| ACT IV SCENE IV | The same. A tent. | |
| [Enter, with drum and colours, CORDELIA, Doctor, and Soldiers] |
| CORDELIA | Alack, 'tis he: why, he was met even now |
| As mad as the vex'd sea; singing aloud; |
| Crown'd with rank fumiter and furrow-weeds, |
| With bur-docks, hemlock, nettles, cuckoo-flowers, |
| Darnel, and all the idle weeds that grow | 5 |
| In our sustaining corn. A century send forth; |
| Search every acre in the high-grown field, |
| And bring him to our eye. |
[Exit an Officer] |
| What can man's wisdom |
| In the restoring his bereaved sense? | 10 |
| He that helps him take all my outward worth. |
| Doctor | There is means, madam: |
| Our foster-nurse of nature is repose, |
| The which he lacks; that to provoke in him, |
| Are many simples operative, whose power | 15 |
| Will close the eye of anguish. |
| CORDELIA | All blest secrets, |
| All you unpublish'd virtues of the earth, |
| Spring with my tears! be aidant and remediate |
| In the good man's distress! Seek, seek for him; | 20 |
| Lest his ungovern'd rage dissolve the life |
| That wants the means to lead it. |
| [Enter a Messenger] |
| Messenger | News, madam; |
| The British powers are marching hitherward. |
| CORDELIA | 'Tis known before; our preparation stands | 25 |
| In expectation of them. O dear father, |
| It is thy business that I go about; |
| Therefore great France |
| My mourning and important tears hath pitied. |
| No blown ambition doth our arms incite, | 30 |
| But love, dear love, and our aged father's right: |
| Soon may I hear and see him! |
| [Exeunt] |
King Lear Overview