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And I, for winking at your discords too,
Have lost a brace of kinsmen: - all are punish'd.

Cap. O, brother Montague! give me thy hand:
This is my daughter's jointure; for no more

Can I demand.

Mon.

But I can give thee more;

For I will raise her statue in pure gold,

That, while Verona by that name is known,
There shall no figure at such rate be set,

As that of true and faithful Juliet.

Cap. As rich shall Romeo by his lady lie;

Poor sacrifices of our enmity!

Prince. A glooming peace this morning with it brings,
The sun for sorrow will not show his head.
Go hence, to have more talk of these sad things;
Some shall be pardon'd, and some punished :

For never was a story of more woe,

Than this of Juliet and her Romeo.

[Exeunt.

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SERVILIUS

TIMANDRA,

Mistresses to Alci

biades.

Lords, Senators, Officers, Soldiers, Thieves, and Attendants.

SCENE, Athens; and the Woods adjoining.

ACT I. SCENE I.

Athens. A Hall in TIMON's House.

Enter Poet, Painter, Jeweller, Merchant, and Others,

at

several Doors.

Poet. Good day, Sir.

Pain. I am glad y' are well.

Poet. I have not seen you long. How goes the world?

Pain. It wears, Sir, as it grows.

Poet.

But what particular rarity? what strange,

Ay, that's well known;

Which manifold record not matches? See,
Magic of bounty! all these spirits thy power
Hath conjur❜d to attend. I know the merchant.
Pain. I know them both: th' other's a jeweller.
Mer. O! 't is a worthy lord.

Jew.

Nay, that 's most fix'd. Mer. A most incomparable man; breath'd, as it were, To an untirable and continuate goodness:

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Mer. O pray, let's see't. For the lord Timon, Sir? Jew. If he will touch the estimate; but, for that Poet. "When we for recompence have prais'd the vile, It stains the glory in that happy verse

Which aptly sings the good."

Mer.

'T is a good form. Jew. And rich: here is a water, look ye.

Pain.

You are rapt, Sir, in some work, some dedication

To the great lord.

Poet.

A thing slipp'd idly from me.

Our poesy is as a gum, which oozes

From whence 't is nourish'd: the fire i' the flint
Shows not, till it be struck; our gentle flame
Provokes itself, and, like the current, flies
What have you there?

Each bound it chafes.

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Poet. Upon the heels of my presentment, Sir.

Let's see your piece.

Pain. 'T is a good piece.

Poet. So 't is this comes off well, and excellent.

Pain.

Poet.

Indifferent.

Admirable! How this grace

Speaks his own standing; what a mental power
This eye shoots forth; how big imagination
Moves in this lip; to the dumbness of the gesture
One might interpret.

Pain. It is a pretty mocking of the life. Here is a touch; is 't good?

Poet.

I'll say of it,

It tutors nature: artificial strife

Lives in these touches, livelier than life.

Enter certain Senators, who pass over the Stage.

Pain.

Poet.

Pain.

Poet.

How this lord is follow'd!

The senators of Athens:

Look, more!

happy men!

You see this confluence, this great flood of visitors.

I have in this rough work shap'd out a man,

Whom this beneath world doth embrace and hug
With amplest entertainment: my free drift
Halts hot particularly, but moves itself
In a wide sea of wax: no levell'd malice
Infects one comma in the course I hold,
But flies an eagle flight, bold, and forth on,
Leaving no tract behind.

Pain. How shall I understand you?
Poet. I will unbolt to you.

You see how all conditions, how all minds,
(As well of glib and slippery creatures, as
Of grave and austere quality) tender down
Their services to lord Timon: his large fortune,
Upon his good and gracious nature hanging,
Subdues and properties to his love and tendance
All sorts of hearts; yea, from the glass-fac'd flatterer
To Apemantus, that few things loves better
Than to abhor himself: even he drops down
The knee before him, and returns in peace
Most rich in Timon's nod.

Pain. I saw them speak together.

Poet.

Sir, I have upon a high and pleasant hill,
Feign'd Fortune to be thron'd: the base o' the mount
Is rank'd with all deserts, all kind of natures,
That labour on the bosom of this sphere

To propagate their states: amongst them all,

Whose eyes are on this sovereign lady fix'd,
One do I personate of lord Timon's frame;
Whom Fortune with her ivory hand wafts to her,

Whose present grace to present slaves and servants
Translates his rivals.

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This throne, this Fortune, and this hill, methinks,
With one man beckon'd from the rest below,
Bowing his head against the steepy mount

To climb his happiness, would be well express'd
In our condition.

Poet.

Nay, Sir, but hear me on.

All those which were his fellows but of late,

(Some better than his value) on the moment
Follow his strides; his lobbies fill with tendance,
Rain sacrificial whisperings in his ear,

Make sacred even his stirrup, and through him
Drink the free air.

Pain.

Ay, marry, what of these?

Poet. When Fortune, in her shift and change of mood,
Spurns down her late belov'd, all his dependants,

Which labour'd after him to the mountain's top,
Even on their knees and hands, let him slip down,
Not one accompanying his declining foot.

Pain. "T is common:

A thousand moral paintings I can show,

That shall demonstrate these quick blows of Fortune's
More pregnantly than words. Yet you do well,
To show lord Timon, that mean eyes have seen
The foot above the head.

Trumpets sound.

Enter TIMON, attended; the Servant of VENTIDIUS talking with him.

Tim.

Imprison'd is he, say you?

Ven. Serv. Ay, my good lord: five talents is his debt;
His means most short, his creditors most strait:
Your honourable letter he desires

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