And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer, Never to hope again.
Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear, In all my miseries; but thou hast forced me Out of thy honest truth to play the woman. Let's dry our eyes: and thus far hear me, Cromwell; And, when I am forgotten, as I shall be, And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention Of me must more be heard-say, I taught thee,- Say, Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory, And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour, Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in ; A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it. Mark but my fall, and that which ruined me: Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition; By that sin fell the angels: how can man then, The image of his Maker, hope to win by it ? Love thyself last; cherish those hearts that hate thee; Corruption wins not more than honesty. Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace, To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not: Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's, Thy God's, and Truth's, then if thou fall'st, O Cromwell, Thou fall'st a blessed martyr. Serve the king; There take an inventory of all I have,
To the last penny: 'tis the king's; my robe, And my integrity to heaven, is all
I dare now call my own. O Cromwell, Cromwell, lad I but served God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age Have left me to mine enemies.
To be, or not to be, that is the question : Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take up arms against a sea of trouble And, by opposing, end them?-To die-to sleepNo more; and by a sleep to say we end The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks That flesh is heir to :-'tis a consummation Devoutly to be wished. To die, -to sleep;To sleep! perchance to dream; aye, there's the rub; For in that sleep of death what dreams may come, When we have shuffled off this mortal coil, Must give us pause:-there's the respect, That makes calamity of so long life : For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely, The pangs of despised love, the law's delay, The insolence of office, and the spurns That patient merit of the unworthy takes, When he himself might his quietus make With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear, To groan and sweat under a weary life; But that the dread of something after death,The undiscovered country, from whose bourn No traveller returns, puzzles the will; And makes us rather bear the ills we have, Than fly to others that we know not of! This conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; And enterprises of great pith and moment, With this regard, their currents turn awry, And lose the name of action.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, Out, brief candle Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player, That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more: it is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
I have lived long enough: my way of life is fallen into the sere, the yellow leaf: And that which should accompany old age, As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, I must not look to have; but in their stead, Curses, not loud, but deep; mouth-honour, breath, Which the poor heart would fain deny, but dare not
A LITTLE onward lend thy guiding hand To these dark steps, a little further on; For yonder bank hath choice of sun or shade: There I am wont to sit, when any chance Relieves me from my task of servile toil, Daily in the common prison else enjoined me; Where I, a prisoner chained, scarce freely draw The air imprisoned also, close and damp, Unwholesome draught: but here I feel amends, The breath of heaven fresh blowing, pure and sweet With day-spring born; here leave me to respire. This day a solemn feast the people hold To Dagon their sea-idol, and forbid Laborious works: unwillingly this rest Their superstition yields me: hence with leave, Retiring from the popular noise, I seek This unfrequented place to find some ease; Ease to the body some, none to the mind, From restless thoughts, that like a deadly swarm Of hornets armed, no sooner found alone,
But rush upon me thronging, and present Times past, what once I was, and what am now. O wherefore was my birth from heaven foretold Twice by an Angel, who at last, in sight Of both my parents, all in flames ascended From off the altar, where an offering burned, As in a fiery column charioting His godlike presence,-
Why was my breeding ordered and prescribed As of a person separate to God, Destined for great exploits; if I must die Betrayed, captived, and both my eyes put out, Made of mine enemies the scorn and gaze; To grind in brazen fetters under task
With this heaven-gifted strength? O glorious strength Put to the labour of a beast, debased
Lower than bond-slave! Promise was, that I Should Israel from Philistian yoke deliver: Ask for this great deliverer now, and find him Eyeless in Gaza, at the mill with slaves, Himself in bonds under Philistian yoke.
O loss of sight, of thee I most complain ! Blind among enemies, O worse than chains, Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age! Light, the prime work of God, to me extinct, And all her various objects of delight Annulled, which might in part my grief have eased; Inferior to the vilest now become
Of man or worm: the vilest here excel me; They creep, yet see; I, dark in light, exposed
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