Imatges de pàgina
PDF
EPUB

Cre. Upon my back, to defend my belly; upon my wit to defend my wiles; upon my fecrefy, to defend mine honesty; my mask to defend my beauty, and you to defend all these; and at all these wards I lie, at a thousand watches.

Pan. Say one of your watches.

Cre. Nay, I'll watch you for that, and that's one of the chiefeft of them too; If I cannot ward what I would not have hit, I can watch you for telling how I took the blow; unless it fwell past hiding, and then it is paft watching.

Pan. You are fuch another.

Enter Boy.

Boy. Sir, my lord would inftantly speak with you. Pan. Where?

Boy. At

your own house, there he unarms him. Pan. Good boy, tell him I come; I doubt, he be hurt. Fare ye well, good neice.

Cre. Adieu, uncle.

Pan. I'll be with you, neice, by and by.

Cre. To bring, uncle

Pan. Ay, a token from Troilus.

Cre. By the fame token, you are a bawd. [Exit Pan. Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love's full facrifice, He offers in another's enterprize:

But more in Troilus thousand-fold I fee,
Than in the glafs of Pandar's praise may be;

Yet hold I off. Women are angels, wooing;
Things won are done: the foul's joy lies in doing:
That Shebelov'd knows nought, that knows not this;
Men prize the thing ungain'd, more than it is.
That She was never yet, that ever knew
Love got, fo fweet, as when Desire did fue:
Atchievement is Command; ungain'd, befeech.
Therefore this maxim out of love I teach;

That though my heart's content from love doth bear,
Nothing of That fhall from mine eyes appear. [Exit.

B 6

SCENE

[blocks in formation]

Changes to Agamenon's Tent in the Grecian Camp. Trumpets. Enter Agamemnon, Neftor, Ulyffes, Diomedes, Menelaus, with others.

RINCES,

Aga. What grief hath fet the jaundice on your

cheeks?

The ample propofition, that hope makes
In all defigns begun on earth below,

Fails in the promis'd largeness: Checks and disasters
Grow in the veins of actions higheft rear'd;
As knots by the conflux of meeting fap
Infect the found pine, and divert his grain
Tortive and errant from his course of growth.
Nor, Princes, is it matter new to us,
That we come short of our Suppose so far,
That after fev'n years' fiege, yet Troy-walls ftand;
Sith every action that hath gone before,
Whereof we have record, trial did draw
Bias and thwart; not anfwering the aim,
And that unbodied figure of the thought

That gave't furmifed fhape. Why then, you Princes,
Do you with cheeks abath'd behold our Works?
And think them fhame, which are, indeed, nought
elfe

But the protractive trials of great Jove,

To find perfiftive conftancy in men?

The fineness of which metal is not found

In fortune's love; for then, the bold and coward,
The wife and fool, the artift and unread,

The hard and foft, feem all affin'd, and kin;
But in the wind and tempeft of her frown,
Diftinction with a broad and powerful fan,
Puffing at all, winnows the light away;
And what hath mafs, or matter by itself,

Lies rich in virtue, and unmingled.

Neft. With due obfervance of thy goodly Seat, Great Agamemnon, *Neftor fhall fupply

Thy latest words.

In the reproof of Chance

Lies the true proof of men: the Sea being smooth,
How many fhallow bauble boats dare fail

Upon her patient breaft, making their way
With thofe of nobler bulk?

But let the ruffian Boreas once enrage
The gentle Thetis, and anon, behold,

The ftrong-ribb'dBark through liquid mountains cuts;
Bounding between the two moist elements,
Like Perfeus' horfe: Where's then the faucy boat,
Whofe weak untimber'd fides but even now
Co-rival'd Greatnefs? or to harbour fled,
Or made a toast for Neptune. Even fo
Doth valour's fhew and valour's worth divide
In forms of fortune. For in her ray and brightness,
The herd hath more annoyance by the brize
Than by the tyger: but when splitting winds
Make flexible the knees of knotted oaks,

And flies get under fhade; the thing of courage.
As rouz'd with rage, with rage doth fympathize;
And, with an accent tun'd in self-fame key,
Returns to chiding fortune.

