The Dramatic Works of W. Shakespeare

Tro.

Cres. Let me go and try:

You cannot shun

Tro. Nothing, but our undertakings: when we Cres. Sir, mine own company. vow to weep seas, live in fire, eat rocks, tame tigers: thinking it harder for our mistress to devise im-Yourself. position enough, than for us to undergo any difficulty imposed. This is the monstruosity in love, lady, that the will is infinite, and the execution confined; that the desire is boundless, and the act a slave to limit.

Cres. They say, all lovers swear more performance than they are able, and yet reserve an ability that they never perform; vowing more than the perfection of ten, and discharging less than the tenth part of one. They that have the voice of lions, and the act of hares, are they not monsters? Tro. Are there such? such are not we: Praise us as we are tasted, allow us as we prove; our head shall go bare, till merit crown it: no perfection in reversion shall have a praise in present: we will not name desert before his birth; and, being born, his addition shall be humble. Few words to fair faith Troilus shall be such to Cressid, as what envy can say worst, shall be a mock for his truth; and what truth can speak truest, not truer than Troilus? Cres. Will you walk in, my lord?

Re-enter PANDARUS.

Pan. What, blushing still? have you not done talking yet?

Cres. Well, uncle, what folly I commit, I dedicate to you.

Pan. I thank you for that; if my lord get a boy of you, you'll give him me: Be true to my lord: if he flinch, chide me for it.

Tro. You know now your hostages; your uncle's word, and my firm faith.

Pan. Nay, I'll give my word for her too; our kindred, though they be long ere they are wooed, they are constant, being won: they are burs, I can tell you; they'll stick where they are thrown.

Cres. Boldness comes to me now, and brings me
heart:-

Prince Troilus, I have lov'd you night and day
For many weary months.

Tro. Why was my Cressid then so hard to win?
Cres. Hard to seem won; but I was won, my lord,
With the first glance that ever--Pardon me;-
If I confess much, you will play the tyrant.
I love you now; but not, till now, so much
But I might master it :-in faith, I lie;

My thoughts were like unbridled children, grown
Too headstrong for their mother: See, we fools!
Why have I blabb'd? who shall be true to us,
When we are so unsecret to ourselves?
But, though I lov'd you well, I woo'd you not;
And yet, good faith, I wish'd myself a man;
Or that we women had men's privilege

Of speaking first. Sweet, bid me hold my tongue;
For, in this rapture, I shall surely speak
The thing I shall repent. See, see your silence,
Cunning in dumbness, from my weakness draws
My very soul of counsel: Stop my mouth.

Tro. And shall, albeit sweet music issues thence.
Pan. Pretty, i' faith.

Cres. My lord, I do beseech you, pardon me;
"Twas not my purpose thus to beg a kiss:
I am ashamed;-O heavens! what have I done?-
For this time will I take my leave, my lord.
Tro. Your leave, sweet Cressid?

Pan. Leave! an you take leave till to-morrow morning,

Cres. Pray you, content you.
Tro.

What offends you, lady?

• Titles.

I have a kind of self resides with you;
But an unkind self, that itself will leave,
To be another's fool. I would be gone:
Where is my wit? I know not what I speak.
Tro. Well know they what they speak, that speak
so wisely.

Cres. Perchance, my lord, I show more craft
than love;

And fell so roundly to a large confession,
To angle for your thoughts: But you are wise;
Or else you love not; for to be wise and love,
Exceeds man's might: that dwells with gods above.
Tro. O, that I thought it could be in a woman,
(As, if it can, I will presume in you,)
To feed for aye' her lamp and flames of love
To keep her constancy in plight and youth,
Outliving beauty's outward, with a mind
That doth renew swifter than blood decays;
Or, that persuasion could but thus convince me,—
That my integrity and truth to you
Might be affronted with the match and weight
Of such a winnow'd purity in love;
How were I then uplifted! but alas,
I am as true as truth's simplicity,
And simpler than the infancy of truth.
Cres. In that I'll war with you.
Tro.

O virtuous fight, When right with right wars, who shall be most right!

True swains in love, shall, in the world to come,
Approve their truths by Troilus: when their rhymes,
Full of protest, of oath, and big compare,
Want similes, truth tired with iteration,-
As true as steel, as plantage to the moon,
As sun to day, as turtle to her mate,
As iron to adamant, as earth to the centre,-
Yet, after all comparisons of truth,
As truth's authentic author to be cited,
As true as Troilus shall crown up the verse,
And sanctify the numbers.

