Ventidius, one of Timon's falfe Friends.
Cupid and Mafkers.

Thieves, Senators, Poet, Painter, Jeweller, Mercer and Merchant; with divers fervants and attendants.

SCENE, Athens; and the Woods not far from it.

TIMON

TIMON of ATHEN s.

ACT

I.

SCENE, A Hall in Timon's Houfe.

Enter Poet, Painter, Jeweller, Merchant, and Mercer, at feveral doors.

G

OOD day, Sir.

POET.

Pain. I am glad y' are well.

Poet. I have not feen you long; how goes the world? Pain. It wears, Sir, as it goes.

Poet. Ay, that's well known.

But what particular rarity? what so strange,
Which manifold record not matches? fee,

(Magick of bounty!) all these spirits thy power
Hath conjur'd to attend. I know the merchant..
Pain. I know them both; th' other's a jeweller.
Mer. O'tis a worthy Lord!

Jew. Nay, that's most fixt.

Mer. A moft incomparable man, breath'd as it were To an untirable and continuate goodness.

He paffes

Jew. I have a jewel here. Mer. O, pray, let's fee't: For the Lord Timon, Sir? VOL. VI.

Jew. If he will touch the estimate: but for thatPoet. When we for recompence have prais'd the vile, It flains the glory in that happy verfe

Which aptly fings the good.

Mer. 'Tis a good form.

[Looking on the jewel.

Jew. And rich; here is a water, look ye.

Pain. You're rapt, Sir, in fome work, fome dedication

To the great Lord.

Poet. A thing flipt idly from me.

Our poefy is as a gum, which iffues

From whence 'tis nourished. The fire i' th' flint

Shews not, 'till it be ftruck: our gentle flame
Provokes itself, and like the current flies

Each bound it chafes. What have you there? (1)
Pain. A picture, Sir:when comes your book forth?
Poet. Upon the heels of my prefentment, Sir.
Let's fee your piece.

Pain. 'Tis a good piece.

Poet. So 'tis,

This comes off well and excellent.

Pain. Indiff'rent.

Poet. Admirable! how this grace

Speaks his own ftanding? what a mental power
This eye fhoots forth? how big imagination
Moves in this lip? to th' dumbness of the gefture
One might interpret.

Pain. It is a pretty mocking of the life:
Here is a touch-is't good?

Poet. I'll fay of it,

It tutors nature; artificial ftrife

Lives in thofe touches, livelier than life.

(1) Each bound it chafes.--] How, chafes? The flood, indeed beating up upon the fhore, covers a part of it, but cannot be faid to drive the fhore away. The poet's allufion is to a wave, which, foaming and chafing on the shore, breaks; and then the water feems to the eye to retire. So, in Lear.

The murmuring furge,

That on th' unnumber'd idle pebbles chafes, &c.

And fo in Jul. Cæfar.

The troubled Tiber, chafing with his shores.

4

Enter

Enter certain Senators.

Pain. How this Lord is followed!

Poet. The Senators of Athens! happy man! (2)
Pain. Look, more!

Poet. You fee this confluence, this great flood of vifiters.
I have, in this tough work fhap'd out a man,
Whom this beneath world doth embrace and hag
With ampleft entertainment. My free drift
Halts not particular, but moves itself
In a wide fea of wax; no levell'd malice
Infects one comma in the course I hold,
But flies an eagle-flight, bold, and forth on,
Leaving no tract behind.

Pain. How fhall I underftand

Poet. I'll unbolt to you.

you ?

You fee, how all conditions, how all minds,
As well of glib and flipp'ry creatures, as
Of grave and auftere quality, tender down
Their fervice to Lord Timon: his largè fortune,
Upon his good and gracious nature hanging,
Subdues and properties to his love and tendance
All forts of hearts; yea, from the glass-fac'd flatterer
To Apemantus, that few things loves better
Than to abhor himself; ev'n he drops down
The knee before him, and returns in peace
Moft rich in Timon's nod.

Pain. I faw them fpeak together.

Poet. I have upon a high and pleasant hill Feign'd Fortune to be thron'd.

The bafe o' th' mount

Is rank'd with all deferts, all kind of natures,
That labour on the bofom of this sphere
To propagate their ftates; amongst them all,
Whofe eyes are on this fov'reign Lady fixt,
One do I perfonate of Timon's frame,
Whom Fortune with her iv'ry hand wafts to her,

(2) Happy men!] Thus the printed copies: but I cannot think the poet meant, that the fenators were happy in being admitted to Timon; their quality might command that: but that Timon was happy in being follow'd, and caress'd, by those of their rank and dignity.

F 2

Whofe

1

Whofe prefent grace to prefent flaves and fervants
Tranflates his rivals.

Pain. "Tis conceiv'd to th' fcope. (3)

This throne, this fortune, and this hill, methinks,
With one man beckon'd from the reft below,
Bowing his head against the steepy mount
To climb his happinefs, would be well expreft
In our condition.

Poet. Nay, but hear me on:

All thofe which were his fellows but of late,
Some better than his value, on the moment
Follow his ftrides; his lobbies fill with tendance;
Rain facrificial whifp'rings in his ear;

Make facred even his ftirrop; and through him
Drink the free air.

Pain. Ay, marry, what of these?

Poet. When Fortune in her fhift and change of mood Spurns down her late belov'd, all his dependants (Which labour'd after to the mountain's top, Even on their knees and hands,) let him flip down, Not one accompanying his declining foot. Pain. "Tis common:

A thousand moral paintings I can fhew,

That shall demonftrate these quick blows of fortune
More pregnantly than words. Yet you do well
To fhew Lord Timom, that mean eyes have feen
The foot above the head.

(3) 'Tis conceiv'd, to scope

This throne, this fortune, &c.] Thus all the editors hitherto have nonfenfically writ, and pointed, this paffage. But, fure, the painter would tell the poet, your conception, Sir, hits the very scope you aim at. This the Greeks would have render'd, rỡ onoπõ ruxɛîs, recta ad fcopum tendis: and Cicero has thus exprefs'd on the like occafion, Signum oculis defiinatum feris. This fenfe our author, in his Henry 8th, expreffes;

I think, you've hit the mark.

And in his Julius Cæfar, at the conclufion of the first act;
Him, and his worth, and our great need of him,
You have right well conceited.

Trumpets