FROM OTHELLO.

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made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.

OTHELLO'S ACCOUNT OF HIS COURTSHIP OF DESDEMONA.

Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors,1

My very noble and approved good masters,—

That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter,

It is most true; true, I have married her;

The very head and front of my offending

Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech,
And little bless'd with the set phrase of peace;
For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith,
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used
Their dearest action in the tented field;
And little of this great world can I speak,

More than pertains to feats of broil and battle;

And therefore little shall I grace my cause,

In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience,
I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver

Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms,
What conjuration, and what mighty magic,

(For such proceeding I am charged withal),
I won his daughter with.

Her father loved me; oft invited me;
Still question'd me the story of my life,

From year to year; the battles, sieges, fortunes,
That I have pass'd.

I ran it through, even from my boyish days,
To the very moment that he bade me tell it.
Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances,

Of moving accidents by flood, and field;

Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly breach;
Of being taken by the insolent foe,

And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence,

And portance in my travel's history:

Wherein of antres3 vast, and deserts idle,

Rough quarries, rocks, and hills, whose heads touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak;-such was the process;

And of the cannibals that each other eat,

The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads

Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to hear,

1 The Venetian senate, before whom the defence is made.

2 Conduct, behaviour.

3 Caves. Lat. antrum.

Tales of these were common in the books of travels of the time, in Mandeville and Raleigh.

Would Desdemona seriously incline:

But still the house affairs would draw her thence ;
Which ever as she could with haste despatch,
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my discourse: which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour, and found good means
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart,
That I would all my pilgrimage dilate,
Whereof by parcels she had something heard,
But not intentively. I did consent;
And often did beguile her of her tears,
When I did speak of some distressful stroke,
That my youth suffer'd. My story being done,

She gave me for my pains a world of sighs:

She swore-In faith, 'twas strange, 'twas passing strange; 'Twas pitiful, 'twas wondrous pitiful:

She wish'd she had not heard it; yet she wish'd

That Heaven had made her such a man: she thank'd me;

And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her,

I should but teach him how to tell my story,

And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I spake:

She loved me for the dangers I had pass'd;

And I loved her, that she did pity them.

This only is the witchcraft I have used.

Act v. Scene 2.

OTHELLO'S SOLILOQUY BEFORE HE MURDERS HIS WIFE.
Desdemona discovered asleep; enter Othello.

It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul,—
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars!
It is the cause.-Yet I'll not shed her blood;
Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow,
And smooth as monumental alabaster.
Yet she must die, else she'll betray more men.
Put out the light, and then-put out the light?
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore,
Should I repent me:-but once put out thine,
Thou cunningest pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat,
That can thy light relume.

When I have pluck'd thy rose,

I cannot give it vital growth again,

Not in a consecutive story.

The abruptness of this commencement, denoting it to be the sudden thinking aloud of a mind in a tumult of horrible emotions, is finely conceived. "It is the cause of what I am about to do, not the action itself, that thus racks my soul." Compare the states of mind represented by Shakespeare in Macbeth, Act I. Sc. 3, and in Brutus, Julius Caesar, Act II. Sc. I.

FROM KING LEAR.

It needs must wither:-I'll smell it on the tree;

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[Kissing her.

Oh balmy breath, that dost almost persuade
Justice to break her sword!-One more, one more.-
Be thus when thou art dead, and I will kill thee,
And love thee after :-One more, and that's the last :
So sweet was ne'er so fatal. I must weep,

But they are cruel1 tears. This sorrow's heavenly;2
It strikes, where it doth love.

FROM KING LEAR.

Act III. Scene 2.

LEAR IN THE STORM.

A heath.-Lear, Kent, the Fool.

Lear. No, I will be the pattern of all patience,
I will say nothing.

*

*

*

Kent. Alas, Sir, are you here? Things that love night,
Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies
Gallow3 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.

The affliction, nor the fear.

Lear.

Man's nature cannot carry

Let the great gods,

That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads,

Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch,
That hast within thee undivulgéd crimes,

Unwhipp'd of justice. Hide thee, thou bloody hand;
Thou perjured, and thou simular man of virtue,
That art incestuous: caitiff, to pieces shake,
That under covert and convenient seeming

Hast practised on man's life!-close pent-up guilts,
Rive your concealing continents, and cry

These dreadful summoners grace.-I am a man
More sinned against than sinning.

