him, And chance it as it may. Here is his cave. Peace and content be here! Lord Timon! Timon! 130 Look out, and speak to friends: the Athenians, By two of their most reverend senate, greet thee: Speak to them, noble Timon. TIMON comes from his cave. Tim. Thou sun, that comfort'st, burn! For each true word, a blister! and each false Worthy Timon, Tim. Of none but such as you, and you of Timon. Live with authority: so soon we shall drive back Of Alcibiades the approaches wild, Sec. Sen. And shakes his threatening sword Against the walls of Athens. First Sen. Therefore, Timon, - 170 Tim. Well, sir, I will; therefore, I will, sir; thus: If Alcibiades kill my countrymen, That Timon cares not. But if he sack fair To the protection of the prosperous gods, Stay not, all's in vain. Tim. Why, I was writing of my epitaph; It will be seen to-morrow: my long sickness Of health and living now begins to mend, 190 Entreat thee back to Athens'; who have And nothing brings me all things. Go, live Third Sen. No talk of Timon, nothing of That these great towers, trophies and schools him expect. thought On special dignities, which vacant lie For thy best use and wearing. Sec. Sen. They confess Toward thee forgetfulness too general, gross: Which now the public body, which doth seldom Play the recanter, feeling in itself A lack of Timon's aid, hath sense withal 150 Of its own fail, restraining aid to Timon; And send forth us, to make their sorrow'd render, Together with a recompense more fruitful Than their offence can weigh down by the dram; Ay, even such heaps and sums of love and wealth As shall to thee blot out what wrongs were In life's uncertain voyage, I will some kind- That mine own use invites me to cut down, please To stop affliction, let him take his haste, Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe, And hang himself. I pray you, do my greeting. Flav. Trouble him no further; thus you still shall find him. Tim. Come not to me again: but say to Timon hath made his everlasting mansion gain! Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign. [Retires to his cave. First Sen. His discontents are unremoveably Coupled to nature. Sec. Sen. Our hope in him is dead: let us return, And strain what other means is left unto us In our dear peril. 231 First Sen. It requires swift foot. [Exeunt. SCENE II. Before the walls of Athens. First Sen. Thou hast painfully discover'd : are his files As full as thy report? I have spoke the least: The enemies' drum is heard, and fearful scouring Doth choke the air with dust: in, and prepare: Ours is the fall, I fear; our foes the snare. [Exeunt. SCENE III. The woods. Timon's cave, and a rude tomb seen. Enter a Soldier, seeking TIMON. Sold. By all description this should be the place. Who's here? speak, ho! No answer! What is this? Timon is dead, who hath outstretch'd his span: Some beast rear'd this; there does not live a Ere thou hadst power or we had cause of fear, Above their quantity. Sec. Sen, So did we woo Transformed Timon to our city's love By humble message and by promised means: We were not all unkind, nor all deserve The common stroke of war. 21 First Sen. These walls of ours Were not erected by their hands from whom You have received your griefs; nor are they such should fall PERICLES, PRINCE OF TYRE. (WRITTEN ABOUT 1608.) INTRODUCTION. Shakespeare's portion of this play has something of the slightness of a preliminary sketch. The first two Acts are evidently by another writer than Shakespeare, and probably the scenes in Act IV. (Sc. IL, V., and VI.), so revolting to our moral sense, are also to be assigned away from him. What remains (Acts III., IV., V., omitting the scenes just mentioned) is the pure and charming romance of Marina, the sea-born child of Pericles, her loss, and the recovery of both child and mother by the afflicted Prince. Whether Shakespeare worked upon the foundation of an earlier play, or whether the non-Shakespearean parts of Pericles were additions made to what he had written, cannot be determined with certainty. i. is supposed by some critics that three hands can be distinguished: that of a general reviser wh wrote the first two acts and Gower's choruses-possibly the dramatist, George Wilkins; that of a second writer who contributed the offensive scenes of Act IV.; and thirdly the hand of Shakespeare. Pericles was entered in the Stationers' register in 1608 by the book-seller Blount, and was published with a very ill arranged text the next year (1609) by another book-seller who had, it is believed, surreptitiously obtained his copy. It was not included among the plays given in the first or second folios, but appeared, with six added plays, in the third folio (1663). The story upon which Pericles was founded is that given in Lawrence Twine's Patterne of Painfull Adventures (1607), itself a reprint of an early printed version from the French; given also in Gower's Confessio Amantis, and originally written about the fifth or sixth century of our era, in Greek. Both Twine and Gower appear to have been made use of by the writers of Pericles, and the debt to Gower is acknowledged by his introduction as the "presenter" of the play. The drama as a whole is singularly undramatic. It entirely lacks unity of action, and the prominent figures of the opening scenes quickly drop out of the play. Most of the story is briefly told in rhymed verse by the presenter, Gower, or is set forth in dumb show. But Shakespeare's portion is one and indivisible. It opens on ship board with a tempest, and in Shakespeare's later play of storm and wreck he has not attempted to rival the earlier treatment of the subject. "No poetry of ship-. wreck and the sea," a living poet writes, "has ever equalled the great scene of Pericles; no such note of music was ever struck out of the clash and contention of tempestuous elements." Cerimon, who is master of the secrets of nature, and who is liberal in his "learned charity," is like a first study of Prospero. In the fifth act Marina, so named from her birth at sea, has grown to the age of fourteen years, and is, as it were, a sister of Miranda and Perdita (note in each case the significant name). She, like Perdita, is a child lost by her parents, and, like Perdita, we see her flower-like with her flowers-only these flowers of Marina are not for a merrymaking, but a grave. The melancholy of Pericles is a clear-obscure of sadness, not a gloom of cloudy remorse like that of Leontes. His meeting with his lost Marina is like an anticipation of the scene in which Cymbeline recovers his sons and daughter; but the scene in Pericles is filled with a rarer, keener passion of joy. 30 To evil should be done by none: I give, my cause who best can justify. 40 [Exit. With golden fruit, but dangerous to be touch'd; For death-like dragons here affright thee die. Yon sometimes famous princes, like thyself, blance pale, That without covering, save yon field of stars, Here they stand martyrs, slain in Cupid's Who tells us life's but breath, to trust it error. I'll make my will then, and, as sick men do Who know the world, see heaven, but, feeling woe, 50 Gripe not at earthly joys as erst they did ; came; But my unspotted fire of love to you. [To the daughter of Antiochus. Thus ready for the way of life or death, I wait the sharpest blow, Antiochus. Ant. Scorning advice, read the conclusion then: 10 Which read and not expounded, 'tis decreed, As these before thee thou thyself shalt bleed. Daugh. Of all say'd yet, mayst thou prove prosperous! Of all say'd yet, I wish thee happiness ! 60 For the embracements even of Jove himself; |