• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

Life would not yield to age.

Old Man. O my good lord,

I have been your tenant, and your father's tenant,

These fourscore years.

Glou. Away, get thee away! Good friend, be gone.

Thy comforts can do me no good at all;

Thee they may hurt.

Old Man. You cannot see your way.

Glou. I have no way, and therefore want no eyes;

I stumbled when I saw. Full oft 'tis seen

Our means secure us, and our mere defects

Prove our commodities. Ah dear son Edgar,

The food of thy abused father's wrath!

Might I but live to see thee in my touch,

I'ld say I had eyes again!

Old Man. How now? Who's there?

Edg. [aside] O gods! Who is't can say 'I am at 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?

Glou. Is it a beggarman?

Old Man. Madman and beggar too.

Glou. He has some reason, else he could not beg.

I' th' 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 th' gods.

They kill us for their sport.

Edg. [aside] How should this be?

Bad is the trade that must play fool to sorrow,

Ang'ring itself and others.- Bless thee, master!

Glou. Is that the naked fellow?

Old Man. Ay, my lord.

Glou. Then prithee get thee gone. If for my sake

Thou wilt o'ertake us hence a mile or twain

I' th' way toward Dover, do it for ancient love;

And bring some covering for this naked soul,

Who I'll entreat to lead me.

Old Man. Alack, sir, he is mad!

Glou. '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,

Come on't what will. Exit.

Glou. Sirrah naked fellow-

Edg. Poor Tom's acold. [Aside] I cannot daub it further.

Glou. Come hither, fellow.

Edg. [aside] And yet I must.- Bless thy sweet eyes, they bleed.

Glou. Know'st thou the way to Dover?

Edg. Both stile and gate, horseway and footpath. Poor Tom hath been

scar'd out of his good wits. Bless thee, good man's son, from

the foul fiend! Five fiends have been in poor Tom at once: of

lust, as Obidicut; Hobbididence, prince of dumbness; Mahu, of

stealing; Modo, of murder; Flibbertigibbet, of mopping and

mowing, who since possesses chambermaids and waiting women.

So,

bless thee, master!

Glou. Here, take this Purse, thou whom the heavens' plagues

Have humbled to all strokes. That I am wretched

Makes thee the happier. Heavens, deal so still!

Let the superfluous and lust-dieted man,

That slaves your ordinance, that will not see

Because he does not feel, feel your pow'r quickly;

So distribution should undo excess,

And each man have enough. Dost thou know Dover?

Edg. Ay, master.

Glou. There is a cliff, whose high and bending head

Looks fearfully in the confined deep.

Bring me but to the very brim of it,

And I'll repair the misery thou dost bear

With something rich about me. From that place

I shall no leading need.

Edg. Give me thy arm.

Poor Tom shall lead thee.

Exeunt.

Scene II. Before the Duke of Albany's Palace.

Enter Goneril and [Edmund the] Bastard.

Gon. Welcome, my lord. I marvel our mild husband

Not met us on the way.

Enter [Oswald the] Steward.

Now, where's your master?

Osw. Madam, within, but never man so chang'd.

I told him of the army that was landed:

He smil'd at it. I told him you were coming:

His answer was, 'The worse.' Of Gloucester's treachery

And of the loyal service of his son

When I inform'd him, then he call'd me sot

And told me I had turn'd the wrong side out.

What most he should dislike seems pleasant to him;

What like, offensive.

Gon. [to Edmund] Then shall you go no further.

It is the cowish terror of his spirit,

That dares not undertake. He'll not feel wrongs

Which tie him to an answer. Our wishes on the way

May prove effects.