As air, as water, wind, or sandy earth,
As fox to lamb, as wolf to heifer's calf,
Pard to the hind, or stepdame to her son;
Yea, let them say, to stick the heart of falsehood,
As false as Cressid.

Pan. Go to, a bargain made: seal it, seal it;
I'll be the witness.-Here, I hold your hand; here,
my cousin's. If ever you prove false one to another,
since I have taken such pains to bring you together,
let all pitiful goers-between be called to the world's
end after my name, call them all-Pandars; let all
inconstant men be Troiluses, all false women Cres-
sids, and all brokers-between Pandars! say, amen.
Tro. Amen.
Cres. Amen.

Pan. Amen. Whereupon I will show you a
chamber and a bed, which bed, because it shall not
Met with and equalled.
I Conclude.

1 Ever.
• Comparison.

speak of your pretty encounters, press it to death:

away.

And Cupid grant all tongue-tied maidens here, Bed, chamber, Pandar, to provide this gear!

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.-The Grecian Camp. Enter AGAMEMNON, ULYSSES, DIOMEDES, NESTOR, AJAX, MENELAUS, and CALCHAS.

Cal. Now, princes, for the service I have done you,
The advantage of the time prompts me aloud
To call for recompense. Appear it to your mind,
That, through the sight I bear in things, to Jove
I have abandon'd Troy, left my possession,
Incurr'd a traitor's name; exposed myself,
From certain and possess'd conveniences,
To doubtful fortunes, séquest'ring from me all
That time, acquaintance, custom, and condition,
Made tame and most familiar to my nature;
And here, to do you service, am become
As new into the world, strange, unacquainted:
I do beseech you, as in way of taste,
To give me now a little benefit,

Out of those many register'd in promise,
Which, you say, live to come in my behalf.
Agam. What wouldst thou of us, Trojan? make

demand.

Cal. You have a Trojan prisoner call'd Antenor, Yesterday took; Troy holds him very dear, Oft have you (often have you thanks therefore) Desired my Cressid in right great exchange, Whom Troy hath still denied: But this Antenor, I know, is such a wrest in their affairs, That their negotiations all must slack, Wanting his manage; and they will almost Give us a prince of blood, a son of Priam, In change of him: let him be sent, great princes, And he shall buy my daughter: and her presence Shall quite strike off all service I have done, In most accepted pain.

Agam.

Let Diomedes bear him, And bring us Cressid hither; Calchas shall have What he requests of us.-Good Diomed, Furnish you fairly for this interchange: Withal, bring word-if Hector will to-morrow Be answer'd in his challenge: Ajax is ready. Dio. This shall I undertake; and 'tis a burden Which I am proud to bear.

[Exeunt DIOMEDES and CALCHAS. Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS, before their Tent. Ulyss. Achilles stands i' the entrance of his tent:Please it our general to pass strangely by him, As if he were forgot; and princes all, Lay negligent and loose regard upon him: I will come last: 'Tis like, he'll question me, Why such unplausive eyes are bent, why turn'd on him:

If so, I have derision med'cinable,

To use between your strangeness and his pride,
Which his own will shall have desire to drink;
It may do good: pride hath no other glass
To show itself, but pride; for supple knees
Feed arrogance, and are the proud man's fees.
Agam. We'll execute your purpose, and put on
A form of strangeness as we pass along;-
So do each lord; and either greet him not,
Or else disdainfully, which shall shake him more
Than if not look'd on. I will lead the way.
Achil. What, comes the general to speak with
me?

You know my mind, I'll fight no more 'gainst Troy.

2 Like a stranger.

To send their smiles before them to Achilles:
To come as humbly as they used to creep
To holy altars.

Achil. What, am I poor of late?
'Tis certain, greatness, once fall'n out with fortune,
Must fall out with men too: What the declin'd is,
He shall as soon read in the eyes of others,
As feel in his own fall: for men, like butterflies,
Show not their mealy wings but to the summer;
And not a man, for being simply man,

Hath any honor; but honor for those honors
That are without him, as place, riches, favor,
Prizes of accident as oft as merit:

Which when they fall, as being slippery standers,
The love that lean'd on them as slippery too,
Do one pluck down another, and together
Die in the fall. But 'tis not so with me:

Fortune and I are friends; I do enjoy
At ample point all that I did possess,

Save these men's looks; who do, methinks, find out

Something not worth in me such rich beholding
As they have often given. Here is Ulysses;
I'll interrupt his reading.-
How now, Ulysses?
Ulyss

Now, great Thetis' son?
Achil. What are you reading?
Ulyss.
A strange fellow here
Writes me, that man-how dearly ever parted,3
How much in having, or without, or in,—
Cannot make boast to have that which he hath,
Nor feels not what he owes, but by reflection;
As when his virtues shining upon others
Heat them, and they retort that heat again
To the first giver.

