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  • Title: King Lear (Modern, Extended Quarto)
  • Editor: Michael Best
  • Textual editors: James D. Mardock, Eric Rasmussen
  • Coordinating editor: Michael Best

    • ISBN: 978-1-55058-463-9

    Copyright Michael Best. This text may be freely used for educational, non-profit purposes; for all other uses contact the Editor.
    Author: William Shakespeare
    Editor: Michael Best
    Not Peer Reviewed

    King Lear (Modern, Extended Quarto)

    [Act 3, scene 4 in Folio]
    [Scene 11]
    Enter Lear, Kent [disguised], and Fool.
    Kent
    Here is the place, my lord. Good my lord, enter.
    The tyranny of the open night's too rough
    1780For nature to endure.
    [Storm still]
    Lear
    Let me alone.
    Kent
    Good my lord, enter.
    Lear
    Wilt break my heart?
    Kent
    I had rather break mine own. 1785Good my lord, enter.
    Lear
    Thou think'st 'tis much that this contentious storm
    Invades us to the skin. So 'tis to thee;
    But where the greater malady is fixed
    The lesser is scarce felt. Thou'dst shun a bear,
    1790But if thy flight lay toward the roaring sea
    Thou'dst meet the bear i'th'mouth. When the mind's free,
    The body's delicate. This tempest in my mind
    Doth from my senses take all feeling else
    Save what beats there. Filial ingratitude!
    1795Is it not as this mouth should tear this hand
    For lifting food to't? But I will punish sure.
    No, I will weep no more. In such a night
    To shut me out? Pour on. I will endure.
    In such a night as this? O Regan, Goneril,
    O Regan, Goneril, 1800your old kind father
    Whose frank heart gave you all!--Oh, that way madness lies;
    Let me shun that; no more of that.
    Kent
    Good my lord, enter.
    Lear
    Prithee go in thyself, seek thy own ease.
    1805This tempest will not give me leave to ponder
    On things would hurt me more. But I'll go in.
    [To the Fool] In boy, go first. You houseless poverty--
    Nay get thee in.
    Exit [the Fool].
    I'll pray, and then I'll sleep.
    Poor naked wretches wheresoe'er you are
    1810That bide the pelting of this pitiless night,
    How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
    Your looped and windowed raggedness, defend you
    From seasons such as these? Oh, I have ta'en
    Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp.
    1815Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
    That thou mayst shake the superflux to them
    And show the heavens more just.
    Enter Edgar [as Poor Tom, behind,] and [the] Fool.
    Edgar
    Fathom and half, fathom and half! Poor Tom.
    1820Fool
    Come not in here, nuncle, here's a spirit. Help me, help me!
    Kent
    Give me thy hand. Who's there?
    Fool
    A spirit. He says his name's Poor Tom.
    1825Kent
    What art thou that dost grumble there in the straw? Come forth.
    [Enter Edgar.]
    Edgar
    Away, the foul fiend follows me. Through the sharp hawthorn blows the cold wind. Go to thy cold bed and warm thee.
    1830Lear
    Hast thou given all to thy two daughters, and art thou come to this?
    Edgar
    Who gives anything to poor Tom, whom the foul fiend hath led through fire, and through ford and whirlpool, o'er bog and 1835quagmire; that has laid knives under his pillow and halters in his pew, set ratsbane by his pottage; made him proud of heart, to ride on a bay trotting-horse over four-inched bridges; to course his own shadow for a traitor. Bless thy five wits. Tom's a-cold. 1840Bless thee from whirlwinds, star-blasting, and taking. Do poor Tom some charity, whom the foul fiend vexes. There could I have him now, and there, and there again.
    [Storm still]
    Lear
    What? His daughters brought him to this pass?
    1845Couldst thou save nothing? Didst thou give them all?
    Fool
    Nay, he reserved a blanket, else we had been all shamed.
    Lear
    Now all the plagues that in the pendulous air
    Hang fated o'er men's faults fall on thy daughters.
    1850Kent
    He hath no daughters, sir.
    Lear
    Death, traitor! Nothing could have subdued nature
    To such a lowness but his unkind daughters.
    Is it the fashion that discarded fathers
    Should have thus little mercy on their flesh?
    1855Judicious punishment: 'twas this flesh
    Begot those pelican daughters.
    Edgar
    Pillicock sat on Pillicock's hill, a lo, lo, lo.
    Fool
    This cold night will turn us all to fools and madmen.
    1860Edgar
    Take heed o'th'foul fiend, obey thy parents, keep thy words justly, swear not, commit not with man's sworn spouse, set not thy sweet heart on proud array. Tom's a-cold.
    Lear
    What hast thou been?
    1865Edgar
