Laf. [Returns.] Nay, come your ways.
King. This haste hath wings, indeed.
Laf. Nay, come your ways;
This is his majesty, say your mind to him :
A traitor you do look like; but such traitors
His majesty seldom fears: I am Cressid's uncle,
That dare leave two together; fare you well. [Exit.
King. Now, fair one, do's your business follow us ?
: Hel. Ay, my good lord. Gerard de Narbon was
My father; in what he did profess, well found. 112
King. I knew him.
Hel. The rather will I spare my praise toward him; Knowing him, is enough. On his bed of death
Many receipts he gave me; chiefly one,
Which, as the dearest issue of his practice,
And of his old experience the only darling,
He bade me store up, as a triple eye,
Safer than mine own too; more dear I have so :
And hearing your high majesty is touch'd
With that malignant cause, wherein the honour
Of my dear father's gift stands chief in power,
I come to tender it, and my appliance,
With all bound humbleness..
King. We thank you, maiden;
But may not be so credulous of cure,
When our most learned doctors leave us; and
The congregated college have concluded,
That labouring art can never ransom nature
From her unaidable estate: I say we must not
So stain our judgment, or corrupt our hope,
To prostitute our past-cure malady
To empiricks; or to dissever so
Our great self and our credit, to esteem
A senseless help, when help past sense we deem.
Hel. My duty then shall pay me for my pains:
I will no more enforce mine office on you;
Humbly entreating from your royal thoughts
A modest one, to bear me back again..
King. I cannot give thee less, to be call'd grateful :
Thou thought'st to help me; and such thanks I give,
As one near death to those that wish him live:
But what at full I know, thou know'st no part
I knowing all my peril, thou no art.
Hel. What I can do, can do no hurt to try,
Since you set up your rest 'gainst remedy.
He that of greatest works is finisher,
Oft does them by the weakest minister:
So holy writ in babes hath judgment shown,
When judges have been babes; great floods have
From simple sources; and great seas have dry'd,
When miracles have by the greatest been deny'd.
Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most sits.
King. I must not hear thee; fare thee well, kind maid;
Thy pains, not us'd, must by thyself be paid:
Proffers, not took, reap thanks for their reward.
Hel. Inspired merit so by breath is barr'd :
It is not so with him, that all things knows,
As 'tis with us, that square our guess by shows:
But most it is presumption in us, when
The help of heaven we count the act of men.
Dear sir, to my endeavours give consent;
Of heaven, not me, make an experiment.
I am not an impostor, that proclaim
Myself against the level of mine aim;
But know I think, and think I know most sure,
My art is not past power, nor you past cure.
King. Art thou so confident? Within what space
Hop'st thou my cure?
Hel. The greatest grace lending grace,
Ere twice the horses of the sun shall bring
Their fiery torcher his diurnal ring;
Ere twice in murk and occidental damp
Moist Hesperus hath quench'd his sleepy lamp;
Or four and twenty times the pilot's glass
Hath told the thievish minutes how they pass;
What is infirm from your sound parts shall fly, 180
Health shall live free, and sickness freely die.
King. Upon thy certainty and confidence,
What dar'st thou venture?
A strumpet's boldness, a divulged shame
Traduc'd by odious ballads; my maiden's name
Sear'd otherwise; no worse of worst extended,
With vilest torture let my life be ended.
King. Methinks, in thee some blessed ́ spirit, doth
His powerful sound within an organ weak:
And what impossibility would slay
In common sense, sense saves another way.
Thy life is dear; for all, that life can rate
Worth name of life, in thee hath estimate;
Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage, virtue, all
That happiness and prime can happy call:
Thou this to hazard, needs must intimate
Skill infinite, or monstrous desperate.
Sweet practiser, thy physick I will try,
That ministers thine own death, if I die.
Hel. If I break time, or flinch in property
Of what I spoke, unpitied let me die;
And well deserv'd! Not helping, death's my fee;
But if I help, what do you promise me?
King. Make thy demand.
Hel. But will you make it even?
King. Ay, by my sceptre, and my hopes of heaven. Hel. Then shalt thou give me, with thy kingly hand, What husband in thy power I will command. Exempted be from me the arrogance
To choose from forth the royal blood of France;
My low and humble name to propagate
With any branch or image of the state:
But such a one thy vassal; whom I know
Is free for me to ask, thee to bestow.
King. Here is my hand; the premises observ'd,
Thy will by my performance shall be serv'd:
So, make the choice of thine own time, for I,
Thy resolv'd patient, on thee still rely.
More should I question thee, and more I must; 220
(Tho' more to know, could not be more to trust :)
From whence thou cam'st, how tended on-But rest
Unquestion'd welcome, and undoubted blest..
Give me some help here, ho! If thou proceed
As high as word, my deed shall match thy deed.
Rousillon. Enter Countess, and Clown.
Count. Come on, sir; I shall now put you to the height of your breeding...
Clo. I will shew myself highly fed, and lowly taught: I know my business is but to the court. 229
Count. But to the court? why, what place make you special, when you put off that with such contempt? But to the court!
Clo. Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any manners, he may easily put it off at court: he that cannot make a leg, put off's cap, kiss his hand, and say nothing, has neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and, indeed, such a fellow, to say precisely, were not for the court: but, for me, I have an answer will serve all men.
Count. Marry, that's a bountiful answer, that fits
|