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Be Alcibiades your plague, you his,

And last so long enough!

1 Sen. We speak in vain.

Go, live

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From Alciabiades to Timon's cave,

With letters of entreaty, which imported

His fellowship i'the cause against your city,
In part for his sake mov'd.

Enter SENATORS from TIMON.

1 Sen. Here come our brothers.

2 Sen. No talk of Timon, nothing of him expect.fing, Doth choke the air with dust: in and prepare ; Our's is the fall, I fear; our foes, the snare.

Tim. But yet I love my country and am not The enemies' drum is heard, and fearful scourOne that rejoices in the common wreck,

As common bruit doth put it.

1 Sen. That's well spoke.

Tim. Commend me to my loving country

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2 Sen. I like this well, he will return again. Tim. I have a tree, which grows here in my close,

That mine own use invites me to cut down,
And shortly must I fell it; Tell my friends,
Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree,
From high to low throughout, that whoso please
To stop affliction, let him take his haste,
Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe,
And hang himself:-I pray you do my greet-
ing.

Flav. Trouble him no further, thus you still shall find him.

Tim. Come not to me again: but say to
Athens,

Timon hath made his everlasting mansion
Upon the beached verge of the salt flood;
Which once a day with his embossed froth
The turbulent surge shall cover; thither come,
And let my grave-stone be your oracle,-
Lips, let sour words go by, and language end:
What is amiss, plague and infection mend!
Graves only be men's works; and death, their
gain!

Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done bis
reign.
[Exit TIMON.
1 Sen. His discontents are unremoveably
Coupled to nature.

2 Sen. Our hope in him is dead let us re

turn,

And strain what other means is left unto us In our dear ¶ peril.

3 Sen. It requires swift foot.

[Exeunt.

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[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.-The Woods.-TIMON's Cave, and a Tomb-stone seen.

Enter a SOLDIER, seeking TIMON.

Sol. By all description this should be the place.

Who's here? speak, ho!-No answer?-What is this?

Timon is dead, who hath outstretch'd his span : Some beast rear'd this; there does not live a man. Dead, sure; and this his grave.

What's on this tomb I cannot read; the character
I'll take with wax.

Our captain hath in every figure skill;
An ag'd interpreter, though young in days:
Before proud Athens he's set down by this.
Whose fall the mark of his ambition is.

[Exit.

SCENE V.-Before the Walls of Athens. Trumpets sound. Enter ALCIBIADES, and Forces.

Alcib. Sound to this coward and lascivions town Our terrible approach. [A Parley sounded. Enter SENATORS on the Walls.

Till now you have gone on, and fill'd the time With all licentious measure, making your wills The scope of justice; till now, myself, and such

As slept within the shadow of your power,

Have wander'd with our travers'd arms, and

breath'd,

Our sufferance vainly: Now the time is flush ↑
When crouching marrow, in the bearer strong,
Cries, of itself, No more: now breathless wrong,
Shall sit and pant in your great chairs of ease;
And pursy insolence shall break his wind,
With fear and horrid flight.

1 Sen. Noble and young,
When thy first griefs were but a mere conceit,
Ere thou hadst power, or we had cause of fear,
We sent to thee; to give thy rages balm,
To wipe out our ingratitude with loves
Above their quantity.

2 Sen. So did we woo

Transformed Timon to our city's love,

By humble message, and by promis'd means; t
We were not all unkind, nor all deserve
The common stroke of war.

1 Sen. These walls of ours

Were not erected by their hands, from whom You have receiv'd your griefs: nor are they such, Than these great towers, trophies, and schools should fall

For private faults in them.

2 Sen. Nor are they living, Who were the motives that you first went out; Shame, that they wanted cunning, in excess Hath broke their hearts. March, noble lord, Into our city with thy banners spread : By decimation, and a tithed death, (If thy revenges hunger for that food, Which nature loaths,) take thou the destin'd tenth;

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And by the hazard of the spotted die,
Let die the spotted.

1 Sen. All have not offended;
For those that were, it is not square, to take,
On those that are, revenges: crimes like lauds,
Are not inherited. Then, dear countryman,
Bring in thy ranks, but leave without thy rage:
Spare thy Athenian cradle, and those kin,
Which, in the bluster of thy wrath, must fall,
With those that have offended: like a shepherd,
Approach the fold, and cull the infected forth.
But kill not altogether.

2 Sen. What thou wilt,

Thou rather shalt enforce it with thy smile. Than hew to't with thy sword.

1 Sen. Set but thy foot

Against our rampir'd gates, and they shall ope:
So thou wilt send thy gentle heart before,
To say, thou'lt enter friendly.

2 Sen. Throw thy glove.

Or any token of thine honour else,

That thou wilt use the wars as thy redress,
And not as our confusion, all thy powers
Shall make their harbour in our town, till we
Have seal'd thy full desire.

