Thou, Nature, art my goddess. To thy law

336My services are bound. Wherefore should I

337Stand in the plague of custom and permit

338The curiosity of nations to deprive me,

339For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines

340Lag of a brother? Why "bastard"? Wherefore "base,"

341When my dimensions are as well compact,

342My mind as generous, and my shape as true

343As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us

344With "base"? With baseness? Bastardy? "Base, base"?

345Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take

346More composition and fierce quality

347Than doth within a dull, stale, tired bed

348Go to the creating a whole tribe of fops

349Got 'tween asleep and wake. Well then,

350Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land.

351Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund

352As to th'legitimate. Fine word, "legitimate."

353Well, my "legitimate," if this letter speed

354And my invention thrive, Edmund the base

355Shall to th'legitimate. I grow, I prosper.

356Now, gods, stand up for bastards!

Kent banished thus? and France in choler parted?

359And the King gone tonight, prescribed his power,

360Confined to exhibition? All this done

361Upon the gad?--Edmund, how now? What news?

[Pockets the letter.] So please your lordship, none.

Why so earnestly seek you to put up that letter?

I know no news, my lord.

What paper were you reading?

Nothing, my lord.

No? what needed then that terrible dispatch of 368it into your pocket? The quality of nothing hath not 369such need to hide itself. Let's see. Come, if it be 370nothing I shall not need spectacles.

I beseech you, sir, pardon me. It is a letter 372from my brother that I have not all o'er-read; and for so 373much as I have perused, I find it not fit for your 374o'er-looking.

Give me the letter, sir.

I shall offend either to detain or give it. 377The contents, as in part I understand them, 378are to blame.

Let's see, let's see!

I hope for my brother's justification, he wrote 381this but as an assay, or taste of my virtue.

390Hum, conspiracy! "Sleep till I wake him," "You should 391enjoy half his revenue"? My son Edgar? Had he a 392hand to write this? A heart and brain to breed it in? 393When came you to this? Who brought it?

It was not brought me, my lord, there's the 395cunning of it. I found it thrown in at the casement of 396my closet.

You know the character to be your brother's?

If the matter were good, my lord, I durst swear 399it were his; but in respect of that I would fain think it 400were not.

It is his?

It is his hand, my lord, but I hope his heart is 403not in the contents.

Has he never before sounded you in this business?

Never, my lord, but I have heard him oft 406maintain it to be fit that sons at perfect age, and fathers 407declined, the father should be as ward to the son, and 408the son manage his revenue.

O villain, villain! His very opinion in the 410letter. Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish 411villain, worse than brutish. Go sirrah, seek him. I'll 412apprehend him, abominable villain. Where is he?

I do not well know, my lord. If it shall please you to 414suspend your indignation against my brother till you can 415derive from him better testimony of his intent, you should 416run a certain course; where, if you violently proceed 417against him mistaking his purpose, it would make a great 418gap in your own honor and shake in pieces the heart of 419his obedience. I dare pawn down my life for him that 420he hath writ this to feel my affection to your honor, and 421to no other pretense of danger.

Think you so?

If your honor judge it meet, I will place you 424where you shall hear us confer of this, and by an 425auricular assurance have your satisfaction--and that without 426any further delay than this very evening.

3He cannot be such a monster.

6To his father, that so tenderly and entirely loves him. 427.3386Heaven and earth! 4Edmund, seek 428him out. Wind me into him, I pray you. Frame the 429business after your own wisdom. I would unstate 430myself to be in a due resolution.

I will seek him sir, presently; convey the 432business as I shall find means, and acquaint you withal.

These late eclipses in the sun and moon 434portend no good to us. Though the wisdom of nature can 435reason it thus and thus, yet nature finds itself scourged 436by the sequent effects. Love cools, friendship falls off, 437brothers divide. In cities, mutinies; in countries, 438discord; in palaces, treason; and the bond cracked 'twixt 439son and father.13 This villain of mine comes under the 440prediction--there's son against father. The King falls from 441bias of nature--there's father against child. We have 442seen the best of our time. Machinations, hollowness, 443treachery, and all ruinous disorders follow us disquietly 444to our graves. 14Find out this villain, Edmund. It shall lose 445thee nothing. Do it carefully. And the noble and 446true-hearted Kent banished; his offence, honesty. 'Tis strange.

This is the excellent foppery of the world, that 448when we are sick in fortune--often the surfeits of our own 449behavior--we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the 450moon, and stars, as if we were villains on necessity, 451fools by heavenly compulsion, knaves, thieves, and 452treachers by spherical predominance; drunkards, 453liars, and adulterers by an enforced obedience of planetary 454influence; and all that we are evil in by a divine 455thrusting on. An admirable evasion of whoremaster man, 456to lay his goatish disposition on the charge of a star. 457"My father compounded with my mother under the 458dragon's tail, and my nativity was under Ursa Major, so 459that it follows I am rough and lecherous." I should 460have been that I am had the maidenliest star in the 461firmament twinkled on my bastardizing.

463Pat he comes, like the catastrophe of the old comedy. 464My cue is villanous melancholy, with a sigh like Tom 465o'Bedlam. --Oh, these eclipses do portend these 466divisions. Fa, sol, la, me.

How now, brother Edmund. What serious 468contemplation are you in?

I am thinking, brother, of a prediction I read this 470other day, what should follow these eclipses.

Do you busy yourself with that?

17.1I promise you, the effects he writes of 17succeed 473unhappily19, 473.1422as of unnaturalness between the child and the parent, death, 423dearth, dissolutions of ancient amities, divisions in state, 473.2424menaces and maledictions against king and nobles, needless 473.3425diffidences, banishment of friends, dissipation of cohorts, nuptial 473.4426breaches, and I know not what. 473.5

Come, come. 474When saw you my father last?

The night gone by.

Spake you with him?

Ay, two hours together.

Parted you in good terms? Found you no 479displeasure in him, by word, nor countenance?

None at all.

Bethink yourself wherein you may have 482offended him, and at my entreaty forbear his presence until 483some little time hath qualified the heat of his displeasure, 484which at this instant so rageth in him that with the 485mischief of your person it would scarcely allay.

Some villain hath done me wrong.

That's my fear. I pray you, have a continent 488forbearance till the speed of his rage goes slower, and, as 489I say, retire with me to my lodging, from whence I will 490fitly bring you to hear my lord speak. Pray ye go. 491There's my key. If you do stir abroad, go armed.

Armed, brother?

Brother, I advise you to the best. I am no honest 494man if there be any good meaning toward you. I have told 495you what I have seen and heard but faintly, nothing 496like the image and horror of it. Pray you, away!

Shall I hear from you anon?

[Calling after him] I do serve you in this business.

499A credulous father and a brother noble,

500Whose nature is so far from doing harms

501That he suspects none; on whose foolish honesty

502My practices ride easy. I see the business.

503Let me, if not by birth, have lands by wit.

504All with me's meet that I can fashion fit.