| ACT V SCENE I | The woods before Timon's cave. | |
| [
Enter Poet and Painter; TIMON watching
them from his cave
] |
| Painter | As I took note of the place, it cannot be far where |
| he abides. |
| Poet | What's to be thought of him? does the rumour hold |
| for true, that he's so full of gold? |
| Painter | Certain: Alcibiades reports it; Phrynia and | 5 |
| Timandra had gold of him: he likewise enriched poor |
| straggling soldiers with great quantity: 'tis said |
| he gave unto his steward a mighty sum. |
| Poet | Then this breaking of his has been but a try for his friends. |
| Painter | Nothing else: you shall see him a palm in Athens | 10 |
| again, and flourish with the highest. Therefore |
| 'tis not amiss we tender our loves to him, in this |
| supposed distress of his: it will show honestly in |
| us; and is very likely to load our purposes with |
| what they travail for, if it be a just true report | 15 |
| that goes of his having. |
| Poet | What have you now to present unto him? |
| Painter | Nothing at this time but my visitation: only I will |
| promise him an excellent piece. |
| Poet | I must serve him so too, tell him of an intent | 20 |
| that's coming toward him. |
| Painter | Good as the best. Promising is the very air o' the |
| time: it opens the eyes of expectation: |
| performance is ever the duller for his act; and, |
| but in the plainer and simpler kind of people, the | 25 |
| deed of saying is quite out of use. To promise is |
| most courtly and fashionable: performance is a kind |
| of will or testament which argues a great sickness |
| in his judgment that makes it. |
| [TIMON comes from his cave, behind] |
| TIMON | [Aside] Excellent workman! thou canst not paint a
| 30 |
| man so bad as is thyself. |
| Poet | I am thinking what I shall say I have provided for |
| him: it must be a personating of himself; a satire |
| against the softness of prosperity, with a discovery |
| of the infinite flatteries that follow youth and opulency. | 35 |
| TIMON | [Aside] Must thou needs stand for a villain in
|
| thine own work? wilt thou whip thine own faults in |
| other men? Do so, I have gold for thee. |
| Poet | Nay, let's seek him: |
| Then do we sin against our own estate, | 40 |
| When we may profit meet, and come too late. |
| Painter | True; |
| When the day serves, before black-corner'd night, |
| Find what thou want'st by free and offer'd light. Come. |
| TIMON | [Aside] I'll meet you at the turn. What a
| 45 |
| god's gold, |
| That he is worshipp'd in a baser temple |
| Than where swine feed! |
| 'Tis thou that rigg'st the bark and plough'st the foam, |
| Settlest admired reverence in a slave: | 50 |
| To thee be worship! and thy saints for aye |
| Be crown'd with plagues that thee alone obey! |
| Fit I meet them. |
| [Coming forward] |
| Poet | Hail, worthy Timon! |
| Painter | Our late noble master! | 55 |
| TIMON | Have I once lived to see two honest men? |
| Poet | Sir, |
| Having often of your open bounty tasted, |
| Hearing you were retired, your friends fall'n off, |
| Whose thankless natures--O abhorred spirits!-- | 60 |
| Not all the whips of heaven are large enough: |
| What! to you, |
| Whose star-like nobleness gave life and influence |
| To their whole being! I am rapt and cannot cover |
| The monstrous bulk of this ingratitude | 65 |
| With any size of words. |
| TIMON | Let it go naked, men may see't the better: |
| You that are honest, by being what you are, |
| Make them best seen and known. |
| Painter | He and myself | 70 |
| Have travail'd in the great shower of your gifts, |
| And sweetly felt it. |
| TIMON | Ay, you are honest men. |
| Painter | We are hither come to offer you our service. |
| TIMON | Most honest men! Why, how shall I requite you? | 75 |
| Can you eat roots, and drink cold water? no. |
| Both | What we can do, we'll do, to do you service. |
| TIMON | Ye're honest men: ye've heard that I have gold; |
| I am sure you have: speak truth; ye're honest men. |
| Painter | So it is said, my noble lord; but therefore | 80 |
| Came not my friend nor I. |
