EXCUSE FOR UNREASONABLE DISLIKE. At first I stuck my choice upon her, ere my heart AS YOU LIKE IT. ACT I. MODESTY AND COURAGE IN YOUTH. BESEECH you, punish me not with your hard thoughts; wherein I confess me much guilty, to deny so fair and excellent ladies any thing. But let your fair eyes, and gentle wishes, go with me to my trial: wherein if I be foiled, there is but one shamed that was never gracious; if killed, but one dead that is willing to be so: I shall do my friends no wrong, for I have none to lament me; the world no injury, for in it I have nothing; only in the world I fill up a place, which may be better supplied when I have made it empty. PLAY-FELLOWS. We still have slept together, Rose at an instant, learn'd, play'd, eat together; Still we went coupled, and inseparable. BEAUTY. Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold. ROSALIND PROPOSING TO WEAR MEN'S CLOTHES. Were it not better, Because that I am more than common tall, A boar-spear in my hand; and (in my heart ACT II. SOLITUDE PREFERRED TO A COURT LIFE, AND THE ADVANTAGES OF ADVERSITY. Now, my co-mates, and brothers in exile, Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, And this our life, exempt from public haunt, Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, Sermons in stones, and good in every thing. REFLECTIONS ON THE WOUNDED STAG. Duke S. Come, shall we go and kill us venison ? And yet it irks me, the poor dappled fools, Being native burghers of this desert city,Should, in their own confines, with forked heads * Have their round haunches gor'd. 1 Lord. Indeed, my lord, The melancholy Jaques grieves at that; Duke S. I Lord. O, yes, into a thousand similes. First, for his weeping in the needless stream; Poor deer, quoth he, thou mak'st a testament As worldlings do, giving thy sum of more To that which had too much: Then, being alone, Left and abandon'd of his velvet friends; 'Tis right, quoth he; this misery doth part The flux of company: Anon, a careless herd, Full of the pasture, jumps along by him, And never stays to greet him; Ay, quoth Jaques, Sweep on, you fat and greasy citizens; 'Tis just the fashion: Wherefore do you look Upon that poor and broken bankrupt there? * Barbed arrows. GRATITUDE IN AN OLD SERVANT. But do not so: I have five hundred crowns, Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood; DESCRIPTION OF A LOVER. O, thou didst then ne'er love so heartily: Or if thou hast not sat as I do now, Or if thou hast not broke from company, DESCRIPTION OF A FOOL, AND HIS MORALIZING ON TIME. Good-morrow, fool, quoth I: No, sir, quoth he, Call me not fool, till heaven hath sent me fortune: And then he drew a dial from his poke; And looking on it with lack-lustre eye, Thus may we see, quoth he, how the world wags: 'Tis but an hour ago, since it was nine; And after an hour more, 'twill be eleven ; An hour by his dial.-O noble fool! A worthy fool! Motley's the only wear *. Jaq. O worthy fool!-One that hath been a cour tier; And says, if ladies be but young, and fair, After a voyage, he hath strange places cramm'd In mangled forms. A FOOL'S LIBERTY OF SPEECH. I must have liberty Withal, as large a charter as the wind, To blow on whom I please; for so fools have: They most must laugh: And why, sir, must they so? He, that a fool doth very wisely hit, APOLOGY FOR SATIRE. Why, who cries out on pride, That can therein tax any private party? Till that the very very meal cbb? What woman in the city do I When that I say, The city-woman bears *The fool was anciently dressed in a party-coloured coat. |