The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works
Page 310
TIMON
That nature, being sick of man’s unkindness,
Should yet be hungry!
He digs the earth
Common mother—thou
Whose womb unmeasurable and infinite breast
Teems and feeds all, whose selfsame mettle
Whereof thy proud child, arrogant man, is puffed
Engenders the black toad and adder blue,
The gilded newt and eyeless venomed worm,
With all th‘abhorrèd births below crisp heaven
Whereon Hyperion’s quick’ning fire doth shine—
Yield him who all thy human sons do hate
From forth thy plenteous bosom, one poor root.
Ensear thy fertile and conceptions womb;
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.
He finds a root
O, a root! Dear thanks.
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!
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,
A poor unmanly melancholy, sprung
From change of fortune. 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 diseased perfumes, and have forgot
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
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,
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,
Will put thy shirt on warm? Will these mossed trees
That have outlived 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’ernight’s surfeit? Call the creatures
Whose naked natures live in all the spite
Of wreakful heaven, whose bare unhousèd trunks
To the conflicting elements exposed
Answer mere nature; bid them flatter thee.
O, thou shalt find—
TIMON A fool of thee! Depart.
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.
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 enforcèdly. Thou’dst courtier be again
Wert thou not beggar. Willing misery
Outlives incertain pomp, is crowned 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.
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 clasped, but bred a dog.
Hadst thou like us from our first swathe proceeded
The sweet degrees that this brief world affords
To such as may the passive drudges of it
Freely command, thou wouldst have plunged thyself
In general riot, melted down thy youth
In different beds of lust, and never learned
The icy precepts of respect, but followed
The sugared 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,
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 burden.
Thy nature did commence in sufferance, time
Hath made thee hard in’t. Why shouldst thou hate men?
They never flattered thee. What hast thou given?
If thou wilt curse, thy father, that poor rag,
Must be thy subject, who in spite put stuff
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
No prodigal.
TIMON I that I am one now.
Were all the wealth I have shut up in thee
I’d give thee leave to hang it. Get thee gone.
That the whole life of Athens were in this!
Thus would I eat it.
He bites the root
APEMANTUS ⌈offering food⌉ Here, I will mend thy feast.
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 botched;
If not, I would it were.
APEMANTUS What wouldst thou have to Athens?
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. 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?
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 mocked thee for too much curiosity; in thy rags thou kno
w’st none, but art despised 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.
APEMANTUS An thou’dst 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 thou ever know beloved?
APEMANTUS Myself.
TIMON I understand thee: thou hadst some means to keep a dog.
APEMANTUS What things in the world canst thou 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.
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 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 accused by the ass. If thou wert the ass, thy dullness would torment thee, and still thou lived’st but as a breakfast to the wolf. If thou wert the 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 killed by the horse. Wert thou a horse, thou wouldst be seized by the leopard. Wert thou a leopard, thou wert german 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 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.
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 see thee again. 356
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.
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.
I’d 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 swoon to see thee.
APEMANTUS Would thou wouldst burst!
TIMON Away, thou tedious rogue!
⌈He throws a stone at Apemantus⌉
I am sorry I shall lose a stone by thee.
APEMANTUS Beast!
TIMON Slave!
APEMANTUS Toad!
TIMON Rogue, rogue, rogue!
I am sick of this false world, and will love naught
But even the mere necessities upon’t.
Then, Timon, presently prepare thy grave.
Lie where the light foam of the sea may beat
Thy gravestone daily. Make thine epitaph,
That death in me at others’ lives may laugh.
He looks on the gold
O, thou sweet king-killer, and dear divorce
‘Twixt natural son and sire; thou bright defiler
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
And mak‘st them kiss, that speak’st with every tongue
To every purpose; O thou touch of hearts:
Think thy slave man rebels, and by thy virtue
Set them into confounding odds, that beasts
May have the world in empire.
APEMANTUS Would ’twere so,
But not till I am dead. I’ll say thou’st gold.
Thou wilt be thronged to shortly.
TIMON Thronged to?
APEMANTUS Ay.
TIMON
Thy back, I prithee.
APEMANTUS Live, and love thy misery.
TIMON
Long live so, and so die. I am quit.
Enter the Banditti, thieves
APEMANTUS
More things like men. Eat, Timon, and abhor them.
