even to his inches, and, with private soul,
did in great Ilion thus translate him to me.
gave wisdom, which is strength, to Jupiter,
and with this law alone, "Let man be free,"
clothed him with the dominion of wide Heaven.
To know nor faith, nor love, nor law to be
omnipotent but friendless is to reign;
and Jove now reigned; for on the race of man
first famine, and then toil, and then disease,
strife, wounds, and ghastly death unseen before,
fell; and the unseasonable seasons drove,
with alternating shafts of frost and fire,
their shelterless, pale tribes to mountain caves :
and in their desert hearts fierce wants he sent,
and mad disquietudes, and shadows idle
of unreal good, which levied mutual war,
so ruining the lair wherein they raged.
Prometheus saw, and waked the legioned hopes
which sleep within folded Elysian flowers,
Nepenthe, Moly, Amaranth, fadeless blooms,
that they might hide with these and rainbow wings
the shape of Death.
the holy pledges that the gods have given you, your chaste, fair daughters. Were't not to upbraid a service to a master not unthankful,
I could say these, in spite of your prevention,
seduced by an imagined faith, not reason,
(which is the strength of nature,) quite forsaking
the Gentile gods, had yielded up themselves
to this new-found religion. This I cross'd,
discover'd their intents, taught you to use,
with gentle words and mild persuasions,
the power and authority of a father,
set off with cruel threats; and so reclaimed them:
and, whereas they with torment should have died,
(hell's furies to me, had they undergone it!)
they are now votaries in great Jupiter's temple,
and, by his priest instructed, grown familiar
with all the mysteries, nay the most abstruse ones,
belonging to his deity.
be Agamemnon, than himself indeed. How oft, with danger of the field beset, or with home-mutinies, would he un-be himself; or, over cruel altars weeping, wish, that with putting off a vizard he might his true inward sorrow lay aside! The shows of things are better than themselves, how doth it stir this airy part of us to hear our poets tell imagin'd fights and the strange blows that feignéd courage gives. When I Achilles hear upon the stage speak honour and the greatness of his soul, methinks I too could on a Phrygian spear run boldly, and make tales for after times: but when we come to act it in the deed, death mars this bravery, and the ugly fears of th' other world sit on the proudest brow: and boasting valour loseth his red cheek.
O change, no pause, no hope! Yet I endure.
I ask yon Heaven, the all-beholding Sun,
has it not seen? The Sea, in storm or calm,
Heaven's ever-changing Shadow, spread below,
have its deaf waves not heard my agony?
ah me! alas, pain, pain ever, for ever!
The crawling glaciers pierce me with the spears
of their moon-freezing crystals; the bright chains
eat with their burning cold into my bones.
Heaven's wingéd hound, polluting from thy lips
his beak in poison not his own, tears up
my heart; and shapeless sights come wandering by,
the ghastly people of the realm of dream,
mocking me: and the Earthquake-fiends are charged
to wrench the rivets from my quivering wounds
when the rocks split and close again behind :
while from their loud abysses howling throng
the genii of the storm, urging the rage
of whirlwind, and afflict me with keen hail.
MESSENGER-QUEEN ELIZABETH-DUCHESS OF
HE sum of all I can, I have disclosed;
why, or for what, the nobles were committed is all unknown to me, my gracious lady. Q. E. Ay me, I see the ruin of my house! the tiger now hath seiz'd the gentle hind; insulting tyranny begins to jet
upon the innocent and awless throne:-
welcome, destruction, blood, and massacre!
I see, as in a map, the end of all.
D. Y. Accursed and unquiet wrangling days!
how many of you have mine eyes beheld?
my husband lost his life to get the crown;
and often up and down my sons were tossed,
for me to joy, and weep, their gain and loss;
and being seated, and domestic broils
clean over-blown, themselves, the conquerors,
make war upon themselves: brother to brother,
blood to blood, self 'gainst self:-O, preposterous
and frantic outrage, end thy damnéd spleen ;
or let me die, to look on death no more!
OBSTINATE grief diSCOMMENDED
QUEEN OF DENMARK-HAMLET-KING OF DENMARK
OOD Hamlet, cast thy nighted colour off,
and let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
Do not for ever with thy vailéd lids
seek for thy noble father in the dust:
thou know'st 'tis common; all that lives must die,
passing through nature to eternity.
Ha. Ay, madam, it is common.
why seems it so particular with thee?
Ha. Seems, madam! nay, it is; I know not seems.
'Tis not alone my inky cloak, good mother,
nor customary suits of solemn black,
nor windy suspiration of forced breath,
no, nor the fruitful river in the eye,
nor the dejected haviour of the visage,
together with all forms, modes, shows of grief,
that can denote me truly: these, indeed, seem,
for they are actions that a man might play:
but I have that within which passeth show;
these but the trappings and the suits of woe.
769 K. 'Tis sweet and commendable in your nature,
Hamlet,
to give these mourning duties to your father:
but, you must know, your father lost a father;
that father lost, lost his; and the survivor bound,
in filial obligation, for some term
to do obsequious sorrow: but to perséver
in obstinate condolement, is a course
of impious stubbornness; 'tis unmanly grief:
it shows a will most incorrect to heaven,
a heart unfortified, a mind impatient;
an understanding simple and unschool'd:
for what we know must be, and is as common
as any the most vulgar thing to sense,
why should we, in our peevish opposition,
take it to heart? Fie! 'tis a fault to heaven,
a fault against the dead, a fault to nature,
to reason most absurd; whose common theme
is death of fathers, and who still hath cried,
from the first corse till he that died to-day,
This must be so.
DUKE OF NORFOLK TO KING RICHARD II
HEAVY sentence, my most sovereign liege,
and all unlook'd-for from your highness' mouth;
a dearer merit, not so deep a maim
as to be cast forth in the common air,
have I deservéd at your highness' hands.
The language I have learn'd these forty years,
my native English, now I must forego
and now my tongue's use is to me no more
than an unstringéd viol or a harp;
or like a cunning instrument cas'd up,
or, being open, put into his hands
that knows no touch to tune the harmony:
within my mouth you have engaol'd my tongue,
doubly portcullis'd with my teeth and lips;
and dull unfeeling barren ignorance
is made my gaoler to attend on me.
I am too old to fawn upon a nurse,
too far in years to be a pupil now:
what is thy sentence, then, but speechless death, which robs my tongue from breathing native breath?
771 CHARACTER OF A NOBLE COURTIER BY AN OLD
THE KING OF FRANCE TO BERTRAM
WOULD I had that corporal soundness now,
as when thy father and myself, in friendship
first tried our soldiership! He did look far
into the service of the time, and was
discipled of the bravest: he lasted long;
but on us both did haggish age steal on,
and wore us out of act. It
much repairs me
In his youth
he had the wit, which I can well observe
to-day in our young lords; but they may jest,
till their own scorn return to them unnoted,
ere they can hide their levity in honour.
So like a courtier, contempt not bitterness
were in his pride or sharpness; if they were,
his equal had awak'd them; and his honour,
clock to itself, knew the true minute when
exception bid him speak, and at this time
his tongue obey'd his hand: who were below him
he used as creatures of another place;
to talk of your good father.
and bow'd his eminent top to their low ranks,
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