Book Read Free

The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works

Page 489

by William Shakespeare


  From forth thy plenteous bosom, one poor root.

  Ensear thy fertile and conceptious womb;

  190

  Let it no more bring out ingrateful man.

  Go great with tigers, dragons, wolves and bears;

  Teem with new monsters, whom thy upward face

  Hath to the marbled mansion all above

  Never presented. O, a root; dear thanks!

  195

  Dry up thy marrows, vines and plough-torn leas,

  Whereof ingrateful man, with liquorish draughts

  And morsels unctuous, greases his pure mind,

  That from it all consideration slips –

  Enter APEMANTUS.

  More man? Plague, plague!

  200

  APEMANTUS I was directed hither. Men report

  Thou dost affect my manners, and dost use them.

  TIMON ’Tis then because thou dost not keep a dog

  Whom I would imitate. Consumption catch thee!

  APEMANTUS This is in thee a nature but infected,

  205

  A poor unmanly melancholy sprung

  From change of future. Why this spade? This place?

  This slave-like habit, and these looks of care?

  Thy flatterers yet wear silk, drink wine, lie soft,

  Hug their diseas’d perfumes, and have forgot

  210

  That ever Timon was. Shame not these woods

  By putting on the cunning of a carper.

  Be thou a flatterer now, and seek to thrive

  By that which has undone thee. Hinge thy knee,

  And let his very breath whom thou’lt observe

  215

  Blow off thy cap; praise his most vicious strain,

  And call it excellent. Thou wast told thus.

  Thou gav’st thine ears, like tapsters that bade

  welcome,

  To knaves, and all approachers. ’Tis most just

  That thou turn rascal; hadst thou wealth again,

  220

  Rascals should have’t. Do not assume my likeness.

  TIMON Were I like thee I’d throw away myself.

  APEMANTUS

  Thou hast cast away thyself, being like thyself

  A madman so long, now a fool. What, think’st

  That the bleak air, thy boisterous chamberlain,

  225

  Will put thy shirt on warm? Will these moist trees,

  That have outliv’d the eagle, page thy heels

  And skip when thou point’st out? Will the cold

  brook,

  Candied with ice, caudle thy morning taste

  To cure thy o’er-night’s surfeit? Call the creatures

  230

  Whose naked natures live in all the spite

  Of wreakful heaven, whose bare unhoused trunks,

  To the conflicting elements expos’d,

  Answer mere nature; bid them flatter thee.

  O thou shalt find –

  TIMON A fool of thee. Depart.

  235

  APEMANTUS I love thee better now than e’er I did.

  TIMON I hate thee worse.

  APEMANTUS Why?

  TIMON Thou flatter’st misery.

  APEMANTUS I flatter not, but say thou art a caitiff.

  TIMON Why dost thou seek me out?

  APEMANTUS To vex thee.

  TIMON Always a villain’s office, or a fool’s.

  240

  Dost please thyself in’t?

  APEMANTUS Ay.

  TIMON What, a knave too?

  APEMANTUS If thou didst put this sour cold habit on

  To castigate thy pride ’twere well; but thou

  Dost it enforcedly. Thou’dst courtier be again

  Wert thou not beggar. Willing misery

  245

  Outlives incertain pomp, is crown’d before;

  The one is filling still, never complete,

  The other, at high wish. Best state, contentless,

  Hath a distracted and most wretched being,

  Worse than the worst, content.

  250

  Thou shouldst desire to die, being miserable.

  TIMON Not by his breath that is more miserable.

  Thou art a slave, whom Fortune’s tender arm

  With favour never clasp’d, but bred a dog.

  Hadst thou like us from our first swath proceeded

  255

  The sweet degrees that this brief world affords

  To such as may the passive drugs of it

  Freely command, thou wouldst have plung’d thyself

  In general riot, melted down thy youth

  In different beds of lust, and never learn’d

  260

  The icy precepts of respect, but followed

  The sugar’d game before thee. But myself –

  Who had the world as my confectionary,

  The mouths, the tongues, the eyes and hearts of men

  At duty, more than I could frame employment:

  265

  That numberless upon me stuck, as leaves

  Do on the oak, have with one winter’s brush

  Fell from their boughs and left me open, bare,

  For every storm that blows – I, to bear this,

  That never knew but better, is some burthen.

  270

  Thy nature did commence in sufferance, time

  Hath made thee hard in’t. Why shouldst thou hate

  men?

  They never flatter’d thee. What hast thou given?

  If thou wilt curse, thy father (that poor rag)

  Must be thy subject, who in spite put stuff

  275

  To some she-beggar and compounded thee

  Poor rogue hereditary. Hence, be gone!

  If thou hadst not been born the worst of men,

  Thou hadst been a knave and flatterer.

  APEMANTUS Art thou proud yet?

  TIMON Ay, that I am not thee.

  APEMANTUS I, that I was

  280

  No prodigal.

  TIMON I, that I am one now.

  Were all the wealth I have shut up in thee,

  I’ld give thee leave to hang it. Get thee gone.

  That the whole life of Athens were in this!

  Thus would I eat it. [eating a root]

  APEMANTUS Here, I will mend thy feast.

  285

  [offering food]

  TIMON First mend my company, take away thyself.