Alcib. Then there's my glove;
Descend, and open your uncharged ports ;+
Those enemies of Timon's, and mine own,
Whom you yourselves shall set out for reproof,
Fall, and no more: and,-to atone your fears
With my more noble meaning,-not a man
Shall pass his quarter, or offend the stream
Of regular justice in your city's bounds,
But shall be remedied, to your public laws
At heaviest answer.

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Both. 'Tis most nobly spoken. Alcib. Descend, and keep your words. The SENATORs descend, and open the Gates. Enter a SOLDIER.

Sold. My noble general, Timon is dead; Entomb'd upon the very hem o'the sea: And on his grave-stone, this insculpture; which With wax I brought away, whose soft impressio Interprets for my poor ignorance.

Alcib. [Reads.] Here lies a wretched corse, of wretched soul bereft:

Seek not my name: A plague consume you wicked caitiff's left!

Here lie I Timon; who, alive, all living men did hate:

Pass by, and curse thy fill; but pass, and stay not here thy gait.

These well express in thee thy latter spirits:
Though thou abhorr'dst in us our human griefs,
Scorn'dst our brain's flow, and those our drop
lets which

From niggard nature fall, yet rich conceit
Taught thee to make vast Neptune weep for aye
On thy low grave, on faults forgiven. Dead
Is noble Timon; of whose memory
Hereafter more.-Bring me into your city
And I will use the olive with my sword:
Make war breed peace; make peace stint † war;
make each

Prescribe to other, as each other's leech.
Let our drums strike.

[Exeunt.

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PERICLES, PRINCE OF TYRE.

LITERARY AND HISTORICAL NOTICE.

THIS play, the authorship of which has been much disputed, was probably written about the year 1606. Pope ranks it among the wretched pieces," which cannot be attributed to Shakspeare; but Malone, who divided it into scenes, considers the internal evidence, (such as the congenial sentiments, the situation of the persons, the colour of the style, and the similitude of its expressions, to passages in his undisputed dramas) suffici ently decisive as to his having written the last three acts, and occasional portions of the preceding two. Indeed, unless it be considered as the production of some inferior playwright, amended by Shakspeare, an earlier date must be assigned to its production, than acknowledged authorities will warrant; for no play in the English language is so incorrect as this---the metre is seldom attended to---verse is frequently printed as prose---and the grossest errors appear throughout. With all these faults, however, it is mentioned as a very popular per formance; and may still be read with pleasure; for it abounds with situations of difficulty and danger, is full of bustle and vivacity, the interest never lags, and the results are all gratifying. Some of the dialogues are nevertheless gross and nonsensical---those which take place in the brothel are superlatively disgusting, nor can they be excusedby the moral intended to be drawn from them. Steevens, upon this portion, has judiciously remarked, that Marina, who is designed for a character of juvenile innocence, appears much too knowing in the impurities of a brothel; nor are her expressions more chastised than her ideas. The unities of time and place are equally outraged the action of the piece is alternately occurring at Antioch in Syria---Tyre in Phoenicia--Tarsus in Cilicia---Mitylene in the island of Lesbos---and Ephesus the capital of Ionia. The story on which the play is founded, is of great antiquity; but the dramatic hero bears no resemblance to his great Athenian namesake. It is taken from the history of Appolonius, king of Tyre, in the Gesta Romanorum, a very old book; which is also related by Gower, in his Confessio Amantis, a poem. Many incidents of the play may be found in the latter work, and even a few of its particular expressions; and, therefore, as Gower himself is introduced, (like the chorus of old) it is reasonable to suppose that Shakspeare chiefly followed the work of that poet.

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ACT I.

Enter GowER.

Before the Palace of Antioch.

To sing a song of old was sung,
From ashes ancient Gower is come;
Assuming man's infirmities,

To glad your ear, and please your eyes.
It hath been sung at festivals,
On ember-eves, and holy ales; +
And lords and ladies of their lives
Have read it for restoratives:
'Purpose to make men glorious;
Et quo antiquius, eo melius
If you, born in these latter times,

When wit's more ripe, accept my raymes,
And that to hear an old man sing,
May to your wishes pleasure bring,

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I life would wish and that I might,
Waste it for you, like taper-light.-
This city then, Antioch the great
Built up for his chiefest seat;
The fairest in all Syria;

(I tell you what mine authors say :)
This king unto him took a pheere,
Who died and left a female heir,
So buxom, blithe, and full of face,
As heaven had lent her all his grace,
With whom the father liking took,
And her to incest did provoke :
Bad father! to entice his own
To evil, should be done by none.
By custom, what they did begin,
Was, with long use, account + no sin.
The beauty of this sinful dame
Made many princes thither frame,

• Wife, the word signifies a mate or companiofi. † Accounted.

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THE N

PUBLIC LIBR

ASTOR, LENOX

TILDEN POUMDATIKYNS

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