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- William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, Act I, Scene II
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Scene IIThe same. Another roomEnter Charmian, Iras, Alexas, and a SoothsayerCharmian Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most any thing Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where’s the soothsayer that you praised so to the queen? O, that I knew this husband, which, you say, must charge his horns with garlands!AlexasSoothsayer!SoothsayerYour will?CharmianIs this the man? Is’t you, sir, that know things?SoothsayerIn nature’s infinite book of secrecy A little I can read.AlexasShow him your hand.Enter Domitius EnobarbusDomitius EnobarbusBring in the banquet quickly; wine enough Cleopatra’s health to drink.CharmianGood sir, give me good fortune.SoothsayerI make not, but foresee.CharmianPray, then, foresee me one.SoothsayerYou shall be yet far fairer than you are.CharmianHe means in flesh.IrasNo, you shall paint when you are old.CharmianWrinkles forbid!AlexasVex not his prescience; be attentive.CharmianHush!SoothsayerYou shall be more beloving than beloved.CharmianI had rather heat my liver with drinking.AlexasNay, hear him.CharmianGood now, some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon, and widow them all: let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage: find me to marry me with Octavius Caesar, and companion me with my mistress.SoothsayerYou shall outlive the lady whom you serve.CharmianO excellent! I love long life better than figs.SoothsayerYou have seen and proved a fairer former fortune Than that which is to approach.CharmianThen belike my children shall have no names: prithee, how many boys and wenches must I have?SoothsayerIf every of your wishes had a womb. And fertile every wish, a million.CharmianOut, fool! I forgive thee for a witch.AlexasYou think none but your sheets are privy to your wishes.CharmianNay, come, tell Iras hers.AlexasWe’ll know all our fortunes.Domitius EnobarbusMine, and most of our fortunes, to-night, shall be—drunk to bed.IrasThere’s a palm presages chastity, if nothing else.CharmianE’en as the o’erflowing Nilus presageth famine.IrasGo, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay.CharmianNay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Prithee, tell her but a worky-day fortune.SoothsayerYour fortunes are alike.IrasBut how, but how? give me particulars.SoothsayerI have said.IrasAm I not an inch of fortune better than she?CharmianWell, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it?IrasNot in my husband’s nose.CharmianOur worser thoughts heavens mend! Alexas,—come, his fortune, his fortune! O, let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee! and let her die too, and give him a worse! and let worst follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fifty-fold a cuckold! Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Isis, I beseech thee!IrasAmen. Dear goddess, hear that prayer of the people! for, as it is a heartbreaking to see a handsome man loose-wived, so it is a deadly sorrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded: therefore, dear Isis, keep decorum, and fortune him accordingly!CharmianAmen.AlexasLo, now, if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores, but they’ld do’t!Domitius EnobarbusHush! here comes Antony.CharmianNot he; the queen.Enter CleopatraCleopatraSaw you my lord?Domitius EnobarbusNo, lady.CleopatraWas he not here?CharmianNo, madam.CleopatraHe was disposed to mirth; but on the sudden A Roman thought hath struck him. Enobarbus!Domitius EnobarbusMadam?CleopatraSeek him, and bring him hither.Where’s Alexas?AlexasHere, at your service. My lord approaches.CleopatraWe will not look upon him: go with us.ExeuntEnter Mark Antony with a Messenger and AttendantsMessengerFulvia thy wife first came into the field.Mark AntonyAgainst my brother Lucius?MessengerAy: But soon that war had end, and the time’s state Made friends of them, joining their force ‘gainst Caesar; Whose better issue in the war, from Italy, Upon the first encounter, drave them.Mark AntonyWell, what worst?MessengerThe nature of bad news infects the teller.Mark AntonyWhen it concerns the fool or coward. On: Things that are past are done with me. ‘Tis thus: Who tells me true, though in his tale lie death, I hear him as he flatter’d.MessengerLabienus— This is stiff news—hath, with his Parthian force, Extended Asia from Euphrates; His conquering banner shook from Syria To Lydia and to Ionia; Whilst—Mark AntonyAntony, thou wouldst say,—MessengerO, my lord!Mark AntonySpeak to me home, mince not the general tongue: Name Cleopatra as she is call’d in Rome; Rail thou in Fulvia’s phrase; and taunt my faults With such full licence as both truth and malice Have power to utter. O, then we bring forth weeds, When our quick minds lie still; and our