split the ears of the groundlings; who, (for the most part) are capable of nothing but inexplicable dumb shows and noise. Pray you avoid it. Be not too tame, neither; but let your own discretion be your tutor. Suit the action to the word, the word to the action; with this special observance, that you o'erstep not the modesty of nature; for any thing so overdone is from the purpose of playing whose end is-to hold as 'twere, the mirror up to nature; to show virtue her own feature, scorn her own image, and the very age and body of the time, his form and pressure. Now, this overdone, or come tardy of, though it make the unskilful laugh, cannot but make the judicious grieve; the censure of one of which must, in your allowance, o'erweigh a whole theatre of others. Oh! There be players that I have seen play, and heard others praise, and that highly, that, neither having the accent of Christian, nor the gait of Christian, pagan nor man, have so strutted and bellowed, that I have thought some of Nature's journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably. II.-Douglas' Account of himself. My name is Norval On the Grampian hills To follow to the field some warlike lord; And heaven soon granted what my sire denied. This moon which rose last night, round as my shield, Sweeping our flocks and herds. The shepherds fled With bended bow, and quiver full of arrows, The road he took; then hasted to my friends, Till we o'ertook the spoil encumber'd foe. We fought and conquer'd. Ere a sword was drawn, I left my father's house, and took with me III.-Douglas' Account of the Hermit. BENEATH a mountain's brow, the most remote And inaccessible, by shepherds trod, In a deep cave, dug by no mortal hand, Who was the wonder of our wand'ring swains. Did they report him; the cold earth his bed, For he had been a soldier in his youth; His speech struck from me, the old man would shake His years away, and act his young encounters: Then having show'd his wounds, he'd sit him down, Of war's vast art, was to this hermit known. IV.-Sempronius' Speech for War. Gods! Can a Roman senate long debate, May reach his heart, and free the world from bondage. Or share their fate. The corpse of half her senate Sit here deliberating in cold debates, If we should sacrifice our lives to honour, Rouse up, for shame! Our brothers of Pharsalia V.-Lucius' Speech for Peace. MY thoughts, I must confess, are turn'd on peace; Our vain attempts. To urge the foe to battle That drew our swords, now wrests them from our bands, Unprofitably shed. What men could do, Is done already. Heaven and earth will witness, VI.-Hotspur's Account of the Fop. MY liege, I deny no prisoners. But I remember, when the fight was done, And, 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held He gave his nose. - And still he smil'd and talk'd : And as the soldiers bare dead bodies by, Betwixt the wind of his nobility. With many holiday and lady terms He question'd me; among the rest, demanded Ee I then, all smarting with my wounds, being gall'd Of guns, and drums, and wounds, (heaven save the mark) Betwixt my love, and your high Majesty. VII.-Hotspur's Soliloquy on the contents of a Letter. "BUT, for mine own part, my Lord, I could be well contented to be there in respect of the love I bear your house." He could be contented to be there! Why is he not then? In respect of the love he bears our house? He shows in this, he loves his own barn better than he loves our house. Let me see some more. "The purpose you undertake is dangerous."-Why that's certain: 'tis danger ous to take a cold, to sleep, to drink: but I tell you, my lord Fool, out of this nettle danger, we pluck this flower safely. "The purpose you undertake is dangerous; the friends you have named, uncertain; the time itself, unsorted; and your whole plot too light for the counterpoise of so great an opposition."-Say you so, say you so? 1 unto you again, you are a shallow cowardly hind, and you lie. What a lackbrian is this! Our plot is as good a plot as ever was laid; our friends true and constant; a good plot, good friends, and full of expectation; an excellent plot, very good friends. What a frosty-spirited rogue is this! Why, my lord of York commends the plot, and the general course of the action. By this hand, if I were now by this rascal, 1 would brain him with his lady's fan. Is there not my ther, my uncle and myself; Lord Edmund Mortimer, my lord of York, and Owen Glendower? Is there not, besides, the Douglases? Have I not all their letters, to meet me in say fa arms by the ninth of the next month? and are there not some of them set forward already? What a pagan rascal is this! an infidel!-Ha! you shall see now, in very sincerity of fear and cold heart, will he to the king, and lay open all our proceedings. Oh! I could divide myself, and go to buffets, for moving such a dish of skimmed milk with so honourable an action-Hang him! let him tell the king. We are prepared. I will set forward to night. VIII.-Othello's Apology for his Marriage. Hath this extent; no more. Rude am I in speech, Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms, I won his daughter with. Her father lov'd me; oft invited me ; I ran it through, e'en from my boyish days To the very moment that he bade me tell it. Of moving accidents by flood and field; Of hairbreadth 'scapes in th' imminent deadly breach : And sold to slavery; of my redemption thence, All these to hear Would Desdemona seriously incline; But still the house affairs would draw her thence; |