this murder had not come into my mind:
but, taking note of thy abhorr'd aspèct,
finding thee fit for bloody villany,

apt, liable to be employed in danger,

I faintly broke with thee of Arthur's death;
and thou, to be endearéd to a king,

made it no conscience to destroy a prince.

Hub. My lord,—

621 K.J. Hadst thou but shook thy head, or made a pause, when I spake darkly what I purposéd;

or turn'd an eye of doubt upon my face,

as bid me tell my tale in express words;

deep shame had struck me dumb, made me break off,
and those thy fears might have wrought fears in me:
but thou didst understand me by my signs,
and didst in signs again parley with sin;

yea, without stop, didst let thy heart consent,

and consequently thy rude hand to act

the deed, which both our tongues held vile to name.—
Out of my sight, and never see me more!

my nobles leave me; and my state is braved,
even at my gates, with ranks of foreign powers;
nay, in the body of this fleshly land,

this kingdom, this confíne of blood and breath,
hostility and civil tumult reigns

between my conscience and my cousin's death.
622 Hub. Arm you against your other enemies,
I'll make a peace between your soul and you.
Young Arthur is alive: this hand of mine
is yet a maiden and an innocent hand,
not painted with the crimson spots of blood.
Within this bosom never enter'd yet

the dreadful motion of a murderous thought;
and you have slandered nature in my form,
which, howsoever rude exteriorly,

is yet the cover of a fairer mind,

than to be butcher of an innocent child.

K.J. Doth Arthur live? O, haste thee to the peers,
throw this report on their incensed rage,
and make them tame to their obedience!
Forgive the comment that my passion made
upon thy feature; for my rage was blind.

W. SHAKESPEARE

URE I am mortal,

the daughter of a shepherd; he was mortal, and she that bore me mortal: prick my hand,

and it will bleed; a fever shakes me, and

the selfsame wind that makes the young lambs shrink makes me a-cold: my fear says I am mortal.

Yet I have heard, (my mother told it me,

and now I do believe it,) if I keep

my virgin-flower uncropt, pure, chaste, and fair,

no goblin, wood-god, fairy, elf, or fiend,

satyr, or other power that haunts the groves,

shall hurt my body, or by vain illusion
draw me to wander after idle fires;
or voices calling me in dead of night,
to make me follow, and so tole me on,

through mire and standing pools, to find my ruin.

J. FLETCHER

624 WAR NOT A GAME TO BE PLAYED AT BY PRINCES

625

GRE

REAT princes have great playthings. Some have played

at hewing mountains into men, and some

at building human wonders mountain-high.
Some have amused the dull sad years of life,
life spent in indolence and therefore sad,
with schemes of monumental fame: and sought
by pyramid and mausolean pomp

shortlived themselves, t' immortalize their bones.
Some seek diversion in the tented field

and make the sorrows of mankind their sport.
But war's a game which, were their subjects wise,
kings would not play at. Nations would do well
to extort their truncheons from the puny hands
of heroes whose infirm and baby minds
are gratified with mischief: and who spoil,
because men suffer it, their toy the World.

WHY

ANTONY

WHY was I framed with this plain honest heart, which knows not to disguise its griefs and weakness,

626

627

but bears its workings outward to the world?
I should have kept the mighty anguish in,
and forced a smile at Cleopatra's falsehood:
Octavia had believed it, and had stay'd;
but I am made a shallow-forded stream,
seen to the bottom: all my clearness scorned,
and all my faults exposed!-See where he comes,
who has profaned the sacred name of friend,
and worn it into vileness!

With how secure a brow and specious form

he guilds the secret villain! Sure that face

was meant for honesty: but heaven mismatched it,
and furnished treason out with Nature's pomp,
to make its work more easy.