Kent.

Alack, bare-headed!

Gracious my Lord, hard by here is a hovel;

1 Cruel to others, if they should cause me to yield and spare her to "betray more men:" or cruel because I am compelled to weep while about to perform a cruel

action.

"This tenderness, with which I lament the punishment which justice compels me to inflict, is a holy passion."-Johnson. The reference is to Heb. xii. 6, "Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth.

"A west-country word signifying to scare or frighten."-Warburton.

♦ Coverings.

Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest;
Repose you there; while I to this hard house,1
(More hard than is the stone whereof 'tis raised;
Which even but now, demanding after you,
Denied me to come in), return, and force

Their scanted courtesy.

Lear.

My wits begin to turn.—

Come on, my boy. How dost, my boy? art cold?
I am cold myself.-Where is this straw, my fellow?

The art of our necessities is strange,

[To Kent.2

That can make vile things precious. Come, your hovel.
Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart
That's sorry yet for thee.

Act III. Scene 4.

Kent. Here is the place, my lord; good my lord, enter: The tyranny of the open night's too rough

For nature to endure.

Lear.

[Storm still.

Let me alone.

Wilt break my heart?

Kent. Good my lord, enter here.
Lear.

Kent. I'd rather break mine own. Good my lord, enter.
Lear. Thou thinkest 'tis much that this contentious storm

Invades us to the skin; so 'tis to thee;

But where the greater malady is fixed,

The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'dst shun a bear;

But if thy flight lay toward the raging sea,

Thou'dst meet the bear i' the mouth. When the mind's free,

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 :

In such a night as this! O Regan, Goneril !—
Your old kind father, whose frank heart gave all,—
O, that way madness lies; let me shun that;
No more of that,—

Kent.

Good my lord, enter here.

Lear. Pr'ythee, go in thyself;

seek thine own ease;

This tempest will not give me leave to ponder

On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in:

In, boy; go first.-[To the Fool.] You houseless poverty,— Nay, get thee in. I'll pray, and then I'll sleep.

1 The palace of Lear's daughters. Servant: knabe (German), a boy.

[Fool goes in.

* Kent is disguised as Lear's attendant.

FROM KING LEAR.

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads, and unfed sides,
Your looped and windowed raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O! I have ta'en
Too little care of this.1 Take physic, pomp;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel;
That thou mayest shake the superflux2 to them,
And show the heavens more just.

Act v. Scene 3.

DEATH OF LEAR.

Albany, Kent, Edgar, Officer, etc.

Enter Lear, with Cordelia3 dead in his arms.

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Lear. Howl, howl, howl, howl!-O, you are men of stone;
Had I your tongues and eyes, I'd use them so

That heaven's vault should crack:-She's gone for ever!
I know when one is dead, and when one lives;
She's dead as earth.-Lend me a looking-glass;

If that her breath will mist or stain the stone,
Why, then she lives.

Kent.

Is this the promised end?

Edg. Or image of that horror?
Alb.

Fall, and cease!*

Lear. This feather stirs ; she lives! if it be so,
It is a chance that does redeem all sorrows

That ever I have felt.

Kent.

O my good master!

[Kneeling.

Lear. Pr'ythee, away.

'Tis noble Kent, your friend.

Edg.

Lear. A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all!
I might have saved her; now she's gone for ever!-
Cordelia, Cordelia, stay a little. Ha!

What is't thou sayest?-Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle, and low, an excellent thing in woman.
I kill'd the slave that was a-hanging thee.
Gentleman. 'Tis true, my lords, he did.

Lear.

Did I not, fellow?

I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion

I would have made them skip: I am old now,
And these same crosses spoil me. Who are you?

Mine eyes are none o' the best :—I'll tell you straight.

1 Have too little regarded this when I had the power of a king. 2 Superfluity.

His youngest daughter, who had been put to death by the orders of the traitor Edmund.

Looking on Lear's ineffectual efforts to restore his daughter, he says, "Rather fall and cease to be at once, than continue in existence only to be wretched."Steevens.