| TIMON | Good honest men! Thou draw'st a counterfeit |
| Best in all Athens: thou'rt, indeed, the best; |
| Thou counterfeit'st most lively. |
| Painter | So, so, my lord. | 85 |
| TIMON | E'en so, sir, as I say. And, for thy fiction, |
| Why, thy verse swells with stuff so fine and smooth |
| That thou art even natural in thine art. |
| But, for all this, my honest-natured friends, |
| I must needs say you have a little fault: | 90 |
| Marry, 'tis not monstrous in you, neither wish I |
| You take much pains to mend. |
| Both | Beseech your honour |
| To make it known to us. |
| TIMON | You'll take it ill. | 95 |
| Both | Most thankfully, my lord. |
| TIMON | Will you, indeed? |
| Both | Doubt it not, worthy lord. |
| TIMON | There's never a one of you but trusts a knave, |
| That mightily deceives you. | 100 |
| Both | Do we, my lord? |
| TIMON | Ay, and you hear him cog, see him dissemble, |
| Know his gross patchery, love him, feed him, |
| Keep in your bosom: yet remain assured |
| That he's a made-up villain. | 105 |
| Painter | I know none such, my lord. |
| Poet | Nor I. |
| TIMON | Look you, I love you well; I'll give you gold, |
| Rid me these villains from your companies: |
| Hang them or stab them, drown them in a draught, | 110 |
| Confound them by some course, and come to me, |
| I'll give you gold enough. |
| Both | Name them, my lord, let's know them. |
| TIMON | You that way and you this, but two in company; |
| Each man apart, all single and alone, | 115 |
| Yet an arch-villain keeps him company. |
| If where thou art two villains shall not be, |
| Come not near him. If thou wouldst not reside |
| But where one villain is, then him abandon. |
| Hence, pack! there's gold; you came for gold, ye slaves: | 120 |
[To Painter] |
| You have work'd for me; there's payment for you: hence! |
[To Poet] |
| You are an alchemist; make gold of that. |
| Out, rascal dogs! |
| [Beats them out, and then retires to his cave] |
| [Enter FLAVIUS and two Senators] |
| FLAVIUS | It is in vain that you would speak with Timon; |
| For he is set so only to himself | 125 |
| That nothing but himself which looks like man |
| Is friendly with him. |
| First Senator | Bring us to his cave: |
| It is our part and promise to the Athenians |
| To speak with Timon. | 130 |
| Second Senator | At all times alike |
| Men are not still the same: 'twas time and griefs |
| That framed him thus: time, with his fairer hand, |
| Offering the fortunes of his former days, |
| The former man may make him. Bring us to him, | 135 |
| And chance it as it may. |
| FLAVIUS | Here is his cave. |
| Peace and content be here! Lord Timon! Timon! |
| Look out, and speak to friends: the Athenians, |
| By two of their most reverend senate, greet thee: | 140 |
| Speak to them, noble Timon. |
| [TIMON comes from his cave] |
| TIMON | Thou sun, that comfort'st, burn! Speak, and |
| be hang'd: |
| For each true word, a blister! and each false |
| Be as cauterizing to the root o' the tongue, | 145 |
| Consuming it with speaking! |
| First Senator | Worthy Timon,-- |
| TIMON | Of none but such as you, and you of Timon. |
| First Senator | The senators of Athens greet thee, Timon. |
| TIMON | I thank them; and would send them back the plague, | 150 |
| Could I but catch it for them. |
| First Senator | O, forget |
| What we are sorry for ourselves in thee. |
| The senators with one consent of love |
| Entreat thee back to Athens; who have thought | 155 |
| On special dignities, which vacant lie |
| For thy best use and wearing. |
| Second Senator | They confess |
| Toward thee forgetfulness too general, gross: |
| Which now the public body, which doth seldom | 160 |
| Play the recanter, feeling in itself |
| A lack of Timon's aid, hath sense withal |
| Of its own fail, restraining aid to Timon; |
| And send forth us, to make their sorrow'd render, |
| Together with a recompense more fruitful | 165 |
| Than their offence can weigh down by the dram; |
| Ay, even such heaps and sums of love and wealth |
| As shall to thee blot out what wrongs were theirs |
