I find, she names my very deed of love;
Only she comes too short,-that I profess
Myself an enemy to all other joys,

Which the most precious square of sense possesses; And find I am alone felicitate

In your dear highness' love.

Cor.

Then poor Cordelia! [Aside.
And yet not so; since, I am sure, my love's
More richer than my tongue.

Lear. To thee, and thine, hereditary ever,
Remain this ample third of our fair kingdom;
No less in space, validity,' and pleasure,
Than that conferred 2 on Goneril.-Now, our joy,
Although the last, not least; to whose young love
The vines of France, and milk of Burgundy,

3

Strive to be interessed: 3 what can you say, to draw A third more opulent than your sisters? Speak. Cor. Nothing, my lord.

Lear. Nothing?

Cor. Nothing.

Lear. Nothing can come of nothing; speak again. Cor. Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave

My heart into my mouth. I love your majesty

According to my bond; nor more, nor less.

Lear. How, how, Cordelia? mend your speech a little,

Lest it may mar your fortunes.

Cor.

Good my lord,

You have begot me, bred me, loved me; I
Return those duties back as are right fit,

an enemy to all other joys which the most precious aggregation of sense can bestow.' Square is here used for the whole complement, as circle is

now sometimes used.

1 Validity is several times used to signify worth, value, by Shakspeare. It does not, however, appear to have been peculiar to him in this sense.

2 The folio reads conferred; the quartos, confirmed. So in a former passage we have in the quartos confirming for conferring. The word confirm might be used in this connection in a legal sense, as it is in instruments of conveyance.

3 To interest and to interesse are not, perhaps, different spellings of the same verb, but two distinct words, though of the same import. We have interessed in Ben Jonson's Sejanus. Drayton also uses the word in the Preface to his Polyolbion.

Obey you, love you, and most honor you.
Why have my sisters husbands, if they say,
They love you all? Haply, when I shall wed,
That lord, whose hand must take my plight, shall carry
Half my love with him, half my care, and duty.
Sure, I shall never marry like

To love my father all.

my sisters,

Lear. But goes this with thy heart?
Cor.
Lear. So young, and so untender?

Cor. So young, my lord, and true.

Ay, good my lord.

Lear. Let it be so,-thy truth then be thy dower ; For, by the sacred radiance of the sun,

The mysteries of Hecate, and the night;

By all the operations of the orbs,

From whom we do exist, and cease to be;
Here I disclaim all my paternal care,

Propinquity and property of blood,

And as a stranger to my heart and me

Hold thee, from this, forever. The barbarous Scythian, Or he that makes his generation 1 messes

1

To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom
Be as well neighbored, pitied, and relieved,
As thou my sometime daughter.

Kent.

Lear. Peace, Kent!

Good my liege,

Come not between the dragon and his wrath.

I loved her most, and thought to set my rest

On her kind nursery.-Hence, and avoid my sight!

[To CORDELIA.

So be my grave my peace, as here I give

Her father's heart from her!-Call France;-who stirs ?

Call Burgundy.-Cornwall, and Albany,

With my two daughters' dowers digest this third;

Let pride, which she calls plainness, marry her.
I do invest you jointly with my power,

Preeminence, and all the large effects

That troop with majesty.-Ourself, by monthly course, With reservation of a hundred knights,

1 His children.

By you to be sustained, shall our abode

Make with you by due turns. Only we still retain 1 The name, and all the additions to a king;

The sway,

Revenue, execution of the rest,3

2

Beloved sons, be yours; which to confirm,

1

This coronet part between you. [Giving the crown.

Kent.

Royal Lear,

Whom I have ever honored as my king,

Loved as my father, as my master followed,

As my great patron thought on in my prayers,

Lear. The bow is bent and drawn; make from the

shaft.

Kent. Let it fall rather, though the fork invade The region of my heart; be Kent unmannerly, When Lear is mad.

man ?

What wouldst thou do, old

Think'st thou, that duty shall have dread to speak, When power to flattery bows? To plainness honor's

bound,

4

When majesty stoops to folly. Reverse thy doom; ^
And, in thy best consideration, check

This hideous rashness. Answer
Answer my life my judgment,
Thy youngest daughter does not love thee least;
Nor are those empty-hearted, whose low sound

Reverbs 5 no hollowness.

