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.

Lear. Out of my sight!

If aught within tha. ittle seeming⚫ substance,
Or all of it, with our displeasure piec'd,
And nothing more, may fitly like your grace,
She's there, and she is yours.

Bur. I know no answer.
Lear. Sir,

Will you, with those infirmities she owes, +
Unfriended, new adopted to our bate,
Dower'd with our curse, and stranger'd with our
oatb,

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

Kent. See better, Lear; and let me still re-Than on a wretch whom nature is asham'a

The true blank + of thine eye.

Lear. Now, by Apollo,

Kent. Now, by Apollo, king,
Thou swear'st thy gods in vain.
Lear. O vassal miscreant!

[main,

[Laying his Hand upon his Sword.
Alb. Corn. Dear Sir, forbear.
Kent. Do:

Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow
Upon the foul disease. Revoke thy gift;

Or, whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,
I'll tell thee, thou dost evil.

Lear. Hear me, recreant!
On thine allegiance hear me !-

Since thou hast sought to make us break our

YOW,

To avert your liking a more worthier way,
Almost to acknowledge hers.

France. This is most strange !

That she, that even but now was your best object,
The argument of your praise, balm of your age,
Most best, most dearest, should in this trice of
time

Commit a thing so monstrous, to dismantle
So many folds of favour! Sure, her offence
Must be of such unnatural degree,

That monsters it, or your fore-vouch'd | affection
Fall into taint: T which to believe of her,
Must be a faith, that reason without miracle
Could never plant in me.

Cor. I yet beseech your majesty,
(If for ** I want that glib and oily art, [intend,
[pride, To speak and purpose not: since what I well

(Which we durst never yet,) and, with strain'd' do't before I speak, that you make known

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

It is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,
No unchaste action, or dishonour'd step,
That hath depriv'd me of your grace and favour :
But even for want of that, for which I am
richer-

A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongue

Upon our kingdom: if, on the tenth day follow-That I am glad I have not, though not to have it,

ing,

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.-

Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu;
He'll shape his old course in a country new.

[Exit.
Re-enter GLOSTER; with FRANCE, BURGUNDY,
and Attendants.

Glo. Here's France and Burgundy, my noble

lord.

Lear. My lord of Burgundy,
We first address towards you, who with this
king
[least,
Hath rival'd for our daughter; What, in the
Will you require in present dower with her,
Or cease your quest of love?

Bur. Most royal majesty,

I crave no more than hath your highness offer'd,
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;

Cor. Peace be with Burgundy!
Since that respects of fortune are his love,
I shall not be his wife.

France. Fairest Cordelia, thou art most rich,
being poor;

Most choice, forsaken; and most lov'd, despis'd:
Thee and thy virtues here I seize upon :
Be it lawful, I take up what's cast away.
Gods, gods! 'tis strange, that from their cold'st
neglect

My love should kindle to inflam'd respect.-

Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my

chance,

Is queen of us, of our's, and our fair France:
Not all the dukes of wat'rish Burgundy

Shall buy this unpriz'd precious maid of me.--

Bid them farewell, Cordella, though unkind:
Thou losest here, a better where to find.
Lear. Thou hast her, France: let her be thine;
for we

Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,
Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops,
Got 'tween asleep and wake?-Well then,
Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land:
Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund,
As to the legitimate: Fine word, legitimate !
Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
CORN-Shall top the legitimate. I grow ; I prosper :-
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see
That face of her's again :-Therefore be gone,
Without our grace, our love, our benison.t-
Come, noble Burgundy.

(Flourish. Exeunt LEAR, BURGUNDY,
WALL, ALBANY, GLOSTER, and Attendants.
France. Bid farewell to your sisters.

Cor. The jewels of our father with wash'd
eyes

Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are;
And, like a sister, am most loath to call
Your faults as they are nam'd. Use well our
father:

To your professed bosoms I commit him:
But yet, alas! stood I within his grace,

I would prefer him to a better place.
So farewell to you both.

Gon. Prescribe not us our duties.
Reg. Let your study

Be to content your lord; who hath receiv'd you
At fortune's alms. You have obedience scanted,
And well are worth the want that you have
wanted.

Cor. Time shall unfold what plaited cun-
ning hides;

Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.
Well may you prosper!

France. Come, my fair Cordelia.

[Exeunt FRANCE und CORDELIA. Gon. Sister, it is not a little I have to say, of us both. I what most nearly appertains to 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 souudest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long-engrafted condition, 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 leave. taking between France and him. Pray yon, let us bit 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.

Enter GLOSTER.

Glo. Kent banish'd thus! Aud France in
choler parted!

And the king gone to-night! subscrib'd his
Confiu'd to exhibition !+ All this done [power!
Upon the gad! --Edmund! How now, what

news?

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?
Edm. Nothing, my lord.

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, 1 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, be 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 our 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, met 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 kim, 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 Gon. We must do something, and i'the heat. the cunning of it; I found it thrown in at the casement of my closet.

[Exeunt.

Enter EDMUND, with a Letter.

Edm. Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy
law

My services are bound: Wherefore should I
Stand in the plague of custom; and permit
The curiosity of nations to deprive me,
For that I am some twelve or fourteen moon-
shines

Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base?
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and any shape as true,
As honest madman's issue? Why brand they us
With base? with baseness? bastardy? base,

base?

Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality,

Glo. You know the character to be your brother's?

Edm. If the matter were good, my lord, I
durst swear it were his; but, in respect of that,
I would fain think it were not.
Glo. It is his.

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, sons at perfect age, and fathers declining, the father should be as ward to the sou, 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 him; I'll apprehend him :-Abominable 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 iny affection to your honour and to no other pretence of danger. Glo. Think you so f

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.

