King Lear, William Shakespeare [good book recommendations TXT] 📗

outward worth. Doctor

There is means, madam:
Our foster-nurse of nature is repose,
The which he lacks; that to provoke in him,
Are many simples operative, whose power
Will close the eye of anguish.

Cordelia

All blest secrets,
All you unpublish’d virtues of the earth,
Spring with my tears! be aidant and remediate
In the good man’s distress! Seek, seek for him;
Lest his ungovern’d rage dissolve the life
That wants the means to lead it.

Enter a Messenger. Messenger

News, madam;
The British powers are marching hitherward.

Cordelia

’Tis known before; our preparation stands
In expectation of them. O dear father,
It is thy business that I go about;
Therefore great France
My mourning and important tears hath pitied.
No blown ambition doth our arms incite,
But love, dear love, and our aged father’s right:
Soon may I hear and see him! Exeunt.

Scene V

Gloucester’s castle.

Enter Regan and Oswald. Regan But are my brother’s powers set forth? Oswald Ay, madam. Regan Himself in person there? Oswald Madam, with much ado: Your sister is the better soldier. Regan Lord Edmund spake not with your lord at home? Oswald No, madam. Regan What might import my sister’s letter to him? Oswald I know not, lady. Regan

’Faith, he is posted hence on serious matter.
It was great ignorance, Gloucester’s eyes being out,
To let him live: where he arrives he moves
All hearts against us: Edmund, I think, is gone,
In pity of his misery, to dispatch
His nighted life: moreover, to descry
The strength o’ the enemy.

Oswald I must needs after him, madam, with my letter. Regan

Our troops set forth to-morrow: stay with us;
The ways are dangerous.

Oswald

I may not, madam:
My lady charged my duty in this business.

Regan

Why should she write to Edmund? Might not you
Transport her purposes by word? Belike,
Something⁠—I know not what: I’ll love thee much,
Let me unseal the letter.

Oswald

Madam, I had rather⁠—

Regan

I know your lady does not love her husband;
I am sure of that: and at her late being here
She gave strange oeillades and most speaking looks
To noble Edmund. I know you are of her bosom.

Oswald

I, madam?

Regan

I speak in understanding; you are; I know’t:
Therefore I do advise you, take this note:
My lord is dead; Edmund and I have talk’d;
And more convenient is he for my hand
Than for your lady’s: you may gather more.
If you do find him, pray you, give him this;
And when your mistress hears thus much from you,
I pray, desire her call her wisdom to her.
So, fare you well.
If you do chance to hear of that blind traitor,
Preferment falls on him that cuts him off.

Oswald

Would I could meet him, madam! I should show
What party I do follow.

Regan

Fare thee well. Exeunt.

Scene VI

Fields near Dover.

Enter Gloucester, and Edgar dressed like a peasant. Gloucester When shall we come to the top of that same hill? Edgar You do climb up it now: look, how we labour. Gloucester Methinks the ground is even. Edgar Horrible steep. Hark, do you hear the sea? Gloucester No, truly. Edgar

Why, then, your other senses grow imperfect
By your eyes’ anguish.

Gloucester

So may it be, indeed:
Methinks thy voice is alter’d; and thou speak’st
In better phrase and matter than thou didst.

Edgar

You’re much deceived: in nothing am I changed
But in my garments.

Gloucester

Methinks you’re better spoken.

Edgar

Come on, sir; here’s the place: stand still. How fearful
And dizzy ’tis, to cast one’s eyes so low!
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles: half way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade!
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head:
The fishermen, that walk upon the beach,
Appear like mice; and yond tall anchoring bark,
Diminish’d to her cock; her cock, a buoy
Almost too small for sight: the murmuring surge,
That on the unnumber’d idle pebbles chafes,
Cannot be heard so high. I’ll look no more;
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.

Gloucester

Set me where you stand.

Edgar

Give me your hand: you are now within a foot
Of the extreme verge: for all beneath the moon
Would I not leap upright.

Gloucester

Let go my hand.
Here, friend, ’s another purse; in it a jewel
Well worth a poor man’s taking: fairies and gods
Prosper it with thee! Go thou farther off;
Bid me farewell, and let me hear thee going.

Edgar Now fare you well, good sir. Gloucester With all my heart. Edgar Why I do trifle thus with his despair Is done to cure it. Gloucester

Kneeling. O you mighty gods!
This world I do renounce, and, in your sights,
Shake patiently my great affliction off:
If I could bear it longer, and not fall
To quarrel with your great opposeless wills,
My snuff and loathed part of nature should
Burn itself out. If Edgar live, O, bless him!
Now, fellow, fare thee well. He falls forward.

Edgar

Gone, sir: farewell.
And yet I know not how conceit may rob
The treasury of life, when life itself
Yields to the theft: had he been where he thought,
By this, had thought been past. Alive or dead?
Ho, you sir! friend! Hear you, sir! speak!
Thus might he pass indeed: yet he revives.
What are you, sir?

Gloucester

Away, and let me die.

Edgar

Hadst thou been aught but gossamer, feathers, air,
So many fathom down precipitating,
Thou’dst shiver’d like an egg: but thou dost breathe;
Hast heavy substance; bleed’st not; speak’st; art sound.
Ten masts at each make not the altitude
Which thou hast perpendicularly fell:
Thy life’s a miracle. Speak yet again.

Gloucester

But have I fall’n, or no?

Edgar

From the dread summit of this chalky bourn.
Look up a-height; the shrill-gorged lark so far
Cannot be seen or heard: do but look up.

Gloucester

Alack, I have no eyes.
Is wretchedness deprived that benefit,
To end itself by death? ’Twas yet some comfort,
When misery could beguile the tyrant’s rage,
And frustrate his proud will.

Edgar Give me your arm: Up: so. How is ’t? Feel you your legs? You stand. Gloucester Too well, too well. Edgar

This is above all strangeness.
Upon the crown o’ the cliff, what thing was that
Which parted from you?

Gloucester

A poor unfortunate beggar.

Edgar

As I stood here below, methought his eyes
Were two full moons;