Something not worth in me such rich beholding
As they have often given. Here is Ulysses;
I’ll interrupt his reading.
How now Ulysses!
Ulysses
Now, great Thetis’ son!
Achilles
What are you reading?
Ulysses
A strange fellow here
Writes me: ‘That man, how dearly ever parted,
How much in having, or without or in,
Cannot make boast to have that which he hath,
Nor feels not what he owes, but by reflection;
As when his virtues shining upon others
Heat them and they retort that heat again
To the first giver.’
Achilles
This is not strange, Ulysses.
The beauty that is borne here in the face
The bearer knows not, but commends itself
To others’ eyes; nor doth the eye itself,
That most pure spirit of sense, behold itself,
Not going from itself; but eye to eye opposed
Salutes each other with each other’s form;
For speculation turns not to itself,
Till it hath travell’d and is mirror’d there
Where it may see itself. This is not strange at all.
Ulysses
I do not strain at the position,—
It is familiar,— but at the author’s drift;
Who, in his circumstance, expressly proves
That no man is the lord of any thing,
Though in and of him there be much consisting,
Till he communicate his parts to others:
Nor doth he of himself know them for aught
Till he behold them form’d in the applause
Where they’re extended; who, like an arch, reverberates
The voice again, or, like a gate of steel
Fronting the sun, receives and renders back
His figure and his heat. I was much wrapt in this;
And apprehended here immediately
The unknown Ajax.
Heavens, what a man is there! a very horse,
That has he knows not what. Nature, what things there are
Most abject in regard and dear in use!
What things again most dear in the esteem
And poor in worth! Now shall we see to-morrow —
An act that very chance doth throw upon him —
Ajax renown’d. O heavens, what some men do,
While some men leave to do!
How some men creep in skittish fortune’s hall,
Whiles others play the idiots in her eyes!
How one man eats into another’s pride,
While pride is fasting in his wantonness!
To see these Grecian lords!— why, even already
They clap the lubber Ajax on the shoulder,
As if his foot were on brave Hector’s breast
And great Troy shrieking.
Achilles
I do believe it; for they pass’d by me
As misers do by beggars, neither gave to me
Good word nor look: what, are my deeds forgot?
Ulysses
Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,
A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:
Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour’d
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon
As done: perseverance, dear my lord,
Keeps honour bright: to have done is to hang
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail
In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;
For honour travels in a strait so narrow,
Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;
For emulation hath a thousand sons
That one by one pursue: if you give way,
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,
Like to an enter’d tide, they all rush by
And leave you hindmost;
Or like a gallant horse fall’n in first rank,
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,
O’er-run and trampled on: then what they do in present,
Though less than yours in past, must o’ertop yours;
For time is like a fashionable host
That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand,
And with his arms outstretch’d, as he would fly,
Grasps in the comer: welcome ever smiles,
And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek
Remuneration for the thing it was;
For beauty, wit,
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all
To envious and calumniating time.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,
That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,
Though they are made and moulded of things past,
And give to dust that is a little gilt
More laud than gilt o’er-dusted.
The present eye praises the present object.
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye
Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,
And still it might, and yet it may again,
If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive
And case thy reputation in thy tent;
Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,
Made emulous missions ’mongst the gods themselves
And drave great Mars to faction.
Achilles
Of this my privacy
I have strong reasons.
Ulysses
But ’gainst your privacy
The reasons are more potent and heroical:
’Tis known, Achilles, that you are in love
With one of Priam’s daughters.
Achilles
Ha! known!
Ulysses
Is that a wonder?
The providence that’s in a watchful state
Knows almost every grain of Plutus’ gold,
Finds bottom in the uncomprehensive deeps,
Keeps place with thought and almost, like the gods,
Does thoughts unveil in their dumb cradles.
There is a mystery — with whom relation
Durst never meddle — in the soul of state;
Which hath an operation more divine
Than breath or pen can give expressure to:
All the commerce that you have had with Troy
As perfectly is ours as yours, my lord;
And better would it fit Achilles much
To throw down Hector than Polyxena:
But it must grieve young Pyrrhus now at home,
When fame shall in our islands sound her trump,
And all the Greekish girls shall tripping sing,
‘Great Hector’s sister did Achilles win,
But our great Ajax bravely beat down him.’
Farewell, my lord: I as your lover speak;
The fool slides o’er the ice that you should break.
