The Complete Works of William Shakespeare Part 281

Lear. Let the great G.o.ds, That keep this dreadful pudder o'er our heads, Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, That hast within thee undivulged crimes Unwhipp'd of justice. Hide thee, thou b.l.o.o.d.y hand; Thou perjur'd, and thou simular man of virtue That art incestuous. Caitiff, in pieces shake That under covert and convenient seeming Hast practis'd on man's life. Close pent-up guilts, Rive your concealing continents, and cry These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man More sinn'd against than sinning.

Kent. Alack, bareheaded?

Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel; Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest.

Repose you there, whilst I to this hard house (More harder than the stones whereof 'tis rais'd, Which even but now, demanding after you, Denied me to come in) return, and force Their scanted courtesy.

Lear. My wits begin to turn.

Come on, my boy. How dost, my boy? Art cold?

I am cold myself. Where is this straw, my fellow?

The art of our necessities is strange, That can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel.

Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart That's sorry yet for thee.

Fool. [sings]

He that has and a little tiny wit- With hey, ho, the wind and the rain- Must make content with his fortunes fit, For the rain it raineth every day.

Lear. True, my good boy. Come, bring us to this hovel.

Exeunt [Lear and Kent].

Fool. This is a brave night to cool a courtesan. I'll speak a prophecy ere I go: When priests are more in word than matter; When brewers mar their malt with water; When n.o.bles are their tailors' tutors, No heretics burn'd, but wenches' suitors; When every case in law is right, No squire in debt nor no poor knight; When slanders do not live in tongues, Nor cutpurses come not to throngs; When usurers tell their gold i' th' field, And bawds and wh.o.r.es do churches build: Then shall the realm of Albion Come to great confusion.

Then comes the time, who lives to see't, That going shall be us'd with feet.

This prophecy Merlin shall make, for I live before his time.

Exit.

Scene III.

Gloucester's Castle.

Enter Gloucester and Edmund.

Glou. Alack, alack, Edmund, I like not this unnatural dealing! When I desir'd their leave that I might pity him, they took from me the use of mine own house, charg'd me on pain of perpetual displeasure neither to speak of him, entreat for him, nor any way sustain him.

Edm. Most savage and unnatural!

Glou. Go to; say you nothing. There is division betwixt the Dukes, and a worse matter than that. I have received a letter this night- 'tis dangerous to be spoken- I have lock'd the letter in my closet. These injuries the King now bears will be revenged home; there's part of a power already footed; we must incline to the King. I will seek him and privily relieve him. Go you and maintain talk with the Duke, that my charity be not of him perceived. If he ask for me, I am ill and gone to bed. Though I die for't, as no less is threat'ned me, the King my old master must be relieved. There is some strange thing toward, Edmund.

Pray you be careful. Exit.

Edm. This courtesy, forbid thee, shall the Duke Instantly know, and of that letter too.

This seems a fair deserving, and must draw me That which my father loses- no less than all.

The younger rises when the old doth fall. Exit.

Scene IV.

The heath. Before a hovel.

Storm still. Enter Lear, Kent, and Fool.

Kent. Here is the place, my lord. Good my lord, enter.

The tyranny of the open night 's too rough For nature to endure.

Lear. Let me alone.

Kent. Good my lord, enter here.

Lear. Wilt break my heart?

Kent. I had rather break mine own. Good my lord, enter.

Lear. Thou think'st 'tis much that this contentious storm Invades us to the skin. So 'tis to thee; But where the greater malady is fix'd, The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'dst shun a bear; But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea, Thou'dst meet the bear i' th' mouth. When the mind's free, The body's delicate. The tempest in my mind Doth from my senses take all feeling else Save what beats there. Filial ingrat.i.tude!

Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand For lifting food to't? But I will punish home!

No, I will weep no more. In such a night 'To shut me out! Pour on; I will endure.

In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril!

Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all!

O, that way madness lies; let me shun that!

No more of that.

Kent. Good my lord, enter here.

Lear. Prithee go in thyself; seek thine own ease.

This tempest will not give me leave to ponder On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in.

[To the Fool] In, boy; go first.- You houseless poverty- Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll sleep.

Exit [Fool].

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are, That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides, Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp; Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, That thou mayst shake the superflux to them And show the heavens more just.

Edg. [within] Fathom and half, fathom and half! Poor Tom!

Enter Fool [from the hovel].

Fool. Come not in here, nuncle, here's a spirit. Help me, help me!

Kent. Give me thy hand. Who's there?

Fool. A spirit, a spirit! He says his name's poor Tom.

Kent. What art thou that dost grumble there i' th' straw?

Come forth.

Enter Edgar [disguised as a madman].

Edg. Away! the foul fiend follows me! Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind. Humh! go to thy cold bed, and warm thee.

Lear. Hast thou given all to thy two daughters, and art thou come to this?

Edg. Who gives anything to poor Tom? whom the foul fiend hath led through fire and through flame, through ford and whirlpool, o'er bog and quagmire; that hath laid knives under his pillow and halters in his pew, set ratsbane by his porridge, made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay trotting horse over four-inch'd bridges, to course his own shadow for a traitor. Bless thy five wits! Tom 's acold. O, do de, do de, do de. Bless thee from whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking! Do poor Tom some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There could I have him now- and there- and there again- and there!

Storm still.

Lear. What, have his daughters brought him to this pa.s.s?

Couldst thou save nothing? Didst thou give 'em all?

Fool. Nay, he reserv'd a blanket, else we had been all sham'd.

Lear. Now all the plagues that in the pendulous air Hang fated o'er men's faults light on thy daughters!

Kent. He hath no daughters, sir.

Lear. Death, traitor! nothing could have subdu'd nature To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.

Is it the fashion that discarded fathers Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?

Judicious punishment! 'Twas this flesh begot Those pelican daughters.

Edg. Pillic.o.c.k sat on Pillic.o.c.k's Hill. 'Allow, 'allow, loo, loo!

Fool. This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.

Edg. Take heed o' th' foul fiend; obey thy parents: keep thy word justly; swear not; commit not with man's sworn spouse; set not thy sweet heart on proud array. Tom 's acold.

Lear. What hast thou been?

Edg. A servingman, proud in heart and mind; that curl'd my hair, wore gloves in my cap; serv'd the l.u.s.t of my mistress' heart and did the act of darkness with her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet face of heaven; one that slept in the contriving of l.u.s.t, and wak'd to do it. Wine lov'd I deeply, dice dearly; and in woman out-paramour'd the Turk.

False of heart, light of ear, b.l.o.o.d.y of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey.

Let not the creaking of shoes nor the rustling of silks betray thy poor heart to woman. Keep thy foot out of brothel, thy hand out of placket, thy pen from lender's book, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind; says suum, mun, hey, no, nonny. Dolphin my boy, my boy, sessa! let him trot by.

Storm still.

Lear. Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer with thy uncover'd body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more than this? Consider him well. Thou ow'st the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume. Ha! Here's three on's are sophisticated! Thou art the thing itself; unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings! Come, unb.u.t.ton here.

[Tears at his clothes.]

Fool. Prithee, nuncle, be contented! 'Tis a naughty night to swim in. Now a little fire in a wild field were like an old lecher's heart- a small spark, all the rest on's body cold. Look, here comes a walking fire.

Enter Gloucester with a torch.