LEAR
strange that they should so depart from home,
And not send back my messenger.
GENTLEMAN
As I learn’d,
The night before there was no purpose in them
Of this remove.
KENT
Hail to , noble master!
LEAR
Ha! Mak’st this shame pastime?
KENT
No, my lord.
FOOL
Ha, ha! he wears cruel garters. Horses are tied by the heads; dogs and bears by the neck, monkeys by the loins, and men by the legs: when a man is overlusty at legs, then he wears wooden nether-stocks.
LEAR
What’s he that so much place mistook
To set here?
KENT
It is both he and she,
Your son and daughter.
LEAR
No.
KENT
Yes.
LEAR
No, I say.
KENT
I say, yea.
LEAR
No, no; they would not.
KENT
Yes, they have.
LEAR
By Jupiter, I swear no.
KENT
By Juno, I swear ay.
LEAR
They durst not do’t.
They could not, would not do’t; worse than murder,
To do upon respect such violent outrage:
Resolve me, with all modest haste, which way
mightst deserve or they impose this usage,
Coming from us.
KENT
My lord, when at their home
I did commend your highness’ letters to them,
I was risen from the place that show’d
My duty kneeling, came there a reeking post,
Stew’d in his haste, half breathless, panting forth
From Goneril his mistress salutations;
Deliver’d letters, spite of intermission,
Which they read; on those contents,
They summon’d up their meiny, straight took horse;
Commanded me to follow and attend
The leisure of their answer; gave me cold looks:
And meeting here the other messenger,
Whose welcome I perceiv’d had poison’d mine,
Being the very fellow which of late
Display’d so saucily against your highness,
Having more man than wit about me, drew;
He rais’d the house with loud and coward cries.
Your son and daughter found this trespass worth
The shame which here it suffers.
FOOL
Winter’s not gone yet, if the wild geese fly that way.
Fathers that wear rags
Do make their children blind,
But fathers that bear bags
Shall see their children kind.
Fortune, that arrant whore,
turns the key to th’ poor.
But for all this, have as many dolours for daughters as canst tell in a year.
LEAR
O, how this mother swells up toward my heart!
Hysterica passio, down, climbing sorrow,
element’s below! Where is this daughter?
KENT
With the earl, sir, here within.
LEAR
Follow me not; stay here.
GENTLEMAN
Made you no more offence but what you speak of?
KENT
None.
How chance the King comes with so small a number?
FOOL
An hadst been set i’ the stocks for that question, hadst well deserved it.
KENT
Why, fool?
FOOL
We’ll set to school to an ant, to teach there’s no labouring i’the winter. All that follow their noses are led by their eyes but blind men; and there’s not a nose among twenty but can smell him that’s stinking. Let go hold when a great wheel runs down a hill, lest it break neck with following it; but the great one that goes upward, let him draw after. When a wise man gives better counsel, give me mine again: I would have none but knaves follow it, since a fool gives it.
That sir which serves and seeks for gain,
And follows but for form,
Will pack when it begins to rain,
And leave in the storm.
But I will tarry; the fool will stay,
And let the wise man fly:
The turns fool that runs away;
The fool no perdy.
KENT
Where learn’d you this, fool?
FOOL
Not i’ the stocks, fool.
LEAR
Deny to speak with me? They are sick? they are weary?
They have travell’d all the night? Mere fetches;
The images of revolt and flying off.
Fetch me a better answer.
GLOUCESTER
My dear lord,
You know the fiery quality of the Duke;
How unremovable and fix’d he is
In his own course.
LEAR
Vengeance! plague! death! confusion!
Fiery? What quality? Why, Gloucester, Gloucester,
I’d speak with the Duke of Cornwall and his wife.
GLOUCESTER
Well, my good lord, I have inform’d them so.
LEAR
Inform’d them! understand me, man?
GLOUCESTER
Ay, my good lord.
LEAR
The King would speak with Cornwall; the dear father
Would with his daughter speak, commands, tends, service,
Are they inform’d of this? My breath and blood!
Fiery? The fiery Duke, tell the hot Duke that—
No, but not yet: maybe he is not well:
Infirmity still neglect all office
Whereto our health is bound: we are not ourselves
When nature, being oppress’d, commands the mind
To suffer with the body: I’ll forbear;
And am fallen out with my more headier will,
To take the indispos’d and sickly fit
For the sound man.
Death on my state!
