The Plays of William Shakespeare

Par. 'Tis not his fault; the spark-
2 Lord.
O, 'tis brave wars !
Par. Most admirable: I have seen those wars.
Ber. I am commanded here, and kept a coil with;
Too young, and the next year, and 'tis too early.
Par. An thy mind stand to it, boy, steal away
bravely.

Ber. I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock,
Creaking my shoes on the plain masonry,
Till honour be bought up, and no sword worn,
But one to dance with! by heaven, I'll steal away.
1 Lord. There's honour in the theft.
Par.

Commit it, count.
2 Lord. I am your accessary; and so farewell.
Ber. I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured
body.

1 Lord. Farewell, captain.

2 Lord. Sweet monsieur Parolles !

Par. Noble heroes, my sword and yours are kin.
Good sparks and lustrous, a word, good metals :-
You shall find in the regiment of the Spinii, one cap-
tain Spurio, with his cicatrice, an emblem of war,
here on his sinister cheek; it was this very sword en-
trenched it: say to him, I live; and observe his re-
ports for me.

2 Lord. We shall, noble captain.
Par. Mars dote on you for his novices!

What will you do?

Ber. Stay; the king

King.
Bring in the admiration; that we with thee
May spend our wonder too, or take off thine,
By wondering how thou took'st it.
Laf.

And not be all day neither.

Nay, I'll fit you,
[Exit Lafeu.

King. Thus he his special nothing ever prologues.
Re-enter Lafeu, with Helena.

Laf. Nay, come your ways.
King. This haste hath wings indeed.
Laf. Nay, come your ways;

This is his majesty, say your mind to him:
A traitor you do look like; but such traitors
His majesty seldom fears: I am Cressid's uncle,
That dare leave two together; fare you well. [Exit.
King. Now, fair one, does your business follow us?
Hel. Ay, my good lord. Gerard de Narbon was
My father; in what he did profess, well found.
King. I knew him.

Hel. The rather will I spare my praises towards him?
Knowing him, is enough. On his bed of death
Many receipts he gave me; chiefly one,
[Exeunt Lords. Which, as the dearest issue of his practice,
And of his old experience the only darling,
He bade me store up, as a triple eye,
Safer than mine own two, more dear; I have so:
And, hearing your high majesty is touch'd
With that malignant cause wherein the honour
Of my dear father's gift stands chief in power,
I come to tender it, and my appliance,
With all bound humbleness.

[Seeing him rise. Par. Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble lords; you have restrained yourself within the list of too cold an adieu: be more expressive to them; for they wear themselves in the cap of the time, there, do muster true gait, eat, speak, and move under the influence of the most received star; and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell.

King.

We thank you, maiden ;

But may not be so credulous of cure,-
When our most learned doctors leave us; and
The congregated college have concluded,
That labouring art can never ransome nature
From her inaidable estate,-I say we must not
So stain our judgement, or corrupt our hope,
To prostitute our past-cure malady
To empirics; or to dissever so

Our great self and our credit, to esteem
A senseless help, when help past sense we deem.
Hel. My duty then shall pay me for my pains :
I will no more enforce mine office on you;
Humbly entreating from your royal thoughts
A modest one, to bear me back again.

King. I cannot give thee less, to be call'd grateful.
Thou thought'st to help me; and such thanks I give
As one near death to those that wish him live:
But, what at full I know, thou know'st no part ;

I knowing all my peril, thou no art.

Hel. What I can do, can do no hurt to try,
Since you set up your rest 'gainst remedy:
He that of greatest works is finisher,

Oft does them by the weakest minister:
So holy writ in babes hath judgement shown,

When judges have been babes. Great floods have flown

From simple sources; and great seas have dried,
When miracles have by the greatest been denied.
Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits,
Where hope is coldest, and despair most sits.

King. I must not hear thee; fare thee well, kin

maid;

Thy pains, not us'd, must by thyself be paid :

Proffers, not took, reap thanks for their reward.

Hel. Inspired merit so by breath is barr'd:
It is not so with him that all things knows,
As 'tis with us that square our guess by shows :
But most it is presumption in us, when
The help of heaven we count the act of men.
Dear sir, to my endeavours give consent;
Of heaven, not me, make an experiment.
I am not an impostor, that prociaim
Myself against the level of mine aim;

But know I think, and think I know most sure,
My art is not paɛt power, nor you past cure.
King. Art thou so confident? Within what space
Hop'st thou my cure?