| And write in thee the figures of their love, |
| Ever to read them thine. | 170 |
| TIMON | You witch me in it; |
| Surprise me to the very brink of tears: |
| Lend me a fool's heart and a woman's eyes, |
| And I'll beweep these comforts, worthy senators. |
| First Senator | Therefore, so please thee to return with us | 175 |
| And of our Athens, thine and ours, to take |
| The captainship, thou shalt be met with thanks, |
| Allow'd with absolute power and thy good name |
| Live with authority: so soon we shall drive back |
| Of Alcibiades the approaches wild, | 180 |
| Who, like a boar too savage, doth root up |
| His country's peace. |
| Second Senator | And shakes his threatening sword |
| Against the walls of Athens. |
| First Senator | Therefore, Timon,-- | 185 |
| TIMON | Well, sir, I will; therefore, I will, sir; thus: |
| If Alcibiades kill my countrymen, |
| Let Alcibiades know this of Timon, |
| That Timon cares not. But if be sack fair Athens, |
| And take our goodly aged men by the beards, | 190 |
| Giving our holy virgins to the stain |
| Of contumelious, beastly, mad-brain'd war, |
| Then let him know, and tell him Timon speaks it, |
| In pity of our aged and our youth, |
| I cannot choose but tell him, that I care not, | 195 |
| And let him take't at worst; for their knives care not, |
| While you have throats to answer: for myself, |
| There's not a whittle in the unruly camp |
| But I do prize it at my love before |
| The reverend'st throat in Athens. So I leave you | 200 |
| To the protection of the prosperous gods, |
| As thieves to keepers. |
| FLAVIUS | Stay not, all's in vain. |
| TIMON | Why, I was writing of my epitaph; |
| it will be seen to-morrow: my long sickness | 205 |
| Of health and living now begins to mend, |
| And nothing brings me all things. Go, live still; |
| Be Alcibiades your plague, you his, |
| And last so long enough! |
| First Senator | We speak in vain. | 210 |
| TIMON | But yet I love my country, and am not |
| One that rejoices in the common wreck, |
| As common bruit doth put it. |
| First Senator | That's well spoke. |
| TIMON | Commend me to my loving countrymen,-- | 215 |
| First Senator | These words become your lips as they pass |
| thorough them. |
| Second Senator | And enter in our ears like great triumphers |
| In their applauding gates. |
| TIMON | Commend me to them, | 220 |
| And tell them that, to ease them of their griefs, |
| Their fears of hostile strokes, their aches, losses, |
| Their pangs of love, with other incident throes |
| That nature's fragile vessel doth sustain |
| In life's uncertain voyage, I will some kindness do them: | 225 |
| I'll teach them to prevent wild Alcibiades' wrath. |
| First Senator | I like this well; he will return again. |
| TIMON | I have a tree, which grows here in my close, |
| That mine own use invites me to cut down, |
| And shortly must I fell it: tell my friends, | 230 |
| Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree |
| From high to low throughout, that whoso please |
| To stop affliction, let him take his haste, |
| Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe, |
| And hang himself. I pray you, do my greeting. | 235 |
| FLAVIUS | Trouble him no further; thus you still shall find him. |
| TIMON | Come not to me again: but say to Athens, |
| Timon hath made his everlasting mansion |
| Upon the beached verge of the salt flood; |
| Who once a day with his embossed froth | 240 |
| The turbulent surge shall cover: thither come, |
| And let my grave-stone be your oracle. |
| Lips, let sour words go by and language end: |
| What is amiss plague and infection mend! |
| Graves only be men's works and death their gain! | 245 |
| Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign. |
| [Retires to his cave] |
| First Senator | His discontents are unremoveably |
| Coupled to nature. |
| Second Senator | Our hope in him is dead: let us return, |
| And strain what other means is left unto us | 250 |
| In our dear peril. |
| First Senator | It requires swift foot. |
| [Exeunt] |
Sources for Timon of Athens