Exit
Patroclus
To this effect, Achilles, have I moved you:
A woman impudent and mannish grown
Is not more loathed than an effeminate man
In time of action. I stand condemn’d for this;
They think my little stomach to the war
And your great love to me restrains you thus:
Sweet, rouse yourself; and the weak wanton Cupid
Shall from your neck unloose his amorous fold,
And, like a dew-drop from the lion’s mane,
Be shook to air.
Achilles
Shall Ajax fight with Hector?
Patroclus
Ay, and perhaps r
eceive much honour by him.
Achilles
I see my reputation is at stake
My fame is shrewdly gored.
Patroclus
O, then, beware;
Those wounds heal ill that men do give themselves:
Omission to do what is necessary
Seals a commission to a blank of danger;
And danger, like an ague, subtly taints
Even then when we sit idly in the sun.
Achilles
Go call Thersites hither, sweet Patroclus:
I’ll send the fool to Ajax and desire him
To invite the Trojan lords after the combat
To see us here unarm’d: I have a woman’s longing,
An appetite that I am sick withal,
To see great Hector in his weeds of peace,
To talk with him and to behold his visage,
Even to my full of view.
Enter Thersites
A labour saved!
Thersites
A wonder!
Achilles
What?
Thersites
Ajax goes up and down the field, asking for himself.
Achilles
How so?
Thersites
He must fight singly to-morrow with Hector, and is so prophetically proud of an heroical cudgelling that he raves in saying nothing.
Achilles
How can that be?
Thersites
Why, he stalks up and down like a peacock,— a stride and a stand: ruminates like an hostess that hath no arithmetic but her brain to set down her reckoning: bites his lip with a politic regard, as who should say ‘There were wit in this head, an ’twould out;’ and so there is, but it lies as coldly in him as fire in a flint, which will not show without knocking. The man’s undone forever; for if Hector break not his neck i’ the combat, he’ll break ’t himself in vain-glory. He knows not me: I said ‘Good morrow, Ajax;’ and he replies ‘Thanks, Agamemnon.’ What think you of this man that takes me for the general? He’s grown a very land-fish, language-less, a monster. A plague of opinion! a man may wear it on both sides, like a leather jerkin.
Achilles
Thou must be my ambassador to him, Thersites.
Thersites
Who, I? why, he’ll answer nobody; he professes not answering: speaking is for beggars; he wears his tongue in’s arms. I will put on his presence: let Patroclus make demands to me, you shall see the pageant of Ajax.
Achilles
To him, Patroclus; tell him I humbly desire the valiant Ajax to invite the most valorous Hector to come unarmed to my tent, and to procure safe-conduct for his person of the magnanimous and most illustrious six-or-seven-times-honoured captain-general of the Grecian army, Agamemnon, et cetera. Do this.
Patroclus
Jove bless great Ajax!
Thersites
Hum!
Patroclus
I come from the worthy Achilles,—
Thersites
Ha!
Patroclus
Who most humbly desires you to invite Hector to his tent,—
Thersites
Hum!
Patroclus
And to procure safe-conduct from Agamemnon.
Thersites
Agamemnon!
Patroclus
Ay, my lord.
Thersites
Ha!
Patroclus
What say you to’t?
Thersites
God b’ wi’ you, with all my heart.
Patroclus
Your answer, sir.
Thersites
If to-morrow be a fair day, by eleven o’clock it will go one way or other: howsoever, he shall pay for me ere he has me.
Patroclus
Your answer, sir.
Thersites
Fare you well, with all my heart.
Achilles
Why, but he is not in this tune, is he?
Thersites
No, but he’s out o’ tune thus. What music will be in him when Hector has knocked out his brains, I know not; but, I am sure, none, unless the fiddler Apollo get his sinews to make catlings on.
Achilles
Come, thou shalt bear a letter to him straight.
Thersites
Let me bear another to his horse; for that’s the more capable creature.
Achilles
My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirr’d;
And I myself see not the bottom of it.
Exeunt Achilles and Patroclus
Thersites
Would the fountain of your mind were clear again, that I might water an ass at it! I had rather be a tick in a sheep than such a valiant ignorance.
Exit
ACT IV
SCENE I. TROY. A STREET.
Enter, from one side, Aeneas, and Servant with a torch; from the other, Paris, Deiphobus, Antenor, Diomedes, and others, with torches
Paris
See, ho! who is that there?