Hel.
The greatest grace lending grace,
Ere twice the horses of the sun shall bring
Their fiery torcher his diurnal ring;
Ere twice in murk and occidental damp
Moist Hesperus hath quench'd his sleepy lamp;
Or four and twenty times the pilot's glass
Hath told the thievish minutes how they pass;
What is infirm from your sound parts shall fly,
Health shall live free, and sickness freely die.
King. Upon thy certainty and confidence,
What dar'st thou venture?

Tax of impudence,

Hel.
A strumpet's boldness, a divulged shame,—
Tradae'd by odious ballads; my maiden's name
Sear'd otherwise; no worse of worst extended,
With vilest torture let my life be ended.

SCENE II-Rousillon. A Room in the Countess's
Palace. Enter Countess and Clown.

Count. Come on, sir; I shall now put you to the height of your breeding.

Clo. I will show myself highly fed, and lowly taught: I know my business is but to the court.

Count. To the court! why, what place make you special, when you put off that with such contempt ? But to the court !

Clo. Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he may easily put it off at court: he that cannot make a leg, put off's cap, kiss his hand, and say nothing, has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and, in deed, such a fellow, to say precisely, were not for the court: but, for me, I have an answer will serve all

men.

Count. Mairy, that's a bountiful answer, that fits all questions.

Clo. It is like a barber's chair, that fits all buttocks; the pin-buttock, the quateh-buttock, the brawn-buttock, or any buttock.

Count. Will your answer serve fit to all questions? Clo. As fit as ten groats is for the hand of an attorney, as the French crown for your taffaty punk, as Tib's rush for Tom's fore-finger, as a pancake for Shrove Tuesday, a morris for May-day, as the nail to his hole, the cuckold to his horn, as a scolding quean to a wrangling knave, as the nun's lip to the friar's mouth; nay, as the pudding to his skin.

Count. Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness

King. Methinks, in thee some blessed spirit doth for all questions? speak;

ifis powerful sound, within an organ weak :
And what impossibility would slay

In common sense, sense saves another way.
Thy life is dear; for all, that life can rate
Worth name of life, in thee hath estimate;
Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, virtue, all
That happiness and prime can happy call:
Thon this to hazard, needs must intimate
Skill infinite, or monstrous desperate.
Sweet practiser, thy physic I will try ;
That ministers thine own death, if I die.

Hel. If I break time, or flinch in property
Of what I spoke, unpitied let me die;

And well deserv'd: Not helping, death's my fee;
But, if I help, what do you promise me?
King. Make thy demand.
Hel.
But will you make it even ?
King. Ay, by my sceptre, and my hopes of heaven.
Hel. Then shalt thou give me, with thy kingly hand,
What husband in thy power I will command:
Exempted be from me the arrogance

fo choose from forth the royal blood of France;
My low and humble name to propagate
With any branch or image of thy state :
But such a one, thy vassal, whom I know
is free for me to ask, thee to bestow.

King. Here is my hand; the premises observ'd,
Thy will by my performance shall be serv'd;
So make the choice of thy own time; for I,
Thy resolv'd patient, on thee still rely.
More should I question thee, and more I must:
Though, more to know, could not be more to trust;
From whence thou eam'st, how tended on,-But rest
Caquestion'd welcome, and undoubted blest.
-Give me some help here, ho!-If thou proceed
As high as word, my deed shall match thy deed.
[Flourish. Exeunt,

Clo. From below your duke, to beneath your constable, it will fit any question.

Count. It must be an answer of most monstrous size, that must fit all demands.

Clo. But a trifle neither, in good faith, if the learned should speak truth of it: here it is, and all that belongs to't: Ask me, if I am a courtier ; it shall do you no harm to learn.

Count. To be young again, if we could: I will be a fool in question, hoping to be the wiser by your answer. I pray you, sir, are you a courtier ?

Clo. O Lord, sir,--There's a simple putting off; -more, more, a hundred of them.

Count. Sir, I am a poor friend of yours, that loves you.
Clo. O Lord, sir,-Thick, thick, spare not me.
Count. I think, sir, you can eat none of this homely

meat.

Clo. O Lord, sir,-Nay, put me to't, I warrant you.
Count. You were lately whipped, sir, as I think.
Clo. O Lord, sir,-Spare not me.

Count. Do you cry, O Lord, sir, at your whipping, and spare not me? indeed, your O Lord, sir, is very sequent to your whipping; you would answer very well to a whipping, if you were but bound to't.

Clo. I ne'er had worse luck in my life, in my-O Lord, sir: I see, things may serve long, but not serve ever. Count. I play the noble housewife with the time, to entertain it so merrily with a fool.

