Contend for empire in thee; and thy goodness
Share with thy birthright! Love all, trust a few,
Do wrong to none: be able for thine enemy
Rather in power, than use; and keep thy friend
Under thy own life's key: be check'd for silence,
But never tax'd for speech.
I am undone; there is no living, none,
If Bertram be away. It were all one,
That I should love a bright particular star,
And think to wed it, he is so above me
In his bright radiance and collateral light
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself:
The hind that would be mated by the lion,
Must die for love. "Twas pretty, though a plague,
To see him every hour; to sit and draw
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls,
In our heart's table; heart, too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour :
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his relics.
THE REMEDY OF EVILS GENERALLY IN OURSELVES
Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie,
Which we ascribe to Heaven: the fated sky
Gives us free scope; only, doth backward pull
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull.
The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not! and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our virtues.
Let's take the instant by the forward top;
For we are old, and on our quick'st decrees
The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time
Steals ere we can effect them.
We still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together; And wheresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans, Still we went coupled, and inseparable.
SOLITUDE PREFERRED TO A COURT LIFE, AND THE ADVANTAGES OF ADVERSITY.
Now, my co-mates, and brothers in exile,
Hath not old custom made this life more sweet
Than that of painted pomp? Are not these woods
More free from peril than the envious court?
Here feel we but the penalty of Adam
The seasons' difference; as the icy fang,
And churlish chiding of the winter's wind;
Which when it bites and blows upon my body,
Even till I shrink with cold, I smile, and say,
This is no flattery: these are counsellors
That feelingly persuade me what I am.
Sweet are the uses of adversity;
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.
REFLECTIONS ON THE WOUNDED STAG.
Duke S. Come, shall we go and kill us venison ? And yet it irks me, the poor dappled fools,Being native burghers of this desert city,Should, in their own confines, with forked heads* Have their round haunches gored.
1 Lord. Indeed, my lord,
The melancholy Jaques grieves at that;
And, in that kind, swears you do more usurp
Than doth your brother that hath banish'd you.
To-day, my lord of Amiens, and myself,
Did steal behind him, as he lay along
Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequester'd stag,
That from the hunters' aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish and, indeed, my lord,
The wretched animal heaved forth such groans,
That their discharge did stretch his leathern, coat
Almost to bursting; and the big round tears
Coursed one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears.
But what said Jaques ? Did he not moralize this spectacle ?
1 Lord. O, yes, into a thousand similes. First, for his weeping in the needless stream! Poor deer, quoth he, thou mak'st a testament As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more To that which had too much: Then, being alone Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends; 'Tis right, quoth he; this misery doth part The flux of company: Anon, a careless herd, Full of the pasture, jumps along by him, And never stays to greet him; Ay, quoth Jaques, Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens;
'Tis just the fashion: Wherefore do you look Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there?
GRATITUDE IN AN OLD SERVANT.
But do not so: I have five hundred crowns,
The thrifty hire I served under your father,
Which I did store to be my foster-nurse,
When service should in my old limbs lie lame,
And unregarded age in corners thrown;
Take that; and He that doth the ravens feed,
Yea, providently caters for the sparrow,
Be comfort to my age! Here is the gold;
All this I give you: Let me be your servant;
Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty:
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors to my blood:
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo
The means of weakness and debility;
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter,
Frosty but kindly let me go with you,
I'll do the service of a younger man
In all your business and necessities.
DESCRIPTION OF A FOOL, AND HIS MORALISING ON TIME.
Good-morrow, fool, quoth I: No, sir, quoth he,
Call me not fool, till Heaven hath sent me fortune:
And then he drew a dial from his poke;
And looking on it with lack-lustre eye,
Says, very wisely, It is ten o'clock:
This may we see, quoth he, how the world wags: 'Tis but an hour ago since it was nine;
And after an hour more it will be eleven;
And so, from hour to hour, we ripe, and ripe,
And then, from hour to hour, we rot, and rot,
And thereby hangs a tale. When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
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