The premises observed214,
Thy will by my performance215 shall be served.
So make the choice of216 thy own time, for I,
Thy resolved patient, on thee still217 rely.
More should I question thee, and more I must —
Though more to know could not be more to trust —
From whence thou cam’st, how tended on.220 But rest
Unquestioned221 welcome and undoubted blest.—
Give me some help here, ho!— If thou proceed
As high as word223, my deed shall match thy deed.
Flourish. Exeunt [the King is carried out]
running scene 5
Enter Countess and Clown [Lavatch]
COUNTESS Come on, sir, I shall now put you to the height1 of
your breeding.2
LAVATCH I will show myself highly fed and lowly3 taught. I
know my business is but to the court.
COUNTESS To the court! Why, what place make you5 special,
when you put off6 that with such contempt? But to the court!
LAVATCH Truly, madam, if God have lent a man any
manners, he may easily put8 it off at court: he that cannot
make a leg, put off’s cap, kiss his hand and say nothing, has
neither leg, hands, lip, nor cap; and indeed such a fellow, to
say precisely, were not for the court. But for me, I have an
answer12 will serve all men.
COUNTESS Marry, that’s a bountiful answer that fits all
questions.
LAVATCH It is like a barber’s chair that fits all buttocks: the
pin-buttock, the quatch-buttock, the brawn16-buttock, or any
buttock.
COUNTESS Will your answer serve fit18 to all questions?
LAVATCH As fit as ten groats19 is for the hand of an attorney, as
your French crown for your taffety punk, as Tib’s rush20 for
Tom’s forefinger, as a pancake for Shrove Tuesday, a morris21
for May Day, as the nail to his hole, the cuckold to his horn22,
as a scolding quean to a wrangling knave23, as the nun’s lip to
the friar’s mouth, nay, as the pudding to his24 skin.
COUNTESS Have you, I say, an answer of such fitness for all
questions?
LAVATCH From below your duke to beneath your constable, it
will fit any question.
COUNTESS It must be an answer of most monstrous size that
must fit all demands.
LAVATCH But a trifle neither31, in good faith, if the learned
should speak truth of it. Here it is, and all that belongs to’t.
Ask me if I am a courtier, it shall do you no harm to learn.
COUNTESS To be young again, if we could. I will be a fool in34
question, hoping to be the wiser by your answer. I pray you,
sir, are you a courtier?
LAVATCH O lord, sir! There’s a simple putting off.37 More, more,
a hundred of them.
COUNTESS Sir, I am a poor friend of yours that loves you.
LAVATCH O lord, sir! Thick40, thick, spare not me.
COUNTESS I think, sir, you can eat none of this homely meat.41
LAVATCH O lord, sir! Nay, put me to’t, I warrant you.
COUNTESS You were lately whipped, sir, as I think.
LAVATCH O lord, sir! Spare not me.
COUNTESS Do you cry, ‘O lord, sir!’ at your whipping, and
‘Spare not me’? Indeed your ‘O lord, sir!’ is very sequent46 to
your whipping: you would answer47 very well to a whipping, if
you were but bound to’t.48
LAVATCH I ne’er had worse luck in my life in my ‘O lord, sir!’ I
see things may serve long, but not serve ever.
COUNTESS I play the noble51 housewife with the time
To entertain it so merrily with a fool.
LAVATCH O lord, sir! Why, there’t serves well again.
COUNTESS An end, sir. To your business. Give Helen this,
Gives a letter
And urge her to a present answer back. Commend55
me to my kinsmen and my son. This is not much.
LAVATCH Not much commendation to them.
COUNTESS Not much employment for you. You understand me?
LAVATCH Most fruitfully. I am there before my legs.59
COUNTESS Haste you again.60
Exeunt [separately]
running scene 6
Enter Count [Bertram], Lafew and Parolles
LAFEW They say miracles are past, and we have our
philosophical persons to make modern and familiar, things2
supernatural and causeless.3 Hence is it that we make trifles
of terrors, ensconcing ourselves into4 seeming knowledge
when we should submit ourselves to an unknown fear.5
PAROLLES Why, ’tis the rarest argument5 of wonder that hath
shot out in our latter7 times.
BERTRAM And so ’tis.
LAFEW To be relinquished of the artists9—
PAROLLES So I say, both of Galen and Paracelsus.10
LAFEW Of all the learnèd and authentic fellows11—
PAROLLES Right, so I say.
LAFEW That gave him out13 incurable—
PAROLLES Why, there ’tis. So say I too.
LAFEW Not to be helped —
PAROLLES Right. As ’twere a man assured of a—
LAFEW Uncertain life and sure death.
PAROLLES Just18, you say well. So would I have said.
LAFEW I may truly say, it is a novelty to the world.
PAROLLES It is, indeed: if you will have it in showing20, you shall
read it in— what-do-ye-call there?
Points to the ballad Lafew holds
Reads
LAFEW ‘A showing of a heavenly effect in an
earthly actor.’
