The woods. Before Timon’s cave.
[Enter Poet and Painter; TIMON
watching them from his cave]
Painter As I took note of the place,
it cannot be far where he abides.
Poet What’s to be thought of him?
does the rumour hold for true, that he’s so full of gold?
Painter Certain: Alcibiades reports it; Phrynia and
Timandra had gold of him: he likewise enriched poor
straggling soldiers with great quantity: ’tis said
he gave unto his steward a mighty sum.
Poet Then this breaking of his has been
but a try for his friends.
Painter Nothing else: you shall see him a palm in
Athens again, and flourish with the highest. Therefore
’tis not amiss we tender our loves to him, in this
supposed distress of his: it will show honestly in
us; and is very likely to load our purposes with
what they travail for, if it be a just true report
that goes of his having.
Poet What have you now to present unto him?
Painter Nothing at this time but my visitation: only
I will promise him an excellent piece.
Poet I must serve him so too, tell him of an intent
that’s coming toward him.
Painter Good as the best. Promising is the very air
o’ the time: it opens the eyes of expectation:
performance is ever the duller for his act; and,
but in the plainer and simpler kind of people, the
deed of saying is quite out of use. To promise is
most courtly and fashionable: performance is a kind
of will or testament which argues a great sickness
in his judgment that makes it.
[TIMON comes from his cave, behind]
Poet I am thinking what I shall say I have provided
for him: it must be a personating of himself; a satire
against the softness of prosperity, with a discovery
of the infinite flatteries that follow youth and opulency.
[TIMON Coming forward]
Poet Hail, worthy Timon!
Painter Our late noble master!
TIMON Have I once lived to see two honest men?
Poet Sir,
Having often of your open bounty tasted,
Hearing you were retired, your friends fall’n off,
Whose thankless natures–O abhorred spirits!–
Not all the whips of heaven are large enough:
What! to you,
Whose star-like nobleness gave life and influence
To their whole being! I am rapt and cannot cover
The monstrous bulk of this ingratitude
With any size of words.
TIMON Let it go naked, men may see’t the better:
You that are honest, by being what you are,
Make them best seen and known.
Painter He and myself
Have travail’d in the great shower of your gifts,
And sweetly felt it.
TIMON Ay, you are honest men.
Painter We are hither come to offer you our service.
TIMON Most honest men!
Why, how shall I requite you?
Can you eat roots, and drink cold water? no.
Both What we can do, we’ll do, to do you service.
TIMON Ye’re honest men:
ye’ve heard that I have gold;
I am sure you have: speak truth; ye’re honest men.
Painter So it is said, my noble lord; but therefore
Came not my friend nor I.
TIMON Good honest men! Thou draw’st a counterfeit
Best in all Athens: thou’rt, indeed, the best;
Thou counterfeit’st most lively.
Painter So, so, my lord.
TIMON E’en so, sir, as I say. And, for thy fiction,
Why, thy verse swells with stuff so fine and smooth
That thou art even natural in thine art.
But, for all this, my honest-natured friends,
I must needs say you have a little fault:
Marry, ’tis not monstrous in you, neither wish I
You take much pains to mend.
Both Beseech your honour
To make it known to us.
TIMON You’ll take it ill.
Both Most thankfully, my lord.
TIMON Will you, indeed?
Both Doubt it not, worthy lord.
TIMON
There’s never a one of you but trusts a knave,
That mightily deceives you.
Both Do we, my lord?
TIMON Ay,
and you hear him cog, see him dissemble,
Know his gross patchery, love him, feed him,
Keep in your bosom: yet remain assured
That he’s a made-up villain.
Painter I know none such, my lord.
Poet Nor I.
TIMON Look you, I love you well;
I’ll give you gold,
Rid me these villains from your companies:
Hang them or stab them, drown them in a draught,
Confound them by some course, and come to me,
I’ll give you gold enough.
Both Name them, my lord, let’s know them.
TIMON You that way and you this,
but two in company;
Each man apart, all single and alone,
Yet an arch-villain keeps him company.
If where thou art two villains shall not be,
Come not near him. If thou wouldst not reside
But where one villain is, then him abandon.
Hence, pack! there’s gold; you came for gold, ye slaves:
[To Painter]
You have work’d for me;
there’s payment for you: hence!
[To Poet]
You are an alchemist; make gold of that.
Out, rascal dogs!
[Beats them out, and then retires to his cave]
[Enter FLAVIUS and two Senators]
FLAVIUS
It is in vain that you would speak with Timon;
For he is set so only to himself
That nothing but himself which looks like man
Is friendly with him.
