follow them to prison.
One step I have advanced thee. If thou dost
As this instructs thee, thou dost make thy way
353285To noble fortunes. Know thou this: that men
Are as the time is; to be tender-minded
Does not become a sword. Thy great employment
Will not bear question. Either say thou ’lt do ’t,
Or thrive by other means.
403290I’ll do ’t, my lord.
About it, and write “happy” when th’ hast done.
Mark, I say, instantly, and carry it so
As I have set it down.
I cannot draw a cart, nor eat dried oats.
453295If it be man’s work, I’ll do ’t.
Sir, you have showed today your valiant strain,
And Fortune led you well. You have the captives
Who were the opposites of this day’s strife.
I do require them of you, so to use them
503300As we shall find their merits and our safety
May equally determine.
Sir, I thought it fit
To send the old and miserable king
To some retention and appointed guard,
553305Whose age had charms in it, whose title more,
To pluck the common bosom on his side
And turn our impressed lances in our eyes,
Which do command them. With him I sent the
Queen,
603310My reason all the same, and they are ready
Tomorrow, or at further space, t’ appear
Where you shall hold your session. At this time
We sweat and bleed. The friend hath lost his friend,
And the best quarrels in the heat are cursed
653315By those that feel their sharpness.
The question of Cordelia and her father
Requires a fitter place.
Sir, by your patience,
I hold you but a subject of this war,
703320Not as a brother.
That’s as we list to grace him.
Methinks our pleasure might have been demanded
Ere you had spoke so far. He led our powers,
Bore the commission of my place and person,
753325The which immediacy may well stand up
And call itself your brother.
Not so hot.
In his own grace he doth exalt himself
More than in your addition.
803330In my rights,
By me invested, he compeers the best.
That were the most if he should husband you.
Jesters do oft prove prophets.
Holla, holla!
853335That eye that told you so looked but asquint.
Lady, I am not well, else I should answer
From a full-flowing stomach. To Edmund.
General,
Take thou my soldiers, prisoners, patrimony.
903340Dispose of them, of me; the walls is thine.
Witness the world that I create thee here
My lord and master.
Mean you to enjoy him?
The let-alone lies not in your goodwill.
953345Nor in thine, lord.
Half-blooded fellow, yes.
Let the drum strike, and prove my title thine.
Stay yet, hear reason.—Edmund, I arrest thee
On capital treason; and, in thine attaint,
1003350This gilded serpent.—For your claim, fair
sister,
I bar it in the interest of my wife.
’Tis she is subcontracted to this lord,
And I, her husband, contradict your banns.
1053355If you will marry, make your loves to me.
My lady is bespoke.
An interlude!
Thou art armed, Gloucester. Let the trumpet sound.
If none appear to prove upon thy person
1103360Thy heinous, manifest, and many treasons,
There is my pledge.He throws down a glove.
I’ll make it on thy heart,
Ere I taste bread, thou art in nothing less
Than I have here proclaimed thee.
1153365Sick, O, sick!
If not, I’ll ne’er trust medicine.
There’s my exchange.He throws down a glove.
What in the world he is
That names me traitor, villain-like he lies.
1203370Call by the trumpet. He that dares approach,
On him, on you, who not, I will maintain
My truth and honor firmly.
A herald, ho!
A herald, ho, a herald!
1253375Trust to thy single virtue, for thy soldiers,
All levied in my name, have in my name
Took their discharge.
My sickness grows upon me.
She is not well. Convey her to my tent.
Regan is helped to exit.
Enter a Herald.
1303380Come hither, herald. Let the trumpet sound,
And read out this.
Sound, trumpet!
A trumpet sounds.
If any man of quality or degree, within the lists of the
army, will maintain upon Edmund, supposed Earl of
1353385Gloucester, that he is a manifold traitor, let him
appear by the third sound of the trumpet. He is bold in
his defense.
Again!
Second trumpet sounds.Again!
Third trumpet sounds.Trumpet answers within.Enter Edgar armed.
1403390Ask him his purposes, why he appears
Upon this call o’ th’ trumpet.
What are you?
Your name, your quality, and why you answer
This present summons?
1453395Know my name is lost,
By treason’s tooth bare-gnawn and canker-bit.
Yet am I noble as the adversary
I come to cope.
Which is that adversary?
1503400What’s he that speaks for Edmund, Earl of
Gloucester?
Himself. What sayest thou to him?