    A servingman, proud in heart and mind, that curled my hair, wore gloves in my cap, served the lust of my mistress's heart and did the act of darkness with her; swore as many oaths as I spake words, and broke them in the sweet face of heaven. One that slept in the 1870contriving of lust and waked to do it. Wine loved I deeply, dice dearly, and in woman out-paramoured the Turk; false of heart, light of ear, bloody of hand; hog in sloth, fox in stealth, wolf in greediness, dog in madness, lion in prey. Let not the creaking of shoes 1875nor the rustlings of silks betray thy poor heart to women. Keep thy foot out of brothel, thy hand out of placket, thy pen from lender's book, and defy the foul fiend. Still through the hawthorn blows the cold wind, heigh no nonny. Dolphin, my boy, 1880my boy. Cease! Let him trot by.
    [Storm still]
    Lear
    Why, thou wert better in thy grave than to answer with thy uncovered body this extremity of the skies. Is man no more but this? Consider him well. Thou owest the worm no silk, the beast no hide, the sheep no 1885wool, the cat no perfume. Here's three on's are sophisticated; thou art the thing itself. Unaccommodated man is no more but such a poor bare forked animal as thou art. Off, off, you lendings. [Attempts to take off his clothes] Come, unbutton--
    Fool
    Prithee, nuncle, be content. This is a naughty night to swim in. Now a little fire in a wild field were like an old letcher's heart, a small spark, all the rest in's body cold. Look, here comes a walking fire.
    1890Enter Gloucester [with a torch].
    1895Edgar
    This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibet. He begins at curfew and walks till the first cock. He gives the web and the pin, squinies the eye, and makes the harelip; mildews the white wheat and hurts the poor creature of earth.
    [Sings.]
    1900Swithold footed thrice the wold,
    He met the nightmare and her ninefold,
    Bid her alight
    And her troth plight,
    And aroint thee, witch, aroint thee.
    Kent
    How fares your grace?
    1905Lear
    What's he?
    Kent
    Who's there? What is't you seek?
    Gloucester
    What are you there? Your names?
    Edgar
    Poor Tom, that eats the swimming frog, the toad, the tadpole, the wall-newt, and the water; that 1910in the fury of his heart, when the foul fiend rages, eats cow dung for salads, swallows the old rat and the ditch dog; drinks the green mantle of the standing pool; who is whipped from tithing to tithing, and stock-punished and imprisoned; who hath had three suits 1915to his back, six shirts to his body.
    Horse to ride, and weapon to wear.
    But mice and rats and such small deer
    Hath been Tom's food for seven long year.
    Beware my follower. Peace, Smolking, peace thou fiend!
    1920Gloucester
    What, hath your grace no better company?
    Edgar
    The Prince of Darkness is a gentleman. Modo, he's called, and Mahu--
    Gloucester
    Our flesh and blood is grown so vile, my lord,
    That it doth hate what gets it.
    1925Edgar
    Poor Tom's a-cold.
    Gloucester
    [To Lear] Go in with me. My duty cannot suffer
    To obey in all your daughters' hard commands.
    Though their injunction be to bar my doors
    And let this tyrannous night take hold upon you,
    1930Yet have I ventured to come seek you out
    And bring you where both food and fire is ready.
    Lear
    First let me talk with this philosopher.
    What is the cause of thunder?
    Kent
    My good lord, take his offer. 1935Go into the house.
    Lear
    I'll talk a word with this most learnèd Theban.
    What is your study?
    Edgar
    How to prevent the fiend, and to kill vermin.
    Lear
    Let me ask you one word in private.
    1940Kent
    [To Gloucester] Importune him [once more] to go, my lord. His wits
    Begin to unsettle.
    Gloucester
    Canst thou blame him?
    [Storm still]
    His daughters seek his death. Oh, that good Kent,
    He said it would be thus, poor banished man.
    1945Thou say'st the King grows mad. I'll tell thee, friend,
    I am almost mad myself. I had a son
    Now outlawed from my blood. 'A sought my life
    But lately, very late. I loved him, friend,
    No father his son dearer. True to tell thee,
    1950The grief hath crazed my wits.
    What a night's this? [To Lear] I do beseech your grace--
    Lear
    Oh, cry you mercy. Noble philosopher, your company.
    Edgar
    Tom's a-cold.
    1955Gloucester
    In fellow. There, in th'hovel, keep thee warm.
    Lear
    Come, let's in all.
    Kent
    This way, my lord.
    Lear
    With him.
    I will keep still with my philosopher.
    1960Kent
    [To Gloucester] Good my lord, soothe him. Let him take the fellow.
    Gloucester
    Take him you on.
    Kent
    Sirrah, come on. Go along with us.
    Lear
    Come, good Athenian.
    1965Gloucester
    No words, no words, hush.
    Edgar
    Childe Rowland to the dark town come,
    His word was still "Fie, fo, and fum,
    I smell the blood of a British man."
    [Exeunt.]
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