Gle. He cannot be such a monster.
Edm. Nor is not, sure.

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. Spake you with him?
Edg. Ay, two hours together.

Edm. Parted you in good terms? Found you no displeasure in him, by word or countenance? Edg. None at all.

Edm. Bethink yourself, wherein you may have offended him; and at my entreaty, forbear his presence, till some little time hath qualified the Glo. To his father, that so tenderly and en-heat 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: 1 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.

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 bis goatish disposition to the charge of a star! My father compounded with my mother under the dragon's tail; and my nativity was under ursa major; so that it follows, I am rough and lecherous.-Tut, I should have been that the I am, had

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; there's my key:-If you do stir abroad, go 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?
Edm. I do serve you in this business.-
[Exit EDGAR.
A credulous father, and a brother noble,
Whose nature is so far from doing harms,
That he suspects none: on whose foolish hon-
esty
My practices ride easy!-I see the business.-
Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit:
All with me's meet, that I can fashion fit.

[Exit.

Gon. By day and night! he wrongs me;
every hour

He flashes into one gross crime or other,
That sets us all at odds: I'll not endure it:
His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids

us

[ing

in maidenliest star On every trifle :-When he returns from hunt the firmament twinkled on my bastardizing.I will not speak with him; say, I am sick :— Edgar

Enter EDGAR.

and pat he comes, like the catastrophe of the old comedy: My cue is villanous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom o'Bedlam.-O these eclipses do portend these divisions! Fa, sol, la,

EAg. How now, brother Edmund? What seneas contemplation are you in ?

Edm. I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow these eclipses.

Edg. Do you busy yourself with that? Edia. I promise you, the effects he writes of cceed unhappily; as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent; death, dearth, dissolu

• Whereas.

If 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
please,
[question;
Yon and your fellows; I'd have it come to
If he dislike it, let him to my sister,
Whose mind and mine, I know, in that are one,
Not to be over-rul'd. Idle old man,
That he hath given away !-Now, by my life,
That still would manage those authorities,
Old fools are babes again; and must be us'd
[abus'd.
With checks, as flatteries, when they are seen
Remember what I have said.

Stew. Very well, madam.
Gon. And let his knights have colder looks

among you:

The usual address to a lord. ↑ Design. Descend from my dignity by privately listening, to What grows of it, no matter; advise your selbe sure of the truth.

1 Manage.

Following. •⚫ Traitors.

+ The constellation so named.

11 These sounds are unnatural and offensive in music.

lows so:

For cohorts some editors read courts. † Temperate.

I would breed from hence occasions, and I shall, Į 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 my very course :-Prepare for dinner.

[Exeunt.

Lear. What services canst thou do? Kent. I can keep honest counsel, ride, run, mar a curious tale in telling it, and deliver a 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?

Lear. Hal 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.

O 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 ras[Striking him.

cal?

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.

Kent. Why, fool?

Fool. Why? For taking one's part that is out of favour: Nay, an thou canst not smile as the Kent. Not so young, Sir, to love a woman for take my coxcomb: Why, this fellow has banwind sits, thou'lt catch cold shortly: There, singing; nor so old, to dote on her for anyish'd two of his daughters, and did the third a thing: I have years on my back forty-eight. Lear. Follow me: thou shalt serve me; if blessing against his will; if thou follow him, like thee no worse after dinner, I will not part nuncle? 'Would I had two coxcombs, and two thou must needs wear my coxcomb.-How now, from thee yet.-Dinner, ho, dinner!-Where's my kuave? my fool? Go you, and call my fool danghters! hither:

Enter STEWARD.

Yon, you, Sirrah, where's my daughter?

1

Stew. So please you,[Erit. 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, my boy?

Fool. If I gave them all my living, I'd keep my coxcombs myself: There's mine; beg another of thy daughters.

Lear. Take heed, Sirrah; the whip.

must be whipp'd out, when Lady, the brach, ý
Fool. Truth's a dog that must to kennel? he
may stand by the fire and stink.

Lear. A pestilent gall to me!
Fool. Sirrah, I'll teach thee a speech.
Lear. Do.

Fool. Mark it, nuncle:

Have more than thou showest,

Speak less than thou knowest,
Lend less than thou owest,
Ride more than thou goest.
Learn more than thou trowest, ¶
Set less than thou throwest;
Leave thy drink and thy whore,
And keep in-a-door,

KING LEAR.

Fools had ne'er less grace in a year;
For wise men are grown foppish;
And know not how their wits to wear,
Their manners are so apish.

Lear. When were you wont to be so full of
songs, Sirrah ?

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.
And I for sorrow sung,

That such a king should play bo-peep.
And go the fools among.

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.

thou and thy Fool. I marvel, what kin daughters are: they'll have me whipp'd for Speaking true, thou'lt have me whipp'd for ying; 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, Buscle; thou hast pared thy wit o'both sides, and left nothing in the middle: Here comes cue o'the parings.

Lear. How now, daughter! what makes that frontlet + on 1 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 Ot without a figure: I am better that thou art now; I am a fool, thou art noth

+ Part of a woman's head-dress, to which Lear comA cypher. pares her frowning brow.

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,
Weary of all, shall want some.-

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
In rank and not-to-be-endured riots. Sir,

I had thought, by making this well known un-
to you,

To have found a safe redress; but now grow
fearful,

By what yourself too late have spoke and done,
That you protect this course, and put it on
By your allowance; which if you should, the

Would not 'scape censure, nor the redresses
sleep;

Which, in the tender of a wholesome weal, ‡
Might in their working do you that offence,
Which else were shame, that then necessity
Will call discreet proceeding.