Should he sit here? This act persuades me
That this remotion of the Duke and her
Is practice only. Give me my servant forth.
Go tell the Duke and’s wife I’d speak with them,
Now, : bid them come forth and hear me,
Or at their chamber door I’ll beat the drum
Till it cry sleep to death.
GLOUCESTER
I would have all well betwixt you.
LEAR
O me, my heart, my rising heart! But down!
FOOL
Cry to it, nuncle, as the cockney did to the eels when she put ’em i’ the paste alive; she knapped ’em o’ the coxcombs with a stick and cried ‘Down, wantons, down!’ her brother that, in pure kindness to his horse buttered his hay.
LEAR
Good morrow to you both.
CORNWALL
Hail to your grace!
REGAN
I am glad to see your highness.
LEAR
Regan, I think you are; I know what reason
I have to think so: if not be glad,
I would divorce me from mother’s tomb,
Sepulchring an adultress. O, are you free?
Some other time for that.—Beloved Regan,
sister’s : O Regan, she tied
Sharp-tooth’d unkindness, like a vulture, here.
LEAR
I can scarce speak to ; thou’lt not believe
With how deprav’d a quality—O Regan!
REGAN
I pray you, sir, take patience. I have hope
You less know how to value her desert
Than she to scant her duty.
LEAR
Say, how is that?
REGAN
I cannot think my sister in the least
Would fail her obligation. If, sir,
She have restrain’d the riots of your followers,
on such ground, and to such wholesome end,
As clears her from all blame.
LEAR
My curses on her.
REGAN
O, sir, you are old;
Nature in you stands on the very verge
Of her confine: you should be rul’d and led
By some discretion, that discerns your state
Better than you yourself. Therefore I pray you,
That to our sister you do make return;
Say you have wrong’d her, sir.
LEAR
Ask her forgiveness?
Do you but mark how this becomes the house?
‘Dear daughter, I confess that I am old;
Age is unnecessary: on my knees I beg
That you’ll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.’
REGAN
Good sir, no more! These are unsightly tricks:
Return you to my sister.
LEAR
Never, Regan:
She abated me of half my train;
Look’d black upon me; struck me with her tongue,
Most serpent-like, upon the very heart.
All the stor’d vengeances of heaven fall
On her ingrateful top! Strike her young bones,
You taking airs, with lameness!
CORNWALL
Fie, sir, fie!
LEAR
You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames
Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,
You fen-suck’d fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
To fall and blast her pride!
REGAN
O the blest gods!
So will you wish on me when the rash mood is on.
LEAR
No, Regan, never have my curse.
tender-hefted nature shall not give
to harshness. Her eyes are fierce; but
Do comfort, and not burn. not in
To grudge my pleasures, to cut off my train,
To bandy hasty words, to scant my sizes,
And, in conclusion, to oppose the bolt
Against my coming in. better know’st
The offices of nature, bond of childhood,
Effects of courtesy, dues of gratitude;
half o’ the kingdom not forgot,
Wherein I endow’d.
REGAN
Good sir, to the purpose.
LEAR
Who put my man i’ the stocks?
CORNWALL
What trumpet’s that?
REGAN
I know’t, my sister’s: this approves her letter,
That she would soon be here.
REGAN
Is your lady come?
LEAR
This is a slave, whose easy borrowed pride
Dwells in the fickle grace of her he follows.
Out, varlet, from my sight!
CORNWALL
What means your grace?
LEAR
Who stock’d my servant? Regan, I have good hope
not know on’t. Who comes here? O heavens!
LEAR
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
Allow obedience, if yourselves are old,
Make it your cause; send down, and take my part!
Art not asham’d to look upon this beard?
O Regan, wilt take her by the hand?
GONERIL
Why not by the hand, sir? How have I offended?
All’s not offence that indiscretion finds
And dotage terms so.
LEAR
O sides, you are too tough!
Will you yet hold? How came my man i’ the stocks?
CORNWALL
I set him there, sir: but his own disorders
Deserv’d much less advancement.
LEAR
You? Did you?
REGAN
I pray you, father, being weak, seem so.
If, till the expiration of your month,
You will return and sojourn with my sister,
Dismissing half your train, come then to me:
I am now from home, and out of that provision
Which shall be needful for your entertainment.
LEAR
Return to her, and fifty men dismiss’d?
