The Dramatic Works of William Shakespeare

my bones: I will buy nine sparrows for a penny and his pia mater is not worth the ninth part of a sparrow. This lord, Achilles, Ajax,who wears his wit in his belly, and his guts in Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, Paris, and

SCENE 11.-Troy.-A Room in PRIAN'S Palace.

HELENUS.

Achil. What?

his head, I'll tell you what I say of him.

Ther. I say, this Ajax

Achil. Nay, good Ajax.

Pri. After so many hours, lives, speeches

spent,

[AJAX offers to strike him, ACHILLES Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks;

interposes.

Ther. Has not so much wit

Achil. Nay, I must hold you..

Deliver Helen, and all damage else—
As honour, loss of time, travel, expense,
Wounds, friends, and what else dear that w
consum'd

Ther. As will stop the eye of Helen's needle, In hot digestion of this cormorant war,for whom he comes to fight.

Achil. Peace, fool!

Ther. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will not: he there; that he; look you there.

Ajax. O thou damned cur! I shall

Achil. Will you set your wit to a fool's? Ther. No, I warrant you; for a fool's will

shame it.

Ther. I serve thee not.

Ajax. Well, go to, go to.

Ther. I serve here voluntary.

Achil. Your last service was sufferance, 'twas not voluntary; no man is beaten voluntary; Ajax was here the voluntary, and you

as under an impress.

Ther. Even so?-a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch, if he knock out either of your brains; a' were as good

crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

Achil. What, with me too, Thersites? Ther. There's Ulysses, and old Nestor,whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails on their toes,-yoke you like draught oxen, and make you plough up the wars. Achil. What, what?

Ther. Yes, good sooth; To, Achilles! to, Ajax! to!

Ajax. I shall cut out your tongue.

Shall be struck off:-Hector, what say you to't Hect. Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than 1,

As far as toucheth my particular, yet,
Dread Priam,

There is no lady of more softer bowels,
More spungy to suck in the sense of fear,
More ready to cry out- Who knows what jol-
lows?

Than Hector is: The wound of peace is surety,
Surety secure; but modest doubt is call'd
To the bottom of the worst. Let Helen go:
The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches
Since the first sword was drawn about this

You are so empty of them. Should not our father

Ther. 'Tis no matter; I shall speak as much Bear the great sway of his affairs with rea

as thou, afterwards.

[sons, Because your speech hath none, that tells him

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[will;

[Exit. Hect. Now youthful Troilus, do not these high strains

Of divination in our sister work

Some touches of remorse? or is your blood
So madly hot, that no discourse of reason,
Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause,
Can qualify the same?

Hect. But value dwells not in particular | Cry, Trojans, cry! a Helen, and a woe: It holds his estimate and dignity Cry, cry! Troy burns, or else let Helen go. As well wherein 'tis precious of itself As in the prizer: 'tis mad idolatry, To make the service greater than the god; And the will dotes, that is attributive To what infectiously itself affects, Without some image of the affected merit. Tro. I take to-day a wife, and my election Is led on in the conduct of my will; My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears, Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores Of will and judgement: How may I avoid, Although my will distaste what it elected, The wife I chose? there can be no evasion To blench from this, and to stand firm by ho

nour:

We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,
When we have soil'd them; nor the remainder
viands

We do not throw in unrespective sieve,t
Because we now are full. It was thought meet,
Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks:
Your breath with full consent bellied his sails;
The seas and winds (old wranglers) took a
truce,
[sir'd;
And did him service: he touch'd the ports de-
And, for an old aunt,‡ whom the Greeks held
captive,

He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth
and freshness
[ing.
Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes pale the morn-
Why keep we her? the Grecians keep our

aunt:

Is she worth keeping? why, she is a pearl,
Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand
ships,

And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.
If you'll avouch, 'twas wisdom Paris went,
(As you must needs, for you all cried-Go,
go,)

If you'll confess, he brought home noble prize,
(As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your
hands,

And cried-Inestimable!) why do you now
The issue of your proper wisdoms rate;
And do a deed that fortune never did,
Beggar the estimation which you priz'd
Richer than sea and land? O theft most base;
That we have stolen what we do fear to keep!
But, thieves, unworthy of a thing so stolen,
That in their country did them that disgrace,
We fear to warrant in our native place!
Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans, cry!
Pri. What noise? what shriek is this?

