Seeking the bubble reputation Ev'n in the cannor's mouth: And then, the Justice; In fair roand belly, with good capon lined, With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut, Full of wise saws and modern instances, 16 And so he plays his part: The sixth age shifts SHAKSPEARE. 20 25 LIFE. ..REASON thus with life, If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing That none but fools would keep: a breath thou art, (Servile to all the skyey influences,) 5 That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st, Of a poor worm: Thy best of rest is sleep, 9 15 And that thou oft provokest; yet grossly fear'st Do curse the gout, serpigo, and the rheum, 25 [age; For ending thee no sooner: Thou hast nor youth, nor But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, Dreaming on both: for all thy blessed youth Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms Of palsied eld; and when thou art old, and rich, Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty, To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this, That bears the name of life? Yet in this life 30 Lie hid more thousand deaths: yet death we fear, 35 That makes these odds all even. SHAKSPEARE. CLARENCE'S DREAM. CLARENCE AND BRAKENBURY. Brak. WHY looks your grace so heavily to-day? Clar. O, I have pass'd a miserable night, So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights, That, as I am a Christian faithful man, I would not spend another such a night, 5 Brak. What was your dream, my lord? I pray you, tell me. Clar. Methought, that I had broken from the Tower, And was embark'd to cross to Burgundy; And in my company my brother Glo'ster, 10 15 Upon the hatches; thence we look'd toward England, O Lord! methought, what pain it was to drown! All scatter'd in the bottom of the sea. Some lay in dead men's skulls; and in those holes Where eyes did once inhabit there were crept (As 'twere in scorn of eyes,) reflecting gems, That woo'd the slimy bottom of the deep, And mock'd the dead bones that lay scatter'd by. 20 25 30 Brak. Had you such leisure, in the time of death, To gaze upon these secrets of the deep? 35 40 45 Clar. Methought, I had; and often did I strive To yield the ghost: but still the envious flood Kept in my soul, and would not let it forth To seek the empty, vast, and wandering air; But smother'd it within my panting bulk, Which almost burst to belch it in the sea. Brak. Awaked you not with this sore agony? Clar. O, no, my dream was lengthen'd after life; O, then began the tempest to my soul! I pass'd, methought, the melancholy flood, With that grim ferryman which poets write of, Unto the kingdom of perpetual night. The first that there did greet my stranger soul Was my great father-in-law, renown'd Warwick; Who cried aloud, "What scourge for perjury Can this dark monarchy afford false Clarence ?" And so he vanish'd: Then came wandering by A shadow like an angel, with bright hair Dabbled in blood; and he shriek'd out aloud, "Clarence is come, false, fleeting, perjured Clarence, That stabb'd me in the field by Tewkesbury; Seize on him, furies, take him to your torments!" With that, methought, a legion of foul fiends Environ'd me, and howled in mine ears Such hideous cries, that with the very noise I trembling waked, and for a season after, Could not believe but that I was in hell; Such terrible impression made my dream. Brak. No marvel, lord, that it affrighted you; I am afraid, methinks, to hear you tell it. 50 50 54 60 65 That now give evidence against my soul, O, spare my guiltless wife, and my poor children! My soul is heavy, and I fain would sleep. SHAKSPEARE. 70 CATO'S SOLILOQUY. Ir must be so-Plato, thou reason'st well!- Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror 5 Eternity! thou pleasing, dreadful thought! 10 15 Through what new scenes and changes must we pass! 20 |