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Timon of Athens: Act 2 Scene 2

Scene II The same. A hall in Timon's house.

[Enter FLAVIUS, with many bills in his hand]

FLAVIUS

No care, no stop! so senseless of expense,

That he will neither know how to maintain it,

Nor cease his flow of riot: takes no account

How things go from him, nor resumes no care

Of what is to continue: never mind

Was to be so unwise, to be so kind.

What shall be done? he will not hear, till feel:

I must be round with him, now he comes from hunting.

Fie, fie, fie, fie!

[Enter CAPHIS, and the Servants of Isidore and Varro]

CAPHIS

Good even, Varro: what,

You come for money?

VARRO'S SERVANT

Is't not your business too?

CAPHIS

It is: and yours too, Isidore?

ISIDORE'S SERVANT

It is so.

CAPHIS

Would we were all discharged!

VARRO'S SERVANT

I fear it.

CAPHIS

Here comes the lord.

[Enter TIMON, ALCIBIADES, and Lords, &c]

TIMON

So soon as dinner's done, we'll forth again,

My Alcibiades. With me? what is your will?

CAPHIS

My lord, here is a note of certain dues.

TIMON

Dues! Whence are you?

CAPHIS

Of Athens here, my lord.

TIMON

Go to my steward.

CAPHIS

Please it your lordship, he hath put me off

To the succession of new days this month:

My master is awaked by great occasion

To call upon his own, and humbly prays you

That with your other noble parts you'll suit

In giving him his right.

TIMON

Mine honest friend,

I prithee, but repair to me next morning.

CAPHIS

Nay, good my lord,--

TIMON

Contain thyself, good friend.

VARRO'S SERVANT

One Varro's servant, my good lord,--

ISIDORE'S SERVANT

From Isidore;

He humbly prays your speedy payment.

CAPHIS

If you did know, my lord, my master's wants--

VARRO'S SERVANT

'Twas due on forfeiture, my lord, six weeks And past.

ISIDORE'S SERVANT

Your steward puts me off, my lord;

And I am sent expressly to your lordship.

TIMON

Give me breath.

I do beseech you, good my lords, keep on;

I'll wait upon you instantly.

[Exeunt ALCIBIADES and Lords]

[To FLAVIUS]

Come hither: pray you,

How goes the world, that I am thus encounter'd

With clamourous demands of date-broke bonds,

And the detention of long-since-due debts,

Against my honour?

FLAVIUS

Please you, gentlemen,

The time is unagreeable to this business:

Your importunacy cease till after dinner,

That I may make his lordship understand

Wherefore you are not paid.

TIMON

Do so, my friends. See them well entertain'd.

[Exit]

FLAVIUS

Pray, draw near.

[Exit]

[Enter APEMANTUS and Fool]

CAPHIS

Stay, stay, here comes the fool with Apemantus:

let's ha' some sport with 'em.

VARRO'S SERVANT

Hang him, he'll abuse us.

ISIDORE'S SERVANT

A plague upon him, dog!

VARRO'S SERVANT

How dost, fool?

APEMANTUS

Dost dialogue with thy shadow?

VARRO'S SERVANT

I speak not to thee.

APEMANTUS

No,'tis to thyself.

[To the Fool]

Come away.

ISIDORE'S SERVANT

There's the fool hangs on your back already.

APEMANTUS

No, thou stand'st single, thou'rt not on him yet.

CAPHIS

Where's the fool now?

APEMANTUS

He last asked the question. Poor rogues, and

usurers' men! bawds between gold and want!

ALL SERVANTS

What are we, Apemantus?

APEMANTUS

Asses.

ALL SERVANTS

Why?

APEMANTUS

That you ask me what you are, and do not know

yourselves. Speak to 'em, fool.

FOOL

How do you, gentlemen?

ALL SERVANTS

Gramercies, good fool: how does your mistress?

FOOL

She's e'en setting on water to scald such chickens

as you are. Would we could see you at Corinth!

