The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare (book suggestions TXT) 📖

>That we have better men. But, hit or miss, Our project’s life this shape of sense assumes-Ajax employ’d plucks down Achilles’ plumes.

NESTOR. Now, Ulysses, I begin to relish thy advice; And I will give a taste thereof forthwith To Agamemnon. Go we to him straight.

Two curs shall tame each other: pride alone Must tarre the mastiffs on, as ‘twere their bone. Exeunt

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ACT II. SCENE 1.

The Grecian camp

 

Enter Ajax and THERSITES

 

AJAX. Thersites!

THERSITES. Agamemnon-how if he had boils full, an over, generally?

AJAX. Thersites!

THERSITES. And those boils did run-say so. Did not the general run then? Were not that a botchy core?

AJAX. Dog!

THERSITES. Then there would come some matter from him; I see none now.

AJAX. Thou bitch-wolf’s son, canst thou not hear? Feel, then.

[Strikes him]

THERSITES. The plague of Greece upon thee, thou mongrel beef-witted lord!

AJAX. Speak, then, thou whinid’st leaven, speak. I will beat thee into handsomeness.

THERSITES. I shall sooner rail thee into wit and holiness; but I think thy horse will sooner con an oration than thou learn a prayer without book. Thou canst strike, canst thou? A red murrain o’ thy jade’s tricks!

AJAX. Toadstool, learn me the proclamation.

THERSITES. Dost thou think I have no sense, thou strikest me thus?

AJAX. The proclamation!

THERSITES. Thou art proclaim’d, a fool, I think.

AJAX. Do not, porpentine, do not; my fingers itch.

THERSITES. I would thou didst itch from head to foot and I had the scratching of thee; I would make thee the loathsomest scab in Greece. When thou art forth in the incursions, thou strikest as slow as another.

AJAX. I say, the proclamation.

THERSITES. Thou grumblest and railest every hour on Achilles; and thou art as full of envy at his greatness as Cerberus is at Proserpina’s beauty-ay, that thou bark’st at him.

AJAX. Mistress Thersites!

THERSITES. Thou shouldst strike him.

AJAX. Cobloaf!

THERSITES. He would pun thee into shivers with his fist, as a sailor breaks a biscuit.

AJAX. You whoreson cur! [Strikes him]

THERSITES. Do, do.

AJAX. Thou stool for a witch!

THERSITES. Ay, do, do; thou sodden-witted lord! Thou hast no more brain than I have in mine elbows; an assinico may tutor thee. You scurvy valiant ass! Thou art here but to thrash Troyans, and thou art bought and sold among those of any wit like a barbarian slave. If thou use to beat me, I will begin at thy heel and tell what thou art by inches, thou thing of no bowels, thou!

AJAX. You dog!

THERSITES. You scurvy lord!

AJAX. You cur! [Strikes him]

THERSITES. Mars his idiot! Do, rudeness; do, camel; do, do.

 

Enter ACHILLES and PATROCLUS

 

ACHILLES. Why, how now, Ajax! Wherefore do you thus?

How now, Thersites! What’s the matter, man?

THERSITES. You see him there, do you?

ACHILLES. Ay; what’s the matter?

THERSITES. Nay, look upon him.

ACHILLES. So I do. What’s the matter?

THERSITES. Nay, but regard him well.

ACHILLES. Well! why, so I do.

THERSITES. But yet you look not well upon him; for who some ever you take him to be, he is Ajax.

ACHILLES. I know that, fool.

THERSITES. Ay, but that fool knows not himself.

AJAX. Therefore I beat thee.

THERSITES. Lo, lo, lo, lo, what modicums of wit he utters! His evasions have ears thus long. I have bobb’d his brain more than he has beat my bones. I will buy nine sparrows for a penny, and his pia mater is not worth the ninth part of a sparrow. This lord, Achilles, Ajax-who wears his wit in his belly and his guts in his head-I’ll tell you what I say of him.

ACHILLES. What?

THERSITES. I say this Ajax- [AJAX offers to strike him]

ACHILLES. Nay, good Ajax.

THERSITES. Has not so much wit—

ACHILLES. Nay, I must hold you.

THERSITES. As will stop the eye of Helen’s needle, for whom he comes to fight.

ACHILLES. Peace, fool.

THERSITES. I would have peace and quietness, but the fool will nothe there; that he; look you there.

AJAX. O thou damned cur! I shall—

ACHILLES. Will you set your wit to a fool’s?

THERSITES. No, I warrant you, the fool’s will shame it.

PATROCLUS. Good words, Thersites.

ACHILLES. What’s the quarrel?

AJAX. I bade the vile owl go learn me the tenour of the proclamation, and he rails upon me.

THERSITES. I serve thee not.

AJAX. Well, go to, go to.

THERSITES. I serve here voluntary.

ACHILLES. Your last service was suff’rance; ‘twas not voluntary. No man is beaten voluntary. Ajax was here the voluntary, and you as under an impress.

THERSITES. E’en so; a great deal of your wit too lies in your sinews, or else there be liars. Hector shall have a great catch an he knock out either of your brains: ‘a were as good crack a fusty nut with no kernel.

ACHILLES. What, with me too, Thersites?

THERSITES. There’s Ulysses and old Nestor-whose wit was mouldy ere your grandsires had nails on their toes-yoke you like draught oxen, and make you plough up the wars.

ACHILLES. What, what?

THERSITES. Yes, good sooth. To Achilles, to Ajax, to-AJAX. I shall cut out your tongue.

