Treason is but trusted like the fox.

The time of life is short.

Two stars keep not their motion in one sphere. The better part of valour is discretion.

יוווו

RUMOUR.

HENRY IV.-PART II.

Rumour is a pipe

Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures;
And of so easy and so plain a stop,

That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,
The still-discordant wavering multitude,
Can play upon it.

SIGNS OF AGE.

Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth, that are written down old with all the characters of age? Have you not a moist eye? a dry hand? a yellow cheek? a white beard? a decreasing leg? an increasing belly? Is not your voice broken? your wind short? your chin double? your wit single? and every part about you blasted with antiquity? and will you yet call yourself young?

SUSPICION.

What a ready tongue suspicion hath !

He that but fears the thing he would not know, Hath, by instinct, knowledge from others' eyes That what he fear'd is chanced.

ILL NEWS.

The first bringer of unwelcome news
Hath but a losing office; and his tongue
Sounds ever after as a sullen bell,
Remember'd knolling a departing friend.

THE DEBASING INFLUENCE OF GOLD.

See, sons, what things you are!

How quickly nature falls into revolt,

When gold becomes her object!

For this the foolish over-careful fathers

Have broke their sleep with thought, their brains with care,

Their bones with industry;

For this they have engrossed and piled up The canker'd heaps of strange-achieved gold; For this they have been thoughtful to invest Their sons with arts and martial exercises:

H

When, like the bee, tolling from every flower The virtuous sweets,

Our thighs pack'd with wax, our mouths with

honey,

We bring it to the hive; and, like the bees, Are murder'd for our pains. This bitter taste Yield his engrossments to the ending father.

NECESSITY OF FORETHOUGHT.

When we mean to build,

We first survey the plot, then draw the model;
And when we see the figure of the house,
Then must we rate the cost of the erection :
Which if we find outweighs ability,

What do we then, but draw anew the model
In fewer offices; or, at least, desist
To build at all?

KING HENRY ON SLEEP.

How many thousand of my poorest subjects Are at this hour asleep!-Sleep, gentle sleep, Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee, That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down, And steep my senses in forgetfulness?

Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs, Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee,

And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber,

Than in the perfumed chambers of the great,
Under the canopies of costly state,

And lull'd with sounds of sweetest melody?
O thou dull god! why liest thou with the vile,
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch,
A watch-case, or a common 'larum bell?
Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge;
And in the visitation of the winds,

Who take the ruffian billows by the top,
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deaf'ning clamours in the slippery clouds,
That, with the hurly, death itself awakes?
Canst thou, O partial sleep! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude;
And in the calmest and most stillest night,
With all appliances and means to boot,
Deny it to a king? Then, happy low, lie down!
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.