Of common ounces? will you with counters sum The past-proportion of his infinite?
And buckle-in a waist most fathomless, With spans and inches so diminutive
As fears and reasons? fye, for godly shame! Hel. No marvel, though you bite so sharp at
You are so empty of them. Should not our father Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons, Because your speech hath none, that tells him so? Tro. You are for dreams and slumbers, brother
You fur your gloves with reason.
You know, an enemy intends you harm; You know, a sword employ'd is perilous, And reason flies the object of all harm : Who marvels then, when Helenus beholds A Grecian and his sword, if he do set The very wings of reason to his heels; And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,
Or like a star dis-orb'd?- Nay, if we talk of reason, Let's shut our gates and sleep: Manhood and
Should have hare hearts, would they but fat their
With this cramm'd reason: reason and respect 3 Make livers pale, and lustihood deject.
Hect. Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost The holding.
What is aught, but as 'tis valued? Hect. But value dwells not in particular will;
It holds his estimate and dignity
As well wherein 'tis precious of itself
As in the prizer: 'tis mad idolatry,
To make the service greater than the god;
And the will dotes, that is attributive
To what infectiously itself affects,
Without some image of the affected merit. Tro. I take to-day a wife, and my election Is led on in the conduct of my will; My will enkindled by mine eyes and ears, Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores Of will and judgment: How may I avoid, Although my will distaste what it elected, The wife I chose? there can be no evasion To blench from this, and to stand firm by honour: We turn not back the silks upon the merchant, When we have soil'd them; nor the remainder viands
We do not throw in unrespective sieve,
Because we now are full. It was thought meet, Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks: Your breath with full consent bellied his sails; The seas and winds (old wranglers) took a truce, And did him service: he touch'd the ports desir'd; And, for an old aunt', whom the Greeks held captive,
He brought a Grecian queen, whose youth and freshness
Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes pale the morning. Why keep we her? the Grecians keep our aunt: Is she worth keeping? why, she is a pearl, Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships, And turn'd crown'd kings to merchants.
If you'll avouch, 'twas wisdom Paris went, (As you must needs, for you all cry'd-Go, go,) If you'll confess, he brought home noble prize, (As you must needs, for you all clapp'd your hands, And cry'd- Inestimable!) why do you now The issue of your proper wisdoms rate; And do a deed that fortune never did, Beggar the estimation which you priz'd Richer than sea and land? O theft most base;
5 Priam's sister, Hesione.
That we have stolen what we do fear to keep! But, thieves, unworthy of a thing so stolen, That in their country did them that disgrace, We fear to warrant in our native place!
Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans, cry!
What noise? what shriek is this?
Tro. 'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice. Cas. [Within.] Cry, Trojans !
Enter CASSANDRA, raving.
Cas. Cry, Trojans, cry! lend me ten thousand
And I will fill them with prophetick tears.
Hect. Peace, sister, peace.
Cas. Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled elders,
Soft infancy, that nothing canst but cry, Add to my clamours! let us pay betimes A moiety of that mass of moan to come. Cry, Trojans, cry! practise your eyes with tears ! Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand; Our fire-brand brother, Paris, burns us all. Cry, Trojans, cry! a Helen and a woe:
Cry, cry! Troy burns, or else let Helen go. [Exit. Hect. Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains
Of divination in our sister work
Some touches of remorse? or is
your blood So madly hot, that no discourse of reason, Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause, Can qualify the same?
Why, brother Hector,
Tro. We may not think the justness of each act Such and no other than event doth form it; Nor once deject the courage of our minds, Because Cassandra's mad; her brain-sick raptures
Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel, Which hath our several honours all engag'd To make it gracious. For my private part,
I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons: And Jove forbid, there should be done amongst us Such things as might offend the weakest spleen To fight for and maintain!
Par. Else might the world convince' of levity. As well my undertakings as your counsels; But I attest the gods, your full consent Grave wings to my propension, and cut off All fears attending or so dire a project. For what, alas, can these my single arms? What propugnation is in one man's valour, To stand the push and enmity of those This quarrel would excite? Yet, I protest, Were I alone to pass the difficulties, And had as ample power as I have will, Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done, Nor faint in the pursuit.
Pri. Paris, you speak Like one besotted on your sweet delights: You have the honey still, but these the gall; So to be valiant, is no praise at all.
Par. Sir, I propose not merely to myself The pleasures such a beauty brings with it; But I would have the soil of her fair rape Wip'd off, in honourable keeping her. What treason were it to the ransack'd queen, Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to me, Now to deliver her possession up,
On terms of base compulsion? Can it be, That so degenerate a strain as this,
Should once set footing in
There's not the meanest spirit on our party, Without a heart to dare, or sword to draw,
Corrupt, change to a worse state. 8 Defence.
When Helen is defended; nor none so noble, Whose life were ill bestow'd, or death unfam'd, Where Helen is the subject: then, I say, Well may we fight for her, whom, we know well, The world's large spaces cannot parallel.
Hect. Paris, and Troilus, you have both said well :. And on the cause and question now in hand Have gloz'd', but superficially; not much Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought Unfit to hear moral philosophy:
The reasons, you allege, do more conduce To the hot passion of distemper'd blood, Than to make up a free determination 'Twixt right and wrong; For pleasure, and revenge, Have ears more deaf than adders to the voice
Of any true decision. Nature craves, All dues be render'd to their owners; Now. What nearer debt in all humanity, Than wife is to the husband? if this law Of nature be corrupted through affection; And that great minds, of' partial indulgence- To their benumbed wills, resist the same; There is a law in each well-order'd nation, To curb those raging appetites that are Most disobedient and refractory.
If Helen then be wife to Sparta's king, As it is known she is, these moral laws
Of nature, and of nations, speak aloud To have her back return'd: Thus to persist In doing wrong, extenuates not wrong,
But makes it much more heavy. Hector's opinion Is this, in way of truth: yet, ne'ertheless, My spritely brethren, I propend2 to you
In resolution to keep Helen still;
For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependance Upon our joint and several dignities.
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