Tro. Why, brother Hector,

We may not think the justness of each act
Such and no other than event doth form it;
Nor once deject the courage of our minds,
Because Cassandra's mad: her brain-sick rap
tures

Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel,
Which hath our several honours all engag'd
To make it gracious. For my private part,
I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons:
And Jove forbid, there should be done amongst

Such things as might offend the weakest spleen
To fight for and maintain!

Par. Else might the world convincet of levity
As well my undertakings, as your counsels:
But I attest the gods, your full consent
Gave wings to my propension, and cut off
All fears attending on so dire a project.
For what, alas, can these my single arms?
What propugnation is in one man's valour,
To stand the push and enmity of those
This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest,
Were I alone to pass the difficulties,
And had as ample power as I have will,
Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done,
Nor faint in the pursuit.

Pri. Paris, you speak

Like one besotted on your sweet delights:
You have the honey still, but these the gall;
So to be valiant, is no praise at all.

Par. Sir, I propose not merely to myself
The pleasures such a beauty brings with it;
But I would have the soil of her fair rape
Wip'd off, in honourable keeping her.
What treason were it to the ransack'd queen,
Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to
Now to deliver her possession up, [me,
On terms of base compulsion? Can it be,
That so degenerate a strain as this, [soms?
Should once set footing in your generous bo-
There's not the meanest spirit on our party,
Without a heart to dare, or sword to draw,
When Helen is defended; nor none so noble,
Whose life were ill bestow'd, or death unfam'd,

Tro. 'Tis our mad sister, I do know her Where Helen is the subject: then, I say,

Well may we fight for her, whom, we know

thou-And on the cause and question now in hand
Have gloz'd, but superficially; not much
Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought
Unfit to hear moral philosophy:
The reasons you allege, do more conduce
To the hot passion of distemper'd blood,
Than to make up a free determination
"Twixt right and wrong; For pleasure, an.

Cas. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrink

led elders,

Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry,
Add to my clamours! let us pay betimes
A moiety of that mass of moan to come.
Cry, Trojans, cry! practise your eyes with

tears!

than wife is to the husband? if this law
Of nature be corrupted through affection;
And that great minds, of partial indulgence
To their benumbed wills, resist the same;
There is a law in each well-order'd nation,
To curb those raging appetites that are
Most disobedient and refractory.
If Helen then be wife to Sparta's king,-
As it is known she is,-these moral laws
Of nature, and of nations, speak aloud
To have her back return'd: Thus to persist
In doing wrong, extenuates not wrong,
But makes it much more heavy. Hector's
opinion.

Is this in way of truth: yet ne'ertheless,
My spritely brethren, I propendt to you
In resolution to keep Helen still;

For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependence
Upon our joint and several dignities.

Tro. Why, there you touch'd the life of our design:

Were it not glory that we more affected
Than the performance of our heaving spleens,
I would not wish a drop of Trojan blood
Spent more in her defence. But, worthy
Hector,

She is a theme of honour and renown;
A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds;
Whose present courage may beat down our

foes,

And fame, in time to come, canonize us:
For, I presume, brave Hector would not lose
So rich advantage of a promis'd glory,
As smiles upon the forehead of this action,
For the wide world's revenue.

Hec. I am yours,

You valiant offspring of great Priamus.-
I have a roistlingt challenge sent amongst
The dull and factious nobles of the Greeks,
Will strike amazement to their drowsy spirits:
I was advértis'd, their great general slept,
Whilst emulations in the army crept;
This, I presume, will wake him.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.--The Grecian Camp.-Before ACHILLES' Tent.

Enter THERSITES.

Ther. How now, Thersites? what, lost in the labyrinth of thy fury? Shall the elephant Ajax carry it thus? he beats me, and I rail at him: O worthy satisfaction! 'would, it were otherwise; that I could beat him, whilst he railed at me: 'Sfoot, I'll learn to conjure and raise devils, but I'll see some issue of my spiteful execrations. Then there's Achilles,-a rare engineer. If Troy be not taken till these two undermine it, the wails will stand till they fall of themselves. O thou great thunder-darter of Olympus, forget that thou art Jove the king of gods; and, Mercury, lose all the serpentine craft of thy Caduceus; if ye take not that little little less-than-little wit from them that they have! which short-armed ignorance itself knows is so abundant scarce, it will not in circumvention deliver a fly from a spider, without drawing their massy irons, and cutting the web. After this, the vengeance on the whole camp! or, rather, the bone-ache! for that, methinks, is the curse dependent on those that war for a placket. I have said my prayers; and devil, envy, say Amen. What, ho! my lord Achilles!