J. DRYDEN

WALLENSTEIN TO MAX. PICCOLOMINI

T that time did I take thee in my arms,

AT

and with thy mantle did I cover thee:

I was thy nurse: no woman could have been
a kinder to thee: I was not ashamed

to do for thee all little offices,

however strange to me: I tended thee

till life returned; and when thine eyes first opened,
I had thee in my arms. Since then, when have I
altered my feelings towards thee? Many thousands
have I made rich, presented them with lands;
rewarded them with dignities and honours;
thee have I loved: my heart, myself, I gave

to thee! They all were aliens: thou wert

our child and inmate. Max.! thou canst not leave me; it cannot be; I may not, will not think

that Max. can leave me.

HE

S. T. COLERIDGE from Schiller

PROMETHEUS

E told the hidden power of herbs and springs, and Disease drank and slept.

sleep.

Death grew like

He taught the implicated orbits woven

of the wide-wandering stars; and how the sun
changes his lair, and by secret spell

the pale moon is transformed, when her broad eye
gazes not on the interlunar sea:

he taught to rule, as life directs the limbs,

the tempest-wingéd chariots of the ocean,

and the Celt knew the Indian. Cities then

were built and through their snow-like columns flowed

the warm winds, and the azure æther shone,

and the blue sea and shadowy hills were seen.
Such, the alleviations of his state,

Prometheus gave to man, for which he hangs
withering in destined pain.

P. B. SHELLEY

628 LADY MACBETH AFter reading HER HUSBAND'S

629

G

LETTER

LAMIS thou art and Cawdor; and shalt be

what thou art promised:-yet do I fear thy nature;

it is too full o' the milk o' human kindness

to catch the nearest way: thou would'st be great, art not without ambition; but without

the illness should attend it: what thou would'st highly,

that would'st thou holily; would'st not play false,
and yet would'st wrongly win: thou'dst have, great
Glamis,

that which cries, Thus thou must do, if thou have it;
and that which rather thou dost fear to do,
than wishest should be undone. Hie thee hither,
that I may pour my spirits in thine ear;
and chastise with the valour of my tongue
all that impedes thee from the golden round,
which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem
to have thee crown'd withal.

W. SHAKESPEARE

PIERRE TO JAFFIER

URSE thy dull stars, and the worse fate of Venice,

where there's no trust, no truth; where innocence
stoops under vile oppression; and vice lords it.
Hadst thou but seen, as I did, how at last
thy beauteous Belvidera, like a wretch

that's doomed to banishment, came weeping forth,
shining through tears, like April-suns in showers

that labour to o'ercome the cloud that loads 'em ;
whilst two young virgins, on whose arm she lean'd,
kindly look'd up, and at her grief grew sad,

as if they catched the sorrows that fell from her:
e'en the lewd rabble that were gathered round
to see the sight, stood mute when they beheld her;
govern'd their roaring throats, and grumbled pity:
I could have hugg'd the greasy rogues: they pleas'd

me.

T. OTWAY

630 TO HENRY WRIOTHESLY, Earl of southaMPTON Non fert vllum ictvm illæsa felicitas

H

E who hath never warr'd with misery,
nor ever tugg'd with fortune and distress,
hath had n'occasion, nor no field to try
the strength and forces of his worthiness:
those parts of judgment which felicity
keeps as conceal'd, affliction must express;
and only men show their abilities,

and what they are, in their extremities.
The world had never taken so full note

of what thou art, had'st thou not been undone;
and only thy affliction hath begot

more fame, than thy best fortunes could have done: for ever by adversity are wrought

the greatest works of admiration; and all the fair examples of renown out of distress and misery are grown. 631 Not to be unhappy is unhappiness, and misery not to have known misery: for the best way unto discretion, is the way that leads us by adversity: and men are better shewed what is amiss

by th' expert finger of calamity,

than they can be with all that fortune brings,

who never shows them the true face of things.

How could we know that thou could'st have endur'd,
with a reposéd cheer, wrong, and disgrace;
and with a heart and countenance assur'd,

have look'd stern death and horrour in the face!
How should we know thy soul hath been secur'd,
in honest counsels, and in way unbase;