To the fire i' the blood: be more abstemious,
Or else, good night, your vow!
Vanity of Human Nature.
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air :
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capp'd towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself;
Yea, all which it inherit shall dissolve;
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,*
Leave not a rack+ behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made of, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
Drunkards enchanted by Ariel.
I told you, sir, that they were red-hot with drink-
So full of valour, that they smote the air [ing.
For breathing in their faces; beat the ground
For kissing of their feet: yet always bending
Towards their project. Then I beat my tabor,
At which, like unback'd colts, they prick'd their ears,
Advanced their eyelids, lifted up their noses,
As they smelt music; so I charm'd their ears,
That, calf-like, they my lowing follow'd through
Tooth'd briers, sharp furzes, pricking goss, and
thorns,
Which enter'd their frail shins: at last I left them
I' the filthy mantled pool beyond your cell,
There dancing up to their chins.
Pray you tread softly, that the blind mole may not Hear a foot.
A body of clouds in motion; but it is most probable that the author wrote track.
His tears ran down his beard, like winter s drops From eaves* of reeds.
Compassion and Clemency superior to Revenge.
Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling
Of their afflictions? and shall not myself,
One of their kind, that relish all as sharply,
Passion as they, be kindlier moved than thou art?
Though with their high wrongs I am struck to the
quick,
Yet, with my nobler reason, 'gainst my fury,
Do I take part: the rarer action is
In virtue than in vengeance: they being penitent,
The sole drift of my purpose doth extend
Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes, and
groves,
And ye, that on the sands with printless foot
Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him
When he comes back; you demi-puppets, that
By moonshine do the green-sour ringlets make,
Whereof the ewe not bites; and you, whose pastime
Is to make midnight-mushrooms; that rejoice
To hear the solemn curfew; by whose aid
(Weak masters though you be) I have bedimm'd
The noon-tide sun, call'd forth the mutinous winds,
And 'twixt the green sea and the azured vault
Set roaring war; to the dread rattling thunder
Have I given fire, and rifted Jove's stout oak
With his own bolt: the strong-based promontory
Have I made shake; and by the spurs pluck'd up
The pine and cedar graves at my command
Have waked their sleepers; opened and let them
By my so potent art.
Senses returning.
The charm dissolves apace,
And as the morning steals upon the night,
Melting the darkness, so their rising senses
Begin to chase the ignorant fumes that mantle
Their clearer reason.-O my good Gonzalo,
My true preserver, and a loyal sir
To him thou follow'st: I will pay thy graces
Home, both in word and deed.-Most cruelly
Didst thou, Alonzo, use me and my daughter;
Thy brother was a furtherer in the act :-
Thou'rt pinch'd for't now, Sebastian.-Flesh and
blood,
You brother mine, that entertain'd ambition, Expell'd remorse* and nature; who, with Sebastian, (Whose inward pinches are most strong)
Would here have kill'd our king: I do forgive thee,
Unnatural though thou art! Their understanding
Begins to swell; and the approaching tide
Will shortly fill the reasonable shores,
That now lie foul and muddy. Not one of them,
That yet looks on me, or would know me.
Where the bee sucks, there suck I;
In a cowslips's bell I lie;
There I crouch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly,
After summer, merrily:
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now,
Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.
*Pity, or tenderness of heart.
If music be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken and so die,-
That strain again; it had a dying fall :
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing, and giving odour.
Natural Affection allied to Love.
O, she that hath a heart of that fine frame,
To pay this debt of love but to a brother,
How will she love, when the rich golden shaft,
Hath killed the flock of all affections else
That live in her ! when liver, brain, and heart,
These sovereign thrones, are all supplied, and
(Her sweet perfections) with one self king.
I saw your brother,
Most provident in peril, bind himself
(Courage and hope both teaching him the practice)
To a strong mast that lived upon the sea;
Where, like Arion on the dolphin's back,
I saw him hold acquaintance with the wave,
So long as I could see.
Dear lad, believe it ;
For they shall yet belie thy happy years
That say, thou art a man: Diana's lip
Is not more smooth and rubious; thy small pipe
Is, as the maiden's organ, shrill and sound,
And all is semblative a woman's part.
Determined Love.
Oli. Why, what would you?
Vio. Make me a willow cabin at your gate, And call upon my soul within the house; Write loyal cantons* of contemned love, And sing them loud even in the dead of night; Holla your name to the reverbrate hills, And make the babbling gossip of the air Cry out, Olivia ! O, you should not rest Between the elements of air and earth, But you should pity me.
Disguise, I see, thou art a wickedness,
Wherein the pregnant‡ enemy does much.
How easy is it for the proper false§
In women's waxen hearts to set their forms!
Alas, our frailty is the cause, not we;
For, such as we are made of, such we be.
True Love.
Come hither, boy; if ever thou shalt love,
In the sweet pangs of it remember me :
For, such as I am, all true lovers are ;
Unstaid and skittish in all motion else,
Save in the constant image of the creature
That is beloved.
The Woman should be youngest in Love
Too old, by heaven let still the woman take
An elder than herself; so wears she to him,
So sways she level in her husbands heart.
For, boy, however we do praise ourselves,
Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm,
*Cantos, verses.
Dextrous, ready fiend.
+ Echoing
§ Fair deceiver.
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