SCENE I. Before TIMON's Cave.

ACT V.

Enter Poet and Painter; TIMON behind, unseen.

Pain. As I took note of the place, it cannot be far where he abides.

:

Poet. What's to be thought of him? Does the rumor hold for true, that he is so full of gold? Pain. Certain Alcibiades reports it; Phrynia and Timandra had gold of him: he likewise enriched poor straggling soldiers with great quantity: 't is said, he gave unto his steward a mighty.

sum.

Tim. Must thou needs stand for a villain in
thine own work? wilt thou whip thine own faults
in other men? Do so; I have gold for thee.
Poet. Nay, let's seek him:

Then do we sin against our own estate,
When we may profit meet, and come too late.
Pain. True;

When the day serves, before black-cornered night,
Find what thou want'st by free and offered light.
Come.

Tim. I'll meet you at the turn. What a god's
gold,

Poet. Then this breaking of his has been but That he is worshiped in a baser temple a try for his friends. Than where swine feed!

Pain. Nothing else: you shall see him a palm in Athens again, and flourish with the highest. Therefore, 't is not amiss we tender our loves to him, in this supposed distress of his: it will shew honestly in us; and is very likely to load our purses with what we travel for, if it be a just and true report that goes of his having.

Poet. What have you now to present unto him? Pain. Nothing at this time but my visitation: only I will promise him an excellent piece.

'T is thou that rigg'st the bark, and plough'st the
foam;

Settlest admiréd reverence in a slave:
To thee be worship! and thy saints for aye
Be crowned with plagues, that thee alone obey!
'Fit I meet them.
[Advancing.

Poet. Hail, worthy Timon!
Pain.

Our late noble master..
Tim. Have I once lived to see two honest men?
Poet. Sir,

Poet. I must serve him so too; tell him of an Having often of your open bounty tasted, intent that's coming toward him.

Pain. Good as the best. Promising is the very air o' the time it opens the eyes of expectation: performance is ever the duller for his act; and, but in the plainer and simpler kind of people, the deed of saying is quite out of use. To promise is most courtly and fashionable: performance is a kind of will or testament, which argues a great sickness in his judgment that makes it.

Tim. Excellent workman! thou canst not paint a man so bad as is thyself.

Poet. I am thinking what I shall say I have provided for him. It must be a personating of himself: a satire against the softness of prosperity; with a discovery of the infinite flatteries that follow youth and opulency.

Hearing you were retired, your friends fall'n off,
Whose thankless natures - O, abhorréd spirits!
Not all the whips of heaven are large enough-
What! to you!

Whose starlike nobleness gave life and influence
To their whole being! I am rapt, and cannot cover
The monstrous bulk of this ingratitude
With any size of words.

Tim. Let it go naked; men may see 't the
better:

You that are honest, by being what you are,
Make them best seen and known.
Pain. He and myself
Have traveled in the great shower of your gifts,
And sweetly felt it.

Tim.

Ay, you are honest men.

Pain. We are hither come to offer you our ser- Confound them by some course, and come to me, I'll give you gold enough.

vice.

Tim. Most honest men! Why, how shall I

requite you?

no.

Both. Name them, my lord; let's know them.
Tim. You that way, and you this; but two in
company:

Can you eat roots and drink cold water?
Both. What we can do we'll do, to do you Each man apart, all single and alone,
Yet an arch-villain keeps him company.

service.

Tim. You are honest men. You have heard If where thou art two villains shall not be,

that I have gold;

[To the Painter.

I am sure you have: speak truth: you are honest Come not near him. - If thou wouldst not reside

men.

[To the Poet. Pain. So it is said, my noble lord: but therefore But where one villain is, then him abandon. Came not my friend nor I. Hence! pack! there's gold; ye came for gold, ye slaves:

Tim. Good honest men.-Thou draw'st a counterfeit.

[To the Painter. Best in all Athens: thou art, indeed, the best; Thou counterfeit'st most lively.

Tim. There's ne'er a one of you but trusts a Men are not still the same. 'T was time and

That mightily deceives you.

Both.

knave,

Do we, my lord?

griefs

That framed him thus: time, with his fairer hand,
Offering the fortunes of his former days,

Tim. Ay, and you hear him cog, see him dis- The former man may make him. Bring us to him,

Be as a caut'rizing to the root o' the tongue,
Consuming it with speaking!