First Senator Bring us to his cave:
It is our part and promise to the Athenians
To speak with Timon.
Second Senator At all times alike
Men are not still the same: ’twas time and griefs
That framed him thus: time, with his fairer hand,
Offering the fortunes of his former days,
The former man may make him. Bring us to him,
And chance it as it may.
FLAVIUS Lord Timon! Timon!
Look out, and speak to friends: the Athenians,
By two of their most reverend senate, greet thee:
Speak to them, noble Timon.
[TIMON comes from his cave]
TIMON Thou sun, that comfort’st, burn!
Speak, and be hang’d:
For each true word, a blister! and each false
Be as cauterizing to the root o’ the tongue,
Consuming it with speaking!
First Senator Worthy Timon,–
TIMON Of none but such as you,
and you of Timon.
First Senator
The senators of Athens greet thee, Timon.
TIMON
I thank them; and would send them back the plague,
Could I but catch it for them.
First Senator O, forget
What we are sorry for ourselves in thee.
The senators with one consent of love
Entreat thee back to Athens; who have thought
On special dignities, which vacant lie
For thy best use and wearing.
Second Senator They confess
Toward thee forgetfulness too general, gross.
TIMON You witch me in it;
Surprise me to the very brink of tears:
Lend me a fool’s heart and a woman’s eyes,
And I’ll beweep these comforts, worthy senators.
First Senator
Therefore, so please thee to return with us
And of our Athens, thine and ours, to take
The captainship, thou shalt be met with thanks,
Allow’d with absolute power and thy good name
Live with authority: so soon we shall drive back
Of Alcibiades the approaches wild,
Who, like a boar too savage, doth root up
His country’s peace.
Second Senator And shakes his threatening sword
Against the walls of Athens.
First Senator Therefore, Timon,–
TIMON Well, sir, I will; therefore, I will, sir; thus:
If Alcibiades kill my countrymen,
Let Alcibiades know this of Timon,
That Timon cares not. But if be sack fair Athens,
And take our goodly aged men by the beards,
Giving our holy virgins to the stain
Of contumelious, beastly, mad-brain’d war,
Then let him know, and tell him Timon speaks it,
In pity of our aged and our youth,
I cannot choose but tell him, that I care not,
And let him take’t at worst; for their knives care not,
While you have throats to answer: for myself,
There’s not a whittle in the unruly camp
But I do prize it at my love before
The reverend’st throat in Athens. So I leave you
To the protection of the prosperous gods,
As thieves to keepers.
FLAVIUS Stay not, all’s in vain.
TIMON Why, I was writing of my epitaph;
it will be seen to-morrow: my long sickness
Of health and living now begins to mend,
And nothing brings me all things. Go, live still;
Be Alcibiades your plague, you his,
And last so long enough!
First Senator We speak in vain.
TIMON But yet I love my country, and am not
One that rejoices in the common wreck,
As common bruit doth put it.
First Senator That’s well spoke.
TIMON Commend me to my loving countrymen,–
First Senator These words become your lips
as they pass thorough them.
Second Senator
And enter in our ears like great triumphers
In their applauding gates.
TIMON Commend me to them,
And tell them that, to ease them of their griefs,
Their fears of hostile strokes, their aches, losses,
Their pangs of love, with other incident throes
That nature’s fragile vessel doth sustain
In life’s uncertain voyage, I will some kindness do them:
I’ll teach them to prevent wild Alcibiades’ wrath.
First Senator I like this well; he will return again.
TIMON I have a tree, which grows here in my close,
That mine own use invites me to cut down,
And shortly must I fell it: tell my friends,
Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree
From high to low throughout, that whoso please
To stop affliction, let him take his haste,
Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe,
And hang himself. I pray you, do my greeting.
FLAVIUS Trouble him no further;
thus you still shall find him.
TIMON Come not to me again: but say to Athens,
Timon hath made his everlasting mansion
Upon the beached verge of the salt flood;
Who once a day with his embossed froth
The turbulent surge shall cover: thither come,
And let my grave-stone be your oracle.
Lips, let sour words go by and language end:
What is amiss plague and infection mend!
Graves only be men’s works and death their gain!
Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign.
[Retires to his cave]
First Senator His discontents are unremoveably
Coupled to nature.
Second Senator
Our hope in him is dead: let us return,
And strain what other means is left unto us
In our dear peril.
First Senator It requires swift foot.
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