Senate sitting. Enter ALCIBIADES, attended. 2 Var. Serv. No matter what; he's poor, and SCENE V. The same. The Senate House. The that's revenge enough. Who can speak broader than he that has no house to put his head in? such may rail against great buildings. Enter SERVILIUS. Tit. O, here's Servilius; now we shall know some answer. Ser. If I might beseech you, gentlemen, to repair some other hour, I should derive much from it: for, take it on my soul, my lord leans wondrously to discontent. His comfortable temper has forsook him; he is much out of health, and keeps his chamber. Luc. Serv. Many do keep their chambers, are not sick : And, if it be so far beyond his health, Ser. Good gods! Tit. We cannot take this for an answer, sir. Flam. [Within.] Servilius, help!-my lord! my lord! Enter TIMON, in a rage; FLAMINIUS following. Tim. What, are my doors oppos'd against my passage? Have I been ever free, and must my house The place which I have feasted, does it now, Tit. My lord, here is my bill. Luc. Serv. Here's mine. Phi. All our bills. 1 Sen. My lord, you have my voice to it; the fault's Bloody; 'tis necessary he should die : senate! 1 Sen. Now, captain? Alcib. I am an humble suitor to your virtues; Nor did he soil the fact with cowardice, And with such sober and unnoted passion 1 Sen. You undergo too strict a paradox, Striving to make an ugly deed look fair: Your words have took such pains, as if they labour'd To bring manslaughter into form, set quarrelling Is valour misbegot, and came into the world Tim. Knock me down with 'em: cleave me to The worst that man can breathe; and make his the girdle. Luc. Serv. Alas! my lord,- Tim. Cut my heart in sums. Tit. Mine fifty talents. Tim. Tell out my blood. Alcib. My lord, 1 Sen. You cannot make gross sins look clear; To revenge is no valour, but to bear. Alcib. My lords, then, under favour, pardon me, If I speak like a captain. Why do fond men expose themselves to battle, And th' ass more captain than the lion; the felon, If wisdom be in suffering. O my lords, As you are great, be pitifully good: Who cannot condemn rashness in cold blood? But, in defence, by mercy,10 'tis most just. But who is man, that is not angry? 2 Sen. You breathe in vain. In vain! his service done And with such sober and unnoted passion 5 You undertake a paradox too hard. 7 What do we, or what have we to do in the field?9 The old copy reads fellow. The alteration was made at Johnson's suggestion, perhaps without necessity. Fellow is a common term of contempt. 9 Gust here means rashness. We still say, 'it was done in a gust of passion.' 10 i. e. I cali mercy herself to witness' 202 At Lacedæmon, and Byzantium, 1 Sen. What's that? TIMON OF ATHENS. Alcib. Why, I say, my lords, h'as done fair ser- And slain in fight many of your enemies : In the last conflict, and made plenteous wounds? Alcib. Hard fate! he might have died in war. 1 Sen. We are for law, he dies; urge it no more, Alcib. Call me to your remembrances.3 3 Sen. What? Alcib. I cannot think, but your age has forgot me; 1 Sen. Alcib. Banish me? Banish your dotage; banish usury, That makes the senate ugly. 1 Sen. If after two days' shine, Athens contain thee, Attend our weighter judgment. And, not to swell our spirit, He shall be executed presently. [Exeunt Senators. Alcib. Now the gods keep you old enough; that you may live Only in bone, that none may look on you! I am worse than mad: I have kept back their foes, 1 i. e. a man who practises riot as if he had made it an oath or duty. 2 He charges them obliquely with being usurers. Thus in a subsequent passage: banish usury, That makes the senate ugly.' SCENE VI.-A magnificent Room in Timon's 1 Lord. The good time of day to you, sir. 1 Lord. Upon that were my thoughts tiring, 2 Lord. It should not be, by the persuasion of his new feasting. 1 Lord. I should think so: He hath sent me an earnest inviting, which many my near occasions did urge me to put off; but he hath conjured me bo yond them, and I must needs appear. 2 Lord. In like manner was I in debt to my im portunate business, but he would not hear my exthat my provision was out. cuse. I am sorry, when he sent to borrow of me, 3 Remembrances is here used as a word of five sylla-i And lasting in her sad remembrance. 4 Base for dishonoured. 5 This, says Steevens, I believe, means 'not to put 1 Lord. I am sick of that grief too, as. I understand how all things go. 2 Lord. Every man here's so. What would he have borrowed of you? 1 Lord. A thousand pieces. 2 Lord. A thousand pieces! 1 Lord. What of you? 3 Lord. He sent to me, sir,-Here he comes. Enter TIMON, and Attendants. Tim. With all my heart, gentlemen both :-And how fare you? 1 Lord. Ever at the best, hearing well of your lordship. 2 Lord. The swallow follows not summer more willing, than we your lordship. Tim. [Aside.] Nor more willingly leaves winter; such summer-birds are men.