Draw thy sword,
That if my speech offend a noble heart,
1553405Thy arm may do thee justice. Here is mine.
He draws his sword.
Behold, it is my privilege, the privilege of mine
honors,
My oath, and my profession. I protest,
Maugre thy strength, place, youth, and eminence,
1603410Despite thy victor-sword and fire-new fortune,
Thy valor, and thy heart, thou art a traitor,
False to thy gods, thy brother, and thy father,
Conspirant ’gainst this high illustrious prince,
And from th’ extremest upward of thy head
1653415To the descent and dust below thy foot,
A most toad-spotted traitor. Say thou “no,”
This sword, this arm, and my best spirits are bent
To prove upon thy heart, whereto I speak,
Thou liest.
1703420In wisdom I should ask thy name,
But since thy outside looks so fair and warlike,
And that thy tongue some say of breeding breathes,
What safe and nicely I might well delay
By rule of knighthood, I disdain and spurn.
1753425Back do I toss these treasons to thy head,
With the hell-hated lie o’erwhelm thy heart,
Which, for they yet glance by and scarcely bruise,
This sword of mine shall give them instant way,
Where they shall rest forever. Trumpets, speak!
1803430Save him, save him!
This is practice, Gloucester.
By th’ law of war, thou wast not bound to answer
An unknown opposite. Thou art not vanquished,
But cozened and beguiled.
1853435Shut your mouth, dame,
Or with this paper shall I stopple it.—Hold, sir.—
Thou worse than any name, read thine own evil.
No tearing, lady. I perceive you know it.
Say if I do; the laws are mine, not thine.
1903440Who can arraign me for ’t?
Most monstrous! O!
Know’st thou this paper?
Ask me not what I know.
She exits.
Go after her, she’s desperate. Govern her.
1953445What you have charged me with, that have I done,
And more, much more. The time will bring it out.
’Tis past, and so am I. But what art thou
That hast this fortune on me? If thou ’rt noble,
I do forgive thee.
2003450Let’s exchange charity.
I am no less in blood than thou art, Edmund;
If more, the more th’ hast wronged me.
My name is Edgar and thy father’s son.
The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices
2053455Make instruments to plague us.
The dark and vicious place where thee he got
Cost him his eyes.
Th’ hast spoken right. ’Tis true.
The wheel is come full circle; I am here.
2103460Methought thy very gait did prophesy
A royal nobleness. I must embrace thee.
Let sorrow split my heart if ever I
Did hate thee or thy father!
Worthy prince, I know ’t.
2153465Where have you hid yourself?
How have you known the miseries of your father?
By nursing them, my lord. List a brief tale,
And when ’tis told, O, that my heart would burst!
The bloody proclamation to escape
2203470That followed me so near—O, our lives’ sweetness,
That we the pain of death would hourly die
Rather than die at once!—taught me to shift
Into a madman’s rags, t’ assume a semblance
That very dogs disdained, and in this habit
2253475Met I my father with his bleeding rings,
Their precious stones new lost; became his guide,
Led him, begged for him, saved him from despair.
Never—O fault!—revealed myself unto him
Until some half hour past, when I was armed.
2303480Not sure, though hoping of this good success,
I asked his blessing, and from first to last
Told him our pilgrimage. But his flawed heart
(Alack, too weak the conflict to support)
’Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief,
2353485Burst smilingly.
This speech of yours hath moved me,
And shall perchance do good. But speak you on.
You look as you had something more to say.
If there be more, more woeful, hold it in,
2403490For I am almost ready to dissolve,
Hearing of this.
This would have seemed a period
To such as love not sorrow; but another,
To amplify too much, would make much more
2453495And top extremity. Whilst I
Was big in clamor, came there in a man
Who, having seen me in my worst estate,
Shunned my abhorred society; but then, finding
Who ’twas that so endured, with his strong arms
2503500He fastened on my neck and bellowed out
As he’d burst heaven, threw him on my father,
Told the most piteous tale of Lear and him
That ever ear received, which, in recounting,
His grief grew puissant, and the strings of life
2553505Began to crack. Twice then the trumpets sounded,
And there I left him tranced.
But who was this?
Kent, sir, the banished Kent, who in disguise
Followed his enemy king and did him service
2603510Improper for a slave.
Help, help, O, help!
What kind of help?
Speak, man!
What means this bloody knife?
2653515’Tis hot, it smokes! It came even from the heart
Of—O, she’s dead!
Who dead? Speak, man.
