Kent. Let it fall rather, though the fork in. vade The region of my heart: be Kent unmannerly, When Lear is mad. What wouldst thou do, old man? [speak, Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bound, [doom; When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy And, in thy best consideration, check This hideous rashness: answer my life, my judgment, Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least; Nor are those empty-hearted, whose low sound Reverbs no hollowness. Lear. Kent, on thy life, no more. Kent. My life I never held but as a pawn To wage against thine enemies; nor fear to lose it, Thy safety being the motive. Kent. See better, Lear; and let me still re The true blank + of thine eye. [main, Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow Lear. Hear me, recreant! VOW, Since thou hast sought to make us break our [pride, (Which we durst never yet,) and, with strain'd To come betwixt our sentence and our power; (Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,) Our potency make good, take thy reward. Five days we do allot thee, for provision To shield thee from diseases of the world; And, on the sixth, to turn thy hated back Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day following, Thy banish trunk be found in our dominions, The moment is thy death: Away! By Jupiter, This shall not be revok'd. Kent. Fare thee well, king: since thus thou wilt appear, Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid, [TO CORDELIA. That justly think'st, and has most rightly said! And your large speeches may your deeds approve, [To REGAN and GONERIL. That good effects may spring from words of love. Bur. Most royal majesty, If aught within that little seeming substance, Bur. I know no answer. Will you, with those infirmities she owes, t Take her, or leave her ? Bur. Pardon me, royal Sir; Election makes not up on such conditions. Lear. Then leave her, Sir; for, by the power that made me, I tell you all her wealth.-For you, great king, [To FRANCE. I would not from your love make such a stray, To match you where I hate; therefore beseech you To avert your liking a more worthier way, France. This is most strange ! That she, that even but now was your best object, Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle That monsters it, or your fore-vouch'd | affection Cor. I yet beseech your majesty, (If for ** I want that glib and oily art, [intend, A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue Lear. Better thou Cor. Peace be with Burgundy! France. Fairest Cordelia, thou art most rich, being poor; Most choice, forsaken; and most lov'd, despis'd; My love should kindle to inflam'd respect. I crave no more than hath your highness offer'd, Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my Nor will you tender less. Lear. Right noble Burgundy, When she was dear to us, we did hold her so; But now her price is fall'n: Sir, there she stands; Reverberates. chance, + The mark to shoot at. Amorous expedition. Follow his old mode of life. 292 Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind: Have no such daughter, nor shall ever sce [Flourish. Exeunt LEAR, BURGUNDY, CORN- Cor. The jewels of our father with wash'd Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are; father: To your professed bosoms I commit him: I would prefer him to a better place. Gon. Prescribe not us our duties. Be to content your lord; who hath receiv'd you Cor. Time shall unfold what plaited cun- Who cover faults, at last shame them derides. France. Come, my fair Cordelia. [Exeunt FRANCE and CORDELIA. Gon. Sister, it is not a little I have to say, of what most nearly appertains to us both. 1 think our father will hence to-night. Reg. That's most certain, and with you; next month with us. Gon. You see how full of changes his age is ; the observation 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. Reg. 'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself. Gon. The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long-engrafted condition, 5 but, therewithal, the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them. Reg. Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him, as this of Kent's banishment. Gon. There is further compliment of leavetaking between France and him. Pray you, let us hit together: If our father carry authority with such dispositions as he bears, this last surrender of his will but offend us. Reg. We shall further think of it. SCENE II.—A Hall in the Earl of GLOSTER's Castle. Enter EDMUND, with a Letter. Edm. Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy My services are bound: Wherefore should I Lag of a brother ? Why hastard ? wherefore base base? Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take | Than doth, within a dull, stale, tred bed, Enter GLOSTER. Glo. Kent banish'd thus! And France in And the king gone to-night! subscrib'd his Edm. So please your lordship, none. [Putting up the Letter. Glo. Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter? Edm. I know no news, my lord. Glo. What paper were you reading? Glo. No? What needed then that terrible |despatch of 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. Edm. I beseech you, Sir, pardon me: it is a letter from my brother, that I have not all o'erread; for so much as I have perused, I find it not fit for your over-looking. Glo. Give me the letter, Sir. Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The contents, as in part! understand them, are to blame. Glo. Let's see, let's see. Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but as an essay or taste of my virtue. Glo. [Reads.] This policy and reverence of age makes the world bitter to the best of our times, keeps cur 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 may speak more. If our father would sleep till I waked him, you should enjoy half his revenue for ever, and live the beloved of your brother, Edgar.— Humph-Conspiracy!-Sleep till I waked him you should enjoy half his revenue,-My son Edgar! Had he a hand to write this ? a heart and brain to breed it in ?-When came this to you? Who brought it? Edm. It was not brought me, my lord, there's the cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet. Glo. You know the character to be your brother's? Edm. If the matter were good, my lord, I Edm. It is his hand, my lord; but, I hope his heart is not in the contents. Glo. Hath he never heretofore sounded you In this business? Edm. Never, my lord: But I have often | heard him maintain | it to be fit, that, sous at ? perfect age, and fathers declining, the father should be as ward to the son, and the son manage his revenue. Glo. O villain, villain!-His very opinion in the letter !-Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain! worse than brutish !-Go sirrah, seek bim; I'll apprehend him :-Abomi. nable villain !-Where is he? Edm. I do not well know, my lord. If it Scene II. shall please you to suspend your indignation |tions of ancient amities; divisions in state, against my brother, till you can derive from him menaces and maledictions against king and better testimony of his intent, you shall run a nobles; needless diffidences, banishment of certain course where, if you violently pro- friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial breaches, ceed against him, mistaking his purpose, it and I know not what. would make a great gap in your own honour, 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 honour and to no other pretence of danger. Glo. Think yon so? Edm. If your honour 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. Glo. He cannot be such a monster. Edg. How long have you been a sectary astronomical? Edm. Come, come, when saw you my father last? Edg. Why, the night gone by. Edm. Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure in him, by word or couutenauce ? Edg. None at all. Edm. Bethink yourself, wherein you may have offended him; and my entreaty, forbear his presence, till some little time hath qualified the Glo. To his father, that so tenderly and en-beat of his displeasure; which at this instant so tirely loves him.-Heaven and earth!-Ed-rageth in him, that with the mischief of your mund, seek him out: wind me into him, I pray person it would scarcely allay. you frame the business after your own wisdom: I would unstate myself, to be in a due resolution. Edm. I will seek him, Sir, presently; convey the business as I shall find means, and acquaint you withal. Edg. Some villain hath done me wrong. Edm. That's my fear. I pray you, have a continent + forbearance, till the speed of his rage goes slower; and, as I say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to hear my lord speak: Pray you, go; my key-If you do stir abroad, go there's armed. Edg. Armed, brother? Edm. Brother, I advise you to the best: go armed; I am no honest man, if there be any good meaning towards you: I have told you what I have seen and heard, but faintly; nothing like the image and horror of it: Pray you, away. Edg. Shall I hear from you anon? A credulous father, and a brother noble, Glo. These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend 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 the bond cracked between son and father. This villain of mine comes under the prediction; there's son against father: there's the king falls from bias of nature; father against child. We have seen the best of our time: Machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all 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 [Exit. offence, honesty !