Contents
-BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD
William Shakespeare (1564–1616). The Tragedy of Hamlet Prince of Denmark.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14.
Scene I
Act I
[King Lear’s palace]
Enter KENT, GLOUCESTER, and EDMUND
Kent.I THOUGHT the King had more affected the Duke of Albany than Cornwall.Glou.It did always seem so to us; but now, in the division of the kingdom, it appears not which of the Dukes he values most; for qualities are so weigh’d, that curiosity in neither can make choice of either’s moiety.Kent.Is not this your son, my lord?Glou.His breeding, sir, hath been at my charge. I have so often blush’d to acknowledge him, that now I am braz’d to ’t.Kent.I cannot conceive you.Glou.Sir, this young fellow’s mother could; whereupon she grew round-womb’d, and had, indeed, sir, a son for her cradle ere she had a husband for her bed. Do you smell a fault?Kent.I cannot wish the fault undone, the issue of it being so proper.Glou.But I have a son, sir, by order of law, some year elder than this, who yet is no dearer in my account. Though this knave came something saucily into the world before he was sent for, yet was his mother fair; there was good sport at his making, and the whoreson must be acknowledged. Do you know this noble gentleman, Edmund?Edm.No, my lord.Glou.My Lord of Kent. Remember him hereafter as my honourable friend.Edm.My services to your lordship.Kent.I must love you, and sue to know you better.Edm.Sir, I shall study deserving.Glou.He hath been out nine years, and away he shall again. The King is coming.Sennet. Enter one bearing a coronet, then KING LEAR, then the DUKES OF ALBANY and CORNWALL, next GONERIL, REGAN, CORDELIA, with followers
Lear.Attend the lords of France and Burgundy, Gloucester.Glou.I shall, my lord.Exeunt [GLOUCESTER and EDMUND].Lear.Meantime we shall express our darker purpose.Give me the map there. Know that we have dividedIn three our kingdom; and ’tis our fast intentTo shake all cares and business from our age,Conferring them on younger strengths, while weUnburden’d crawl toward death. Our son of Cornwall,And you, our no less loving son of Albany,We have this hour a constant will to publishOur daughters’ several dowers, that future strifeMay be prevented now. The Princes, France and Burgundy,Great rivals in our youngest daughter’s love,Long in our court have made their amorous sojourn,And here are to be answer’d. Tell me, my daughters,—Since now we will divest us both of rule,Interest of territory, cares of state,—Which of you shall we say doth love us most,That we our largest bounty may extendWhere nature doth with merit challenge? Goneril,Our eldest-born, speak first.Gon.Sir, I love you more than word can wield the matter;Dearer than eye-sight, space, and liberty;Beyond what can be valued, rich or rare;No less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honour;As much as child e’er lov’d, or father found;A love that makes breath poor, and speech unable:Beyond all manner of so much I love you.Cor.[Aside.]What shall Cordelia speak? Love and be silent.Lear.Of all these bounds, even from this line to this,With shadowy forests and with champains rich’d,With plenteous rivers and wide-skirted meads,We make thee lady. To thine and Albany’s issuesBe this perpetual. What says our second daughter,Our dearest Regan, wife of Cornwall? Speak.Reg.I am made of that self metal as my sister,And prize me at her worth. In my true heartI find she names my very deed of love;Only she comes too short, that I professMyself an enemy to all other joysWhich the most precious square of sense possesses;And find I am alone felicitateIn your dear Highness’ love.Cor.[Aside.]Then poor Cordelia!And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love’sMore ponderous than my tongue.Lear.To thee and thine hereditary everRemain this ample third of our fair kingdom;No less in space, validity, and pleasure,Than that conferr’d on Goneril. Now, our joy,Although our last and least, to whose young loveThe vines of France and milk of BurgundyStrive to be interess’d, what can you say to drawA third more opulent than your sisters? Speak.Cor.Nothing, my lord.Lear.Nothing!Cor.Nothing.Lear.Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again.Cor.Unhappy that I am, I cannot heaveMy heart into my mouth. I love your MajestyAccording to my bond; no more nor less.Lear.How, how, Cordelia! Mend your speech a little,Lest you may mar your fortunes.Cor.Good my lord,You have begot me, bred me, lov’d me: IReturn those duties back as are right fit;Obey you, love you, and most honour you.Why have my sisters husbands, if they sayThey love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,That lord whose hand must take my plight shall carryHalf my love with him, half my care and duty.Sure, I shall never marry like my sisters[To love my father all].Lear.But goes thy heart with this?Cor.Ay, my good lord.Lear.So young, and so untender?Cor.So young, my lord, and true.Lear.Let it be so; thy truth, then, be thy dower!For, by the scared radiance of the sun,The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;By all the operation of the orbsFrom whom we do exist, and cease to be;Here I disclaim all my paternal care,Propinquity and property of blood,And as a stranger to my heart and meHold thee, from this, for ever. The barbarous Scythian,Or he that makes his generation messesTo gorge his appetite, shall to my bosomBe as well neighbour’d, piti’d, and reliev’d,As thou my sometime daughter.Kent.Good my liege,—Lear.Peace, Kent!Come not between the dragon and his wrath.I lov’d her most, and thought to set my restOn her kind nursery. [To COR.] Hence, and avoid my sight!