-Gentlemen, our dinner will not recompense this long stay: feast your ears with the music awhile; if they will fare so harshly on the trumpet's sound: we shall to't pre sently. 1 Lord. I hope, it remains not unkindly with your lordship, that I returned you an empty mos senger. Tim. O, sir, let it not trouble you. 2 Lord. My noble lord, Tim. Ah, my good friend! what cheer? [The Banquet brought in. 2 Lord. My most honourable lord, I am e'en sick of shame, that, when your lordship this other day sent to me, I was so unfortunate a beggar. Tim. Think not on't, sir. 2 Lord. If you had sent but two hours before,Tim. Let it not cumber your better remembrance." -Come, bring in all together. 2 Lord. All covered dishes! 1 Lord. Royal cheer, I warrant you. 3 Lord. Doubt not that, if money, and the season can yield it. 2 Lord. How do you? What's the news? 3 Lord. Alcibiades is banished: Hear you of it? 12 Lord. Alcibiades banished! 3 Lord. 'Tis so, be sure of it. 1 Lord. How? how? 2 Lord. I pray you, upon what? Tim. My worthy friends, will you draw near? 3 Lord. I'll tell you more anon. Here's a noble feast toward." I think we might read with advantage: And not to quell our spirit.' e. not to repress or humble it. 6 To lay for hearts, is to endeavour to win the affections of the people. 7Upon that were my thoughts feeding or most anxiously employed.' 8 i. e. your good memory.' Shakspeare and his contemporaries often use the comparative for the positive or superlative. Thus in King John: Nay, but make haste the better foot before.' 9 i. e. near at hand, or in prospect. So in Romeo and Juliet:- 'We have a foolish trifling banquet towards.' 2 Lord. This is the old man still. 3 Lord. Will't hold? will't hold? ACT IV. SCENE I. Without the Walls of Athens. Enter TIMON. Tim, Each man to his stool, with that spur as he would to the lip of his mistress: your diet shall be in all places alike. Make not a city feast of it, to let the meat cool ere we can agree upon the first place: Sit, sit. The gods require our thanks. You great benefactors, sprinkle our society with thankfulness. For your own gifts, make yourselves praised: but reserve still to give, lest your deities be despised. Lend to each man enough, that one need not lend to another: for, were your godheads to borrow of men, men would forsake the gods. Make the meat be beloved, more than the man that gives it. Let Large-handed robbers your grave masters are, no assembly of twenty be without a score of villains: And pill by law: maid, to thy master's bed; If there sit twelve women at the table, let a dozen of Thy mistress is o' the brothel! son of sixteen, them be-as they are.-The rest of your lees, O gods, the senators of Athens, together with the common lag of people,-what is amiss in them, you gods, make suitable for destruction. For these my present friends,-as they are to me nothing, so in nothing bless them, and to nothing they are welcome. Uncover, dogs, and lap. Tim. Let me look back upon thee, O thou wall, [The dishes uncovered are full of warm water. Some speak. What does his lordship mean? Some other. I know not. Tim. May you a better feast never behold, water Is your perfection. This is Timon's last; Pluck the lin'd crutch from the old limping sire, With it beat out his brains! piety, and fear, Religion to the gods, peace, justice, truth, Domestic awe, night-rest, and neighbourhood, Instruction, manners, mysteries, and trades, Degrees, observances, customs, and laws, Decline to your confounding contraries, And yet confusion live!-Plagues, incident to men Your potent and infectious fevers heap On Athens, ripe for stroke! thou cold sciatica, Cripple our senators, that their limbs may halt As lamely as their manners! lust and liberty!" Creep in the minds and marrows of our youth; That 'gainst the stream of virtue they may strive, And drown themselves in riot! itches, blains, Sow all the Athenian bosoms; and their crop [Throwing water in their faces. Be general leprosy! breath infect breath; Your reeking villany. Live loath'd, and long, That their society, as their friendship, may Most smiling, smooth, detested parasites, Be merely poison! Nothing I'll bear from thee, Courteous destroyers, affable wolves, meek bears, But nakedness, thou detestable town! You fools of fortune, trencher-friends, time's flies, Take thou that too, with multiplying bans !" Cap and knee slaves, vapours, and minute-jacks! Timon will to the woods; where he shall find Of man, and beast, the infinite malady The unkindest beast more kinder than mankind. Crust you quite o'er!-What, dost thou go? The gods confound (hear me, you good gods all,) Soft, take thy physic first-thou too,-and thou;-The Athenians both within and out that wall! [Throws the dishes at them, and drives them out. Stay, I will lend thee money, borrow none.What, all in motion? Henceforth be no feast, Whereat a villain's not a welcome guest. Burn, house; sink, Athens! henceforth hated be Of Timon, man, and all humanity! [Exit. Re-enter the Lords, with other Lords and Senators. 