-Strange! strange ! Edm. This is the excellent foppery of the world! that, when we are sick in fortune, (often the surfeit of our own behaviour,) we make guilty of our disasters, the sun, the moon, and the stars; as if we were villains by necessity: fools, by heavenly compulsion; knaves, thieves, 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 disposition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my motherHe flashes into one gross crime or other, under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under ursa major; ++ so that it follows, I am That sets us all at odds: I'll not endure it: [ing rough and lecherous.-Tut, I should have been His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids that in maidenliest star the I am, had On every trifle :-When he returns from huntthe firmament twinkled on my bastardizing. I will not speak with him; say, I am sick :EdgarIf you come slack of former services, You shall do well; the fault of it I'll answer. Stew. He's coming, madam; I hear him. [Horns within. Gon. Put on what weary negligence you [question: please, You and your fellows; I'd have it come to Enter EDGAR. and pat he comes, like the catastrophe of the old comedy: My cue is villanous inelancholy, with a sigh like Tom o'Bedlam.--O these eclipses do portend these divisions! Fa, sol, la, mi. # Edg. How now, brother Edmund? What serious contemplation are you in? Edm. I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow these eclipses. SCENE III.-A Room in the Duke of Enter GONERIL and STEWARD. Stew. Ay, madam. Gon. By day and night! he wrongs me; every hour us If he dislike it, let him to my sister, That still would manage those authorities, Remember what I have said. Edg. Do you busy yourself with that? Edm. I promise you, the effects he writes of succeed unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent; death, dearth, dissolu↑ Design. Descend from my diguity by privately listening, to What be sure of the truth. • Whereas. The usual address to a lord. Manage. Following. .. Traitors. + The constellation so named. Stew. Very well, madam. grows of it, no matter; advise your fel. lows so: For cohorts some editors read courts. Temperate. I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall, kindness appears, as well in the general depen That I may speak :-I'll write straight to my dants, as in the duke himself also, and your sister, daughter. To hold any very course :-Prepare for dinner. [Exeunt. SCENE IV.-A Hall in the same. Enter KENT, disguised. Kent. If but as well 1 other accents borrow, That can my speech diffuse, my good intent May carry through itself to that full issue For which I raz'd+ my likeness.-Now, banish'd Kent, If thou canst serve where thou dost stand condemn'd, (So may it come !) thy master, whom thou lov'st, Shall find thee full of labours. Lear. What services canst thou do? Kent. I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious tale in telling it, and deliver á plain message bluntly: that which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualify'd in; and the best of me is diligence. Lear. How old art thou? Kent. Not so young, Sir, to love a woman for singing; nor so old, to dote on her for any thing: I have years on my back forty-eight. Lear. 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 fool? Go you, and call my fool hither: Enter STEWARD. You, you, Sirrah, where's my daughter? Stew. So please you,[Exit. Lear. What says the fellow there? Call the clotpoll back.-Where's my fool, ho!--I think the world's asleep.-How now? where's that mongrel ? Knight. He says, my lord, your daughter is not well. Lear. Why came not the slave back to me, when I call'd him? Knight. Sir, he answer'd me in the roundest manner, he would not. Lear. He would not! Lear. Ha! say'st thou so? Knight. I beseech you, pardon me, my lord, if I be mistaken; for my duty cannot be silent, when I think your highness is wrong'd. Lear. Thou but remember'st me of mine own conception; I have perceived a most faint neglect of late; which I have rather blamed as mine own jealous curiosity, than as a very pretence and purpose of unkindness: I will look further into't. But where's my fool? I have not seen him these two days. Knight. Since my young lady's going into France, Sir, the fool hath much pined away. Lear. No more of that; I have noted it well. -Go you, and tell my daughter I would speak with her.-Go you, call hither my fool. Re-enter STEWARD. you Sir, you Sir, come you hither: Who am I, Sir ? Stew. My lady's father. Lear. My lady's father? my lord's knave: you whoresom dog! you slave! you cur! Stew. I am none of this, my lord; I beseech you, pardon me. Lear. Do you bandy looks with me, you rascal ? [Striking him. Stew. I'll not be struck, my lord. Kent. Nor tripped neither; you base football player. [Tripping up his Heels. Lear. I thank thee, fellow; thou servest me, and I'll love thee. Kent. Come, 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. [Pushes the STEWARD out. Lear. Now, my friendly knave, I thank thee: there's earnest of thy service. [Giving KENT Money. Enter FOOL. Fool. If I gave them all my living, I'd keep my coxcombs myself: There's mine; beg auother of thy daughters. Lear. Take beed, Sirrah; the whip. must be whipp'd out, when Lady, the brach, § Fool. Truth's a dog that must to kennel? he may stand by the fire and stink. Lear. A pestilent gall to me! Fool. Mark it, nuncle: Have more than thou showest, Punctilious jealousy. Bitch hound. 