No, rather I abjure all roofs, and choose
To wage against the enmity o’ the air;
To be a comrade with the wolf and owl,
Necessity’s sharp pinch! Return with her?
Why, the hot-blooded France, that dowerless took
Our youngest born, I could as well be brought
To knee his throne, and, squire-like, pension beg
To keep base life afoot. Return with her?
Persuade me rather to be slave and sumpter
To this detested groom.
GONERIL
At your choice, sir.
LEAR
I , daughter, do not make me mad:
I will not trouble , my child; farewell:
We’ll no more meet, no more see one another.
But yet art my flesh, my blood, my daughter;
Or rather a disease that’s in my flesh,
Which I must needs call mine. art a boil,
A plague sore, or embossed carbuncle
In my corrupted blood. But I’ll not chide ;
Let shame come when it will, I do not call it:
I do not bid the thunder-bearer shoot,
Nor tell tales of to high-judging Jove:
Mend when canst; be better at leisure:
I can be patient; I can stay with Regan,
I and my hundred knights.
REGAN
Not altogether so,
I look’d not for you yet, nor am provided
For your fit welcome. Give ear, sir, to my sister;
For those that mingle reason with your passion
Must be content to think you old, and so—
But she knows what she does.
LEAR
Is this well spoken?
REGAN
I dare avouch it, sir: what, fifty followers?
Is it not well? What should you need of more?
Yea, or so many, sith that both charge and danger
Speak ’gainst so great a number? How in one house
Should many people, under two commands,
Hold amity? hard; almost impossible.
GONERIL
Why might not you, my lord, receive attendance
From those that she calls servants, or from mine?
REGAN
Why not, my lord? If then they chanc’d to slack ,
We could control them. If you will come to me,—
For now I spy a danger,—I entreat you
To bring but five-and-twenty: to no more
Will I give place or notice.
LEAR
I gave you all,—
REGAN
And in good time you gave it.
LEAR
Made you my guardians, my depositaries;
But kept a reservation to be followed
With such a number. What, must I come to you
With five-and-twenty, Regan, said you so?
REGAN
And speak’t again my lord; no more with me.
LEAR
Those wicked creatures yet do look well-favour’d
When others are more wicked; not being the worst
Stands in some rank of praise.
I’ll go with :
fifty yet double five-and-twenty,
And art twice her love.
GONERIL
Hear me, my lord:
What need you five-and-twenty? Ten? Or five?
To follow in a house where twice so many
Have a command to tend you?
REGAN
What need one?
LEAR
O, reason not the need: our basest beggars
Are in the poorest thing superfluous:
Allow not nature more than nature needs,
Man’s life is cheap as beast’s. art a lady;
If only to go warm were gorgeous,
Why, nature needs not what gorgeous wear’st
Which scarcely keeps warm. But, for true need,—
You heavens, give me that patience, patience I need!
You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both!
If it be you that stirs these daughters’ hearts
Against their father, fool me not so much
To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger,
And let not women’s weapons, water-drops,
Stain my man’s cheeks! No, you unnatural hags,
I will have such revenges on you both
That all the world shall,—I will do such things,—
What they are yet, I know not; but they shall be
The terrors of the earth. You think I’ll weep;
No, I’ll not weep:—
I have full cause of weeping; but this heart
Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws
Or I’ll weep.—O fool, I shall go mad!
CORNWALL
Let us withdraw; ’twill be a storm.
REGAN
This house is little: the old man and his people
Cannot be well bestow’d.
GONERIL
his own blame; put himself from rest
And must needs taste his folly.
REGAN
For his particular, I’ll receive him gladly,
But not one follower.
GONERIL
So am I purpos’d.
Where is my lord of Gloucester?
CORNWALL
Followed the old man forth, he is return’d.
GLOUCESTER
The King is in high rage.
CORNWALL
is he going?
GLOUCESTER
He calls to horse; but will I know not .
CORNWALL
best to give him way; he leads himself.
GONERIL
My lord, entreat him by no means to stay.
GLOUCESTER
, the night comes on, and the high winds
Do sorely ruffle; for many miles about
There’s scarce a bush.
REGAN
O, sir, to wilful men
The injuries that they themselves procure
Must be their schoolmasters. Shut up your doors.
He is attended with a desperate train,
And what they may incense him to, being apt
To have his ear abus’d, wisdom bids fear.
CORNWALL
Shut up your doors, my lord; a wild night.
My Regan counsels well: come out o’ the storm.