Lear.

Kent, on thy life, no more.

Kent. My life I never held but as a pawn
Το wage against thine enemies, nor fear to lose it,
Thy safety being the motive.

Lear.

Out of my sight!

1 Thus the quarto; folio, "we shall retain."

2 « All the titles belonging to a king."

3 By "the execution of the rest," all the other functions of the kingly office are probably meant.

4 The folio reads, "reserve thy state;" and has falls instead of "stoops to folly."

5 This is, perhaps, a word of the Poet's own; meaning the same as reverberates.

The expression to wage against is used in a letter from Guil. Webbe to Robt. Wilmot, prefixed to Tancred and Gismund, 1592:-" You shall not be able to wage against me in the charges growing upon this action.'

Kent. See better, Lear, and let me still remain
The true blank of thine eye.
Lear. Now, by Apollo,-

Kent.

Thou swear'st thy gods in vain.

Lear.

Now, by Apollo, king,

O vassal! miscreant!

[Laying his hand on his sword.

Alb. Corn. Dear sir, forbear.
Kent. Do;

Kill thy physician, and the fee bestow
Upon the foul disease. Revoke thy gift,
Or, whilst I can vent clamor from my throat,
I'll tell thee, thou dost evil.

Lear.

Hear me, recreant ! On thine allegiance, hear me !

Since thou hast sought to make us break our vow, (Which we durst never yet,) and, with strained pride, To come betwixt our sentence and our power, (Which nor our nature nor our place can bear ;) Our potency made good, take thy reward.

2

Five days we do allot thee, for provision
To shield thee from diseases of the world;
And, on the sixth, to turn thy hated back

Upon our kingdom. If, on the tenth day following,
Thy banished trunk be found in our dominions,
The moment is thy death. Away! By Jupiter,
This shall not be revoked.

Kent. Fare thee well, king; since thus thou wilt

4

appear,

Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here.
The gods to their dear shelter take thee, maid,

[To CORDELIA. That justly think'st, and hast most rightly said!— And your large speeches may your deeds approve, [To REGAN and GONERIL.

1 The blank is the mark at which men shoot. 2 "They to whom I have surrendered my authority, yielding me the ability to dispense it in this instance." Quarto B. reads "make good." 3 Thus the quartos. The folio reads "disasters." By diseases are meant uneasinesses, inconveniences.

The quartos read "Friendship;" and in the next line, instead of "dear shelter," "protection."

That good effects may spring from words of love.-
Thus Kent, O princes, bids you all adieu;
He'll shape his old course in a country new.

[Exit.

Re-enter GLOSTER, with FRANCE, BURGUNDY, and Attendants.

Glo. Here's France and Burgundy, my noble lord. Lear. My lord of Burgundy,

We first address towards you, who with this king Hath rivalled for our daughter. What, in the least, Will you require in present dower with her,

Or cease your quest of love?!

Bur.

Most royal majesty, I crave no more than hath your highness offered,

Nor will you tender less.

Lear.
Right noble Burgundy,
When she was dear to us, we did hold her so;
But now her price is fallen. Sir, there she stands;
If aught within that little, seeming 2 substance,
Or all of it, with our displeasure pieced,

And nothing more, may fitly like your grace,
She's there, and she is yours.

Bur.

Lear. Sir,

I know no answer.

Will you, with those infirmities she owes,3

Unfriended, new-adopted to our hate,

Dowered with our curse, and strangered with our oath, Take her, or leave her?

Pardon me, royal sir;

Bur.
Election makes not up on such conditions.

4

Lear. Then leave her, sir; for, by the power that

made me,

I tell you all her wealth.-For you, great king,

[To FRANCE.

1 A quest is a seeking or pursuit: the expedition in which a knight was engaged is often so named in the Faerie Queen.

2 Seeming here means specious.

3 i. e. owns.

4 That is, I cannot decide to take her upon such terms; or, such conditions leave me no choice.