Achil.
This is not strange, Ulysses.
The beauty that is borne here in the face
The bearer knows not, but commends itself
To others' eyes: nor doth the eye itself
(That most pure spirit of sense) behold itself,
Not going from itself; but eye to eye oppos'd
Salutes each other with each other's form.
For speculation turns not to itself,
Till it hath travell'd, and is married there
Where it may see itself: this is not strange at all.
Ulyss. I do not strain at the position,

It is familiar; but at the author's drift:
Who, in his circumstance,' expressly proves--
That no man is the lord of any thing,
(Though in and of him there be much consisting,)
Till he communicate his parts to others:
Nor doth he of himself know them for aught
Excellently endowed. • Detail of argument.

If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive,

Till he behold them form'd in the applause
Where they are extended, which, like an arch, re- And case thy reputation in thy tent;

verberates

The voice again; or like a gate of steel
Fronting the sun, receives and renders back

His figure and his heat. I was much rapt in this;
And apprehended here immediately

The unknown Ajax.

Heavens, what a man is there! a very horse;

That has he knows not what. Nature, what things

there are,

Most abject in regard, and dear in use!
What things again most dear in the esteem,
And poor in worth! now shall we see to-morrow,
An act that very chance doth throw upon him,
Ajax renown'd. O heavens, what some men do,
While some men leave to do!

How some men creep in skittish fortune's hall,
Whiles others play the idiots in her eyes!
How one man eats into another's pride,
While pride is fasting in his wantonness!
To see these Grecian lords!—why, even already
They clap the lubber Ajax on the shoulder;
As if his foot were on brave Hector's breast,
And great Troy shrinking.

Arhil. I do believe it: for they pass'd by me,
As misers do by beggars; neither gave to me.
Good word, nor look: What, are my deeds forgot?
Ulyss. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,

A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:

Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods them

Ulyss. Is that a wonder?

Ha! known!

The providence that's in a watchful state,
Knows almost every grain of Plutus' gold;
Finds bottom in the uncomprehensive deeps;
Keeps place with thought, and almost like the gods,
Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.
There is a mystery (with whom relation
Durst never meddle) in the soul of state;
Which hath an operation more divine,
Than breath, or pen, can give expressure to;
All the commerce that you have had with Troy,
As perfectly is ours, as yours, my lord;
And better would it fit Achilles much,
To throw down Hector, than Polyxena:
But it must grieve young Pyrrhus now at home,
When fame shall in our islands sound her trump;
And all the Greekish girls shall tripping sing,-
Great Hector's sister did Achilles win;

Those scraps are good deeds past: which are de- But our great Ajax bravely beat down him.

vour'd

As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done: Perséverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honor bright: To have done is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail

In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For honor travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For emulation hath a thousand sons,

That one by one pursue: if you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter'd tide they all rush by,
And leave you hindmost;—

Or, like a gallant horse fallen in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O'er-run and trampled on: Then what they do in

present,

Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours:
For time is like a fashionable host,

That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand;
And with his arms out-stretch'd, as he would fly,
Grasps in the comer: Welcome ever smiles,
And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue
seek

Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,

High birth, vigor of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.

One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.—
That all, with one consent, praise new-born gawds,"
Though they are made and moulded of things past;
And give to dust, that is a little gilt,
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.

The present eye praises the present object:
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye,
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might; and yet it may again,
5 New-fashioned toys.

Farewell, my lord: I as your lover speak;
The fool slides o'er the ice that you should break.

[Exit:

Patr. To this effect, Achilles, have I mov'd you:
A woman impudent and mannish grown
Is not more loath'd than an effeminate man
In time of action. I stand condemn'd for this;
They think, my little stomach to the war,
And your great love to me, restrains you thus:
Sweet, rouse yourself; and the weak wanton Cupid
Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold,
And, like a dew-drop from the lion's mane,
Be shook to air.
Achil.

Shall Ajax fight with Hector? Patr. Ay; and, perhaps, receive much honor by him.

Achil. I sce, my reputation is at stake;
My fame is shrewdly gor'd.