Through.
Incline to, as a question of honour.
Blustering.
& Envy.
The wand of Mercury which is wreathed with serpents.

Enter PATROULUS.

Patr. Who's there? Thersites? Good Thersites, come in and rail.

Ther. If I could have remembered a gilt counterfeit, thou wouldest not have slipped out of my contemplation: but it is no matter; Thyself upon thyself! The common curse of mankind, folly and ignorance, be thine in great revenue! heaven bless thee from a tutor, and discipline come not near thee! Let thy blood be thy direction till thy death! then if she, that lays thee out, says-thou art a fair corse, I'll be sworn and sworn upon't, she never shrouded any but lazars. Amen.-Where's Achilles? Putr. What, art thou devout? wast thou in prayer?

Ther. Ay; The heavens hear me!
Enter ACHILLES.

Achil. Who's there?
Patr. Thersites, my lord.

Why, my cheese, my digestion, why hast thon Achil. Where, where?-Art thou come? not served thyself in to my table so many meals? Come; what's Agamemnon?·

Ther. Thy commander, Achilles :-Then tell me, Patroclus, what's Achilles?

Putr. Thy lord, Thersites; Then tell me, I pray thee, what's thyself?

Ther. Thy knower, Patroclus; Then tell me, Patroclus, what art thou?

Patr. Thou mayest tell, that knowest.
Achil. O, tell, tell.

Ther. I'll decline the whole question. Agamemnon commands Achilles; Achilles is my lord; I am Patroclus' knower; and Patroclus is a fool.

Patr. You rascal!

Ther. Peace, fool; I have not done.

Achil. He is a privileged man.-Proceed, Thersites.

Ther. Agamemnon is a fool; Achilles is a fool; Thersites is a fool; and, as aforesaid, Patroclus is a fool.

Achil. Derive this; come.

Ther. Agamemnon is a fool to offer to command Achilles; Achilles is a fool to be commanded of Agamemnon; Thersites is a fool to serve such a fool; and Patroclus is a fool positive.

Patr. Why am I a fool?

Ther. Make that demand of the prover.-It suffices me, thou art. Look you, who comes here!

Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, NESTOR,
DIOMEDES, and AJAX.

Achil. Patroclus, I'll speak with nobody:Come in with me, Thersites.

[Erit.

Ther. Here is such patchery, such juggling, and such knavery! all the argument is, a cuckold, and a whore; A good quarrel, to draw emulous; factions, and bleed to death upon. Now the dry serpigos on the subject: [Exit. and war, and lechery, confound all! Agam. Where is Achilles? Putr. Within his tent; but ill dispos'd, my lord.

Agam. Let it be known to him that we are here.

He shent|| our messengers; and we lay by
Our appertainments, visiting of him:

Ajax. Is he so mah? Do you not think, he thinks himself a better man than I am? Agam. No question.

Ajax. Will you subscribe his thought, and say he is?

Ajax. Yes, lion-sick, sick of proud heart:as you may call it melancholy, if you will favour the man; but, by my head, 'tis pride: But why, why? let him show us a cause.-A word, by lord. [Takes AGAMEMNON aside. Nest. What moves Ajax thus to bay at him? Ulyss. Achilles hath inveigled his fool from him.

Nest. Who? Thersites?
Ulyss. He.

Nest. Then will Ajax lack matter, if he have lost his argument.*

Ulyss. No you see, he is his argument, that has his argument; Achilles.

Nest. All the better; their fraction is more our wish, than their faction: But it was a strong composure, a fool could disunite.

Ulyss. The amity, that wisdom knits not, folly may easily untie. Here comes Patroclus. Re-enter PATROCLUS.

Nest. No Achilles with him.

Ulyss. The elephant hath joints, but none for courtesy: his legs are legs for necessity, not for flexure.

Patr. Achilles bids me say-he is much sorry, If any thing more than your sport and pleasure Did move your greatness, and this noble state, To call upon him; he hopes, it is no other, But, for your health and your digestion sake, And after-dinner's breath.+

Agam. Hear you, Patroclus ;

We are too well acquainted with these

answers:

But his evasion, wing'd thus swift with scorn,
Cannot outfly our apprehensions.

