POET.
Good day, Sir.

Pain.
I am glad y' are well.

Poet.
I have not seen you long; how goes the world?

Pain.
It wears, Sir, as it goes.

Poet.
Ay, that's well known.
But what particular rarity? what so strange,
Which manifold record not matches? see! Jeweller and Merchant enter; other Suitors pass over the Stage.
Magick of bounty! all these spirits thy power
Hath conjur'd to attend. I know the merchant.

Pain.
I know them both; th' other's a jeweller.

Mer.
O 'tis a worthy Lord!

Jew.
Nay, that's most fixt.

Mer.
A most incomparable man, breath'd as it were
To an untirable and continuate goodness.

Jew.
I have a jewel here.

Mer.
O, pray, let's see 't:
For the Lord Timon, Sir?

Jew.
If he will touch the estimate: but for that— [Exeunt Merchant and Jeweller.

Poet. [to himself.]
When we for recompense have prais'd the vile,
It stains the glory in that happy verse
Which aptly sings the good.

Pain.
You're rapt, Sir, in some work, some dedication
To the great Lord.

Poet.
A thing slipt idly from me.
Our poesie is as a gum, which issues
From whence 'tis nourished.
What have you there?

Pain.
A picture, Sir—and when comes your book forth?

Poet.
Upon the heels of my presentment, Sir.
Let's see your piece.

Pain.
'Tis a good piece.

Poet.
So 'tis,
This comes off well and excellent.

Pain.
Indiff'rent.

Poet.
Admirable! how this grace
Speaks his own standing? what a mental power
This eye shoots forth? how big imagination
Moves in this lip? to th' dumbness of the gesture
One might interpret.

Pain.
It is a pretty mocking of the life:
Here is a touch—is't good?

Poet.
I'll say of it,
It tutors nature; artificial strife
Lives in those touches, livelier than life. Enter certain Senators, and pass on.

Pain.
How this Lord is followed!

Poet.
The Senators of Athens! happy man!

Pain.
Look, more!

Poet.
You see this confluence, this great flood of visiters
I have upon a high and pleasant hill
Feign'd Fortune to be thron'd. The base o' th' mount
Is rank'd with all deserts, all kind of natures,
That labour on the bosom of this sphere
To propagate their states: amongst them all,
Whose eyes are on this sovereign lady fixt,
One do I personate of Timon's frame,
Whom Fortune with her iv'ry hand wafts to her,
Whose present grace to present slaves and servants
Translates his rivals.

Pain.
'Tis conceiv'd to th' scope.
This throne, this fortune, and this hill, methinks,
With one man becken'd from the rest below,
Bowing his head against the steepy mount
To climb his happiness, would be well exprest
In our condition.

Poet.
Nay, but hear me on:
When Fortune in her shift and change of mood
Spurns down her late belov'd, all his dependants,
(Which labour'd after to the mountain's top,
Even on their knees and hands,) let him slip down,
Not one accompanying his declining foot.

Pain.
'Tis common:
A thousand moral paintings I can shew,
That shall demonstrate these quick blows of fortune
More pregnantly than words. Yet you do well
To shew Lord Timon, that mean eyes have seen
The foot above the head.

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