Clo. O Lord, sir-why, there't serves well again.
Count. An end, sir, to your business: Give Helen this,
And urge her to a present answer back :
Commend me to my kinsmen, and my son;
This is not much.

Clo. Not much commendation to them,
Count. Not much employment for you: You under
stand me?

Clo. Most fruitfully; I am there before my legs.
Count. Haste you again. [Exeunt severally.

SCENE III-Paris. A Room in the King's Palace.

Enter Bertram, Lafeu, and Parolles.

Laf. They say, miracles are past; and we have our philosophical persons, to make modern and familiar things, supernatural and causeless. Hence is it, that we make trifles of terrors; ensconcing ourselves into seeming knowledge, when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear.

Par. Why, 'tis the rarest argument of wonder, that hath shot out in our latter times.

Ber. And so 'tis.

Laf. To be relinquished of the artists,——

Par. So I say: both of Galen and Paracelsus.
Laf. Of all the learned and authentic fellows,
Par. Right, so I say.

Laf. That gave him out incurable,—
Par. Why, there 'tis ; so say I too.
Laf. Not to be helped,——

Par. Right: as 'twere, a man assured of an-
Laf. Uncertain life, and sure death.

Par, Just, you say well; so would I have said.
Laf. I may truly say, it is a novelty to the world.
Par. It is, indeed if you will have it in showing,
you shall read it in,-What do you call there?

Laf. A showing of a heavenly effect in an earthly

Laf. Generally thankful.

Enter King, Helena, and Attendants.

Par. I would have said it; you say well: Here comes the king.

Laf. Lustick, as the Dutchman says: I'll like a maid the better, whilst I have a tooth in my head: Why, he's able to lead her a coranto.

Par. Mort du Vinaigre! Is not this Helen?
Laf. 'Fore God. I think so.

King. Go, call before me all the lords in court.
[Exit an Attendant.

Sit, my preserver, by thy patient's side ;
And with this healthful hand, whose banish'd sense
Thou hast repeal'd, a second time receive
The confirmation of my promis'd gift,
Which but attends thy naming.

Enter several Lords.

Fair maid, send forth thine eye: this youthful parcel
Of noble bachelors stand at my bestowing,
O'er whom both sovereign power and father's voice
I have to use: thy frank election urake;
Thou hast power to choose, and they none to forsake.
Hel. To each of you one fair and virtuous mistress
Fall, when love please !-marry, to each, but one!
Laf. I'd give bay Curtal, and his furniture,
My mouth no more were broken than these boys',
And writ as little beard.

Hel. Gentlemen,

Heav'n hath, through me, restor'd the king to health-
All. We understand it, and thank heaven for you.
Hel. I am a simple maid; and therein wealthiest,
That, I protest, I simply am a maid :-
Please it your majesty, I have done already :
The blushes in my cheeks thus whisper me,
We blush, that thou should'st choose; but, be refus'd,
Let the white death sit on, thy cheek forever;
We'll ne'er come there again.

Make choice; and, see,

King.
Who shuns thy love, shuns all his love in me.
Hel. Now, Dian, from thy altar do I fly ;
And to imperial Love, that god most high,
Do my sighs stream.-Sir, will you hear my suit?
1 Lord. And grant it.

Hel. 'Thanks, sir; all the rest is mute. Laf. I had rather be in this choice, than throw amesace for my life.

Hel. The honour, sir, that flames in your fair eyes, Before I speak, too threateningly replies: Love make your fortunes twenty times above Her that so wishes, and her humble love! 2 Lord, No better, if you please. Hel.

My wish receive,

Which great love grant! and so I take my leave. Laf. Do all they deny her? An they were sons of mine, I'd have them whipped; or I would send them to the Turk, to make eunuchs of.

Hel. Be not afraid [To a Lord.] that I your hand

should take;

I'll never do you wrong for your own sake:
Blessing upon your vows! and in your bed
Find fairer fortune, if you ever wed!

Laf. These boys are boys of ice, they'll none have her: sure, they are bastards to the English; the French ne'er got them.

Hel. You are too young, too happy, and too good, To make yourself a son out of my blood.

4 Lord. Fair one, I think not so.

Laf. There's one grape yet,-I am sure, thy father drank wine. But if thou be'st not an ass, I am a youth of fourteen; I have known thee already.

Hel. I dare not say, I take you; [To Ber.] but I give Me, and my service, ever whilst I live,

Into your guiding power.-This is the man.

King. Why then, young Bertram, take her, she's thy wife.

Ber. My wife, my liege? I shall beseech your high

sickly bed.