1 Lord. How now, my lords? 2 Lord. Know you the quality of Lord Timon's fury? 3 Lord. Pish! did you see my cap? 4 Lord. I have lost my gown. 3 Lord. He's but a mad lord, and nought but humour sways him. He gave me a jewel the other day, and now he has beat it out of my hat:-Did you see my jewel? 4 Lord. Did you see my cap? 2 Lord. Here 'tis. 4 Lord. Here lies my gown. 1 Lord. Let's make no stay. 1 In all places alike. This alludes to the mode in which guests were formerly placed at table according to rank in 2 Warburton and Mason say we should read foes stead of fees, which is the reading of the old copy. bave ventured to substitute lees, a more probable word to be misprinted fees, the long fand 1 being easily mistaken for each other. Timon means to call the senators the lees and dregs of the city, Sordes et fax urbis, on account of their vile propensities. 3 i. e. the highest of your excellence. These flies are couch'd. And grant, as Timon grows, his hate may grow Amen. [Exit. SCENE II. Athens. A Room in Timon's House. 1 Serv. Hear you, master steward, where's our Are we undone? cast off? nothing remaining? 1 Serv. Such a house broke! As we do turn our backs term was used for time serving busy bodies, who had their oar in every man's boat, or hand in every man's dish.' 6 This and the next speech is spoken by the newly. arrived lords. 7 In the old MS. play of Timon, painted stones are introduced as part of this mock banquet. It seems probable that Shakspeare was acquainted with this ancient drama. Timon has thrown nothing at his guests, but warm water and dishes. 8 Steevens explains this common sewers,' which is quite ludicrous, unless he meant it metaphorically. GeIneral filths means common strumpets: filthiness, and obscenity were synonymous with our ancestors. 9 i. e. contrarieties, whose nature it is to waste or destroy each other. as doth a galled rock O'erhang and jutty his confounded base." King Henry V. 10 Liberty here means licentiousness or libertinism. So in the Comedy of Errors: 5 Minute-jacks, are the same as jacks of the clockhouse, automaton figures appended to clocks: but the And many such like liberties of sin.' 11 i. e. accumulated curses. Multiplying for multiplied, the active participle with a passive signification. From our companion, thrown into his grave; Slink all away; leave their false vows with him, With his disease of all-shunn'd poverty, Infect the air! Twinn'd brothers of one womb,- The greater scorns the lesser. Not nature, Walks, like contempt, alone.-More of our fellows. But by contempt of nature:6 Enter other Servants. Flav. All broken implements of a ruin'd house. Flav. Good fellows all, The latest of my wealth I'll share amongst you. Nay, put out all your hands. To have his pomp, and all what state compounds, I'll ever serve his mind with my best will; SCENE III. The Woods. Enter TIMON. Tim. O blessed breeding sun, draw from the earth Rotten humidity; below thy sister's orb 1 So those who were familiar to his buried fortunes, who in the most ample manner participated them, slink all away,' &c. 2 This conceit occurs again in King Lear : Fairest Cordelia, thou art most rich, being poor? Johnson observes, that Nothing contributes more to the exaltation of Timon's character than the zeal and fidelity of his servants; nothing but real virtue can be honored by domestics; nothing but impartial kindness can gain affection from dependants.' 3 Fierce here means tehement. Raise me this beggar, and deny't' that lord; Who dares, who It is the pasture lards the brother's sides, In purity of manhood stand upright, Who seeks for better of thee, sauce his palate Ha, you gods! why this? Will lug your priests and servants from your sides;14 Will knit and break religions; bless the accurs'd, meaning of the passage as it now stands is, Men are 9 This man does not refer to any particular person, but to any supposed individual. So in As You Like It: "Who can come in and say that I mean her, When such a one as she such is her neighbours,' 10 Grize, step or degree, 11 i. e. seize, gripe. 4 Blood is here used for passion, propensity, affec tion. Malone asserts that blood is used for natural propensity or disposition throughout these plays; but he has not given a single instance, while we have many passages where it can mean nothing but passion or af-serve me instead of roots. Tection. 5 That is, the moon's- this sublunary world. 6 Brother, when his fortune is enlarged, will scorn brother: such is the general depravity of mankind. Not even beings besieged with misery can bear good fortune without contemming their fellow creatures, above whom accident has elevated them.' But is here used in its ex. ceptive sense, and signifies without. 