Go to: Antony and Cleopatra Table of Contents, where you can also read the CLASSICS REVITALIZED paraphrase of this scene
Rome. An Apartment in Caesar's House.
(Enter Octavius Caesar, Lepidus, and Attendants.)
Caesar: You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know, /It is not Caesar's natural vice to hate /Our great competitor. From Alexandria /This is the news:he fishes, drinks, and wastes /The lamps of night in revel: is not more manlike /Than Cleopatra;, nor the queen of Ptolemy /More womanly than he: hardly gave audience, or /Vouchsaf'd to think he had partners: you shall find there /A man who is the abstract of all faults /That all men follow.
Lepidus: I must not think there are /Evils enow to darken all his goodness: /His faults in him seem as the spots of heaven, /More fiery by night's blackness; hereditary /Rather than purchas'd; what he cannot change /Than what he chooses.
Caesar: You are too indulgent. Let's grant it is not /Amiss to tumble on the bed of Ptolemy; /To give a kingdom for a mirth; to sit /And keep the turn of tippling with a slave; /To reel the streets at noon, and stand the buffet /With knaves that smell of sweat: say this becomes him, /As his composure must be rare indeed /Whom these things cannot blemish, yet must Antony /No way excuse his foils when we do bear /So great weight in his lightness. If he fill'd /His vacancy with his voluptuousness, /Full surfeits and the dryness of his bones /Call on him for't: but to confound such time /That drums him from his sport, and speaks as loud /As his own state and ours, 'tis to be chid /As we rate boys, who, being mature in knowledge, /Pawn their experience to their present pleasure, /And so rebel to judgment.
(Enter a Messenger.)
Lepidus: Here's more news.
Messenger: Thy biddings have been done; and every hour, /Most noble Caesar, shalt thou have report /How 'tis abroad. Pompey is strong at sea; /And it appears he is belov'd of those /That only have fear'd Caesar: to the ports /The discontents repair, and men's reports /Give him much wrong'd.
Caesar: I should have known no less: /It hath been taught us from the primal state /That he which is was wish'd until he were; /And the ebb'd man, ne'er lov'd till ne'er worth love, /Comes dear'd by being lack'd. This common body, /Like to a vagabond flag upon the stream, /Goes to and back, lackeying the varying tide, /To rot itself with motion.
Messenger: Caesar, I bring thee word /Menecrates and Menas, famous pirates, /Make the sea serve them, which they ear and wound /With keels of every kind: many hot inroads /They make in Italy; the borders maritime /Lack blood to think on't, and flush youth revolt: /No vessel can peep forth but 'tis as soon /Taken as seen; for Pompey's name strikes more /Than could his war resisted.
Caesar: Antony, /Leave thy lascivious wassails. When thou once /Was beaten from Modena, where thou slew'st /Hirtius and Pansa, consuls, at thy heel /Did famine follow; whom thou fought'st against, /Though daintily brought up, with patience more /Than savages could suffer: thou didst drink /The stale of horses, and the gilded puddle /Which beasts would cough at: thy palate then did deign /The roughest berry on the rudest hedge; /Yea, like the stag when snow the pasture sheets, /The barks of trees thou browsed'st; on the Alps /It is reported thou didst eat strange flesh, /Which some did die to look on: and all this, /It wounds thine honour that I speak it now, /Was borne so like a soldier that thy cheek /So much as lank'd not.
Lepidus: 'Tis pity of him.
Caesar: Let his shames quickly /Drive him to Rome; 'tis time we twain /Did show ourselves i' thefield; and to that end /Assemble we immediate council: Pompey /Thrives in our idleness.
Lepidus: To-morrow, Caesar, /I shall be furnish'd to inform you rightly /Both what by sea and land I can be able /To front this present time.
Caesar: Till which encounter /It is my business too. Farewell.
Lepidus: Farewell, my lord: what you shall know meantime /Of stirs abroad, I shall beseech you, sir, /To let me be partaker.
Caesar: Doubt not, sir; /I knew it for my bond.
(Exeunt.)
Go to: Next scene (Act 1, Scene 5), or Antony and Cleopatra Table of Contents, where you can also read the CLASSICS REVITALIZED paraphrase of this scene
No comments:
Post a Comment