steel

Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.

THE KING'S ENVY OF A SHEP.
HERD'S LIFE.

O GOD! methinks it were a happy life,
To be no better than a homely swain ;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now,
To carve out dials quaintly, point by
point,

Thereby to see the minutes how they run:
How many make the hour full complete,
How many hours bring about the day,
How many days will finish up the year,
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the
times:

So many hours must I tend my flock;
So many hours must I take my rest;
So many hours must I contemplate;
So many hours must I sport myself;

So many years ere I shall shear the fleece; So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and years,

Pass'd over to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.

Ah, what a life were this! how sweet! how lovely!

RICHARD DUKE OF GLOSTER'S DESCRIPTION OF HIMSELF. WHY, I can smile, and murder while smile;

And cry, content, to that which grieves my heart;

And wet my cheeks with artificial tears, And frame my face to all occasions;

I'll drown more sailors than the mermaid

shall;

I'll slay more gazers than the basilisk; I'll play the orator as well as Nestor; Deceive more slily than Ulysses could, And, like a Sinon, take another Troy: I can add colours to the cameleon;

much err'd.

I would invent as bitter-searching terms,
As curst, as harsh, and horrible to hear,
Deliver'd strongly through my fixed teeth,
With full as many signs of deadly hate,
As lean-faced Envy in her loathsome cave:
My tongue should stumble in mine earnest
words:

Mine eyes shall sparkle like the beaten flint;

My hair be fixed on end, as one distract; Ay, every joint should seem to curse and ban:

And even now my burden'd heart would break,

Should I not curse them. Poison be their drink!

Gall, worse than gall, the daintiest that they taste!

Their sweetest shade, a grove of cypress

trees!

Their chiefest prospect, murdering basilisks!

Their softest touch, as smart as lizard's stings;

Their music frightful as the serpent's hiss; And boding screech-owls make the concert full !

All the foul terrors in dark-seated hell.

THE DUKE OF GLOSTER ON
HIS DEFORMITY.
King Richard III.

Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of
York;

And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house,

In the deep bosom of the ocean buried. Now are our brows bound with victorious

wreaths;

Our bruised arms hung up for monuments;

Our stern alarums, chang'd to merry meetings,

Our dreadful marches to delightful mea

sures.

Grim-visag'd war hath smooth'd his wrinkled front;

And now, instead of mounting barbed steeds,

To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,

He capers nimbly in a lady s chamber,
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
But I, that am not shaped for sportive
tricks,

Nor made to court an amorous looking. glass;

I, that am rudely stamp'd, and want love's majesty,

To strut before a wanton ambling nymph; I, that am curtail'd of this fair proportion, Cheated of feature by dissembling nature, Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,

And that so lamely and unfashionable, That dogs bark at me, as I halt by them ;

Why I, in this weak piping time of peace,

Have no delight to pass away the time;
Unless to spy my shadow in the sun,
And descant on mine own deformity;
And therefore,—since I cannot prove a
lover,

swine

Melting with tenderness and mild compassion,

Wept like two children, in their death's sad story.

"O thus," quoth Dighton, "lay the gentle babes-"

"Thus, thus," quoth Forrest, "girdling

one another

Lies now even in the centre of this isle, Near to the town of Leicester, as we learn:

From Tamworth thither, is but one day's march.

In God's name, cheerly on, courageous friends,

To reap the harvest of perpetual peace
By this one bloody trial of sharp war.

CARDINAL WOLSEY ON THE VICISSITUDES OF LIFE.

King Henry VIII. FAREWELL, a long farewell, to all my greatness,

This is the state of man; to-day he puts forth

The tender leaves of hope, to-morrow blossoms,

And bears his blushing honours thick upon him;

The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ;

And, when he thinks, good easy man, full surely

His greatness is a ripening,-nips his root, And then he falls, as I do. I have ven

tured,

Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders,

This many summers in a sea of glory; But far beyond my depth; my high-blown pride

At length broke under me; and now has left me,

Weary, and old with service, to the

mercy

Of a rude stream, that must for ever hide

me.

Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye;

I feel my heart new open'd: O, how wretched

Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favours!

There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to,

women have ;

Corruption wins not more than honesty. Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,

and fear not :

AWAY!

Measure for Measure.

TAKE, O take those lips away,

That so sweetly were forsworn; And those eyes, the break of day, Lights that do mislead the morn : But my kisses bring again, Seals of love, but seal'd in vain.

Hide, O hide those hills of snow,

Which thy frozen bosom bears, On whose tops the pinks that grow Are of those that April wears: But first set my poor heart free, Bound in those icy chains by thee.