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Shakespeare - All's Well that Ends Well (12669 Characters)
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1603 | |
ALLS WELL THAT ENDS WELL | |
by William Shakespeare | |
Dramatis Personae | |
KING OF FRANCE | |
THE DUKE OF FLORENCE | |
BERTRAM, Count of Rousillon | |
LAFEU, an old lord | |
PAROLLES, a follower of Bertram | |
TWO FRENCH LORDS, serving with Bertram | |
STEWARD, Servant to the Countess of Rousillon | |
LAVACHE, a clown and Servant to the Countess of Rousillon | |
A PAGE, Servant to the Countess of Rousillon | |
COUNTESS OF ROUSILLON, mother to Bertram | |
HELENA, a gentlewoman protected by the Countess | |
A WIDOW OF FLORENCE. | |
DIANA, daughter to the Widow | |
VIOLENTA, neighbour and friend to the Widow | |
MARIANA, neighbour and friend to the Widow | |
Lords, Officers, Soldiers, etc., French and Florentine | |
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SCENE: | |
Rousillon; Paris; Florence; Marseilles | |
ACT I. SCENE 1. | |
Rousillon. The COUNT'S palace | |
Enter BERTRAM, the COUNTESS OF ROUSILLON, HELENA, and LAFEU, all in black | |
COUNTESS. In delivering my son from me, I bury a second husband. | |
BERTRAM. And I in going, madam, weep o'er my father's death anew; | |
but I must attend his Majesty's command, to whom I am now in | |
ward, evermore in subjection. | |
LAFEU. You shall find of the King a husband, madam; you, sir, a | |
father. He that so generally is at all times good must of | |
necessity hold his virtue to you, whose worthiness would stir it | |
up where it wanted, rather than lack it where there is such | |
abundance. | |
COUNTESS. What hope is there of his Majesty's amendment? | |
LAFEU. He hath abandon'd his physicians, madam; under whose | |
practices he hath persecuted time with hope, and finds no other | |
advantage in the process but only the losing of hope by time. | |
COUNTESS. This young gentlewoman had a father- O, that 'had,' how | |
sad a passage 'tis!-whose skill was almost as great as his | |
honesty; had it stretch'd so far, would have made nature | |
immortal, and death should have play for lack of work. Would, for | |
the King's sake, he were living! I think it would be the death of | |
the King's disease. | |
LAFEU. How call'd you the man you speak of, madam? | |
COUNTESS. He was famous, sir, in his profession, and it was his | |
great right to be so- Gerard de Narbon. | |
LAFEU. He was excellent indeed, madam; the King very lately spoke | |
of him admiringly and mourningly; he was skilful enough to have | |
liv'd still, if knowledge could be set up against mortality. | |
BERTRAM. What is it, my good lord, the King languishes of? | |
LAFEU. A fistula, my lord. | |
BERTRAM. I heard not of it before. | |
LAFEU. I would it were not notorious. Was this gentlewoman the | |
daughter of Gerard de Narbon? | |
COUNTESS. His sole child, my lord, and bequeathed to my | |
overlooking. I have those hopes of her good that her education | |
promises; her dispositions she inherits, which makes fair gifts | |
fairer; for where an unclean mind carries virtuous qualities, | |
there commendations go with pity-they are virtues and traitors | |
too. In her they are the better for their simpleness; she derives | |
her honesty, and achieves her goodness. | |
LAFEU. Your commendations, madam, get from her tears. | |
COUNTESS. 'Tis the best brine a maiden can season her praise in. | |
The remembrance of her father never approaches her heart but the | |
tyranny of her sorrows takes all livelihood from her cheek. No | |
more of this, Helena; go to, no more, lest it be rather thought | |
you affect a sorrow than to have- | |
HELENA. I do affect a sorrow indeed, but I have it too. | |
LAFEU. Moderate lamentation is the right of the dead: excessive | |
grief the enemy to the living. | |
COUNTESS. If the living be enemy to the grief, the excess makes it | |
soon mortal. | |
BERTRAM. Madam, I desire your holy wishes. | |
LAFEU. How understand we that? | |
COUNTESS. Be thou blest, Bertram, and succeed thy father | |
In manners, as in shape! Thy blood and virtue | |
Contend for empire in thee, and thy goodness | |
Share with thy birthright! Love all, trust a few, | |
Do wrong to none; be able for thine enemy | |
Rather in power than use, and keep thy friend | |
Under thy own life's key; be check'd for silence, | |
But never tax'd for speech. What heaven more will, | |
That thee may furnish, and my prayers pluck down, | |
Fall on thy head! Farewell. My lord, | |
'Tis an unseason'd courtier; good my lord, | |
Advise him. | |
LAFEU. He cannot want the best | |
That shall attend his love. | |
COUNTESS. Heaven bless him! Farewell, Bertram. Exit | |
BERTRAM. The best wishes that can be forg'd in your thoughts be | |
servants to you! [To HELENA] Be comfortable to my mother, your | |
mistress, and make much of her. | |
LAFEU. Farewell, pretty lady; you must hold the credit of your | |
father. Exeunt BERTRAM and LAFEU | |
HELENA. O, were that all! I think not on my father; | |
And these great tears grace his remembrance more | |
Than those I shed for him. What was he like? | |
I have forgot him; my imagination | |
Carries no favour in't but Bertram's. | |
I am undone; there is no living, none, | |
If Bertram be away. 'Twere all one | |
That I should love a bright particular star | |
And think to wed it, he is so above me. | |
In his bright radiance and collateral light | |
Must I be comforted, not in his sphere. | |
Th' ambition in my love thus plagues itself: | |
The hind that would be mated by the lion | |
Must die for love. 'Twas pretty, though a plague, | |
To see him every hour; to sit and draw | |
His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls, | |
In our heart's table-heart too capable | |
Of every line and trick of his sweet favour. | |
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy | |
Must sanctify his relics. Who comes here? | |
Enter PAROLLES | |
[Aside] One that goes with him. I love him for his sake; | |
And yet I know him a notorious liar, | |
Think him a great way fool, solely a coward; | |
Yet these fix'd evils sit so fit in him | |
That they take place when virtue's steely bones | |
