King Lear | Page 6

should kindle to inflam'd respect.-- Thy dowerless daughter, king, thrown to my chance, Is queen of us, of ours, and our fair France: Not all the dukes of waterish Burgundy Can buy this unpriz'd precious maid of me.-- Bid them farewell, Cordelia, though unkind: Thou losest here, a better where to find.
Lear. Thou hast her, France: let her be thine; for we Have no such daughter, nor shall ever see That face of hers again.--Therefore be gone Without our grace, our love, our benison.-- Come, noble Burgundy.
[Flourish. Exeunt Lear, Burgundy, Cornwall, Albany, Gloster, and Attendants.]
France. Bid farewell to your sisters.
Cor. The jewels of our father, with wash'd eyes Cordelia leaves you: I know you what you are; And, like a sister, am most loath to call Your faults as they are nam'd. Love well our father: To your professed bosoms I commit him: But yet, alas, stood I within his grace, I would prefer him to a better place. So, farewell to you both.
Reg. Prescribe not us our duties.
Gon. Let your study Be to content your lord, who hath receiv'd you At fortune's alms. You have obedience scanted, And well are worth the want that you have wanted.
Cor. Time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides: Who cover faults, at last shame them derides. Well may you prosper!
France. Come, my fair Cordelia.
[Exeunt France and Cordelia.]
Gon. Sister, it is not little I have to say of what most nearly appertains to us both. I think our father will hence to-night.
Reg. That's most certain, and with you; next month with us.
Gon. You see how full of changes his age is; the observation we have made of it hath not been little: he always loved our sister most; and with what poor judgment he hath now cast her off appears too grossly.
Reg. 'Tis the infirmity of his age: yet he hath ever but slenderly known himself.
Gon. The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look to receive from his age, not alone the imperfections of long-ingraffed condition, but therewithal the unruly waywardness that infirm and choleric years bring with them.
Reg. Such unconstant starts are we like to have from him as this of Kent's banishment.
Gon. There is further compliment of leave-taking between France and him. Pray you let us hit together: if our father carry authority with such dispositions as he bears, this last surrender of his will but offend us.
Reg. We shall further think of it.
Gon. We must do something, and i' th' heat.
[Exeunt.]

Scene II. A Hall in the Earl of Gloster's Castle.
[Enter Edmund with a letter.]
Edm. Thou, nature, art my goddess; to thy law My services are bound. Wherefore should I Stand in the plague of custom, and permit The curiosity of nations to deprive me, For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base? When my dimensions are as well compact, My mind as generous, and my shape as true As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base? Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take More composition and fierce quality Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed, Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops Got 'tween asleep and wake?--Well then, Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land: Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund As to the legitimate: fine word--legitimate! Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed, And my invention thrive, Edmund the base Shall top the legitimate. I grow; I prosper.-- Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
[Enter Gloster.]
Glou. Kent banish'd thus! and France in choler parted! And the king gone to-night! subscrib'd his pow'r! Confin'd to exhibition! All this done Upon the gad!--Edmund, how now! What news?
Edm. So please your lordship, none.
[Putting up the letter.]
Glou. Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter?
Edm. I know no news, my lord.
Glou. What paper were you reading?
Edm. Nothing, my lord.
Glou. No? What needed, then, that terrible dispatch of it into your pocket? the quality of nothing hath not such need to hide itself. Let's see. Come, if it be nothing, I shall not need spectacles.
Edm. I beseech you, sir, pardon me. It is a letter from my brother that I have not all o'er-read; and for so much as I have perus'd, I find it not fit for your o'erlooking.
Glou. Give me the letter, sir.
Edm. I shall offend, either to detain or give it. The contents, as in part I understand them, are to blame.
Glou. Let's see, let's see!
Edm. I hope, for my brother's justification, he wrote this but as an essay or taste of my virtue.
Glou. [Reads.] 'This policy and reverence of age makes the world bitter to the best of our times; keeps our fortunes from us till our oldness cannot relish them.