TWELFTH NIGHT: OR WHAT YOU WILL. ACT THE FIRST. SCENE I. The DUKE's palace. Enter DUKE, CURIO, and other Lords; DUKE. If music be the food of love, play on; Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting, The appetite may sicken, and so die. That strain again! it had a dying fall: O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound, That breathes upon a bank of violets, Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more: 'Tis not so sweet now as it was before. O spirit of love! how quick and fresh art thou, That, notwithstanding thy capacity Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there, Of what validity and pitch soe'er, But falls into abatement and low price, 285 What, Curio? CUR. Will you go hunt, my lord? DUKE. CUR. The hart. DUKE. Why, so I do, the noblest that I have: O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds, Enter VALENTINE. How now! what news from her? VAL. So please my lord, I might not be admitted; But from her handmaid do return this answer: The element itself, till seven years' heat, Shall not behold her face at ample view; But, like a cloistress, she will veiled walk And water once a day her chamber round With eye-offending brine: all this to season A brother's dead love, which she would keep fresh And lasting in her sad remembrance. DUKE. O, she that hath a heart of that fine frame To pay this debt of love but to a brother, How will she love, when the rich golden shaft Hath kill'd the flock of all affections else That live in her; when liver, brain and heart, These sovereign thrones, are all supplied, and fill'd Love-thoughts lie rich when canopied with bowers. [Exeunt. |