The History of King Lear.
¶loue cooles, friend
ship fals off, brothers diuide, in Cities muti-
¶nies, in Countries di
scords, Pallaces trea
son, the bond crackt
¶betweene
sonne and father; finde out this villaine,
Edmund it
¶shall lo
se thee nothing, do it carefully; and the noble and true
¶hearted
Kent bani
sht, his offence hone
st;
strange,
strange!
¶Bast. This is the excellent foppery of the world, that when we
¶are
sicke in Fortune, often the
surfet of our owne behauiour,
¶we make guilty of our di
sa
sters, the Sunne, the Moore, and the
450stars, as if we were villaines by nece
ssity, fooles by heauenly
¶compul
sion, knaues, theeues, and trecherers by
spirituall predo-
¶minance, drunkards, liars, and adulterers by an enforc'
st obedi-
¶ence of planitary influence, and all that we are euill in, by a di-
¶uine thru
sting on, an admirable eua
sion of whore-ma
ster man,
¶to lay his goati
sh di
spo
sition to the charge of
stars; my Father
¶compounded with my Mother vnder the Dragons taile, & my
¶natiuity was vnder
Vrsa maior,
so that it followes I am rough &
¶lecherous; Fut, I
should haue beene that I am, had the maiden-
460le
st
starre of the Firmament twinckled on my ba
stardy;
Edgar,
¶& out he comes like the Cata
strophe of the old Comedy, mine
¶is villanous melancholy, with a
sigh like them of
Bedlam; O
465the
se Ecclip
ses do portend the
se diui
sions.
¶Edgar. How now brother
Edmund, what
serious contempla-
¶Bast. I am thinking brother of a prediction I read this other
470day, what
should follow the
se Ecclip
ses.
¶Edg. Doe you bu
sie your
selfe about that?
¶Bast. I promi
se you the effects he writ of,
succeed vnhappily,
¶as of vnnaturalne
sse betweene the childe and the parent, death,
473.1dearth, di
ssolutions of ancient armies, diui
sions in
state, mena-
¶ces and maledictions again
st King and Nobles, needle
sse diffi-
¶dences, bani
shment of friends, di
ssipation of Cohorts, nuptiall
¶breaches, and I know not what.
.5Edg. How long haue you bin a
sectary A
stronomicall?
¶Bast. Come, come, when
saw you my father la
st?
475Edg. Why the night gone by.
¶Bast. Spake you with him?
