Par. [Aside to Ber.]

Use a more spacious ceremony to the noble lords; you have restrained yourself within the list of too cold an adieu: be more expressive to them: for they wear themselves in the cap of the time, there do muster ^note true gait ^{note note}, eat ^note, speak, and move ^note under the influence of the most received star; and though the devil lead the measure, such are to be followed: after them, and take a more dilated farewell.

Ber.

And I will do so.

Par.

Worthy fellows; and like to prove most sinewy sword-men.

Laf. [Kneeling ^note]
Pardon, my lord, for me and for my tidings.

King.
I'll fee ^note thee to stand up.

Laf.
Then here's a man stands, that has ^note brought ^note his pardon.
I would you had kneel'd, my lord, to ask me mercy;
And that at my bidding you could so stand up. ^note

King.
I would I had; so I had broke thy pate,
And ask'd thee mercy for't ^note.

Laf.
Good faith, across ^note: but, my good lord, 'tis thus;
Will you be cured of your infirmity?

King.
No.

Laf.
O, will you eat no grapes, my royal fox?
Yes, but you will my noble grapes ^note, an if
My royal fox could reach them: I have seen a medicine ^{note note note}
That's able to breathe life into a stone,
Quicken a rock, and make you dance canary
With spritely fire and motion; whose simple touch
Is powerful to araise ^note King Pepin ^note, nay,
To give ^note great Charlemain a pen in's ^note hand,
And write ^note to her a love-line ^note.

King.
What ‘her’ is this?

Laf.
Why, Doctor She ^note: my lord, there's one arrived,
If you will see her: now, by my faith and honour,
If seriously I may convey ^note my thoughts
In this my light deliverance, I have spoke
With one that, in her sex, her years, profession,

Wisdom and constancy, hath amazed me more
Than I dare blame ^note my weakness ^note: will you see her,
For that is her demand, and know her business?
That done, laugh well at me.

King.
Now, good Lafeu,
Bring in the admiration; that we with thee
May spend our wonder too, or take off thine
By wondering how thou took'st it.

Laf.
Nay, I'll fit you,
And not be all day neither. [Exit ^note.

King.
Thus he his special nothing ^note ever prologues. Re-enter Lafeu, with Helena. ^note

Laf.
Nay, come your ways ^note.

King.
This haste hath wings indeed.

Laf.
Nay, come your ways;
This is his majesty, say your mind to him:
A traitor you do look like; but such traitors
His majesty seldom fears: I am ^note Cressid's uncle,
That dare leave two together; fare you well. [Exit. ^{note note}

King.
Now, fair one, does your business follow us?

Hel.
Ay, my good lord.
Gerard de Narbon ^note was my father;
In ^note what he did profess, well found.

King.
I knew him ^note.

Hel.
The rather will I spare my praises ^note towards him;
Knowing him is enough. On's ^note bed of death
Many receipts ^note he gave me; chiefly one,

Which, as the dearest issue of his practice,
And of his old experience the ^note only darling,
He bade me store up, as a triple eye,
Safer than mine own two, more dear ^note; I have so:
And, hearing your high majesty is touch'd
With that malignant cause, wherein the honour
Of my dear father's gift stands chief in power ^note,
I come to tender it and my appliance,
With all bound humbleness.

King.
We thank you, maiden;
But may not be so credulous of cure,
When our most learned doctors leave us, and
The congregated college have concluded
That labouring art can never ransom ^note nature
From her inaidible ^note estate ^note; I say ^note we must not
So stain ^note our judgement, or corrupt our hope,
To prostitute our past-cure malady
To empirics, or to dissever so
Our great self and our credit, to esteem
A senseless help, when help past sense we deem.

Hel.
My duty, then, shall pay me for my pains:
I will no more enforce mine ^note office on you;
Humbly entreating from your royal thoughts
A modest one, to bear me back again.

King.
I cannot give thee less, to be call'd grateful:
Thou thought'st to help me; and such thanks I give
As one near death to those that wish him live:
But, what at full I know, thou know'st no part;
I knowing all my peril, thou no art.

Hel.
What I can do can do no hurt to try,
Since you set up your rest 'gainst remedy
He that of greatest works is finisher,
Oft does them by the weakest minister:

So holy writ in babes hath judgement shown,
When judges have been babes; great floods have flown
From simple sources; and great seas have dried,
When miracles have by the greatest ^note been denied.
Oft expectation fails, and most oft there
Where most it promises; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits ^note.

King.
I must not hear thee; fare thee well, kind maid;
Thy pains not used must by thyself be paid:
Proffers not took reap thanks for their reward.

Hel.
Inspired merit so by breath is barr'd:
It is not so with Him that all things knows,
As 'tis with us that square our guess by shows;
But most it is presumption in us when
The help of heaven we count the act of men.
Dear sir, to my endeavours give consent;
Of heaven, not me, make an experiment.
I am not an impostor ^note, that proclaim
Myself against the level of mine aim;
But know I think, and think I know most sure,
My art is not past power, nor you past cure.

King.
Art thou so confident? within what space
Hopest thou my cure?

Hel.
The great'st grace lending ^note grace,
Ere twice the horses of the sun shall bring
Their fiery torcher his diurnal ring;
Ere twice in murk and occidental damp
Moist Hesperus hath quench'd his ^note sleepy lamp;
Or four and twenty times the pilot's glass
Hath told the thievish minutes how they pass;
What is infirm from your sound parts shall fly,
Health shall live free, and sickness freely die.

King.
Upon thy certainty and confidence

What darest thou venture?

Hel.
Tax of impudence,
A strumpet's boldness, a divulged shame
Traduced by odious ballads: my maiden's ^note name ^note
Sear'd otherwise, ne worse of ^note worst extended ^note,
With vilest torture let my life be ended.

King.
Methinks in thee some blessed spirit doth speak
His powerful sound ^note within ^note an organ weak:
And what impossibility would slay
In common sense, sense saves another way.
Thy life is dear; for all, that life can rate
Worth name of life, in thee hath estimate,
Youth, beauty, wisdom, courage ^note, all
That happiness and prime ^note can happy call:
Thou this to hazard needs must intimate
Skill infinite or monstrous desperate.
Sweet practiser, thy physic I will try,
That ministers thine own death if I die.

Hel.
If I break time, or flinch in property
Of what I spoke, unpitied let me die,
And well deserved: not helping, death's my fee;

But, if I help, what do you promise me?

King.
Make thy demand.

Hel.
But will you make it even?

King.
Ay, by my sceptre and my hopes of heaven ^note.

Hel.
Then shalt thou give me with thy kingly hand
What husband in thy power I will command:
Exempted be from me the arrogance
To choose from forth the royal blood of France,
My low and humble name to propagate
With any branch or image ^note of thy state;
But such a one, thy vassal, whom I know
Is free for me to ask, thee to bestow.

King.
Here is my hand; the premises observed,
Thy will by my performance shall be served:
So make the ^note choice of thy ^note own time; for I,
Thy resolved patient, on thee still rely.
More should I question thee, and more I must,
Though more to know could not be more to trust,
From whence thou camest, how tended on: but rest
Unquestion'd welcome, and undoubted blest.
Give me some help here, ho! If thou proceed
As high as word, my deed shall match thy deed ^note. [Flourish. Exeunt. ^{note note}

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