Exit
FIRST THIEF Where should he have this gold? It is some poor fragment, some slender ort of his remainder. The mere want of gold and the falling-from of his friends drove him into this melancholy.
SECOND THIEF It is noised he hath a mass of treasure.
THIRD THIEF Let us make the assay upon him. If he care not for’t, he will supply us easily. If he covetously reserve it, how shall ’s get it?
SECOND THIEF True, for he bears it not about him; ’tis hid.
FIRST THIEF Is not this he?
OTHER THIEVES Where?
SECOND THIEF ’Tis his description.
THIRD THIEF He, I know him.
ALL THIEVES (coming forward) Save thee, Timon.
TIMON Now, thieves.
ALL THIEVES
Soldiers, not thieves.
TIMON Both, too, and women’s sons.
ALL THIEVES We are not thieves, but men that much do want.
TIMON
Your greatest want is, you want much of meat.
Why should you want? Behold, the earth hath roots.
Within this mile break forth a hundred springs.
The oaks bear mast, the briars scarlet hips.
The bounteous housewife nature on each bush
Lays her full mess before you. Want? Why want?
FIRST THIEF
We cannot live on grass, on berries, water,
As beasts and birds and fishes.
TIMON
Nor on the beasts themselves, the birds and fishes;
You must eat men. Yet thanks I must you con
That you are thieves professed, that you work not
In holier shapes; for there is boundless theft
In limited professions. (Giving gold) Rascal thieves,
Here’s gold. Go suck the subtle blood o‘th’ grape
Till the high fever seethe your blood to froth,
And so scape hanging. Trust not the physician:
His antidotes are poison, and he slays
More than you rob. Take wealth and lives together.
Do villainy; do, since you protest to do’t,
Like workmen. I’ll example you with thievery.
The sun’s a thief, and with his great attraction
Robs the vast sea. The moon’s an arrant thief,
And her pale fire she snatches from the sun.
The sea’s a thief, whose liquid surge resolves
The moon into salt tears. The earth’s a thief,
That feeds and breeds by a composture stol’n
From gen‘ral excrement. Each thing’s a thief.
The laws, your curb and whip, in their rough power
Has unchecked theft. Love not yourselves. Away,
Rob one another. There’s more gold. Cut throats;
All that you meet are thieves. To Athens go,
Break open shops; nothing can you steal
But
thieves do lose it. Steal no less for this I give you,
And gold confound you howsoe’er. Amen.
THIRD THIEF He’s almost charmed me from my profession by persuading me to it.
FIRST THIEF ’Tis in the malice of mankind that he thus advises us, not to have us thrive in our mystery.
SECOND THIEF I’ll believe him as an enemy, and give over my trade.
FIRST THIEF Let us first see peace in Athens. There is no time so miserable but a man may be true.
Exeunt Thieves
Enter Flavius to Timon
FLAVIUS O you gods!
Is yon despised and ruinous man my lord,
Full of decay and failing? O monument
And wonder of good deeds evilly bestowed!
What an alteration of honour has desp’rate want made!
What viler thing upon the earth than friends,
Who can bring noblest minds to basest ends!
How rarely does it meet with this time’s guise,
When man was wished to love his enemies!
Grant I may ever love and rather woo
Those that would mischief me than those that do!
Timon sees him
He’s caught me in his eye. I will present
My honest grief unto him, and as my lord
Still serve him with my life.—My dearest master.
TIMON
Away! What art thou?
FLAVIUS Have you forgot me, sir?
TIMON
Why dost ask that? I have forgot all men;
Then if thou grant‘st thou’rt man, I have forgot thee.
FLAVIUS An honest poor servant of yours.
TIMON
Then I know thee not. I never had
Honest man about me; ay, all I kept were knaves,
To serve in meat to villains.
FLAVIUS The gods are witness,
Ne’er did poor steward wear a truer grief
For his undone lord than mine eyes for you.
TIMON
What, dost thou weep? Come. nearer then; I love thee
Because thou art a woman, and disclaim’st
Flinty mankind whose eyes do never give
But thorough lust and laughter. Pity’s sleeping.
Strange times, that weep with laughing, not with
weeping!
FLAVIUS
I beg of you to know me, good my lord,
T’accept my grief,⌈He offers his money⌉
and whilst this poor wealth lasts
To entertain me as your steward still.
TIMON Had I a steward
So true, so just, and now so comfortable?
It almost turns my dangerous nature mild.