LEAR. Nothing can come of nothing: speak again CORDELIA. Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave My heart into my mouth: I love your majesty There is no appeal to her affection-it is the King, not the father, who speaks. LEAR. How now Cordelia ! mend your speech a little, Lest it may mar your fortunes. The unworthy threat brings all her dignity to her aid, although she does not forget the child in the woman: CORDELIA. Good my lord, You have begot me, bred me, lov'd me. I Return these duties back as are most fit; Why have my sisters husbands, if they say They love you, all? Haply when I shall wed, That lord, whose hand must take my plight, shall carry Half my love with him, half my care and duty. Her plainness forfeits her share of the kingdom, which is divided between her sisters. The old King has to learn the lesson her words should have taught him, in a bitterer way. In the next scene we part from Cordelia, who is married to the King of France-Burgundy, like too many others, holding respects of fortune for his love. France well esteems his treasure: Fairest Cordelia, thou art most rich, being poor; A noble lover, but an unfrequent one-at any rate in our time. Cordelia impressively addresses her sisters as she parts from them: The jewels of our father, with washed eyes Your faults as they are nam'd. Use well our father: To your professing bosoms I commit him : But yet alas! stood I within his grace, I would prefer him to a better place. The business of the Play begins and stirringly the Dramatist sets to work. Shakespere, unlike most writers, who would have been tempted by the situation to make Cordelia a second Cinderella, withdraws her from the scene as soon as the darker passions gloom upon the stage. Like the lingering light of an evening in autumn, longingly as it lurks round the withering flowers and the bare trees: when the storm-winds arise and the night-clouds gather, its blue throne is soon lost in the dark and angry sky And the scene soon changes. Cordelia has scarcely left ere her sisters, who remember she was always most lov'd, regard her father's dismissal of her as an "infirmity of age." The poor old King, who in Regan's pithy judgment," has ever but slenderly known himself" is quickly punished. Goneril discovers that every hour He flashes into one gross crime or other. His servant is insulted, his hundred knights by degrees minished and at last disallowed himself rebuked, checked, angered by one sister after the other, till at last, his sole servant: friend adviser: confident is the poor Fool. Quaint vehicle of true philosophy! in whose sharpest gibe is ever a touch of pity-bitter, in truth, as the world's lessons, but rich in a catholic love of humanity. Alas! there are no such fools now. Our wise men are the only fools, and they so puzzle and torture, mock and mar their fellows, with their word-wisdom and their cramped policy, that it is a real good as well as a delight to turn to the honest philosophy of Shakespere's Fools. But we must to our task-and we confess we have little relish for this part of our work-this sad Tragedy-this death of all love. We are not now attempting an analysis of the character of Lear. But how fine, how glorious a theme! How his distempered mind passes through the fierce changes of the tempest that is to purge and purify him. Very soon his love for Cordelia returns. The first cold word from Goneril makes him at once exclaim: O most small fault, How ugly didst thou in Cordelia shew. From this point his passion rapidly works him to that terrible climax-the Curse on Goneril, which closes with the invocation to Heaven that she may feel-in her own offspring How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is To have a thankless child. From Goneril, Lear goes to Regan. She denies herself. The old King's message to her and her husband is suggestive of the change taken place in his mind : The King would speak with Cornwall-the dear father They meet-he tells her how Goneril Has looked black on him, struck him with her tongue They are interrupted by the entrance of Goneril. He now sees they are leagued against him, and here again his mind reverts to Cordelia, but his pride prevents his going to "hotblooded France" To knee his throne, and, squire-like, pension beg There is yet a lingering hope that the two elder daughters are not both cruel: No, Regan, thou shalt never have my curse, Thy tender hefted nature shall not give Thee o'er to harshness. But he soon discovers that both can forget The offices of nature, bond of childhood, He would have bidden Regan a gentler farewell : I will not trouble thee, my child-farewell We'll no more meet, no more see one another But the scene is too harsh for this-stripped of all respect, attendance, courtesy: and to his complaint hearing his own children reply that All's not offence that indiscretion finds, And dotage terms so his heart rises against their foul cruelty. But be remembers his treatment of Cordelia-his angry division of the kingdom, and his humiliation is greater than his rage: You see we have, you Gods, a poor old man, As full of grief as age-wretched in both. He totters from their presence-heart-broken-mad. And they? -they bar their doors against him and the friendless, childless, distraught King rushes into the welcome darkness of the night to drown his loud grief in the wailing of the angry winds and the wrathful echoes of the storm-clouds: I tax not you, you elements with unkindness I never gave you kingdoms, called you daughters He feels nor rain nor cold, nor deafens to the thunder nor blenches to the lightning. His miseries overwhelm him. I am a man More sinn'd against than sinning. But we must leave him, even on the threshold of this scenewhich is one of the most masterly the great Dramatist has given us—but one, foreign to our present purpose. Fruitful comment is the scene on the truth that wisdom is always the child of sorrow. At the very turning of his brain-and here how literally true with nature, the keenest wit, the most sensitive love, the most pregnant philosphy issues from his lips. Through all, his daughters glimmer-his memory serving as the key to his madness. He feigns the judge's office-but the first he arraigns is Goneril. And then again, questioning the cause of Regan's cruelty, whom after Cordelia, he seems to have loved best. Let them anatomize Regan. See what breeds about her heart is there any cause in nature for these hard How often are we tempted to the same exclamation. But we must turn from the terrific grandeur of this sublime scene to a gentler and more beautiful picture. Cordelia hears of her father's cruel usage. Her feelings are painted as only Shakespere could paint: Now and then an ample tear trill'd down Her delicate cheek: it seem'd she was a queen Sought to be king o'er her patience and sorrow strove Who should express her goodliest. You have seen Could so become it. "Once or twice" we are told He heav'd the name of father, Pantingly forth as if it pressed her heart, Cry'd sisters! sisters! shame of ladies! sisters! The holy water from her heavenly eyes. The King after some struggle of shame with love, sees Cordelia. He is ill, and she, the dismissed, the disinherited, the discarded: is his nurse. How beautiful the group, and how grateful the transition from the former picture. It is as if we had passed from contemplating the double serpent round the Roman Priest to the picture of the old Greek with his mother-daughter. O my dear father! Restoration, hang Her heart dwells on his sufferings— Had you not been their father, these white flakes To be exposed against the warring winds, To stand against the deep dread-bolted thunder? Of quick cross lightning. -mine enemy's dog Though he had bit me, should have stood that night Lear awakes. His reason slowly returns-with eyes fixed on Thou art a soul in bliss. the doubt rises You are a spirit, I know : the memory is glimmering: Methinks I should know you And then the incredulous joy, hastening the glad recognition : Do not laugh at me For as I am a man, I think this lady To be my child-Cordelia. The transition from stupor to consciousness-thence to memory -hope-joy-is very fine. NO. X. C C VOL. I. |