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Of reasonable affairs? is he not stupid

With age, and altering rheums? Can he speak? hear? Know man from man? dispute his own estate?*

Lies he not bed-rid? and again does nothing,

But what he did being childish?

Flo.

No, good sir;

He has his health, and ampler strength, indeed,
Than most have of his age.

Pol.

By my white beard,

You offer him, if this be so, a wrong

Something unfilial. Reason, my son,

Should choose himself a wife; but as good reason,
The father (all whose joy is nothing else

But fair posterity) should hold some counsel
In such a business.

RURAL SIMPLICITY.

I was not much afeard; for once or twice
I was about to speak; and tell him plainly,
The self-same sun, that shines upon his court,
Hides not his visage from our cottage, but
Looks on alike.

LOVE CEMENTED BY PROSPERITY, BUT LOOSENED BY
ADVERSITY.

Prosperity's the very bond of love;

Whose fresh complexion and whose heart together
Affliction alters.

ACT V.

WONDER, PROCEEDING FROM SUDDEN JOY. There was speech in their dumbness, language in their very gesture; they looked, as they had heard of a world ransomed, or one destroyed. A notable passion of wonder appeared in them: but the wisest beholder, that knew no more but seeing, could not say, if the im

*Talk over his affairs.

portance* were joy or sorrow: but in the extremity of the one, it must needs be.

'A STATUE.

What was he that did make it?-See, my lord,

Would you not deem it breath'd? and that those veins Did verily bear blood?

Pol.

Masterly done:

The very life seems warm upon her lip.

Leon. The fixture of her eye has motion in't†

As we are mock'd with art.

Still, methinks,

There is an air comes from her. What fine chisel
Could ever yet cut breath? Let no man mock me,
For I will kiss her.

A WIDOW COMPARED TO A TURTLE.

I, an old Turtle,

Will wing me to some wither'd bough; and there
My mate, that's never to be found again,

Lament till I am lost.

*The thing imported.

†I. e. Though her eye be fixed, it seems to have motion in it.

+As if.

THE

BEAUTIES OF SHAKSPEARE.

PART II.

HISTORICAL PLAYS,

CHRONOLOGICALLY ARRANGED.

**

King John.

ACT I.

NEW TITLES.

GOOD den, sir Richard,-God-a-mercy-fellow;-
And if his name be George, I'll call him Peter:
For new-made honour doth forget men's names;
'Tis too respective,† and too sociable,

For your conversion. Now your traveller,-
He and his tooth-pick at my worship's mess:
And when my knightly stomach is sufficed,
Why then I suck my teeth, and catechize
My picked man of countries;§-My dear sir
(Thus, leaning on mine elbow, I begin,)
I shall beseech you-That is question now;
And then comes answer like an A B C-book:||
O sir, says answer, at your best command;
At your employment: at your service, sir:——
No, sir, says question, I, sweet sir, at yours:
And so, ere answer knows what question would
(Saving in dialogue of compliment;

And talking of the Alps and Appennines,

The Pyrenean, and the river Po,)

It draws toward supper in conclusion so.

But this is worshipful society,

*Good evening. † Respectful.

My travelled fop.

+Change of condition. ||Catechism.

And fits the mounting spirit, life myself:
For he is but a bastard to the time,
That doth not smack of observation.

ACT II.

DESCRIPTION OF ENGLAND.

That pale, that white-faced shore,

Whose foot spurns back the ocean's roaring tides,
And coops from other lands her islanders,
Even till that England, hedg'd in with the main,
That water-walled bulwark, still secure

And confident from foreign purposes,
Even till that utmost corner of the west
Salute thee for her king.

DESCRIPTION OF AN ENGLISH ARMY.

His marches are expedient* to this town, His forces strong, his soldiers confident. With him along is come the mother-queen, An Ate, stirring him to blood and strife; With her her niece, the lady Blanch of Spain; With them a Bastard of the king deceased: And all the unsettled humours of the land,-Rash, inconsiderate, fiery voluntaries, With ladies' faces, and fierce dragons' spleens,— Have sold their fortunes at their native homes, Bearing their birthrights proudly on their backs, To make a hazard of new fortunes here. In brief, a braver choice of dauntless spirits, Than now the English bottoms have waft o'er, Did never float upon the swelling tide, To do offence and scath in Christendom. The interruption of their churlish drums Cuts off more circumstance: they are at hand. * Immediate, expeditious.

†The goddess of revenge.

+ Mischief.

COURAGE.

By how much unexpected, by so much We must awake endeavour for defence; For courage mounteth with occasion.

A BOASTER.

What cracker is this same, that deafs our ears With this abundance of superfluous breath?

DESCRIPTION OF VICTORY BY THE FRENCH,

You men of Angiers, open wide your gates, And let young Arthur, Duke of Bretagne, in; Who, by the hand of France, this day hath made 'Much work for tears in many an English mother, Whose sons lie scatter'd on the bleeding ground: Many a widow's husband grovelling lies, Coldly embracing the discolour'd earth; And victory, with little loss, doth play Upon the dancing banners of the French; Who are at hand, triumphantly display'd To enter conquerors.

VICTORY DESCRIBED BY THE ENGLISH.

Rejoice, you men of Angiers, ring your bells; King John, your king and England's, doth approach, Commander of this hot malicious day!

Their armours, that march'd hence so silver bright, Hither return all gilt with Frenchmen's blood; There stuck no piume in any English crest,

That is removed by a staff of France;

Our colours do return in those same hands

That did display them when we first march'd forth;
And, like a jolly troop of huntsmen, come
Our lusty English, all with purpled hands,
Dyed in the dying slaughter of their foes.

A COMPLETE LADY.

If lusty love should go in quest of beauty,

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