1st Sen.

Worthy Timon,

Let Alcibiades know this of Timon,
That Timon cares not. But if he sack fair Athens,
And take our goodly agéd men by the beards,

Tim. Of none but such as you, and you of Giving our holy virgins to the stain

Of contumelious, beastly, mad-brained war;

Timon. 2nd Sen. The senators of Athens greet thee, Then let him know,-and tell him, Timon speaks it Timon. In pity of our agéd and our youth,

Tim. I thank them; and would send them back I cannot choose but tell him, that I care not,

Toward thee, forgetfulness too general, gross :
Which now the public body,— which doth seldom
Play the recanter,- feeling in itself

A lack of Timon's aid, hath sense withal
Of its own fall, restraining aid to Timon:
And send forth us to make their sorrowed render,
Together with a recompense more fruitful
Than their offense can weigh down by the dram:
Ay, even such heaps and sums of love and wealth,
As shall to thee blot out what wrongs were theirs,
And write in thee the figures of their love,
Ever to read them thine.

2nd Sen. And enter in our ears like great triúmphers

And I'll beweep these comforts, worthy senators.
1st Sen. Therefore, so please thee to return In their applauding gates.

with us,

And of our Athens (thine and ours) to take
The captainship, thou shalt be met with thanks,
Allowed with absolute power, and thy good name
Live with authority. So, soon we shall drive back
Of Alcibiades the approaches wild ;

Who, like a boar too savage, doth root up
His country's peace.

2nd Sen. And shakes his threat'ning sword Against the walls of Athens.

1st Sen.

Therefore, Timon,

And tell them that, to ease them of their griefs,
Their fears of hostile strokes, their achés, losses,
Their pangs of love, with other incident throes
That nature's fragile vessel doth sustain

In life's uncertain voyage, I will some kindness do
them:

I'll teach them to prevent wild Alcibiades' wrath.
2nd Sen. I like this well; he will return again.
Tim. I have a tree which grows here in my close,
That mine own use invites me to cut down,

Tim. Well, sir, I will; therefore I will, sir: And shortly must I fell it: tell my friends,

Thus,

If Alcibiades kill my countrymen,

Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree,
From high to low throughout, that whoso please

To stop affliction, let him take his haste,
Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe,
And hang himself. I pray you, do my greeting.
Flav. Trouble him no further; thus you still

shall find him.

Tim. Come not to me again: but say to Athens,
Timon hath made his everlasting mansion
Upon the beachéd verge of the salt flood;
Which once a day with his embosséd froth
The turbulent surge shall cover; thither come,
And let my gravestone be your oracle.—
Lips, let sour words go by, and language end:
What is amiss, plague and infection mend!
Graves only be men's works; and death their gain!
Sun, hide thy beams! Timon hath done his reign.
[Exit TIMON.
1st Sen. His discontents are unremovably
Coupled to nature.

3rd Sen. No talk of Timon, nothing of him.

expect.

The enemies' drum is heard, and fearful scouring
Doth choke the air with dust. In, and prepare;
Ours is the fall, I fear; our foes the snare.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV. The Woods. TIMON's Cave, and a
Tombstone seen.

Enter a Soldier seeking TIMON.

Sol. By all description this should be the place. Who's here? speak, ho!- No answer? - What is this?

Timon is dead, who hath outstretched his span :
Some beast reared this; there does not live a man.
Dead, sure; and this his grave. —

2nd Sen. Our hope in him is dead: let us re- What's on this tomb I cannot read; the character turn,

And strain what other means is left unto us

In our dear peril.

1st Sen.

I'll take with wax:

Our captain hath in every figure skill;

An aged interpreter, though young in days:

It requires swift foot. [Exeunt. Before proud Athens he's set down by this,

2nd Sen. We stand much hazard, if they bring With all licentious measure, making your wills

not Timon.

Mess. I met a courier, one mine ancient friend; Whom, though in general part we were opposed, Yet our old love made a particular force,

The scope of justice; till now, myself and such.
As slept within the shadow of your power,
Have wandered with our traversed arms, and
breathed

And made us speak like friends: this man was Our sufferance vainly now the time is flush,

Noble and young,
When thy first griefs were but a mere conceit,
Ere thou hadst power, or we had cause of fear,