Patr.
O, then beware;
Those wounds heal ill, that men do give themselves:
Omission to do what is necessary

Seals a commission to a blank of danger;
And danger, like an ague, subtly taints
Even then when we sit idly in the sun.

Achil. Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus:
I'll send the fool to Ajax, and desire him
To invite the Trojan lords after the combat,
To see us here unarm'd: I have a woman's longing,
An appetite that I am sick withal,
To see great Hector in his weeds of peace;
To talk with him, and to behold his visage,
Even to my full of view. A labor sav'd!
Enter THERSITES.

Ther. A wonder!
Achil. What?

Ther. Ajax goes up and down the field, asking for himself.

Achil. How so?

The descent of the deities to combat on either side. • Polyxena. • Friend.

Ther. He must fight singly to-morrow with Hector; and is so prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling, that he raves in saying nothing.

Achil. How can that be?

Ther. Why, he stalks up and down like a peacock, a stride, and a stand: ruminates, like an hostess, that hath no arithmetic but her brain to set down her reckoning: bites his lip with a politic regard, as who should say-there were wit in this head, an 'twould out; and so there is; but it lies as coldly in him as fire in a flint, which will not show without knocking. The man's undone for ever; for if Hector break not his neck i' the combat, he'll break it himself in vain glory. He knows not me: I said, Goodmorrow, Ajax; and he replies, Thanks, Agamemnon. What think you of this man, that takes me for the general? He has grown a very land-fish, languageless, a monster. A plague of opinion! a man may wear it on both sides, like a leather jerkin.

Achil. Thou must be my ambassador to him, Thersites.

Ther. Who, I why, he'll answer nobody; he professes not answering; speaking is for beggars; he wears his tongue in his arms. I will put on his presence; let Patroclus make demands to me, you shall see the pageant of Ajax.

Achil. To him, Patroclus: Tell him,-I humbly desire the valiant Ajax, to invite the most valorous Hector to come unarmed to my tent; and to procure safe conduct for his person, of the magnanimous, and most illustrious, six-or-seven-times honored captaingeneral of the Grecian army, Agamemnon. Do this. Patr. Jove bless great Ajax! Ther. Humph!

Patr. What say you to't?

Ther. God be wi' you, with all my heart.
Patr. Your answer, sir.

Ther. If to-morrow be a fair day, by eleven o'clock it will go one way or other; howsoever, he shall pay for me ere he has me.

Patr. Your answer, sir.

Ther. Fare you well, with all my heart.

Achil. Why, but he is not in this tune, is he? Ther. No, but he's out o' tune thus. What music will be in him when Hector has knock'd out his brains, I know not: But, I am sure, none; unless the fiddler Apollo get his sinews to make catlings' on. Achil. Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him straight.

Ther. Let me bear another to his horse; for that's the more capable' creature.

Achil. My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirr'd; And I myself see not the bottom of it.

[Exeunt ACHILLES and PATROCLUS. Ther. 'Would the fountain of your mind were clear again, that I might water an ass at it! I had rather be a tick in a sheep, than such a valiant ignorance. [Exit.

ACT IV.

SCENE I.-Troy. A Street. Enter, at one side, ENEAS and Servant, with a Torch; at the other, PARIS, DEIPHOBUS, ANTENOR, DIOMEDEs, and others, with Torches. Par. See, ho! who's that there? Dei.

"Tis the lord Encas.
Ene. Is the prince there in person?—
Had I so good occasion to lie long,
As you, prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business
Should rob my bed-mate of my company.

Dio. That's my mind too.-Good morrow,
Æneas.

lord

Par. A valiant Greek, Eneas; take his hand : Witness the process of your speech, wherein You told-how Diomed, a whole week by days, Did haunt you in the field. Ene. Health to you, valiant sir, During all question of the gentle truce: But when I meet you arm'd, as black defiance, As heart can think, or courage execute.

Dio. The one and other Diomed embraces. Our bloods are now in calm; and, so long, health: But when contention and occasion meet, By Jove, I'll play the hunter for thy life, With all my force, pursuit, and policy.

Ene. And thou shalt hunt a lion that will fly With his face backward.-In humane gentleness, Welcome to Troy! now, by Anchises' life, Welcome, indeed! By Venus' hand I swear, No man alive can love, in such a sort, The thing he means to kill, more excellently. Dio. We sympathize:-Jove, let Æneas live, • Conversation.

If to my sword his fate be not the glory,
A thousand complete courses of the sun!
But, in mine emulous honor, let him die,
With every joint a wound: and that to-morrow!
Ene. We know each other well.