Ber. But follows it, my lord, to bring me down
Must answer for your raising? I know her well;
She had her breeding at my father's charge:
A poor physician's daughter my wife!-Disdain
Rather corrupt me ever!

King. Tis only title thou disdain'st in her, the which

I can build up. Strange is it, that our bloods,
Of colour, weight, and heat, pour'd all together,
Would quite confound distiuction, yet stand off
In differences so mighty: If she be

All that is virtuous, (save what thou dislik'st,

poor physician's daughter,) thou dislik'st

Of virtue for the name: but do not so:

From lowest place when virtuous things proceed,
The place is dignify'd by the doer's deed:
Where great additions swell, and virtue none,
It is a dropsied honour: good alone
Is good, without a name; vileness is so:
The property by what it is should go,
Not by the title. She is young, wise, fair;
In these to nature she's immediate heir;

And these breed honour: that is honour's scorn,
Which challenges itself as honour's born,
And is not like the sire: Honours best thrive,
When rather from our acts we them derive
Than our fore-goers: the mere word's a slave,
Debauch'd on every tomb; on every grave,
A lying trophy, and as oft is dumb,
Where dust, and damn'd oblivion, is the tomb
Of honour'd bones indeed. What should be said?
If thou canst like this creature as a maid,
I can create the rest: virtue, and she,

Is her own dower; honour, and wealth, from me.
Ber. I cannot love her, nor will strive to do't.
King. Thou wrong'st thyself, if thou should'st strive
to choose.

Hel. That you are well restor'd, my lord, I am glad: Let the rest go.

King. My honour's at the stake; which to defeat,
I must produce my power: Here, take her hand,
Proud scornful boy, unworthy this good gift;
That dost in vile misprision shackle up
My love, and her desert; that canst not dream,
We, poizing us in her defective scale,

Shall weigh thee to the beam: that wilt not know,
It is in us to plant thine honour, where

We please to have it grow: Check thy contempt:
Obey our will, which travails in thy good:
Believe not thy disdain, but presently
Do thine own fortunes that obedient right,
Which both thy duty owes, and our power claims;
Or I will throw thee from my care for ever,
Into the staggers, and the careless lapse
Of youth and ignorance; both my revenge and hate,
Loosing upon thee in the name of justice,
Without all terms of pity: Speak; thine answer.
Ber. Pardon, my gracious lord; for I submit
My faney to your eyes: When I consider,
What great creation, and what dole of honour,
Fhes where you bid it, I find, that she, which late
Was in my nobler thoughts most base, is now
The praised of the king; who, so ennubled,
la, as 'twere, born so.

King. Good fortune, and the favour of the king, Smile upon this contract; whose ceremony Shall seem expedient on the now-born brief, And be perform'd to-night: the solemn feast Shall more attend upon the coming space, Expecting absent friends. As thou lov'st her, Thy love's to me religious; else, does err.

[Ext. King, Bert. Hel. Lords, and Attendants. Lef. Do you hear, monsieur ? a word with you. Par. Your pleasure, sir?

Laf. Your lord and master did well to make his recantation.

Per. Recantation?-My lord? my master?

Laf. Ay; Is it not a language, I speak? Par. A most harsh one; and not to be understood without bloody succeeding. My master?

Laf. Are you companion to the count Rousillon? Par. To any count; to all courts; to what is man. Laf. To what is count's man; count's master is of another style.

Par. You are too old, sir; let it satisfy you, you are too old.

Laf. I must tell thee, sirrah, I write man; to which title age cannot bring thee.

Par. What I dare too well do, I dare not do.

Laf. I did think thee, for two ordinaries, to be a pretty wise fellow; thou didst make tolerable vent of thy travel; it might pass: yet the scarfs, and the bannerets, about thee, did manifoldly dissuade me from believing thee a vessel of too great a burden. I have now found thee; when I lose thee again, I care not: yet art thou good for nothing but taking up; and that thou art scarce worth.

Par. Hadst thou not the privilege of antiquity upon thee,

Laf. Do not plunge thyself too far in anger, lest thou hasten thy trial; which if-Lord have mercy on thee for a hen! So, my good window of lattice, fare thee well; thy casement I need not open, for I look through thee. Give me thy hand.

Par. My lord, you give me most egregious indig nity.

Laf. Ay, with all my heart; and thou art worthy

of it.

Par. I have not, my lord, deserved it.

Laf. Yes, good faith, every dram of it; and I will not bate thee a scruple.

Par. Well, I shall be wiser.

Laf. E'en as soon as thou canst, for thou hast to pull at a smack o' the contrary. If ever thou be'st bound in thy scarf, and beaten, thou shalt find what it is to be proud of thy bondage. I have a desire to hold my acquaintance with thee, or rather my knowledge; that I may say, in the default, he is a man I know.