Your lady, sir, your lady. And her sister
By her is poisoned. She confesses it.
2703520I was contracted to them both. All three
Now marry in an instant.
Here comes Kent.
Enter Kent.
Produce the bodies, be they alive or dead.
Gentleman exits.
This judgment of the heavens, that makes us
2753525tremble,
Touches us not with pity. O, is this he?
To Kent. The time will not allow the compliment
Which very manners urges.
I am come
2803530To bid my king and master aye goodnight.
Is he not here?
Great thing of us forgot!
Speak, Edmund, where’s the King? And where’s
Cordelia?
Goneril and Regan’s bodies brought out.
2853535Seest thou this object, Kent?
Alack, why thus?
Yet Edmund was beloved.
The one the other poisoned for my sake,
And after slew herself.
2903540Even so.—Cover their faces.
I pant for life. Some good I mean to do
Despite of mine own nature. Quickly send—
Be brief in it—to th’ castle, for my writ
Is on the life of Lear, and on Cordelia.
2953545Nay, send in time.
Run, run, O, run!
To who, my lord? To Edmund. Who has the office?
Send
Thy token of reprieve.
3003550Well thought on. Take my sword. Give it the
Captain.
Haste thee for thy life.
The Soldier exits with Edmund’s sword.
He hath commission from thy wife and me
To hang Cordelia in the prison, and
3053555To lay the blame upon her own despair,
That she fordid herself.
The gods defend her!—Bear him hence awhile.
Howl, howl, howl! O, you are men of stones!
Had I your tongues and eyes, I’d use them so
3103560That heaven’s vault should crack. She’s gone
forever.
I know when one is dead and when one lives.
She’s dead as earth.—Lend me a looking glass.
If that her breath will mist or stain the stone,
3153565Why, then she lives.
Is this the promised end?
Or image of that horror?
Fall and cease.
This feather stirs. She lives. If it be so,
3203570It is a chance which does redeem all sorrows
That ever I have felt.
O, my good master—
Prithee, away.
’Tis noble Kent, your friend.
3253575A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all!
I might have saved her. Now she’s gone forever.—
Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little. Ha!
What is ’t thou sayst?—Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman.
3303580I killed the slave that was a-hanging thee.
’Tis true, my lords, he did.
Did I not, fellow?
I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion
I would have made him skip. I am old now,
3353585And these same crosses spoil me. To Kent. Who
are you?
Mine eyes are not o’ th’ best. I’ll tell you straight.
If Fortune brag of two she loved and hated,
One of them we behold.
3403590This is a dull sight. Are you not Kent?
The same,
Your servant Kent. Where is your servant Caius?
He’s a good fellow, I can tell you that.
He’ll strike and quickly too. He’s dead and rotten.
3453595No, my good lord, I am the very man—
I’ll see that straight.
That from your first of difference and decay
Have followed your sad steps.
You are welcome
3503600hither.
Nor no man else. All’s cheerless, dark, and deadly.
Your eldest daughters have fordone themselves,
And desperately are dead.
Ay, so I think.
3553605He knows not what he says, and vain is it
That we present us to him.
Very bootless.
Enter a Messenger.Edmund is dead, my lord.
That’s but a trifle here.—
3603610You lords and noble friends, know our intent:
What comfort to this great decay may come
Shall be applied. For us, we will resign,
During the life of this old Majesty,
To him our absolute power; you to your rights,
3653615With boot and such addition as your Honors
Have more than merited. All friends shall taste
The wages of their virtue, and all foes
The cup of their deservings. O, see, see!
And my poor fool is hanged. No, no, no life?
3703620Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life,
And thou no breath at all? Thou ’lt come no more,
Never, never, never, never, never.—
Pray you undo this button. Thank you, sir.
Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,
3753625Look there, look there!
He faints. To Lear. My lord,
my lord!
Break, heart, I prithee, break!
Look up, my lord.
3803630Vex not his ghost. O, let him pass! He hates him
That would upon the rack of this tough world
Stretch him out longer.
He is gone indeed.
The wonder is he hath endured so long.
3853635He but usurped his life.
Bear them from hence. Our present business
Is general woe. To Edgar and Kent. Friends of my
soul, you twain
Rule in this realm, and the gored state sustain.
3903640I have a journey, sir, shortly to go;
My master calls me. I must not say no.
The weight of this sad time we must obey,
Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say.
The oldest hath borne most; we that are young
3953645Shall never see so much nor live so long.