ills told us Is as our earing. Fare thee well awhile.MessengerAt your noble pleasure.ExitMark AntonyFrom Sicyon, ho, the news! Speak there!First AttendantThe man from Sicyon,—is there such an one?Second AttendantHe stays upon your will.Mark AntonyLet him appear. These strong Egyptian fetters I must break, Or lose myself in dotage.Enter another MessengerWhat are you?Second MessengerFulvia thy wife is dead.Mark AntonyWhere died she?Second MessengerIn Sicyon: Her length of sickness, with what else more serious Importeth thee to know, this bears.Gives a letterMark AntonyForbear me.Exit Second MessengerThere’s a great spirit gone! Thus did I desire it: What our contempt doth often hurl from us, We wish it ours again; the present pleasure, By revolution lowering, does become The opposite of itself: she’s good, being gone; The hand could pluck her back that shoved her on. I must from this enchanting queen break off: Ten thousand harms, more than the ills I know, My idleness doth hatch. How now! Enobarbus!Re-enter Domitius EnobarbusDomitius EnobarbusWhat’s your pleasure, sir?Mark AntonyI must with haste from hence.Domitius EnobarbusWhy, then, we kill all our women: we see how mortal an unkindness is to them; if they suffer our departure, death’s the word.Mark AntonyI must be gone.Domitius EnobarbusUnder a compelling occasion, let women die; it were pity to cast them away for nothing; though, between them and a great cause, they should be esteemed nothing. Cleopatra, catching but the least noise of this, dies instantly; I have seen her die twenty times upon far poorer moment: I do think there is mettle in death, which commits some loving act upon her, she hath such a celerity in dying.Mark AntonyShe is cunning past man’s thought.Exit AlexasDomitius EnobarbusAlack, sir, no; her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love: we cannot call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report: this cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove.Mark AntonyWould I had never seen her.Domitius EnobarbusO, sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful piece of work; which not to have been blest withal would have discredited your travel.Mark AntonyFulvia is dead.Domitius EnobarbusSir?Mark AntonyFulvia is dead.Domitius EnobarbusFulvia!Mark AntonyDead.Domitius EnobarbusWhy, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice. When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a man from him, it shows to man the tailors of the earth; comforting therein, that when old robes are worn out, there are members to make new. If there were no more women but Fulvia, then had you indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented: this grief is crowned with consolation; your old smock brings forth a new petticoat: and indeed the tears live in an onion that should water this sorrow.Mark AntonyThe business she hath broached in the state Cannot endure my absence.Domitius EnobarbusAnd the business you have broached here cannot be without you; especially that of Cleopatra’s, which wholly depends on your abode.Mark AntonyNo more light answers. Let our officers Have notice what we purpose. I shall break The cause of our expedience to the queen, And get her leave to part. For not alone The death of Fulvia, with more urgent touches, Do strongly speak to us; but the letters too Of many our contriving friends in Rome Petition us at home: Sextus Pompeius Hath given the dare to Caesar, and commands The empire of the sea: our slippery people, Whose love is never link’d to the deserver Till his deserts are past, begin to throw Pompey the Great and all his dignities Upon his son; who, high in name and power, Higher than both in blood and life, stands up For the main soldier: whose quality, going on, The sides o’ the world may danger: much is breeding, Which, like the courser’s hair, hath yet but life, And not a serpent’s poison. Say, our pleasure, To such whose place is under us, requires Our quick remove from hence.Domitius EnobarbusI shall do’t.Exeunt
William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, Act I
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William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, Act III, Scene Xiii. Alexandria. Cleopatra’s palace.
- William Shakespeare: Antony and Cleopatra, Act III, Scene Xiii. Alexandria. Cleopatra’s palace.
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TrendingHere are the facts and trivia that people are buzzing about.
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Current Events This Week: January 2023
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Andersen’s Fairy Tales: Contents
The Celtic Twilight: A Teller of Tales
- Did Birds Evolve from Dinosaurs?
- The Twelve Dancing Princesses
- Current Events This Week: January 2023
- African Americans by the Numbers
- Andersen’s Fairy Tales: Contents
- The Celtic Twilight: A Teller of Tales
