(Still your own foes), deliver you, as most
Abated* captives, to some nation
That won you without blows !

ACT IV.

PRECEPTS AGAINST ILL FORTUNE. You were us'd To say, extremity was the trier of spirits ; That common chances common men could bear; That, when the sea was calm, all boats alike Show'd mastership in floating: fortune's blows, When most struck home, being gentle wounded, A noble cunning: you were us’d to load me [craves With precepts, that would make invincible The heart that conn'd them.

ON COMMON FRIENDSHIPS.

0,world, thy slippery turns! Friends now fast sworn,
Whose double bosoms seem to wear one heart,
Whose hours, whose bed, whose meal, and exercise,
Are still together, who twin, as 't were, in love
Unseparable, shall within this hour,
On a dissension of a doitt, break out
To bitterest enmity: So fellest foes,
Whose passions and whose plots have broke their
To take the one the other, by some chance, (sleep,
Some trick not worth an egg, shall grow dear friends,
And interjoin their issues.

MARTIAL FRIENDSHIP.

Let me twine
Mine arms about that body, where against
My grained ash a hundred times hath broke,
* Subdued.

+ A small coin.

a

And scared the moon with splinters! Here I clip*
The anvil of my sword; and do contest
As hotly and as nobly with thy love,
As ever in ambitious strength I did
Contend against thy valour. Know thou first,
I loved the maid I married; never man
Sigh'd truer breath; but that I see thee here,
Thou noble thing! more dances my rapt heart,
Than when I first my wedded mistress saw [thee,
Bestride my threshold. Why, thou Mars! I tell
We have a power on foot; and I had purpose
Once more to hew thy target from thy brawny
Or lose mine arm for’t: Thou hast beat me out
Twelve several times, and I have nightly since
Dreamt of encounters 'twixt thyself and me;
We have been down together in my sleep,
Unbuckling helms, fisting each other's throat,
And wak'd half dead with nothing.

ACT V.

THE SEASON OF SOLICITATION.

He was not taken well; he had not din'd: The veins unfill’d, our blood is cold, and then We pout upon the morning, are unapt To give or to forgive; but when we have stuff'd These pipes, and these conveyances of our blood With wine and feeding, we have suppler souls Than in our priest-like fasts: therefore I'll watch Till he be dieted to my request.

[him

OBSTINATE RESOLUTION. My wife comes foremost; then the honour'd

Wherein this trunk was fram'd, and in her hand
The grandchild to her blood. But, out, affection!
All bond and privilege of nature, break!
Let it be virtuous, to be obstinate.-
What is that curt’sey worth, or those dove's eyes,
Which can make gods forsworn?-I melt, and am

not
Of stronger earth than others.--My mother bows;
As if Olympus to a molehill should
In supplication nod: and my young boy
Hath an aspect of intercession, which
Great nature cries, Deny not—Let the Volsces
Plough Rome, and harrow Italy; I'll never
Be such a gosling* to obey instinct; but stand,
As if a man were author of himself,
And knew no other kin.

a

RELENTING TENDERNESS.

a

Like a dull actor now, I have forgot my part, and I am out, Even to a full disgrace. Best of my flesh, Forgive my tyranny; but do not say, For that, Forgive our Romans.—0, a kiss Long as my exile, sweet as my revenge! Now by the jealous queent of heaven, that kiss I carried from thee, dear; and my true lip Hath virgin'd it e'er since.-You gods! I prate, And the most noble mother of the world Leave unsaluted: Sink, my knee, i'the earth; Of thy deep duty more impressions show Than that of common sons.

The moon of Rome; chaste as the icicle,
That's curded by the frost from purest snow,
And hangs on Dian's temple: Dear Valeria!

CORIOLANUS'S PRAYER TOR HIS SON.
The god of soldiers,
With the consent of supreme Jove, inform
Thy thoughts with nobleness; that thou mayst prove
To shame unvulnerable, and stick i’the wars
Like a great sea-mark, standing every flaw*,
And saving those that eye

thee!
VOLUMNIA'S PATHETIC SPEECH TO HER SON

CORIOLANUS.
Think with thyself,
How more unfortunate than all living women
Are we come hither: since that thy sight, which

should Make our eyes flow with joy, hearts dance with

comforts, Constrains them weep, and shake with fear and Making the mother, wife, and child, to see [sorrow: The son, the husband, and the father, tearing His country's bowels out.

And to poor we, Thine enmity's most capital: thou barr’st us Our prayers to the gods, which is a comfort That all but we enjoy.

* We must find An evident calamity, though we had Our wish, which side should win: for either thou Must, as a foreign recreant, be led With manacles thorough our streets, or else Triumphantly tread on thy country's ruin;

*

And bear the palm, for having bravely shed
Thy wife and children's blood. For myself, son,
I purpose not to wait on fortune, till
These wars determine*: if I cannot persuade thee
Rather to show a noble grace to both parts,
Than seek the end of one, thou shalt no sooner
March to assault thy country, than to tread
(Trust to't, thou shalt not) on thy mother's womb,
That brought thee to this world.

PEACE AFTER A SIEGE.

Ne'er through an arch so hurried the blown tide, As the recomforted through the gates. Why, hark The trumpets, sackbuts, psalteries, and fifes, [you; Tabors and cymbals, and the shouting Romans, Make the sun dance.

CYMBELINE.

ACT I.

PARTING LOVERS.
Imo. Thou shouldst have made him
As little as a crow, or less, ere left
To after-eye him.
Pisa.

Madam, so I did.
Imo. I would have broke mine eye-strings;

crack’d them, but To look

him: till the diminution
Of space had pointed him sharp as my needle:
Nay, follow'd him, till he had melted from
The smallness of a gnat to air; and then