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Save these men's looks; who do, methinks, find out |
Something not worth in me such rich beholding |
As they have often given. Here is Ulysses. |
I'll interrupt his reading. |
How now, Ulysses! |
ULYSSES. Now, great Thetis' son! |
ACHILLES. What are you reading? |
ULYSSES. A strange fellow here |
Writes me that man-how dearly ever parted, |
How much in having, or without or in- |
Cannot make boast to have that which he hath, |
Nor feels not what he owes, but by reflection; |
As when his virtues shining upon others |
Heat them, and they retort that heat again |
To the first giver. |
ACHILLES. This is not strange, Ulysses. |
The beauty that is borne here in the face |
The bearer knows not, but commends itself |
To others' eyes; nor doth the eye itself- |
That most pure spirit of sense-behold itself, |
Not going from itself; but eye to eye opposed |
Salutes each other with each other's form; |
For speculation turns not to itself |
Till it hath travell'd, and is mirror'd there |
Where it may see itself. This is not strange at all. |
ULYSSES. I do not strain at the position- |
It is familiar-but at the author's drift; |
Who, in his circumstance, expressly proves |
That no man is the lord of anything, |
Though in and of him there be much consisting, |
Till he communicate his parts to others; |
Nor doth he of himself know them for aught |
Till he behold them formed in th' applause |
Where th' are extended; who, like an arch, reverb'rate |
The voice again; or, like a gate of steel |
Fronting the sun, receives and renders back |
His figure and his heat. I was much rapt in this; |
And apprehended here immediately |
Th' unknown Ajax. Heavens, what a man is there! |
A very horse that has he knows not what! |
Nature, what things there are |
Most abject in regard and dear in use! |
What things again most dear in the esteem |
And poor in worth! Now shall we see to-morrow- |
An act that very chance doth throw upon him- |
Ajax renown'd. O heavens, what some men do, |
While some men leave to do! |
How some men creep in skittish Fortune's-hall, |
Whiles others play the idiots in her eyes! |
How one man eats into another's pride, |
While pride is fasting in his wantonness! |
To see these Grecian lords!-why, even already |
They clap the lubber Ajax on the shoulder, |
As if his foot were on brave Hector's breast, |
And great Troy shrinking. |
ACHILLES. I do believe it; for they pass'd by me |
As misers do by beggars-neither gave to me |
Good word nor look. What, are my deeds forgot? |
ULYSSES. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back, |
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, |
A great-siz'd monster of ingratitudes. |
Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devour'd |
As fast as they are made, forgot as soon |
As done. Perseverance, dear my lord, |
Keeps honour bright. To have done is to hang |
Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail |
In monumental mock'ry. Take the instant way; |
For honour travels in a strait so narrow - |
Where one but goes abreast. Keep then the path, |
For emulation hath a thousand sons |
That one by one pursue; if you give way, |
Or hedge aside from the direct forthright, |
Like to an ent'red tide they all rush by |
And leave you hindmost; |
Or, like a gallant horse fall'n in first rank, |
Lie there for pavement to the abject rear, |
O'er-run and trampled on. Then what they do in present, |
Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours; |
For Time is like a fashionable host, |
That slightly shakes his parting guest by th' hand; |
And with his arms out-stretch'd, as he would fly, |
Grasps in the corner. The welcome ever smiles, |
And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek |
Remuneration for the thing it was; |
For beauty, wit, |
High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service, |
Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all |
To envious and calumniating Time. |
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin- |
That all with one consent praise new-born gawds, |
Though they are made and moulded of things past, |
And give to dust that is a little gilt |
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted. |
The present eye praises the present object. |
Then marvel not, thou great and complete man, |
That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax, |
Since things in motion sooner catch the eye |
Than what stirs not. The cry went once on thee, |
And still it might, and yet it may again, |
If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive |
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