Much attribute he hath; and much the reason
Why we ascribe it to him: yet all his virtues,-
Not virtuously on his own part beheld,-
Do, in our eyes, begin to lose their gloss;
Yea, like fair fruit in an unwholesome dish,
Are like to rot untasted. Go and tell him,
We come to speak with him: And you shall
not sin,

If you do say we think him over-proud,
And under-honest; in self-assumption greater,
Than in the note of judgement; and worthier
than himself

Here tend the savage strangeness he puts on;
Disguise the holy strength of their command,
And underwrite in an observing kind
His humorous predominance; yea, watch
His pettish lunes, This ebbs, his flows, as if
The passage and whole carriage of this action
Rode on his tide. Go, tell him this; and add,
That, if he overhold his price so much,
We'll none of him; but let him, like an engine
Not portable, lie under this report-
Bring action hither, this cannot go to war:
A stirring dwarf we do allowance** give
Before a sleeping giant:-Tell him so.

Patr. 1 shall; and bring his answer presently. [Exit.

Agam. In second voice we'll not be satisfied, e come to speak with him.-Ulysses, enter. [Exit ULYSSES.

Ajax. What is he more than another? Agam. No more than what he thinks he is.

Agam. No, noble Ajax; you are as strong, valiant, as wise, no less noble, much more gentle, and altogether more tractable. Ajax. Why should a man be proud? How doth pride grow? I know not what pride is. Agam. Your mind's the clearer, Ajax, and your virtues the fairer. He that is proud, eats up himself: pride is his own glass, his own trumpet, his own chronicle; and whatever praises itself but in the deed, devours the deed in the praise. as I hate the

Ajax. I do hate a proud man, engendering of toads.

Nest. And yet he loves himself: Is it not strange? [Aside.

Re-enter ULYSSES.

Ulyss. Achilles will not to the field to-morrow.
Agam. What's his excuse?

Ulyss. He doth rely on none;
But carries on the stream of his dispose,
Without observance or respect of any,
In will peculiar and in self-admission.

Agam. Why will he not, upon our fair request,

sake only,

Untent his person, and share the air with us?
Ulyss. Things small as nothing, for request's
[greatness;
He makes important: Possess'd he is with
And speaks not to himself, but with a pride
That quarrels at self-breath: imagin'd worth
Holds in his blood such swoln and hot dis-
course,

That, 'twixt his mental and his active parts
Kingdom'd Achilles in commotion rages,
And batters down himself: What should I say?
He is so plaguy proud, that the death tokens of
Cry-No recovery.
[it

Agam. Let Ajax go to him.-
Dear lord, go you and greet him in his tent:
'Tis said, he holds you well; and will be led,
At your request, a little from himself.

Ulyss. O'Agamemnon, let it not be so! We'll consecrate the steps that Ajax makes When they go from Achilles: Shall the proud lord,

That bastes his arrogance with his own seam ;*
And never suffers matter of the world
Enter his thoughts,-save such as do revolve
And ruminate himself,-shall he be worshipp'd
Of that we hold an idol more than he ?
No, this thrice worthy and right valiant lord
Must not so stale his palm, nobly acquir'd;
Nor, by my will, assubjugate his merit,
As amply titled as Achilles is,
By going to Achilles:

That were to enlard his fat-already pride;
And add more coals to Cancer, when he burns
With entertaining great Hyperion.†
This lord go to him! Jupiter forbid;
And say in thunder-Achilles, go to him.
Nest. O, this is well; he rubs the vein of
him.

[Aside.

enters June 21.

The sign in the zodiac into which the sun

"And Cancer reddens with the solar blaze" Thomson. Strike.

Agam. O, no, you shall not go.
Ajar. An he be proud with me, I'll pheeze* To call together all his state of war;

Keeps thicket. Please it our great general

his pride:

Let me go to him.

Ulyss. Not for the worth that hangs upon
our quarrel.

Ajax. A paltry, insolent fellow,-
Nest. How he describes

Himself:

[Aside.

Ajax. I will let his humours blood.

[Aside.

Agam. He'll be physician, that should be the patient.

Ajax. An all men

Were o' my mind,—

Ulyss. Wit would be out of fashion. [Aside. Ajax. He should not bear it so,

He should eat swords first. Shall pride carry it?

Nest. An 'twould, you'd carry half. [Aside.
Ulyss. He'd have ten shares.