APEMANTUS

Good! gramercy.

[Enter Page]

FOOL

Look you, here comes my mistress' page.

PAGE

[To the Fool] Why, how now, captain! what do you

in this wise company? How dost thou, Apemantus?

APEMANTUS

Would I had a rod in my mouth, that I might answer

thee profitably.

PAGE

Prithee, Apemantus, read me the superscription of

these letters: I know not which is which.

APEMANTUS

Canst not read?

PAGE

No.

APEMANTUS

There will little learning die then, that day thou

art hanged. This is to Lord Timon; this to

Alcibiades. Go; thou wast born a bastard, and thou't

die a bawd.

PAGE

Thou wast whelped a dog, and thou shalt famish a

dog's death. Answer not; I am gone.

[Exit]

APEMANTUS

E'en so thou outrunnest grace. Fool, I will go with

you to Lord Timon's.

FOOL

Will you leave me there?

APEMANTUS

If Timon stay at home. You three serve three usurers?

ALL SERVANTS

Ay; would they served us!

APEMANTUS

So would I,--as good a trick as ever hangman served thief.

FOOL

Are you three usurers' men?

ALL SERVANTS

Ay, fool.

FOOL

I think no usurer but has a fool to his servant: my

mistress is one, and I am her fool. When men come

to borrow of your masters, they approach sadly, and

go away merry; but they enter my mistress' house

merrily, and go away sadly: the reason of this?

VARRO'S SERVANT

I could render one.

APEMANTUS

Do it then, that we may account thee a whoremaster

and a knave; which not-withstanding, thou shalt be

no less esteemed.

VARRO'S SERVANT

What is a whoremaster, fool?

FOOL

A fool in good clothes, and something like thee.

'Tis a spirit: sometime't appears like a lord;

sometime like a lawyer; sometime like a philosopher,

with two stones moe than's artificial one: he is

very often like a knight; and, generally, in all

shapes that man goes up and down in from fourscore

to thirteen, this spirit walks in.

VARRO'S SERVANT

Thou art not altogether a fool.

FOOL

Nor thou altogether a wise man: as much foolery as

I have, so much wit thou lackest.

APEMANTUS

That answer might have become Apemantus.

ALL SERVANTS

Aside, aside; here comes Lord Timon.

[Re-enter TIMON and FLAVIUS]

APEMANTUS

Come with me, fool, come.

FOOL

I do not always follow lover, elder brother and

woman; sometime the philosopher.

[Exeunt APEMANTUS and Fool]

FLAVIUS

Pray you, walk near: I'll speak with you anon.

[Exeunt Servants]

TIMON

You make me marvel: wherefore ere this time

Had you not fully laid my state before me,

That I might so have rated my expense,

As I had leave of means?

FLAVIUS

You would not hear me,

At many leisures I proposed.

TIMON

Go to:

Perchance some single vantages you took.

When my indisposition put you back:

And that unaptness made your minister,

Thus to excuse yourself.

FLAVIUS

O my good lord,

At many times I brought in my accounts,

Laid them before you; you would throw them off,

And say, you found them in mine honesty.

When, for some trifling present, you have bid me

Return so much, I have shook my head and wept;

Yea, 'gainst the authority of manners, pray'd you

To hold your hand more close: I did endure

Not seldom, nor no slight cheques, when I have

Prompted you in the ebb of your estate

And your great flow of debts. My loved lord,

Though you hear now, too late--yet now's a time--

The greatest of your having lacks a half

To pay your present debts.

TIMON

Let all my land be sold.

FLAVIUS

'Tis all engaged, some forfeited and gone;

And what remains will hardly stop the mouth

Of present dues: the future comes apace:

What shall defend the interim? and at length

How goes our reckoning?

TIMON

To Lacedaemon did my land extend.

FLAVIUS

O my good lord, the world is but a word:

Were it all yours to give it in a breath,

How quickly were it gone!

