SCENE I.
An Apartment in the Duke's Palace.
Enter Duke, Curio, Lords; Musicians attending.
Duke.
If musick be the food of love, play on,
Give me excess of it; that, surfeiting1 note
,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.—
That strain again;—it had a dying fall2 note
:
-- 340 --
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet South3 note
,
That breathes upon a bank of violets4 note
,
Stealing, and giving odour.—Enough; no more;
'Tis not so sweet now, as it was before.
O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou!
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe'er5 note
,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute! so full of shapes is fancy,
That it alone is high-fantastical6 note
.
Cur.
Will you go hunt, my lord?
Duke.
What, Curio?
Cur.
The hart.
Duke.
Why, so I do, the noblest that I have:
O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first,
-- 341 --
Methought, she purg'd the air of pestilence;
That instant was I turn'd into a hart;
And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,
E'er since pursue me7 note
.—How now? what news from her?
-- 342 --
Enter Valentine.
Val.
So please my lord, I might not be admitted,
But from her handmaid do return this answer:
The element itself, till seven years heat8 note
,
-- 343 --
Shall not behold her face at ample view;
But, like a cloistress, she will veiled walk,
And water once a day her chamber round
With eye-offending brine: all this, to season
A brother's dead love, which she would keep fresh,
And lasting, in her sad remembrance.
Duke.
O, she that hath a heart of that fine frame,
To pay this debt of love but to a brother,
How will she love, when the rich golden shaft,
Hath kill'd the flock of all affections9 note else
That live in her1 note
: when liver, brain, and heart,
These sovereign thrones2 note, are all supplied, and fill'd,
(Her sweet perfections3 note,) with one self king4 note
.—
-- 344 --
Away before me to sweet beds of flowers;
Love-thoughts lie rich, when canopied with bowers.
[Exeunt.
-- 345 --
James Boswell [1821], The plays and poems of William Shakspeare, with the corrections and illustrations of various commentators: comprehending A Life of the Poet, and an enlarged history of the stage, by the late Edmond Malone. With a new glossarial index (J. Deighton and Sons, Cambridge) [word count] [S10201].