Ulyff. Agamemnon,

Thou great commander, nerve and bone of Greece,
Heart of our numbers, foul, and only fpirit,
In whom the tempers and the minds of all
Should be fhut up: hear, what Ulyffes fpeaks.
Befides th' applause and approbation

-Neftor fhall apply

Thy latest words] What were these latest Words? A Common-place Obfervation, illuftrated by a particular Image, that Oppotion and Adverfity were useful to try and diftinguish between the valiant Man and the Coward. The wife Man and the Fool. From whence it appears, that Shakespear wrote,

-Neftor shall supply, &c.

Warb.

The

The which, moft mighty for thy place and fway, [To Agamemnon.

And thou, most rev'rend for thy ftretcht-out life,
[To Neftor.

I give to both your speeches; which were fuch,
As Agamemnon and the hand of Greece

Should hold up high in brafs; and fuch again,
As venerable Neftor (hatch'd in filver)

Should with a bond of air, strong as the axle-tree-
On which heav'n rides, knit all the Grecians' ears
To his experienc'd tongue: yet let it please both
(Thou great, and wife) to hear Ulyffes fpeak.
Aga. Speak, Prince of Ithaca: we lefs expect,
That matter needlefs, of importless burden,
Divide thy lips; than we are confident,
When rank Therfites opes his mastiff jaws,
We fhall hear mufic, wit, and oracle.

Uly. Troy, yet upon her basis, had been down,
And the great Hector's fword had lack'd a mafter,
But for these inftances.

The fpeciality of Rule hath been neglected;
And, look, how many Grecian Tenis do ftand
Hollow upon this Plain, fo many hollow factions.
* When that the General not likes the hive,
To whom the Foragers fhall all repair,

What honey is expected? degree being vizarded,
Th' unworthieft fhews as fairly in the mask.
The heavens themfelves, the planets, and this center,
Obferve degree, priority and place.

Infifture, courfe, proportion, feafon, form,

Office and custom, in all line of order:
And therefore is the glorious planet Sol

When that the General is not like the hive,] The Image is taken from the Government of Bees. But what are we to underftand by this Line? either it has no Meaning, or a Meaning contrary to the Drift of the Speaker. We fhould certainly then read,

When that the General not likes the hive:

i. e. when the Soldiers like not, and refuse to pay Obedience to their General.

Warb.

In noble eminence enthron'd and spher'd
Amidst the rest, whose med'cinable eye
Corrects the ill afpects of planets evil,

And pofts like the commandment of a King,
Sans check, to good and bad. But when the Planets
In evil mixture to diforder wander,

What plagues, and what portents, what mutiny?
What raging of the Sea? fhaking of earth?
Commotion in the winds? frights, changes, horrors,
Divert and crack, rend and deracinate
The unity and married calm of states

Quite from their fixture? Oh, when degree is shaken, (Which is the ladder to all high defigns)

The enterprize is fick. How could communites,
Degrees in schools, and brotherhood in cities,
Peaceful commerce from dividable fhores,
The primogeniture, and due of birth,
Prerogative of age, crowns, fcepters, lawrels,
(But by degree) stand in authentic place?
Take but degree away, untune that ftring,
And hark what difcord follows; each thing meets
In mere oppugnancy. The bounded waters
Would lift their bofoms higher than the shores,
And make a fop of all this folid Globe:
Strength would be lord of imbecillity,

And the rude fon would ftrike his father dead:
Force would be Right; or rather, Right and Wrong
(Between whofe endless jar Juftice precides)
Would lofe their names, and fo would Juftice too.
Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite (an univerfal wolf,

So doubly feconded with will and power)
Muft make perforce an univerfal prey,
And laft eat up itself. Great Agamemnon!
This Chaos, when degree is fuffocate,
Follows the choaking:

And this neglection of degree is it,

That

« AnteriorContinua »