Looks bleak i' th' cold wind; withal, full oft we see | |
Cold wisdom waiting on superfluous folly. | |
PAROLLES. Save you, fair queen! | |
HELENA. And you, monarch! | |
PAROLLES. No. | |
HELENA. And no. | |
PAROLLES. Are you meditating on virginity? | |
HELENA. Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you; let me ask you a | |
question. Man is enemy to virginity; how may we barricado it | |
against him? | |
PAROLLES. Keep him out. | |
HELENA. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant in the | |
defence, yet is weak. Unfold to us some warlike resistance. | |
PAROLLES. There is none. Man, setting down before you, will | |
undermine you and blow you up. | |
HELENA. Bless our poor virginity from underminers and blowers-up! | |
Is there no military policy how virgins might blow up men? | |
PAROLLES. Virginity being blown down, man will quicklier be blown | |
up; marry, in blowing him down again, with the breach yourselves | |
made, you lose your city. It is not politic in the commonwealth | |
of nature to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational | |
increase; and there was never virgin got till virginity was first | |
lost. That you were made of is metal to make virgins. Virginity | |
by being once lost may be ten times found; by being ever kept, it | |
is ever lost. 'Tis too cold a companion; away with't. | |
HELENA. I will stand for 't a little, though therefore I die a | |
virgin. | |
PAROLLES. There's little can be said in 't; 'tis against the rule | |
of nature. To speak on the part of virginity is to accuse your | |
mothers; which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs | |
himself is a virgin; virginity murders itself, and should be | |
buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate | |
offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites, much like a | |
cheese; consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with | |
feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, | |
idle, made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the | |
canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but lose by't. Out with't. | |
Within ten year it will make itself ten, which is a goodly | |
increase; and the principal itself not much the worse. Away | |
with't. | |
HELENA. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking? | |
PAROLLES. Let me see. Marry, ill to like him that ne'er it likes. | |
'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss with lying; the longer kept, | |
the less worth. Off with't while 'tis vendible; answer the time | |
of request. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap out of | |
fashion, richly suited but unsuitable; just like the brooch and | |
the toothpick, which wear not now. Your date is better in your | |
pie and your porridge than in your cheek. And your virginity, | |
your old virginity, is like one of our French wither'd pears: it | |
looks ill, it eats drily; marry, 'tis a wither'd pear; it was | |
formerly better; marry, yet 'tis a wither'd pear. Will you | |
anything with it? | |
HELENA. Not my virginity yet. | |
There shall your master have a thousand loves, | |
A mother, and a mistress, and a friend, | |
A phoenix, captain, and an enemy, | |
A guide, a goddess, and a sovereign, | |
A counsellor, a traitress, and a dear; | |
His humble ambition, proud humility, | |
His jarring concord, and his discord dulcet, | |
His faith, his sweet disaster; with a world | |
Of pretty, fond, adoptious christendoms | |
That blinking Cupid gossips. Now shall he- | |
I know not what he shall. God send him well! | |
The court's a learning-place, and he is one- | |
PAROLLES. What one, i' faith? | |
HELENA. That I wish well. 'Tis pity- | |
PAROLLES. What's pity? | |
HELENA. That wishing well had not a body in't | |
Which might be felt; that we, the poorer born, | |
Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes, | |
Might with effects of them follow our friends | |
And show what we alone must think, which never | |
Returns us thanks. | |
Enter PAGE | |
PAGE. Monsieur Parolles, my lord calls for you. Exit PAGE | |
PAROLLES. Little Helen, farewell; if I can remember thee, I will | |
think of thee at court. | |
HELENA. Monsieur Parolles, you were born under a charitable star. | |
PAROLLES. Under Mars, I. | |
HELENA. I especially think, under Mars. | |
PAROLLES. Why under Man? | |
HELENA. The wars hath so kept you under that you must needs be born | |
under Mars. | |
PAROLLES. When he was predominant. | |
HELENA. When he was retrograde, I think, rather. | |
PAROLLES. Why think you so? | |
HELENA. You go so much backward when you fight. | |
PAROLLES. That's for advantage. | |
HELENA. So is running away, when fear proposes the safety: but the | |
composition that your valour and fear makes in you is a virtue of | |
a good wing, and I like the wear well. | |
PAROLLES. I am so full of business I cannot answer thee acutely. I | |
will return perfect courtier; in the which my instruction shall | |
serve to naturalize thee, so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's | |
counsel, and understand what advice shall thrust upon thee; else | |
thou diest in thine unthankfulness, and thine ignorance makes | |
thee away. Farewell. When thou hast leisure, say thy prayers; | |
when thou hast none, remember thy friends. Get thee a good | |
husband and use him as he uses thee. So, farewell. | |
Exit | |
HELENA. Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, | |
Which we ascribe to heaven. The fated sky | |
Gives us free scope; only doth backward pull | |
Our slow designs when we ourselves are dull. | |
What power is it which mounts my love so high, | |
That makes me see, and cannot feed mine eye? | |
The mightiest space in fortune nature brings | |
To join like likes, and kiss like native things. | |
Impossible be strange attempts to those | |
That weigh their pains in sense, and do suppose | |
What hath been cannot be. Who ever strove | |
To show her merit that did miss her love? | |
The King's disease-my project may deceive me, | |
But my intents are fix'd, and will not leave me. Exit |
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