Corn. Lest it see more, prevent it :-Out, vile jelly! Where is thy lustre now? [Tears out GLOSTER's other eye, and throws it on the ground. Glo. All dark and comfortless.-Where's my son Edmund, enkindle all the sparks of nature, Reg. Out, treacherous villain ! Thou call'st on him that hates thee: it was he That made the overture of thy treasons to us; Who is too good to pity thee. Glo. O my follies! Then Edgar was abus'd. Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him! Reg. Go, thrust him out at gates, and let him smell His way to Dover.-How is't, my lord? How look you? Corn. I have receiv'd a hurt :-Follow me, lady.— Turn out that eyeless villain ;-throw this slave Upon the dunghill.-Regan, I bleed apace : Untimely comes this hurt: Give me your arm. [Exit CORNWALL, led by REGAN ;—Servants unbind GLOSTER, and lead him out. 1 Serv. I'll never care what wickedness I do, If this man comes to good. 2 Serv. If she live long, And, in the end, meet the old course of death, 1 Serv. Let's follow the old earl, and get the Bedlam To lead him where he would; his roguish madness Allows itself to any thing. 2 Ser. Go thou; I'll fetch some flax,and whites of eggs, To apply to his bleeding face. Now, heaven help him! [Exeunt severally. ACT IV. SCENE 1.-The HEATH. Enter EDGAR. Edgar. Yet better thus, and known to be contemn'd, Than still contemn'd and flatter'd. To be worst,5 The lowest, and most dejected thing of fortune, Stands still in esperance, lives not in fear : [5] I cannot help thinking that this passage should be written thus: Yet better thus unknown to be contemn'd, Than still contemn'd and flatter'd to be worse. TYRWHITT. The lamentable change is from the best ; The wretch, that thou hast blown unto the worst, My father, poorly led ?-World, world, O world! Old Man. O my good lord, I have been your tenant, and your father's tenant, these fourscore years. Glo. Away, get thee away; good friend, be gone : Thy comforts can do me no good at all, Thee they may hurt. Old Man. Alack, sir, you cannot see your way. I stumbled when I saw : Full oft 'tis seen, Our mean secures us; and our mere defects Might I but live to see thee in my touch, I'd say, I had eyes again! Old Man. How now? Who's there? Edg. [Aside.] O gods! Who is't can say, I am át the worst ? I am worse than e'er I was. Old Man. 'Tis poor mad Tom. Edg. [Aside.] And worse I may be yet: the worst is not, So long as we can say, This is the worst. Old Man. Fellow, where goest? Glo. Is it a beggar-man ? Old Man. Madman and beggar too. Glo. He has some reason, else he could not beg. l'the last night's storm I such a fellow saw; Which made me think a man a worm: My son Came then into my mind; and yet my mind Was then scarce friends with him: I have heard more since : As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; Thy kill us for their sport. Edg. How should this be?— [6] Mean is here a substantive, and signifies a middle state. STEEVENS Bad is the trade must play the fool to sorrow, Old Man. Ay, my lord. If, for my sake, Glo. Then, pr'ythee, get thee gone Old Man. Alack, sir, he's mad. Glo. 'Tis the time's plague, when madmen lead the blind. Do as I bid thee, or rather do thy pleasure: Above the rest, be gone. Old Man. I'll bring him the best 'parel that I have, Gome on't what will. Glo. Sirrah, naked fellow. [Exit. Edg. Poor Tom's a-cold.—I cannot daub it further.7 [Aside. Glo. Come hither, fellow. Edg. [Aside.] And yet I must.-Bless thy sweet eyes, they bleed. Glo. Know'st thou the way to Dover? Edg. Both stile and gate, horse-way and foot-path. Poor Tom hath been scared out of his good wits: Bless the good man from the foul fiend! Five fiends have been in poor Tom at once; of lust, as Obidicut; Hobbididance, prince of dumbness; Mahu, of stealing; Modo, of murder ;and Flibbertigibbit, of mopping and mowing; who since possess chamber-maids and waiting-women. So bless thee, master! [8] Shakspeare has made Edgar, in his feigned distraction, frequently allude to a vile imposture of some English jesuits, at that time much the subject of conversation; the history of it having been just then composed with great art and vigour of style and composition by Dr. S. Harsenet, afterwards archbishop of York, by order of the privy council, in a work intitled, " A Decla "ration of egregious Popish Impostures to withdraw her Majesty's Subjects "from their Allegiance, &c. practised by Edmunds, alias Weston, a Jesuit, "and divers Romish priests his wicked Associates"; printed 1603. The imposture was in substance this. While the Spaniards were preparing their armada against England, the jesuits were here busy at work to promote it by making converts: one method they employed was to dispossess pretended demoniacks, by which artifice they made several hundred converts among the common people. The principal scene of this farce was laid in the family of one Mr. Edmund Peckham, a Roman catholic, where Marwood, a servant of Anthony Babington (who was afterwards executed for treason), Trayford,an attendant upon Mr. Peckham, and Sarah and Priswood Williams, and Anne Smith three chambermaids, in that family, came into the priest's hands for cure. But the discipline of the patients was so long and severe, and the priests so elate and careless with their success, that the plot was discover. |