  APEMANTUS

  So I shall mend mine own, by th’ lack of thine.

  TIMON ’Tis not well mended so, it is but botch’d;

  If not, I would it were.

  APEMANTUS What wouldst thou have to Athens?

  290

  TIMON Thee thither in a whirlwind. If thou wilt,

  Tell them there I have gold; look, so I have.

  APEMANTUS Here is no use for gold.

  TIMON The best and truest;

  For here it sleeps, and does no hired harm.

  APEMANTUS Where liest a nights, Timon?

  TIMON Under that’s above me.

  295

  Where feed’st thou a days, Apemantus?

  APEMANTUS Where my stomach finds meat; or, rather,

  where I eat it.

  TIMON Would poison were obedient and knew my mind!

  APEMANTUS Where wouldst thou send it?

  300

  TIMON To sauce thy dishes.

  APEMANTUS The middle of humanity thou never

  knewest, but the extremity of both ends. When thou

  wast in thy gilt and thy perfume, they mock’d thee for

  too much curiosity; in thy rags thou know’st none, but

  305

  art despis’d for the contrary. There’s a medlar for thee;

  eat it.

  TIMON On what I hate I feed not.

  APEMANTUS Dost hate a medlar?

  TIMON Ay, though it look like thee.

  310

  APEMAN
TUS And th’ hadst hated meddlers sooner, thou

  shouldst have loved thyself better now. What man

  didst thou ever know unthrift that was beloved after

  his means?

  TIMON Who, without those means thou talk’st of, didst

  315

  thou ever know belov’d?

  APEMANTUS Myself.

  TIMON I understand thee; thou hadst some means to

  keep a dog.

  APEMANTUS What things in the world canst thou

  320

  nearest compare to thy flatterers?

  TIMON Women nearest, but men – men are the things

  themselves. What wouldst thou do with the world,

  APEMANTUS, if it lay in thy power?

  APEMANTUS Give it the beasts, to be rid of the men.

  325

  TIMON Wouldst thou have thyself fall in the confusion

  of men, and remain a beast with the beasts?

  APEMANTUS Ay, Timon.

  TIMON A beastly ambition, which the gods grant thee

  t’attain to. If thou wert the lion, the fox would beguile

  330

  thee; if thou wert the lamb, the fox would eat thee; if

  thou wert the fox, the lion would suspect thee, when

  peradventure thou wert accus’d by the ass; if thou wert

  the ass, thy dulness would torment thee, and still thou

  liv’dst but as a breakfast to the wolf; if thou wert the

  335

  wolf, thy greediness would afflict thee, and oft thou

  shouldst hazard thy life for thy dinner; wert thou the

  unicorn, pride and wrath would confound thee and

  make thine own self the conquest of thy fury; wert

  thou a bear, thou wouldst be kill’d by the horse; wert

  340

  thou a horse, thou wouldst be seiz’d by the leopard;

  wert thou a leopard, thou wert germane to the lion,

  and the spots of thy kindred were jurors on thy life. All

  thy safety were remotion, and thy defence absence.

  What beast couldst thou be that were not subject to a

  345

  beast? And what a beast art thou already, that seest not

  thy loss in transformation!

  APEMANTUS If thou couldst please me with speaking to

  me, thou mightst have hit upon it here; the

  commonwealth of Athens is become a forest of beasts.

  350

  TIMON How has the ass broke the wall, that thou art out

  of the city?

  APEMANTUS Yonder comes a poet and a painter. The

  plague of company light upon thee! I will fear to catch

  it, and give way. When I know not what else to do, I’ll

  355

  see thee again.

  TIMON When there is nothing living but thee, thou

  shalt be welcome. I had rather be a beggar’s dog than

  Apemantus.

  APEMANTUS Thou art the cap of all the fools alive.

  360

  TIMON Would thou wert clean enough to spit upon!

  APEMANTUS A plague on thee, thou art too bad to curse.

  TIMON All villains that do stand by thee are pure.

  APEMANTUS

  There is no leprosy but what thou speak’st.

  TIMON If I name thee.

  365

  I’ll beat thee, but I should infect my hands.

  APEMANTUS I would my tongue could rot them off!

  TIMON Away, thou issue of a mangy dog!

  Choler does kill me that thou art alive;

  I swound to see thee.

  370

  APEMANTUS Would thou wouldst burst!

  TIMON

  Away, thou tedious rogue, I am sorry I shall lose a

  stone by thee. [throwing a stone at him]

  APEMANTUS Beast!

  TIMON Slave!

  375

  APEMANTUS Toad!

  TIMON Rogue, rogue, rogue!

  I am sick of this false world, and will love nought

  But even the mere necessities upon’t.

  Then, Timon, presently prepare thy grave;

  380

  Lie where the light foam of the sea may beat

  Thy grave-stone daily: make thine epitaph,

  That death in me at others’ lives may laugh.

  [looking on the gold]

  O thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce

  ’Twixt natural son and sire, thou bright defiler

  385

  Of Hymen’s purest bed, thou valiant Mars,

  Thou ever young, fresh, loved and delicate wooer,

  Whose blush doth thaw the consecrated snow

  That lies on Dian’s lap! Thou visible god,

  That sold’rest close impossibilities,

  390

  And mak’st them kiss; that speak’st with every

 

‹ Prev