TIMON

You tell me true.

FLAVIUS

If you suspect my husbandry or falsehood,

Call me before the exactest auditors

And set me on the proof. So the gods bless me,

When all our offices have been oppress'd

With riotous feeders, when our vaults have wept

With drunken spilth of wine, when every room

Hath blazed with lights and bray'd with minstrelsy,

I have retired me to a wasteful cock,

And set mine eyes at flow.

TIMON

Prithee, no more.

FLAVIUS

Heavens, have I said, the bounty of this lord!

How many prodigal bits have slaves and peasants

This night englutted! Who is not Timon's?

What heart, head, sword, force, means, but is

Lord Timon's?

Great Timon, noble, worthy, royal Timon!

Ah, when the means are gone that buy this praise,

The breath is gone whereof this praise is made:

Feast-won, fast-lost; one cloud of winter showers,

These flies are couch'd.

TIMON

Come, sermon me no further:

No villanous bounty yet hath pass'd my heart;

Unwisely, not ignobly, have I given.

Why dost thou weep? Canst thou the conscience lack,

To think I shall lack friends? Secure thy heart;

If I would broach the vessels of my love,

And try the argument of hearts by borrowing,

Men and men's fortunes could I frankly use

As I can bid thee speak.

FLAVIUS

Assurance bless your thoughts!

TIMON

And, in some sort, these wants of mine are crown'd,

That I account them blessings; for by these

Shall I try friends: you shall perceive how you

Mistake my fortunes; I am wealthy in my friends.

Within there! Flaminius! Servilius!

[Enter FLAMINIUS, SERVILIUS, and other Servants]

SERVANTS

My lord? my lord?

TIMON

I will dispatch you severally; you to Lord Lucius;

to Lord Lucullus you: I hunted with his honour

to-day: you, to Sempronius: commend me to their

loves, and, I am proud, say, that my occasions have

found time to use 'em toward a supply of money: let

the request be fifty talents.

FLAMINIUS

As you have said, my lord.

FLAVIUS

[Aside] Lord Lucius and Lucullus? hum!

TIMON

Go you, sir, to the senators--

Of whom, even to the state's best health, I have

Deserved this hearing--bid 'em send o' the instant

A thousand talents to me.

FLAVIUS

I have been bold--

For that I knew it the most general way--

To them to use your signet and your name;

But they do shake their heads, and I am here

No richer in return.

TIMON

Is't true? can't be?

FLAVIUS

They answer, in a joint and corporate voice,

That now they are at fall, want treasure, cannot

Do what they would; are sorry--you are honourable,--

But yet they could have wish'd--they know not--

Something hath been amiss--a noble nature

May catch a wrench--would all were well--'tis pity;--

And so, intending other serious matters,

After distasteful looks and these hard fractions,

With certain half-caps and cold-moving nods

They froze me into silence.

TIMON

You gods, reward them!

Prithee, man, look cheerly. These old fellows

Have their ingratitude in them hereditary:

Their blood is caked, 'tis cold, it seldom flows;

'Tis lack of kindly warmth they are not kind;

And nature, as it grows again toward earth,

Is fashion'd for the journey, dull and heavy.

[To a Servant]

Go to Ventidius.

[To FLAVIUS]

Prithee, be not sad,

Thou art true and honest; ingeniously I speak.

No blame belongs to thee.

[To Servant]

Ventidius lately

Buried his father; by whose death he's stepp'd

Into a great estate: when he was poor,

Imprison'd and in scarcity of friends,

I clear'd him with five talents: greet him from me;

Bid him suppose some good necessity

Touches his friend, which craves to be remember'd

With those five talents.

[Exit Servant]

[To FLAVIUS]

That had, give't these fellows

To whom 'tis instant due. Ne'er speak, or think,

That Timon's fortunes 'mong his friends can sink.

FLAVIUS

I would I could not think it: that thought is

bounty's foe;

Being free itself, it thinks all others so.

[Exeunt]