Making not reservation of yourselves,
(Still your own foes), deliver you, as most
Abated captives, to some nation
That won you without blows!
PRECEPTS AGAINST ILL FORTUNE
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
With precepts, that would make invincible
The heart that conn'd them.
ON COMMON FRIENDSHIPS.
O, world, thy slippery turns! Friends now fast
Whose double bosoms seem to wear one heart,
Whose hours, whose bed, whose meal, and exercise,
Are still together, who twin, as 'twere, in love
Unseparable, shall within this hour,
On a dissention of a doit +, break out
To bitterest enmity: So, fellest foes,
Whose passions and whose plots have broke their sleep
To take the one the other, by some chance,
Some trick not worth an egg, shall grow dear friends, And interjoin their issues.
Mine arms about that body, where against
My grained ash an hundred times hath broke,
And scar'd 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
Bestride my threshold. Why, thou Mars! I tell thee,
We have a power on foot; and I had purpose
Once more to hew thy target from, thy brawn +,
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.
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 him
Till he be dieted to my request.
My wife comes foremost; then the honour'd mould 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 doves' 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 yo
Hath an aspect of intercession, which
Great nature cries, Deny not,-Let the Volces
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.
RELENTING TENDERNESS.
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.—O, a kiss
Long as my exile, sweet as my revenge!
Now by the jealous queen + 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 impression show
Than that of common sons.
The noble sister of Publicola,
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 FOR HIS SON.
The god of soldiers,
With the consent of supreme Jove, inform
Thy thoughts with nobleness; that thou may'st prove
To shame unvulnerable, and stick i' the wars
Like a great sea-mark, standing every flaw ‡,
And saving those that
VOLUMNIA'S PATHETIC SPEECH TO HER SON CORIO
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 sor
Making the mother, wife, and child, to see
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.
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.
Ne'er through an arch so hurried the blown tide,
As the recomforted through the gates. Why, hark you;
The trumpets, sackbuts, psalteries, and fifes,
Tabors and cymbals, and the shouting Romans,
Make the sun dance.
Imo.THOU should'st have made him
As little as a crow, or less, ere left
Imo. I would have broke mine eye-strings; crack'd them, but
To look upon 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
Have turn'd mine eye, and wept.-But, good Pisanio, When shall we hear from him?
Imo. I did not take my leave of him, but had Most pretty things to say: ere I could tell him, How I would think on him, at certain hours, Such thoughts, and such; or I could make him swear The shes of Italy should not betray
Mine interest, and his honour; or have charg'd him,
At the sixth hour of morn, at noon, at midnight,
To encounter me with orisons +, for then
I am in heaven for him: or ere I could
Give him that parting kiss, which I had set
Betwixt two charming words, comes in my father,
And, like the tyrannous breathing of the north,
Shakes all our buds from growing.
+ Meet me with reciprocal prayer.
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