Glo. He cannot be fuch a monster.

Edm. Nor is not, sure.

Glo. To his father, that so tenderly and entirely loves him--Heav'n and Earth! Edmund, feek him out; wind me into him, I pray you; frame the business after your own wisdom. I would unstate myself, to be in a due refolution.

Edm. I will feek him, Sir, presently: convey the business as I shall find means, and acquaint you withal.

Glo. These late eclipses in the fun and moon portend no good to us; tho' the wisdom of nature can reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourg'd by the frequent effects. Love cools, friendship falls off, brothers divide. In cities, mutinies; in countries, discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond crack'd 'twixt fon and father. This villain of mine comes under the prediction, there's fon against father; the King falls from bias of nature, there's father against child. We have seen the best of our time. Machinations, hollowness, treachery, and all ruinous disorders follow us disquietly to our graves! Find out this villain, Edmund; it shall lose thee nothing, do it carefully and the noble and true-hearted Kent banish'd! his offence, Honesty. "Tis strange. [Exit.

Manet Edmund.

Edm. This is the excellent foppery of the world, that, when we are fick in fortune, (often the furfeits of our own behaviour) we make guilty of our disasters, the fun, the moon and stars (7); as if we were villains on neceffity; fools, by heavenly compulfion; knaves,

(7) We make guilty of our disosters, the fun, the moon, and stars :] It was the opinion of judicial aftrologers, that whatsoever good dispositions the infant, unborn, might be endow'd with, either from nature or traductively from its parents; yet if, at the hour of birth, its deli. very was by any cafual accident so accelerated, or retarded, that it fell in with the predominancy of a malignant constellation; that momentary influence would entirely change its nature, and bias it to all the contrary ill qualities. ---This was so wretched and monstrous an opinion, that it well deserved and was well fitted for the lath of fatire.

Mr. Warburton. thieves,

thieves, and treacherous, by spherical predominance; drunkards, lyars, and adulterers, by an inforc'd obedience of planetary influence; and all that we are evil in, by a divine thrusting on. An admirable evasion of whore-master man, to lay his goatish disposition on the charge of a star! my father compounded with my mother under the Dragon's tail, and my nativity was under Urfa major; so that it follows, I am rough and lecherous. I should have been what I am, had the maidenliest star in the firmament twinkled on my baf tardizing.

To him, Enter Edgar.

Pat!-he comes, like the Catastrophe of the old comedy; my cue is villanous Melancholy, with a figh like Tom o' Bedlam-O, these eclipses portend these divifions! fa, fol, la, me

Edg. How now, brother Edmund, what serious contemplation are you in ?

Edm. I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this other day, what should follow these eclipses. Edg. Do you bufy your self with that?

Edm. I promise you, the effects, he writes of, succeed

unhappily. When faw you my father last?

Edg. The night gone by.

Edm. Spake you with him?

Edg. Ay, two hours together.

Edm. Parted you in good terms, found you no dif

pleasure in him, by word or countenance?

Edg. None at all.

Edm. Bethink yourself, wherein you have offended him: and, at my intreaty, forbear his prefence, until some little time hath qualified the heat of his displeafure; which at this instant so rageth in him, that with the mischief of your person it would scarcely allay.

Edg. Some villain hath done me wrong.

Edm. That's my fear; I pray you, have a continent forbearance 'till the speed of his rage goes flower: and as I say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will fitly bring you to hear my lord speak: pray you,

go

go, there's my key: if you do stir abroad, go arm'd. Edg. Arm'd, brother!

Edm. Brother, I advise you to the best; I am no honeft man, if there by any good meaning toward you: I have told you what I have seen and heard, but faintly; nothing like the image and horror of it; pray you,

away.

Edg. Shall I hear from you anon?

Edm. I do ferve you in this business.
A credulous father, and a brother noble,
Whose nature is so far from doing harms,
That he fufpects none; on whofe foolish honefty
My practices ride eafy: I fee the business.
Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit;
All with me's meet, that I can fashion fit.

[Exit.

[Exit.

SCENE, the Duke of Albany's Palace.

Gon.

Enter Gonerill, and Steward.