1 Estate or property. Ownest, possessest. + Design. Belierest. And thou shalt have more Than two tens to a score, Lear. This is nothing, fool. Fool. Then 'tis like the breath of an unfee'd lawyer; you gave me nothing for't: Can you make no use of nothing, nuncle? Lear. Why, no, boy; nothing can be made out of nothing. Fool. Pr'ythee, tell him, so much the rent of bis land comes to; he will not believe a fool. [To KENT. Lear. A bitter fool! Fool. Dost thou know the difference, my boy, between a bitter fool and a sweet fool! Lear. No, lad; teach me. Fool. That lord, that counsel'd thee To give away thy land, Come place him here by me, Or do thou for him stand: The sweet and bitter fool Will presently appear; The one in motley here, The other found out there. Lear. Dost thou call me fool, boy? Fool. All thy other titles thou hast given away; that thou wast born with. Kent. This is not altogether fool, my lord. Fool. No, 'faith, lords and great men will not let me; if I had a monopoly out, they Mould have part on't and ladies too, they will not let me have all fool to myself; they'll be snatching. Give me an egg, nuncle, and I'll give thee two crowns. Lear. What two crowns shall they be? Fool. Why, after I have cut the egg i'the middle, and eat up the meat, the two crowns of the egg. When thou clovest thy crown i'the middle, and gavest away both parts, thou borest thine ass on thy back over the dirt: Thou hadst little wit in thy bald crown, when thou gavest thy golden one away. If I speak like myself in this, let him be whipp'd that first finds it so. [Singing. Fools had ne'er less grace in a year; Lear. When were you wont to be so full of songs, Sirrab? Fool. I have used it, nuncle, ever since thou madest thy daughters thy mother: for when thou gavest them the rod, and put'st down thine own breeches, Then they for sudden joy did weep, [Singing. That such a king should play bo-peep. Pr'ythee, nuncle, keep a schoolmaster that can teach thy fool to lie; I would fain learn to lie. Lear. If you lie, Sirrah, we'll have you whipp'd. Fool. I marvel, what kin thou and thy daughters are they'll have me whipp'd for speaking true, thou'lt have me whipp'd for lying; and, sometimes, I am whipp'd for holding my peace. I had rather be any kind of thing, than a fool: and yet I would not be thee, Buncle; thou hast pared thy wit o'both sides, and left nothing in the middle: Here comes one o'the parings. Enter GONERIL. Lear. How now, daughter! what makes that frontlet + on? Methinks, you are too much of late i'the frown. Fool. 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 am a fool, thou art noth Favour. Part of a woman's head-dress, to which Lear com pares her frowning brow. A cypher. ing.-Yes, forsooth, I will hold my tongue; so your face [To GON.] bids me, though you say nothing. Mum, mum, He that keeps nor crust nor crum, That's a sheal'd peascod. [Pointing to LEAR. Gon. Not only, Sir, this your all-licens'd fool, But other of your insolent retinue Do hourly carp and quarrel; breaking forth I 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, fault Would not 'scape censure, nor the redresses sleep; Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal, So, Fool. For you trow, nuncle, The hedge-sparrow fed the cuckoo so long, Lear. Are you our daughter? Gon. Come, Sir, I would you would make use of that good wisdom whereof I know you are fraught; and put away these dispositions, which of late transform you from what you rightly are. Fool. May not an ass know when the cart draws the horse?-Whoop, Jug I love thee. Lear. Does any here know me ?-Why this is not Lear: does Lear walk thus? speak thus ? Where are his eyes? Either his notion weakens, or his discernings are lethargied.-Sleeping or waking?-Ha! sure, '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 sove reignty, knowledge, and reason, I should be false persuaded I had daughters. Fool. Which they will make an obedient father. Lear. Your name, fair gentlewoman? This admiration is much o'the favour ¶ As you are old and reverend, you should be wise : Here do you keep a hundred knights and squires; Men so disordered, so debauch'd, and bold, Lear. Darkness and devils!- Gon. You strike my people; and your dis- Make servants of their betters. Enter ALBANY. Lear. Woe, that too late repents,--O Sir, are you come? A mere husk which contains nothing. |