AS YOU LIKE IT. Sidney Lee

mangled forms.-O that I were a fool!

       I am ambitious for a motley coat.

       DUKE SENIOR

       Thou shalt have one.

       JAQUES

       It is my only suit,

       Provided that you weed your better judgments

       Of all opinion that grows rank in them

       That I am wise. I must have liberty

       Withal, as large a charter as the wind,

       To blow on whom I please; for so fools have:

       And they that are most gallèd with my folly,

       They most must laugh. And why, sir, must they so?

       The “why” is plain as way to parish church:

       He that a fool doth very wisely hit

       Doth very foolishly, although he smart,

       Not to seem senseless of the bob; if not,

       The wise man’s folly is anatomiz’d

       Even by the squandering glances of the fool.

       Invest me in my motley; give me leave

       To speak my mind, and I will through and through

       Cleanse the foul body of the infected world,

       If they will patiently receive my medicine.

       DUKE SENIOR

       Fie on thee! I can tell what thou wouldst do.

       JAQUES

       What, for a counter, would I do but good?

       DUKE SENIOR

       Most mischievous foul sin, in chiding sin;

       For thou thyself hast been a libertine,

       As sensual as the brutish sting itself;

       And all the embossèd sores and headed evils

       That thou with license of free foot hast caught

       Wouldst thou disgorge into the general world.

       JAQUES

       Why, who cries out on pride

       That can therein tax any private party?

       Doth it not flow as hugely as the sea,

       Till that the weary very means do ebb?

       What woman in the city do I name

       When that I say, The city-woman bears

       The cost of princes on unworthy shoulders?

       Who can come in and say that I mean her,

       When such a one as she, such is her neighbour?

       Or what is he of basest function

       That says his bravery is not on my cost,—

       Thinking that I mean him,—but therein suits

       His folly to the metal of my speech?

       There then; how then? what then? Let me see wherein

       My tongue hath wrong’d him: if it do him right,

       Then he hath wrong’d himself; if he be free,

       Why then, my taxing like a wild-goose flies,

       Unclaim’d of any man.—But who comes here?

       [Enter ORLANDO, with his sword drawn.]

       ORLANDO

       Forbear, and eat no more.

       JAQUES

       Why, I have eat none yet.

       ORLANDO

       Nor shalt not, till necessity be serv’d.

       JAQUES

       Of what kind should this cock come of?

       DUKE SENIOR

       Art thou thus bolden’d, man, by thy distress:

       Or else a rude despiser of good manners,

       That in civility thou seem’st so empty?

       ORLANDO

       You touch’d my vein at first: the thorny point

       Of bare distress hath ta’en from me the show

       Of smooth civility: yet am I inland bred,

       And know some nurture. But forbear, I say;

       He dies that touches any of this fruit

       Till I and my affairs are answered.

       JAQUES

       An you will not be answered with reason, I must die.

       DUKE SENIOR

       What would you have? your gentleness shall force

       More than your force move us to gentleness.

       ORLANDO

       I almost die for food, and let me have it.

       DUKE SENIOR

       Sit down and feed, and welcome to our table.

       ORLANDO

       Speak you so gently? Pardon me, I pray you:

       I thought that all things had been savage here;

       And therefore put I on the countenance

       Of stern commandment. But whate’er you are

       That in this desert inaccessible,

       Under the shade of melancholy boughs,

       Lose and neglect the creeping hours of time;

       If ever you have look’d on better days,

       If ever been where bells have knoll’d to church,

       If ever sat at any good man’s feast,

       If ever from your eyelids wip’d a tear,

       And know what ‘tis to pity and be pitied,

       Let gentleness my strong enforcement be:

       In the which hope I blush, and hide my sword.

       DUKE SENIOR

       True is it that we have seen better days,

       And have with holy bell been knoll’d to church,

       And sat at good men’s feasts, and wip’d our eyes

       Of drops that sacred pity hath engender’d:

       And therefore sit you down in gentleness,

       And take upon command what help we have,

       That to your wanting may be minister’d.

       ORLANDO

       Then but forbear your food a little while,

       Whiles, like a doe, I go to find my fawn,

       And give it food. There is an old poor man

       Who after me hath many a weary step

       Limp’d in pure love: till he be first suffic’d,—

       Oppress’d with two weak evils, age and hunger,—

       I will not touch a bit.

       DUKE SENIOR

       Go find him out.

       And we will nothing waste till you return.

       ORLANDO

       I thank ye; and be blest for your good comfort!

       [Exit.]

       DUKE SENIOR

       Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy;

       This wide and universal theatre

       Presents more woeful pageants than the scene

       Wherein we play in.

       JAQUES

       All the