PERICLES
Like a bold champion, I assume THe lists,
Nor ask advice of any other thought
But faithfulness and courage.
[He reads the riddle.]
I am no viper, yet I feed
On mother’s flesh which did me breed.
I sought a husband, in which labour
I found that kindness in a father:
He’s father, son, and husband mild;
I mother, wife, and yet his child.
How they may be, and yet in two,
As you will live, resolve it you.
Sharp physic is the last: but, O you powers
That give heaven countless eyes to view men’s acts,
Why cloud they not their sights perpetually,
If this be true, which makes me pale to read it?
Fair glass of light, I loved you, and could still,
[Takes hold of the hand of the Princess.]
Were not this glorious casket stored with ill:
But I must tell you, now my thoughts revolt;
For he’s no man on whom perfections wait
That, knowing sin within, will touch the gate,
You are a fair viol, and your sense the strings;
Who, finger’d to make man his lawful music,
Would draw heaven down, and all the gods to hearken;
But being play’d upon before your time,
Hell only danceth at so harsh a chime.
Good sooth, I care not for you.
ANTIOCHUS.
Prince Pericles, touch not, upon thy life,
For that’s an article within our law,
As dangerous as the rest. Tour time’s expired:
Either expound now, or receive your sentence.
PERICLES.
Great king,
Few love to hear the sins they love to act;
‘Twould braid yourself too near for me to tell it.
Who has a book of all that monarchs do,
He’s more secure to keep it shut than shown:
For vice repeated is like the wandering wind,
Blows dust in others’ eyes, to spread itself;
And yet the end of all is bought thus dear,
The breath is gone, and the sore eyes see clear
To stop the air would hurt them. The blind mole casts
Copp’d hills towards heaven, to tell the earth is throng’d
By man’s oppression; and the poor worm doth die for’t.
Kind are earth’s gods; in vice their law’s their will;
And if Jove stray, who dares say Jove doth ill?
It is enough you know; and it is fit,
What being more known grows worse, to smother it.
All love the womb that their first bred,
Then give my tongue like leave to love my head.
ANTIOCHUS.[Aside]
Heaven, that I had thy head! he has found the meaning:
But I will gloze with him. — Young prince of Tyre.
Though by the tenour of our strict edict,
Your exposition misinterpreting,
We might proceed to cancel of your days;
Yet hope, succeeding from so fair a tree
As your fair self, doth tune us otherwise:
Forty days longer we do respite you;
If by which time our secret be undone,
This mercy shows we’ll joy in such a son:
And until then your entertain shall be
As doth befit our honour and your worth.
[Exeunt all but Pericles.]
PERACLES.
How courtesy would seem to cover sin,
When what is done is like an hypocrite,
The which is good in nothing but in sight!
If it be true that I interpret false,
Then were it certain you were not so bad
As with foul incest to abuse your soul;
Where now you’re both a father and a son,
By your untimely claspings with your child,
Which pleasure fits an husband, not a father;
And she an eater of her mother’s flesh,
By the defiling of her parent’s bed;
And both like serpents are, who though they feed
On sweetest flowers, yet they poison breed.
Antioch, farewell! for wisdom sees, those men
Blush not in actions blacker than the night,
Will shun no course to keep them from the light.
One sin, I know, another doth provoke;
Murder’s as near to lust as flame to smoke:
Poison and treason are the hands of sin,
Ay, and the targets, to put off the shame:
Then, lest my life be cropp’d to keep you clear,
By flight I ‘II shun the danger which I fear.
[Exit.]
[Re-enter Antiochus.]
ANTIOCHUS.
He gath found the meaning, for which we mean
To have his head.
He must not live to trumpet forth my infamy,
Nor tell the world Antiochus doth sin
In such a loathed manner;
And therefore instantly this prince must die;
For by his fall my honour must keep high.
Who attends us there?
[Enter Thaliard.]
THALIARD.
Doth your highness call?
ANTIOCHUS.
Thaliard,
You are of our chamber, and our mind partakes
Her private actions to your secrecy;
And for your faithfulness we will advance you.
Thaliard, behold, here’s poison, and here’s gold;
We hate the prince of Tyre, and thou must kill him:
It fits thee not to ask the reason why,
Because we Bid it. Say, is it done?
THALIARD.
My lord,
Tis done.
ANTIOCHUS.
Enough.
[Enter a Messenger.]
Let your breath cool yourself, telling your haste.
MESSENGER.
My lord, prlnce Pericles is fled.