Par. My lord, you do me most insupportable vexation.

Lef. I would it were hell-pains for thy sake, and my poor doing eternal: for doing I am past; as I will by thee, in what motion age will give me leave. [Exit.

Par. Well, thou hast a son shall take this disgrace off me; scurvy, old, filthy, scurvy lord!-Well, I must be patient; there is no fettering of authority. I'll beat him, by my life, if I can meet him with any convenience, an he were double and double a lord. I'll have no more pity of his age, than I would have ofI'll beat him, an if I could but meet him again.

Par. This is hard and undeserved measure, my lord. Lef. Go to, sir; you were beaten in Italy for pick. ing a kernel out of a pomegranate; you are a vaga. bond, and no true traveller: you are more sauey with lords, and honourable personages, than the heraldry of your birth and virtue gives you commission. You are not worth another word, else I'd call you knave. I leave you. [Exit.

Enter Bertram.

Par. Good, very good; it is so then.-Good, very good; let it be concealed a while.

Ber. Undone, and forfeited to cares forever!
Par. What is the matter, sweet heart?

Ber. Although before the solemn pricst I have sworn,

I will not bed her.

Par. What? what, sweet heart?

Ber. O my Parolles, they have married me:

I'll to the Tuscan wars, and never bed her.

Par. France is a dog-hole, and it no more merits

The tread of a man's foot: to the wars!

keep them on, have them still.-O, my knave! How does my old lady?

Clo. So that you had her wrinkles, and I her money, I would she did as you say.

Par. Why, I say nothing.

Clo. Marry, you are the wiser man; for many a man's tongue shakes out his master's undoing: To say nothing, to do nothing, to know nothing, and to have nothing, is to be a great part of your title; which is within a very little of nothing.

Par. Away, thou'rt a knave.

Clo. You should have said, sir, before a knave thou art a knave; that is, before me thou art a knave; this had been truth, sir.

Par. Go to, thou art a witty fool, I have found thee, Clo. Did you find me in yourself, sir? or were you taught to find me? The search, sir, was profitable; and much fool may you find in you, even to the world's pleasure, and the increase of laughter.

Par. A good knave, i'faith, and well fed.

Ber. There's letters from my mother: what the im- Madam, my lord will go away to-night;

port is,

I know not yet.

A very serious business calls on him. The great prerogative and rite of love,

Pur. Ay, that would be known: To the wars, my Which, as your due, time claims, he does acknowledge;

boy, to the wars!

He wears his honour in a box unseen,
That hugs his kicksy-wicksy here at home;
Spending his manly marrow in her arms,

Which should sustain the bound and high curvet
Of Mars's fiery steed: To other regions!
France is a stable; we that dwell in't, jades ;
Therefore, to the war!

Ber. It shall be so; I'll send her to my house,
Acquaint my mother with my hate to her,
And wherefore I am fled: write to the king
That which I durst not speak: His present gift
Shall furnish me to those Italian fields,
Where noble fellows strike: War is no strife
To the dark house, and the detested wife.

Par. Will this capricio hold in thee, art sure?
Ber. Go with me to my chamber, and advise me.

I'll send her straight away: To-morrow
I'll to the wars, she to her single sorrow.

Par. Why, these balls bound; there's noise in it.-
'Tis hard;

A young man, married, is a man that's marr'd :
Therefore away, and leave her bravely; go:
The king has done you wrong; but, hush! 'tis so.
[Exeunt.

SCENE IV.-The same. Another Room in the same.
Enter Helena and Clown.

Hel. My mother greets me kindly: Is she well? Clo. She is not well; but yet she has her health : she's very merry; but yet she is not well: but thanks be given, she's very well, and wants nothing i' the world; but yet she is not well.

Hel. If she be very well, what does she ail, that she's not very well?

Clo. Truly, she's very well, indeed, but for two things.
Hel. What two things?

Clo. One, that she's not in heaven, whither God send her quickly! the other, that she's in earth, from whence God send her quickly!

Enser Parolles.

Par. Bless you, my fortunate lady!

Hel. I hope, sir, I have your good will to have mine own good fortunes.

Par. You had my prayers to lead them on; and to

But puts it off by a compell'd restraint;

Whose want, and whose delay, is strewed with sweets,
Which they distil now in the curbed time,

To make the coming hour o'erflow with joy,
And pleasure drown the brim.

Hel.

What's his will else? Par. That you will take your instant leave o' the

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Livros

The Plays of William Shakespeare, Volume 1