網頁圖片
PDF
ePub 版

Man, proud man,

Drest in a little brief authority

Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd,
His glassy essence-like an angry ape,

Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,
As make the angels weep!

B.

BANISHMENT.

Banished?

O friar, the damned use that word in hell;
Howlings attend it: How hast thou the heart,
Being a divine, a ghostly confessor,

A sin-absolver, and my friend profest,
To mangle me with that word-banishment?
Go say, I sent thee forth to purchase honour,
And not, the king exil'd thee. Or suppose
Devouring pestilence hangs in our air,
And thou art flying to a fresher clime.
Look, what thy soul holds dear, imagine it
To lie that way thou go'st, not whence thou com'st.

All places that the eye of heaven visits,

Are to the wise man ports and happy havens.

Banish me?

Banish your dotage: banish usury,

That makes the senate ugly.

Flies may do this, when I from this must fly ;
They are free men, but I am banished.

BARGAINS BASTARDY-BATTLE.

I've stoopt my neck under your injuries,
And sigh'd my English breath in foreign clouds
Eating the bitter bread of banishment:
While you have fed upon my signiories;
Dis-park'd my parks, and fell'd my forest woods;
From mine own windows torn my household-coat,
Raz'd out my impress; leaving me no sign,
Save men's opinions, and my living blood,
To shew the world I am a gentleman.

BARGAINS.

I'll give thrice so much land

To any well-deserving friend;

But, in the way of bargain, mark ye me,
I'll cavil on the ninth part of a hair.

BASTARDY.

Why bastard? wherefore base?

When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and my shape as true,
As honest Madam's issue?

[merged small][merged small][ocr errors]

He did confound the best part of an hour

In changing hardiment with great Glendower :

17

Three times they breath'd, and three times did they

drink,

Upon agreement, of swift Severn's flood.

This day hath made

Much work for tears in many an English mother,
Whose sons lie scatter'd on the bleeding ground:

Many a widow's husband grovelling lies,
Coldly embracing the discolour'd earth:
And victory, with little loss, doth play
Upon the dancing banners of the French.

Methought, he bore him in the thickest troop,
As doth a lion in a herd of neat:

Or as a bear, encompass'd round with dogs;
Who having pinch'd a few, and made them cry,
The rest stand all aloof, and bark at him.

My sons-God knows, what hath bechanced them :
But this I know,—they have demean'd themselves
Like men born to renown, by life, or death.
Three times did Richard make a lane to me;
And thrice cried,-Courage, father, fight it out!
And full as oft came Edward on my side,
With purple faulchion, painted to the hilt,
In blood of those that had encounter'd him.

The cannons have their bowels full of wrath ;
And ready mounted are they, to spit forth
Their iron indignation 'gainst your walls.

If we are mark'd to die, we are enough
To do our country loss; and if to live,
The fewer men the greater share of honour.
A thousand hearts are great within my bosom;
Advance our standards, set upon our foes;
Our ancient word of courage, fair Saint George,
Inspire us with the spleen of fiery dragons!
Upon them! Victory sits on our helms.

BEAUTY.

Beauty is a witch,

Against whose charms faith melteth into blood.

My beauty, though but mean,
Needs not the painted flourish of your praise :
Beauty is bought by judgment of the eye,
Not utter'd by base sale of chapmen's tongues.

'Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand lay'd on.

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!
It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear:
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety: Other women cloy
The appetites they feed; but she makes hungry,
Where most she satisfies.

BEES.

So work the honey Bees;

Creatures, that by a rule in nature, teach
The act of order to a peopled kingdom.

BLUNTNESS.

This is some fellow,

Who, having been prais'd for bluntness, doth affect
A saucy roughness, and constrains the garb,
Quite from his nature: He can't flatter, he !-
An honest mind and plain, he must speak truth;
An they will take it, so; if not, he's plain.

These kind of knaves I know, which in this plainness
Harbour mere craft, and far corrupter ends,

Than twenty silly ducking observants,

That stretch their duty nicely.

This rudeness is a sauce to his good wit,

Which gives men stomach to digest his words
With better appetite.

I have neither writ, nor words, nor worth, Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech, To stir men's blood: I only speak right on.

BOASTING.

Who knows himself a braggart,

Let him fear this; for it will come to pass,
That every braggart shall be found an ass.

Here's a large mouth, indeed,

That spits forth death, and mountains, rocks, and seas; Talks as familiarly of roaring lions,

As maids of thirteen do of puppy-dogs

I'll rant as well as thou.

Nay, an thou'lt mouth,

What art thou? Have not I

An arm as big as thine? a heart as big?

Thy words, I grant, are bigger; for I wear not

My dagger in my mouth.

He made me mad,

To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet,

And talk so like a waiting-gentlewoman

Of guns, and drums, and wounds, (God save the

mark!)

And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmacity, for an inward bruise;
And that it was great pity, so it was,
This villanous salt-petre should be digg'd
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth,
Which many a good tall fellow had destroy'd
So cowardly; and, but for these vile guns,
He would himself have been a soldier..

Here is a silly, stately style indeed!
The Turk, that two-and-fifty kingdoms hath
Writes not so tedious a style as this.

« 上一頁繼續 »