—So be my grave my peace, as here I giveHer father’s heart from her! Call France.—Who stirs?Call Burgundy. Cornwall and Albany,With my two daughters’ dowers digest the third;Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.I do invest you jointly with my power,Pre-eminence, and all the large effectsThat troop with majesty. Ourself, by monthly course,With reservation of an hundred knights,By you to be sustain’d, shall our abodeMake with you by due turn. Only we shall retainThe name, and all the addition to a king;The sway, revenue, execution of the rest,Beloved sons, be yours; which to confirm,This coronet part between you.Kent.Royal Lear,Whom I have ever honour’d as my king,Lov’d as my father, as my master follow’d,As my great patron thought on in my prayers,—Lear.The bow is bent and drawn; make from the shaft.Kent.Let it fall rather, though the fork invadeThe region of my heart: be Kent unmannerlyWhen Lear is mad. What wouldst thou do, old man?Thinkst thou that duty shall have dread to speak,When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour’s bound,When majesty falls to folly. Reserve thy state;And, in thy best consideration, checkThis hideous rashness. Answer my life my judgement,Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;Nor are those empty-hearted whose low soundsReverb no hollowness.Lear.Kent, on thy life, no more.Kent.My life I never held but as a pawnTo wage against thy enemies, ne’er fear to lose it.Thy safety being motive.Lear.Out of my sightKent.See better, Lear; and let me still remainThe true blank of thine eye.Lear.Now, by Apollo,—Kent.Now, by Apollo, king,Thou swear’st thy gods in vain.Lear.O, vassal! miscreant![Laying his hand on his sword.]Alb. & Corn.Dear sir, forbear.Kent.Kill thy physician, and thy fee bestowUpon the foul disease. Revoke thy gift;Or, whilst I can vent clamour from my throat,I’ll tell thee thou dost evil.Lear.Hear me, recreant!On thine allegiance, hear me!That thou hast sought to make us break our vows,Which we durst never yet, and with strain’d prideTo come betwixt our sentences and our power,Which nor our nature nor our place can bear,Our potency made good, take thy reward.Five days we do allot thee, for provisionTo shield thee from disasters of the world;And on the sixth to turn thy hated backUpon our kingdom. If, on the tenth day following,Thy banish’d trunk be found in our dominions,The moment is thy death. Away! By Jupiter,This shall not be revok’d.Kent.Fare thee well, king! Sith thus thou wilt appear,Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.[To CORDELIA.] The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,That justly think’st, and hast most rightly said![To REGAN and GONERIL.] And your large speeches may your deeds approve,That good effects may spring from words of love.Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu;He’ll shape his old course in a country new.Exit.Flourish. Re-enter GLOUCESTER, with FRANCE, BURGUNDY, and Attendants
Glou.Here’s France and Burgundy, my noble lord.Lear.My Lord of Burgundy,We first address toward you, who with this kingHath rivall’d for our daughter. What, in the least,Will you require in present dower with her,Or cease your quest of love?Bur.Most royal Majesty,I crave no more than what your Highness offer’d,Nor will you tender less.Lear.Right noble Burgundy,When she was dear to us, we did hold her so;But now her price is fallen. Sir, there she stands:If aught within that little-seeming substance,Or all of it, with our displeasure piec’d,And nothing more, may fitly like your Grace,She’s there, and she is yours.Bur.I know no answer.Lear.Will you, with those infirmities she owes,Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,Dower’d with our curse, and stranger’d with our oath,Take her, or leave her?Bur.Pardon me, royal sir;Election makes not up in such conditions.Lear.Then leave her, sir; for, by the power that made me,I tell you all her wealth. [To FRANCE.] For you, great king,I would not from your love make such a stray,To match you where I hate; therefore beseech youTo avert your liking a more worthier wayThan on a wretch whom Nature is asham’dAlmost to acknowledge hers.France.This is most strange,That she, whom even but now was your best object,The argument of your praise, balm of your age,The best, the dearest, should in this trice of timeCommit a thing so monstrous, to dismantleSo many folds of favour. Sure, her offenceMust be of such unnatural degree,That monsters it, or your fore-vouch’d affectionFallen into taint; which to believe of her,Must be a faith that reason without miracleShould never plant in me.Cor.I yet beseech your Majesty,—If for I want that glib and oily art,To speak and purpose not; since what I well intend,I’ll do ’t before I speak,—that you make knownIt is no vicious blot, murder, or foulness,No unchaste action, or dishonoured step,That hath depriv’d me of your grace and favour;But even for want of that for which I am richer,A still-soliciting eye, and such a tongueThat I am glad I have not, though not to have itHath lost me in your liking.Lear.Better thouHadst not been born than not to have pleas’d me better.France.Is it but this,—a tardiness in natureWhich often leaves the history unspokeThat it intends to do? My Lord of Burgundy,What say you to the lady? Love’s not loveWhen it is mingled with regards that standAloof from the entire point. Will you have her?She is herself a dowry.Bur.Royal king,Give but that portion which yourself propos’d,And here I take Cordelia by the hand,Duchess of Burgundy.Lear.Nothing. I have sworn; I am firm. 