Deiphobus
It is the Lord Aeneas.
Aeneas
Is the prince there in person?
Had I so good occasion to lie long
As you, prince Paris, nothing but heavenly business
Should rob my bed-mate of my company.
Diomedes
That’s my mind too. Good morrow, Lord Aeneas.
Paris
A valiant Greek, Aeneas,— take his hand,—
Witness the process of your speech, wherein
You told how Diomed, a whole week by days,
Did haunt you in the field.
Aeneas
Health to you, valiant sir,
During all question of the gentle truce;
But when I meet you arm’d, as black defiance
As heart can think or courage execute.
Diomedes
The one and other Diomed embraces.
Our bloods are now in calm; and, so long, health!
But when contention and occasion meet,
By Jove, I’ll play the hunter for thy life
With all my force, pursuit and policy.
Aeneas
And thou shalt hunt a lion, that will fly
With his face backward. In humane gentleness,
Welcome to Troy! now, by Anchises’ life,
Welcome, indeed! By Venus’ hand I swear,
No man alive can love in such a sort
The thing he means to kill more excellently.
Diomedes
We sympathize: Jove, let Aeneas live,
If to my sword his fate be not the glory,
A thousand complete courses of the sun!
But, in mine emulous honour, let him die,
With every joint a wound, and that to-morrow!
Aeneas
We know each other well.
Diomedes
We do; and long to know each other worse.
Paris
This is the most despiteful gentle greeting,
The noblest hateful love, that e’er I heard of.
What business, lord, so early?
Aeneas
I was sent for to the king; but why, I know not.
Paris
His purpose meets you: ’twas to bring this Greek
To Calchas’ house, and there to render him,
For the enfreed Antenor, the fair Cressid:
Let’s have your company, or, if you please,
Haste there before us: I constantly do think —
Or rather, call my thought a certain knowledge —
My brother Troilus lodges there to-night:
Rouse him and give him note of our approach.
With the whole quality wherefore: I fear
We shall be much unwelcome.
Aeneas
That I assure you:
Troilus had rather Troy were borne to Greece
Than Cressid borne from Troy.
Paris
There is no help;
> The bitter disposition of the time
Will have it so. On, lord; we’ll follow you.
Aeneas
Good morrow, all.
Exit with Servant
Paris
And tell me, noble Diomed, faith, tell me true,
Even in the soul of sound good-fellowship,
Who, in your thoughts, merits fair Helen best,
Myself or Menelaus?
Diomedes
Both alike:
He merits well to have her, that doth seek her,
Not making any scruple of her soilure,
With such a hell of pain and world of charge,
And you as well to keep her, that defend her,
Not palating the taste of her dishonour,
With such a costly loss of wealth and friends:
He, like a puling cuckold, would drink up
The lees and dregs of a flat tamed piece;
You, like a lecher, out of whorish loins
Are pleased to breed out your inheritors:
Both merits poised, each weighs nor less nor more;
But he as he, the heavier for a whore.
Paris
You are too bitter to your countrywoman.
Diomedes
She’s bitter to her country: hear me, Paris:
For every false drop in her bawdy veins
A Grecian’s life hath sunk; for every scruple
Of her contaminated carrion weight,
A Trojan hath been slain: since she could speak,
She hath not given so many good words breath
As for her Greeks and Trojans suffer’d death.
Paris
Fair Diomed, you do as chapmen do,
Dispraise the thing that you desire to buy:
But we in silence hold this virtue well,
We’ll but commend what we intend to sell.
Here lies our way.
Exeunt
SCENE II. THE SAME. COURT OF PANDARUS’ HOUSE.
Enter Troilus and Cressida
Troilus
Dear, trouble not yourself: the morn is cold.
Cressida
Then, sweet my lord, I’ll call mine uncle down;
He shall unbolt the gates.
Troilus
Trouble him not;
To bed, to bed: sleep kill those pretty eyes,
And give as soft attachment to thy senses
As infants’ empty of all thought!
Cressida
Good morrow, then.
Troilus
I prithee now, to bed.
Cressida
Are you a-weary of me?
Troilus
O Cressida! but that the busy day,
Waked by the lark, hath roused the ribald crows,
And dreaming night will hide our joys no longer,
I would not from thee.
Cressida
Night hath been too brief.
Troilus
Beshrew the witch! with venomous wights she stays
As tediously as hell, but flies the grasps of love
Complete Plays, The Page 82