PAROLLES That’s it. I would have said the very same.
LAFEW Why, your dolphin is not lustier. ’Fore me25, I speak in
respect—
PAROLLES Nay, ’tis strange, ’tis very strange. That is the brief27
and the tedious of it, and he’s of a most facinerious28 spirit
that will not acknowledge it to be the—
LAFEW Very hand of heaven.
PAROLLES Ay, so I say.
LAFEW In a most weak—
PAROLLES And debile minister33, great power, great transcendence,
which should indeed give us a further use to be made
than alone the recovery of the king, as to be—
LAFEW Generally36 thankful.
Enter King, Helen and Attendants
PAROLLES I would have said it; you say well. Here comes the
king.
Lafew and Parolles stand aside
LAFEW Lustigue, as the Dutchman39 says. I’ll like a maid the
better whilst I have a tooth40 in my head. Why, he’s able to lead
her a coranto.41
PAROLLES Mor du vinager!42 Is not this Helen?
LAFEW ’Fore God, I think so.
KING Go, call before me all the lords in court.
[Exit Attendant]
Sit, my preserver, by thy patient’s side,
Helen sits
And with this healthful hand, whose banished sense46
Thou hast repealed47, a second time receive
The confirmation of my promised gift,
Which but attends49 thy naming.
Enter three or four Lords
Fair maid, send forth thine eye: this youthful parcel50
Of noble bachelors stand at my bestowing51,
O’er whom both sovereign power and father’s voice
I have to use. Thy frank election53 make.
Thou hast power to choose, and they none to forsake.54
HELEN To each of you one fair and virtuous mistress
Fall, when love please! Marry, to each, but one!
LAFEW I’d give bay curtal and his furniture57
My mouth no more were broken than these boys’58,
And writ59 as little beard.
KING Peruse them well:
Not one of those but had a noble father.
HELEN Gentlemen, heaven hath through me restored the
king to health.
She addresses her to a Lord
ALL We understand it, and thank heaven for you.
HELEN I am a simple maid, and therein wealthiest
That I protest66 I simply am a maid.
Please it your majesty, I have done already.
The blushes in my cheeks thus whisper68 me,
‘We blush that thou shouldst choose. But be refused,
Let the white death70 sit on thy cheek for ever,
We’ll ne’er come there again.’
KING Make choice and see,
Who shuns thy love shuns all his love in me.73
HELEN Now, Dian74, from thy altar do I fly,
And to imperial Love75, that god most high,
To First Lord
Do my sighs stream.— Sir, will you hear my suit?
FIRST LORD And grant it.
HELEN Thanks, sir. All78 the rest is mute.
Aside
LAFEW I had rather be in this choice than throw
ames-ace for my life.80
To Second Lord
HELEN The honour81, sir, that flames in your fair eyes
Before I speak, too threat’ningly replies.
Love83 make your fortunes twenty times above
Her that so wishes84, and her humble love.
SECOND LORD No better85, if you please.
HELEN My wish receive,
Which great love grant! And so I take my leave.
Aside
LAFEW Do all they deny her? An they were sons
of mine, I’d have them whipped, or I would send them to
th’Turk90 to make eunuchs of.
To Third Lord
HELEN Be not afraid that I your hand should take.
I’ll never do you wrong for your own sake.
Blessing upon your vows, and in your bed
Find fairer fortune, if you ever wed!
Aside
LAFEW These boys are boys of ice, they’ll none have
her. Sure96 they are bastards to the English, the French ne’er
got97 ’em.
To Fourth Lord
HELEN You are too young, too happy98, and too good,
To make yourself a son out of my blood.
FOURTH LORD Fair one, I think not so.
Aside
LAFEW There’s one grape101 yet. I am sure thy father
drunk wine.102 But if thou be’st not an ass, I am a youth of
fourteen. I have known103 thee already.
To Bertram
HELEN I dare not say I take you, but I give
Me and my service, ever whilst I live,
Into your guiding power. This is the man.
KING Why, then, young Bertram, take her: she’s thy wife.
BERTRAM My wife, my liege? I shall beseech your highness,
In such a business give me leave to use
The help of mine own eyes.
KING Know’st thou not, Bertram, what she has done for me?
BERTRAM Yes, my good lord,
But never hope to know why I should marry her.
KING Thou know’st she has raised me from my sickly bed.
BERTRAM But follows it, my lord, to bring me down115
Must answer for your raising? I know her well:
She had her breeding at my father’s charge.117
A poor physician’s daughter my wife? Disdain
Rather corrupt me ever!119
KING ’Tis only title120 thou disdain’st in her, the which
I can build up. Strange is it that our bloods,
Of colour, weight and heat, poured all together,
Would quite confound distinction, yet stands off123
In differences so mighty. If she be
All that is virtuous, save what thou dislik’st,
A poor physician’s daughter, thou dislik’st
Of virtue for the name.
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