In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man,
As modest stillness and humility:
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of tigers;
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood;
Disguise fair nature with hard-favour'd rage:
Then lend the eye a terrible aspect;
Let it pry through the portage of the head,
Like brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it,
As fearfully, as doth a galled rock
O'erhang and jutty his confounded base,
Swill'd with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide;
Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
To its full height!-On, on, you noble English,
Whose blood is set from fathers of war proof!
Fathers, that, like so many Alexanders,
Have, in these parts, from morn till even fought,
And sheath'd their swords for lack of argument.
Dishonour not your mothers; now attest,
That those whom you call'd fathers, did beget you.
Be copy now to men of grosser blood,
And teach them how to war!-And you, good yeomen,
Whose limbs were made in England, shew us here
The mettle of your pasture; let us swear
That you are worth your breeding: which I doubt not;
For there is none of you so mean and base,
That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips,
Straining upon the start. The game's afoot:
Follow your spirit; and' upon this charge,
Cry-God for Harry! England! and Saint George !
IV. Duke of Vienna to Angelo, inculcating public
There is a kind of character in thy life,
That, to the observer, doth thy history
Fully unfold. Thyself and thy belongings
Are not thine own so proper, as to waste
Thyself upon thy virtues, them on thee.
Heaven doth with us, as we with torches do;
Not light them for themselves: for if our virtues
Did not go forth with us, 'twere all alike
As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touchid, But to fine issues: nor: nature ever:lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence,
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor,
Both thanks and use.
But I do bend my speech
To one that can my part in him advertise.
Hold, therefore, Angelo.
In our remove be thou at full ourself:
Mortality and merey in Vienna
Live in thy tongue and heart. Old Escalusy
Though first in question, is thy secondary,
Take thy commission.
V. The Bishop of Carlisle dissuading the deposi tion of King Richard, and the crowning of Bolingbroke.
WORST in this royal presence may I speak,
Yet best beseeming me to speak the truth.
Would God, that any in this noble presences
Were enough noble to be upright judge -
Of noble Richard; then true nobleness would
Teach him forbearance from so foul a wrongs
What subject can give sentence on his king??
And who sits here that is not Richard's subject ?!
Thieves are not judg'd, but they are by to hear,
Although apparent guilt be seen in them:
And shall the figure of God's majesty,
His captain, steward, deputy elect,
Anointed, crowned, planted many years,
Be judg'd by subject and inferior breath,
And he himself not present? O, forbid it, God,
That in a christian climate, souls refin'd
Should shew so heinous, black, obscenc a deed !
I speak to subjects, and a subject speaks,
Stirr'd up by heaven, thus boldly for his king.
My lord Hereford here, whom you call king,
Is a foul traitor to proud Hereford's king:
And if you crown him, let me prophesy,—
The blood of English shall manure the ground,
And future ages groan for this foul act:
Peace shall go sleep with Turks and infidels,
And, in this seat of peace, tumultuous wars
Shall kin with kin and kind with kind confound;
Disorder, horror, fear, and mutiny,
Shall here inhabit, and this land be call'd ̧
The field of Golgotha and dead men's sculls,
O, if you rear this house against this house,
It will the woefullest division prove,
That ever fell upon this cursed earth:
Prevent, resist it, let it not be so,
Lest children's children cry against you--looe!
VI. Volumnia exhorting her son Coriolanus, to sooth and please the Plebeians.
I have a heart as little apt as yours,
But yet a brain, that leads my use of anger
To better vantage.
You are too absolute:
Though therein you can never be too noble.
But when extremities speak, I have heard you say,
Honour and policy, like unsever'd friends,
I' the war do grow together: grant that, and tell me,
In peace, what each of them by the other lose,.,
That they combine not there?
If it be honour, in your wars, to seem
The same you are not, (which for your
You adopt as policy,) how is it less, or worse,
That it shall hold companionship in peace
With honour, as in war; since that to both
It stands in like request ?
Now it lies with you to speak to the people:
Not by your own instruction, nor by the matter
Which your heart prompts you to; but with such words
That are but roasted on your tongue, but bastards and
Of no allowance to your bosom's truth.
Now this no more dishonours you at all,
Than to take in a town with gentle words,
Which else would put you to your fortune, and
The hazard of much blood.-
I would dissemble with my nature, where
My fortunes and my friends, at stake, required
I should do so in honour: I am in this,
Your wife, your son, these, senators, the nobles:
And you will rather shew our general lowts
How you can frown, than spend a fawn upon
For the inheritance of their loves, and safeguard
Of what that want might ruin.
I pr'ythee now, my son,
Go to them, with this bonnet in thy hand;
And thus far having stretch'd it, (here be with them,)
Thy knee bussing the stone, (for in such business
Action is eloquence, and the eyes of the ignorant
More learned than the ears,) waving thy head,
With often thus correcting thy stout heart,
Now humble as the ripest mulberry,
"That will not hold the handling: or say to them,
Thou art their soldier, and being bred in broils,
Hast not the soft way, which thou dost confess
Were fit for thee to use, as they to claim,
In asking their good loves: but thou wilt frame
Thyself, forsooth, hereafter theirs, so far
As thou hast power and person.
Go, and be rul'd: although I know, thou hadst rather
Follow thine enemy in a fiery gulf,
Than flatter him in a bower.
VII. The Prince of Verona exhorting old Capulet and Montague to restore the peace.
REBELLIOUS Subjects, enemies to peace, Prophaners of this neighbour-stained steel,
Will they not hear?-what ho! you men, you beasts,-
That quench the fire of your pernicious ragè
With purple fountains issuing from your veins,
On pain of torture, from those bloody hands
Throw your mistemper'd weapons to the ground,
And hear the sentence of your moved prince.
Three civil brawls, bred of an airy word,
By thee, old Capulet, and Montague,
Have thrice disturb'd the quiet of our streets;
And made Verona's ancient citizens
Cast up their grave beseeming ornaments,
To wield old partisans, in hands as old,
Canker'd with peace, to part your canker'd hate;
If ever you disturb our streets again,
Your lives shall pay the forfeit of the peace.
For this time, all the rest depart away:
You, Capulet, shall go along th me;
And Montague, come you this afternoon,
To know our further pleasure in this case,
To old Free town, our common judgment-place.
Once more on pain of death, all men depart.
VIII. Wolsey's advice to Cromwell, how to rise with out ambition.
CROMWELL, I did not think to shed a tear In all my miseries, but thou hast forc'd me, Out of thy honest truth, to play the woman, Let's dry our eyes. And thus far hear me, Cromwell; And, when I am forgotten, as I shall be; And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention Of me more must be heard of, say, I taught thee, Say Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory, And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour,Found thee a way, out of his wreek, to rise in ; A sure and safe one, though thy master miss'd it. Mark but my fall, and that that ruin'd me. Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition; By that sin fell the angels, how can man then, The image of his maker, hope to win by 't?. Love thyself last: cherish those hearts that hate thee;' -Corruption wins not more than honesty.
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