UNKINDNESS. Thy sister's naught: 0 Regan, she hath tied Sharp-tooth'd unkindness, like a vulture here. [Points to his heart. OFFENCES MISTAKEN. All's not offence, that indiscretion finds, And dotage terms so. RISING PASSION. THE NECESSARIES OF LIFE FEW. LEAR ON THE INGRATITUDE OF HIS DAUGHTERS. old man, As full of grief as age; wretched in both! If it be you that stir these daughters' hearts Against their father, fool me not so much To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger! 0, let not women's weapons, water-drops, Stain my man's cheeks.-No, you unnatural hags, I will have such revenges on you both, * Swelling. That all the world shall—I will do such things,- WILFUL MEN. O, sir, to wilful men, The injuries, that they themselves procure, Must be their schoolmasters. ACT III. Gent. Contending with the fretful element: ON MAN Is man no more than this ? Consider him well: Thou owest the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no wool, the cat no perfume :-Ha! here's three of us are sophisticated ?—Thou art the thing itself: unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor, bare, forked animal as thou art.-Off, off, you lendings. * Whose dags are drawu dry by its young. [cocks ! Blow, wind, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the You sulphurous and thought-executing* fires Vaunt-courierst to oak-cleaving thunderbolts, Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder, Strike flat the thick rotundity o' the world! Crack nature's moulds, all germens spill at once, That make ingrateful man! * * Rumble thy bellyfull! Spit, fire! spout, rain! * # † Avant couriers, French. * Quick as thought. Obedience. Kent. Alas, sir, are you here? things that love night, Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies Gallow* the very wanderers of the dark, And make them keep their caves: Since I was man, Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder, Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never Remember to have heard: man's nature cannot carry The affliction, nor the fear. Lear. Let the great gods, That keep this dreadful pother t o'er our heads, Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, That hast within thee undivulged crimes, Unwhipp'd of justice: Hide thee, thou bloody hand; Thou perjur'd, and thou simular $ man of virtue That art incestuous: Caitiff, to pieces shake, That under covert and convenient seeming $ Hast practis'd on man's life !~Close pent-up guilts, Rive your concealing continents, and cry These dreadful summoners gracell.-I am a man, More sinn'd against, than sinning. Kent. Alack, bare-headed !, Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel; Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest. Lear. Thou think'st'tis much, that this contentious Invades us to the skin : so 'tis to thee; (storm But where the greater malady is fix'd, The lesser is scarce felt. Thou’dst shun a bear: But if thy flight lay towards the raging sea, [free, Thou’dst meet the bear i'the mouth. When the mind's The body's delicate: the tempest in my mind Doth from my senses take all feeling else, Save what beats there.- Filial ingratitude ! Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand, For lifting food to't?—But I will punish home:No, I will weep no more. .-In such a night To shut me out! Pour on; I will endure: * Scare or frighten. Appearance. + Blastering noise. # Counterfeit. In such a night as this ! O Regan, Goneril! Kent. Good my lord, enter here. [Fool goes in. Poor naked wretches, whereso'er you are, That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, How shall your houseless heads, and unfed sides, Your loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you From seasons such as these? O, I have ta'en Too little care of this! Take physic, pomp; Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel; That thou may'st shake the superflux to them, And show the heavens more just. Enter EDGAR, disguised as a Madman. Edg. Away! the foul fiend follows me!Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind. Humph! go to thy cold bed, and warm thee. Lear. Hast thou given all to thy two daughters ! And art thou come to this? Now, all the plagues that in the pendulous air, Hang fated o'er men's faults, light on thy daughters ! Kent. He hath no daughters, sir. [nature Lear. Death, traitor! nothing could have subdu'd To such a lowness, but his unkind daughters.Is it the fashion, that discarded fathers Should have thus little mercy on their flesh? Judicious punishment! 'twas this flesh begot Those pelican daughters. CC |