7 This is the reading of the old copy. Steevens reads 'denude. It has been said that there is no antecedent to which deny it can be referred. I think that it clearly refers to great fortune in the preceding sentence, with which I have now connected it, by placing a colon instead of a period at nature. The construction will be, 'Raise me this beggar to great fortune, and deny it to that lord,' &c. 8 The folio of 1623 reads: It is the pas tour lards the brother's sides, The second folio changes leave to leane The probable 12 No insincere or inconstant supplicant: gold will not 13 You clear heavens, is you pure heavens. So in Lear: the clearest gods, who make them honours Of men's impossibilities, have preserv'd thee.' 14 Aristophanes, in his Plutus, makes the priest of Jupiter desert his service to live with Plutus. 15 This alludes to an old custom of drawing away the pillow from under the heads of men, in their last agonies, to accelerate their departure. 16 It is not clear what is meant by wappen'd in this passage; perhaps worn out, debilitated. In Fletcher's Two Noble Kinsmen, (which tradition says was written in conjunction with Shakspeare,) we have unwappered in a contrary sense. 17 Restores to all the freshness and sweetness of youth. Youth is called by the old poets the April of man's life.' Young Fenton, in the Merry Wives of Windsor, smells April and May.' 18 i. e. lie in the earth, where nature laid thee; thou'rt quick, means thou hast life and motion in thee. Thy lips rot off! Tim. I will not kiss thee; then the rot returns To thine own lips again.' Alcib. How came the noble Timon to this change? Tim. As the moon does, by wanting light to give: But then renew I could not, like the moon; There were no suns to borrow of. Alcib. Noble Timon, What friendship may I do thee? For thou'rt a man! Alcib. I have heard in some sort of thy miseries. Tim. Thou saw'st them, when I had prosperity. Alcib. I see them now; then was a blessed time. Tim. As thine is now, held with a brace of harlots. Timan. Is this the Athenian minion, whom the world Art thou Timandra ? Yes. Voic'd so regardfully? Give them diseases, leaving with thee their lust. Hang thee, monster! Alcib. Pardon him, sweet Timandra; for his wits Are drown'd and lost in his calamities.- 1 This alludes to the old erroneous prevalent opinion, that infection communicated to another left the infecter free. I will not,' says Timon, take the rot from thy lips by kissing thee. See the fourth satire of Donne. 2 See Act ii. Sc. 2. The diet was a customary term for the regimen prescribed in these cases. So in The Mastive, a Collection of Epigrams: 'She took not diet nor the sweat in season." 3 Warburton justly observes, that this passage is wonderfully sublime and picturesque.' image occurs in King Richard II. The same 'Devouring pestilence hangs in our air.' 4 Cutting. Tim. That, Why me, Timon? By killing villains, thou wast born to conquer Put up thy gold; Go on,-here's gold,-go on; That through the window-bars bore at men's eyes, But set them down horrible traitors: Spare not the babe Whose dimpled smiles from fools exhaust their mercy : Think it a bastard, whom the oracle Tim. Dost thou, or dost thou not, heaven's curse upon thee! Phr. & Timan. Give us some gold, good Timon: Hast thou more? Tim. Enough to make a whore forswear her trade, And to make whores, a bawd. Hoid up, you sluts, Your aprons mountant: You are not oathable.Although, I know, you'll swear, terribly swear, Into strong shudders, and to heavenly agues, The immortal gods that hear you,-spare your oaths I'll trust to your conditions: Be whores still; And he whose pious breath seeks to convert you Be strong in whore, allure him, burn him up; Let your close fire predominate his smoke, And be no turncoats: Yet may your pains, six months, Be quite contrary:10 And thatch your poor thin roofs breasts, in a passage he has cited from Weaver's Plantagenet's Tragical Story, but it seems to me doubtful. I can hardly think the passage warrants Johnson's explanation, The virgin shows her bosom through the lattice of her chamber." 6 An allusion to the tale of Edipus. 7 i. e, against objects of charity and compassion. Su in Troilus and Cre sida, Ulysses says: "For Hector, in his blaze of wrath, subscribes S That is, enough to make whores leave whoring, and a bawd leave making whores." 9 Conditions for dispositions. 5 By window-bars the poet probably means 'the partJet, gorget, or kerchief, which women put about their 10 The meaning of this passage appears to be as Steeneck, and pin down over their paps,' sometimes called vens explains it-Timon had been exhorting them to a niced, and translated Mamillare or fascia pectoralis: follow constantly their trade of debauchery, but he inand described as made of fine linen: from its semitrans-terrupts himself and imprecates upon them that for half parency arose the simile of window bars. This is the the year their pains may be quite contrary, that they Dest explanation I have to offer. The late Mr. Boswell may suffer such punishment as is usually inflicted upon thoughi that windows were used to signify a woman's harlots. He then continues his exhortations. |