ID my father ftrike my gentleman for chiding of his fool?

Stew. Ay, madam.

Gon. By day and night, he wrongs me; every hour He flashes into one grofs crime or other,

That fets us all at odds; I'll not endure it:

His knights grow riotous, and himself upbraids us
On ev'ry trifle. When he returns from hunting,
I will not speak with him; fay, I am fick.
If you come flack of former fervices,

You fhall do well; the fault of it I'll answer.
Stew. He's coming, madam, I hear him.
Gon. Put on what weary negligence you please,
You and your fellows: I'd have it come to question.
If he diftafte it, let him to my fifter,

Whofe mind and mine, I know, in that are one,
Not to be over-rul'd: Idle old Man, (8)

That

(8) Idle old Man,] The following lines, as they are fine in themfelves, and very much in character for Gonerill, I have reftor'd from

the

That ftill would manage thofe Authorities,
That he hath giv'n way! Now, by my Life,
Old Fools are Babes again; and must be used

With checks, like flatt'rers when they're feen t'abuse us. Remember, what I have faid.

Stery. Very well, madam.

Gon. And let his knights have colder looks among you: what grows of it, no matter; advise your fellows fo: I'll write ftrait to my fifter to hold my courfe: prepare for dinner.

[Exeunt.

SCENE changes to an open Place before the

Palace.

Enter Kent difguis'd.

F but as well I other accents borrow,

Kent⋅ I

And can my speech diffuse, my good intent (9) May carry thro' itself to that full iffue,

For which I raz'd my likeness. Now, banish'd Kent, If thou can'ft ferve where thou doft ftand condemn'd, So may it come, thy mafter, whom thou lov't,

Shall find thee full of labours.

the old 4to. The last verse, which I have ventur'd to amend, is there printed thus;

With Checks, like Flatt'ries when they are feen abus'd.

(9) And can my fpeech difufe,] This reading we derived firft from Mr. Rowe's edition; and from thence it has taken poffeffion in the two impreffions given us by Mr. Pope. But the poet's word was cer tainly, diffufe: And Kent would fay, " If I can but fo fpread out my "accents," (de telle forte efpandre, as the French term it ;) 66 vary my "tone, and utterance, fo widely from what it used to be, as to difguife. "it; &c." And diffused in this fenfe of obfolete, difguifed, our poet has more than once employed.

Let them from forth a faw-pit rush at once,
With fome diffufed fong:·
Merry Wives of Windfor
To fwearing, and ftern looks, diffus'd attire.

Vouchfafe, diffus'd infection of a man.

King Henry Vth.

King Richard IIId.

Horns

Horns within. Enter Lear, Knights and Attendants.

Lear. Let me not flay a jot for dinner, go, get it ready: How now, what art thou?

Kent. A man, Sir.

[To Kent.

Lear. What doft thou profefs? what would'st thou with us?

Kent. I do profess to be no less than I feem; to serve him truly, that will put me in truft; to love him that is honest; to converse with him that is wife and fays little ; to fear judgment; to fight when I cannot chufe, and to eat no fish.

Lear. What art thou?

Kent. A very honeft-hearted fellow, and as poor as the King.

Lear. If thou beeft as poor for a fubject, as he is for a King, thou art poor enough. What would'st thou ? Kent. Service.

Lear. Whom would'st thou serve ?

Kent. You.

Lear. Doft thou know me, fellow?

Kent. No, Sir, but you have that in your counte nance, which I would fain call master.

Lear. What's that?

Kent. Authority.

Lear. What fervices canft thou do?

Kent. I can keep honeft counfels, ride, run, mar a curious tale in telling it, and deliver a plain meffage bluntly that which ordinary men are fit for, I am quas lify'd in; and the beft of me is diligence.

:

Lear. How old art thou?

Kent. Not fo young, Sir, to love a woman for finging; nor fo old, to doat on her for any thing. I have years on my back forty eight.

Lear. Follow me, thou fhalt ferve me; if I like thee no worfe after dinner, I will not part from thee yet. Dinner, ho, dinner--where's my knave? my fool! go you, and call my fool hither. You, you, firrah, where's my daughter ?

Enter