[Aside. Ajax. I'll knead him, I will make him supple:

Nest. He's not yet thorough warm: forcet him with praises:

Pour in, pour in; his ambition is dry. [Aside.
Ulyss. My lord, you feed too much on this
dislike.
[To AGAMEMNON.

Nest. O noble general, do not do so.
Dio. You must prepare to fight without
Achilles.

Ulyss. Why, 'tis this naming of him does him harm.

Here is a man-But 'tis before his face;
I will be silent.

Nest. Wherefore should you so?
He is not emulous, as Achilles is.

Ulyss. Know the whole world, he is as val

iant.

Ajax. A whoreson dog, that shall palter thus with us!

I would, he were a Trojan!

Nest. What a vice

Were it in Ajax now———
Ulyss. If he were proud?

Dio. Or covetous of praise?
Ulyss. Ay, or surly borne ?
Dio. Or strange, or self-affected?

Ulyss. Thank the heavens, lord, thou art of
sweet composure;
[suck:
Praise him that got thee, she that gave thee
Fam'd be thy tutor, and thy parts of nature
Thrice-fam'd beyond all erudition:
But he that disciplin'd thy arms to fight,
Let Mars divide eternity in twain,
And give him half: and, for thy vigour,
Bull-Bearing Milo his addition|| yield
To sinewy Ajax. I will not praise thy wis-
Which, like a bourn,¶ a pale, a shore, confines
Thy spacious and dilated parts: Here's Nes-
Instructed by the antiquary times, [tor,
He must, he is, he cannot but be wise ;-
But pardon, father Nestor, were your days
As green as Ajax', and your brain so tem-
per'd,

[dom,

You should not have the eminence of him,
But be as Ajax.

Ajax. Shall I call you father?

Nest. Ay, my good son.

Dio. Be rul'd by him, lord Ajax.

Ulyss. There is no tarrying here; the hart Achilles

Fresh kings are come to Troy: To-morrow, We must with all our main of power stand fast:

And here's a lord,

to west,

-come knights from east

And cull their flower, Ajax shall cope the best. Agam. Go we to council. Let Achilles sleep:

Light boats sail swift, though greater hulks draw deep. [Exeunt.

ACT II

SCENE I-Troy.-A Room in PRIAM'S Palace.

Enter PANDARUS and a SERVANT. Pan. Friend! you! pray you, a word: Do not you follow the young lord Paris?

Serv. Ay, Sir, when he goes before me.
Pan. You do depend upon him, I mean?
Serv. Sir, I do depend upon the lord.
Pan. You do depend upon a noble gentle-
man; I must needs praise him.
Serv. The lord be praised!

Pan. You know me, do you not?
Serv. 'Faith, Sir, superficially.

Pan. Friend, know me better; I am the lord Pandarus.

Serv. I hope, I shall know your honour better.

Pan. I do desire it.

Serv. You are in the state of grace.

[Music within. Pan. Grace! not so, friend; honour and lordship are my titles: What music is this? Serv. I do but partly know, Sir; it is music in parts.

Pan. Know you the musicians?
Serv. Wholly, Sir.

Pan. Who play they to?

Serv. To the hearers, Sir.

Pan. At whose pleasure, friend?

Serv. At mine, Sir, and theirs that love music.

Pan. Command, I mean, friend.
Serv. Who shall I command, Sir?

Pan. Friend, we understand not one another; I am too courtly, and thou art too cunning: At whose request do these men play?

Serv. That's to't, indeed, Sir: Marry, Sir, at the request of Paris my lord, who is there in person; with him, the mortal Venus, the heart-blood of beauty, love's invisible soul,-~ Pan. Who, my cousin, Cressida ?

Serv. No, Sir, Helen; Could you not find out that by her attributes?

Pan. It should seem, fellow, that thou hast not seen the lady Cressida. I come to speak with Paris from the prince Troilus: I will make a complimental assault upon him, for my business seeths.*

Serv. Sodden business! there's a stewed phrase, indeed!

Enter PARIS and HELEN, attended. Pan. Fair be to you, my lord, and to all this fair company! fair desires, in all fair measure, fairly guide them! especially to you fair queen! fair thoughts be your fair pillow! Helen. Dear lord, you are full of fair words. Pan. You speak your fair pleasure, sweet queen.

* Boils,

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The Dramatic Works of William Shakespeare: From the Text of ..., Volume 2