Dio. We do; and long to know each other worse. Par. This is the most despiteful gentle greeting, The noblest hateful love, that e'er I heard of.What business, lord, so early?

Ene. I was sent for to the king; but why, I

To Calchas' house; and there to render him,
For the enfreed Antenor, the fair Cressid:
Let's have your company: or, if you please,
Haste there before us: I constantly do think,
(Or, rather, call my thought a certain knowledge,)
My brother Troilus lodges there to-night;
Rouse him, and give him note of our approach,
With the whole quality wherefore: I fear
We shall be much unwelcome.
Ene.
That I assure you;
Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece,
Than Cressid borne from Troy.
Par.

There is no help;

He merits well to have her, that doth seek her
(Not making any scruple of her soilure)
With such a hell of pain, and world of charge:
And you as well to keep her, that defend her
(Not palating the taste of her dishonor)
With such a costly loss of wealth and friends:
He, like a puling cuckold, would drink up
The lees and dregs of a flat tamed piece;

You, like a lecher, out of whorish loins
Are pleas'd to breed out your inheritors:

Pan. To do what? to do what?-let her say what; what have I brought you to do? Cres. Come, come; beshrew your heart! you'll ne'er be good,

Nor suffer others.

Pan. Ha, ha! Alas, poor wretch! a poor ca pocchia!-hast not slept to-night? would he not, a naughty man, let it sleep? a bugbear take him! [Knocking.

Cres. Did I not tell you?-'would he were knock'd o' the head!

Who's that at door? good uncle, go and seeMy lord, come you again into my chamber:

Both merits pois'd, each weighs nor less nor more; You smile, and mock me, as if I meant naughtily. But he as he, the heavier for a whore.

Par. You are too bitter to your countrywoman. Dio. She's bitter to her country: Hear me, Paris,

For every false drop in her bawdy veins

A Grecian's life hath sunk; for every scruple
Of her contaminated carrion weight,

A Trojan hath been slain: since she could speak,
She hath not given so many good words breath,
As for her Greeks and Trojans suffer'd death.

Par. Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do, Dispraise the thing that you desire to buy: But we in silence hold this virtue well,We'll not commend what we intend to sell. Here lies our way.

[Exeunt.

Enter PANDARUS.

Tro. Ha, ha!

thing.

Cres. Come, you are deceiv'd, I think of no such [Knocking. How earnestly they knock! pray you, come in; I would not for half Troy have you seen here. [Exeunt TROILUS and CRESSIDA. Pan. [Going to the door.] Who's there? what's the matter? will you beat down the door? How now what's the matter?

Enter ENEAS.

Ene. Good morrow, lord, good morrow.

Pan. Who's there? my lord Æneas? By my troth, I knew you not: what news with you so early?

Ene. Is not prince Troilus here?

Pan. Here! what should he do here?

Ene. Come, he is here, my lord, do not deny him; It doth import him much to speak with me.

Pan. Is he here, say you? 'tis more than I know, I'll be sworn:-For my own part, I came in late: What should he do here?

Ene. Who!-nay, then :

Come, come, you'll do him wrong ere you are 'ware:
You'll be so true to him, to be false to him:
Do not you know of him, yet go fetch him hither;
Go.

As PANDARUS is going out, enter TROILUS.
Tro. How now? what's the matter?
Ene. My lord, I scarce have leisure to salute you,
My matter is so rash: There is at hand
The Grecian Diomed, and our Antenor
Paris your brother, and Deiphobus,
Deliver'd to us; and for him forthwith,

We must give up to Diomedes' hand
Ere the first sacrifice within this hour,
The lady Cressida.

Tro.
Is it so concluded?
Ene. By Priam, and the general state of Troy;
They are at hand, and ready to effect it.

Tro. How my achievements mock me! I will go meet them: and, my lord Eneas, We met by chance; you did not find me here. Ene. Good, good, my lord; the secrets of nature Have not more gift in taciturnity.

[Exeunt TROILUS and ENEAS. Pan. Is't possible? no sooner got, but lost? The devil take Antenor! the young prince will go mad.

Cres. A pestilence on him! now will he be A plague upon Antenor, I would they had broke's

mocking;

I shall have such a life,

Pan. How now, how now! how go maidenheads?

-Here, you maid! where's my cousin Cressid? Cres. Go hang yourself, you naughty mocking uncle!

You bring me to do,' and then you flout me too. • Noisy. To do is here used in a wanton sense.

neck!

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