THERSITES. ‘Tis no matter; I shall speak as much as thou afterwards.

PATROCLUS. No more words, Thersites; peace!

THERSITES. I will hold my peace when Achilles’ brach bids me, shall I?

ACHILLES. There’s for you, Patroclus.

THERSITES. I will see you hang’d like clotpoles ere I come any more to your tents. I will keep where there is wit stirring, and leave the faction of fools. Exit PATROCLUS. A good riddance.

ACHILLES. Marry, this, sir, is proclaim’d through all our host, That Hector, by the fifth hour of the sun, Will with a trumpet ‘twixt our tents and Troy, Tomorrow morning, call some knight to arms That hath a stomach; and such a one that dare Maintain I know not what; ‘tis trash. Farewell.

AJAX. Farewell. Who shall answer him?

ACHILLES. I know not; ‘tis put to lott’ry. Otherwise. He knew his man.

AJAX. O, meaning you! I will go learn more of it. Exeunt

ACT II. SCENE 2.

Troy. PRIAM’S palace

 

Enter PRIAM, HECTOR, TROILUS, PARIS, and HELENUS

 

PRIAM. After so many hours, lives, speeches, spent, Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks: ‘Deliver Helen, and all damage else-As honour, loss of time, travail, expense, Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consum’d In hot digestion of this cormorant war-Shall be struck off.’ Hector, what say you to’t?

HECTOR. Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I, As far as toucheth my particular,

Yet, dread Priam,

There is no lady of more softer bowels, More spongy to suck in the sense of fear, More ready to cry out ‘Who knows what follows?’

Than Hector is. The wound of peace is surety, Surety secure; but modest doubt is call’d The beacon of the wise, the tent that searches To th’ bottom of the worst. Let Helen go.

Since the first sword was drawn about this question, Every tithe soul ‘mongst many thousand dismes Hath been as dear as Helen-I mean, of ours.

If we have lost so many tenths of ours To guard a thing not ours, nor worth to us, Had it our name, the value of one ten, What merit’s in that reason which denies The yielding of her up?

TROILUS. Fie, fie, my brother!

Weigh you the worth and honour of a king, So great as our dread father’s, in a scale Of common ounces? Will you with counters sum The past-proportion of his infinite,

And buckle in a waist most fathomless With spans and inches so diminutive

As fears and reasons? Fie, for godly shame!

HELENUS. No marvel though you bite so sharp at reasons, You are so empty of them. Should not our father Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons, Because your speech hath none that tells him so?

TROILUS. You are for dreams and slumbers, brother priest; You fur your gloves with reason. Here are your reasons: You know an enemy intends you harm;

You know a sword employ’d is perilous, And reason flies the object of all harm.

Who marvels, then, when Helenus beholds A Grecian and his sword, if he do set The very wings of reason to his heels And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove, Or like a star disorb’d? Nay, if we talk of reason, Let’s shut our gates and sleep. Manhood and honour Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their thoughts With this cramm’d reason. Reason and respect Make livers pale and lustihood deject.

HECTOR. Brother, she is not worth what she doth, cost The keeping.

TROILUS. What’s aught but as ‘tis valued?

HECTOR. But value dwells not in particular will: It holds his estimate and dignity

As well wherein ‘tis precious of itself As in the prizer. ‘Tis mad idolatry

To make the service greater than the god-I And the will dotes that is attributive To what infectiously itself affects,

Without some image of th’ affected merit.

TROILUS. I take to-day a wife, and my election Is led on in the conduct of my will;

My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears, Two traded pilots ‘twixt the dangerous shores Of will and judgment: how may I avoid, Although my will distaste what it elected, The wife I chose? There can be no evasion To blench from this and to stand firm by honour.

We turn not back the silks upon the merchant When we have soil’d them; nor the remainder viands We do not throw in unrespective sieve, Because we now are full. It was thought meet Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks; Your breath with full consent benied his sails; The seas and winds, old wranglers, took a truce, And did him service. He touch’d the ports desir’d; And for an old aunt whom the Greeks held captive He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness Wrinkles Apollo’s, and makes stale the morning.

Why keep we her? The Grecians keep our aunt.

Is she worth keeping? Why, she is a pearl Whose price hath launch’d above a thousand ships, And turn’d crown’d kings to merchants.

If you’ll avouch ‘twas wisdom Paris went-As you must needs, for you all cried ‘Go, go’-

If you’ll confess he brought home worthy prize-As you must needs, for you all clapp’d your hands, And cried ‘Inestimable!’ -why do you now The issue of your proper wisdoms rate, And do a deed that never fortune did-Beggar the estimation which you priz’d Richer than sea and land? O theft most base, That we have stol’n what we do fear to keep!

But thieves unworthy of a thing so stol’n That in their country did them that disgrace We fear to warrant in our native place!

CASSANDRA. [Within] Cry, Troyans, cry.

PRIAM. What noise, what shriek is this?

TROILUS. ‘Tis our mad sister; I do know her voice.

CASSANDRA. [Within] Cry, Troyans.

HECTOR. It is Cassandra.

 

Enter CASSANDRA, raving CASSANDRA. Cry, Troyans, cry. Lend me ten thousand eyes, And I will fill them with prophetic tears.

HECTOR. Peace, sister, peace.

CASSANDRA. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled eld, Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry, Add to my clamours. Let us pay betimes A moiety of that mass of moan to come.

Cry, Troyans, cry. Practise your eyes with tears.

Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand;