Act I
Scene I
Alexandria. A room in Cleopatra’s palace.
Enter Demetrius and Philo. | |
Philo |
Nay, but this dotage of our general’s
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Flourish. Enter Antony, Cleopatra, her Ladies, the Train, with Eunuchs fanning her. | |
Look, where they come:
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Cleopatra | If it be love indeed, tell me how much. |
Antony | There’s beggary in the love that can be reckon’d. |
Cleopatra | I’ll set a bourn how far to be beloved. |
Antony | Then must thou needs find out new heaven, new earth. |
Enter an Attendant. | |
Attendant | News, my good lord, from Rome. |
Antony | Grates me: the sum. |
Cleopatra |
Nay, hear them, Antony:
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Antony | How, my love! |
Cleopatra |
Perchance! nay, and most like:
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Antony |
Let Rome in Tiber melt, and the wide arch
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Cleopatra |
Excellent falsehood!
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Antony |
But stirr’d by Cleopatra.
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Cleopatra | Hear the ambassadors. |
Antony |
Fie, wrangling queen!
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Demetrius | Is Caesar with Antonius prized so slight? |
Philo |
Sir, sometimes, when he is not Antony,
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Demetrius |
I am full sorry
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Scene II
The same. Another room.
Enter Charmian, Iras, Alexas, and a Soothsayer. | |
Charmian | Lord Alexas, sweet Alexas, most any thing Alexas, almost most absolute Alexas, where’s the soothsayer that you praised so to the queen? O, that I knew this husband, which, you say, must charge his horns with garlands! |
Alexas | Soothsayer! |
Soothsayer | Your will? |
Charmian | Is this the man? Is’t you, sir, that know things? |
Soothsayer |
In nature’s infinite book of secrecy
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Alexas | Show him your hand. |
Enter Enobarbas. | |
Enobarbas |
Bring in the banquet quickly; wine enough
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Charmian | Good sir, give me good fortune. |
Soothsayer | I make not, but foresee. |
Charmian | Pray, then, foresee me one. |
Soothsayer | You shall be yet far fairer than you are. |
Charmian | He means in flesh. |
Iras | No, you shall paint when you are old. |
Charmian | Wrinkles forbid! |
Alexas | Vex not his prescience; be attentive. |
Charmian | Hush! |
Soothsayer | You shall be more beloving than beloved. |
Charmian | I had rather heat my liver with drinking. |
Alexas | Nay, hear him. |
Charmian | Good now, some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon, and widow them all: let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage: find me to marry me with Octavius Caesar, and companion me with my mistress. |
Soothsayer | You shall outlive the lady whom you serve. |
Charmian | O excellent! I love long life better than figs. |
Soothsayer |
You have seen and proved a fairer former fortune
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Charmian | Then belike my children shall have no names: prithee, how many boys and wenches must I have? |
Soothsayer |
If every of your wishes had a womb,
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Charmian | Out, fool! I forgive thee for a witch. |
Alexas | You think none but your sheets are privy to your wishes. |
Charmian | Nay, come, tell Iras hers. |
Alexas | We’ll know all our fortunes. |
Enobarbas | Mine, and most of our fortunes, to-night, shall be—drunk to bed. |
Iras | There’s a palm presages chastity, if nothing else. |
Charmian | E’en as the o’erflowing Nilus presageth famine. |
Iras | Go, you wild bedfellow, you cannot soothsay. |
Charmian | Nay, if an oily palm be not a fruitful prognostication, I cannot scratch mine ear. Prithee, tell her but a worky-day fortune. |
Soothsayer | Your fortunes are alike. |
Iras | But how, but how? give me particulars. |
Soothsayer | I have said. |
Iras | Am I not an inch of fortune better than she? |
Charmian | Well, if you were but an inch of fortune better than I, where would you choose it? |
Iras | Not in my husband’s nose. |
Charmian | Our worser thoughts heavens mend! Alexas—come, his fortune, his fortune! O, let him marry a woman that cannot go, sweet Isis, I beseech thee! and let her die too, and give him a worse! and let worst follow worse, till the worst of all follow him laughing to his grave, fifty-fold a cuckold! Good Isis, hear me this prayer, though thou deny me a matter of more weight; good Isis, I beseech thee! |
Iras | Amen. Dear goddess, hear that prayer of the people! for, as it is a heartbreaking to see a handsome man loose-wived, so it is a deadly sorrow to behold a foul knave uncuckolded: therefore, dear Isis, keep decorum, and fortune him accordingly! |
Charmian | Amen. |
Alexas | Lo, now, if it lay in their hands to make me a cuckold, they would make themselves whores, but they’ld do’t! |
Enobarbas | Hush! here comes Antony. |
Charmian | Not he; the queen. |
Enter Cleopatra. | |
Cleopatra | Saw you my lord? |
Enobarbas | No, lady. |
Cleopatra | Was he not here? |
Charmian | No, madam. |
Cleopatra |
He was disposed to mirth; but on the sudden
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Enobarbas | Madam? |
Cleopatra | Seek him, and bring him hither. Where’s Alexas? |
Alexas | Here, at your service. My lord approaches. |
Cleopatra | We will not look upon him: go with us. Exeunt. |
Enter Antony with a Messenger and Attendants. | |
Messenger | Fulvia thy wife first came into the field. |
Antony | Against my brother Lucius? |
Messenger |
Ay:
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Antony | Well, what worst? |
Messenger | The nature of bad news infects the teller. |
Antony |
When it concerns the fool or coward. On:
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Messenger |
Labienus—
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Antony | Antony, thou wouldst say— |
Messenger | O, my lord! |
Antony |
Speak to me home, mince not the general tongue:
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Messenger | At your noble pleasure. Exit. |
Antony | From Sicyon, ho, the news! Speak there! |
First Attendant | The man from Sicyon—is there such an one? |
Second Attendant | He stays upon your will. |
Antony |
Let him appear.
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Enter another Messenger. | |
What are you? | |
Second Messenger | Fulvia thy wife is dead. |
Antony | Where died she? |
Second Messenger |
In Sicyon:
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Antony |
Forbear me. Exit Second Messenger.
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Re-enter Enobarbas. | |
Enobarbas | What’s your pleasure, sir? |
Antony | I must with haste from hence. |
Enobarbas | Why, then, we kill all our women: we see how mortal an unkindness is to them; if they suffer our departure, death’s the word. |
Antony | I must be gone. |
Enobarbas | Under a compelling occasion, let women die: it were pity to cast them away for nothing; though, between them and a great cause, they should be esteemed nothing. Cleopatra, catching but the least noise of this, dies instantly; I have seen her die twenty times upon far poorer moment: I do think there is mettle in death, which commits some loving act upon her, she hath such a celerity in dying. |
Antony | She is cunning past man’s thought. |
Enobarbas | Alack, sir, no; her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love: we cannot call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report: this cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove. |
Antony | Would I had never seen her! |
Enobarbas | O, sir, you had then left unseen a wonderful piece of work; which not to have been blest withal would have discredited your travel. |
Antony | Fulvia is dead. |
Enobarbas | Sir? |
Antony | Fulvia is dead. |
Enobarbas | Fulvia! |
Antony | Dead. |
Enobarbas | Why, sir, give the gods a thankful sacrifice. When it pleaseth their deities to take the wife of a man from him, it shows to man the tailors of the earth; comforting therein, that when old robes are worn out, there are members to make new. If there were no more women but Fulvia, then had you indeed a cut, and the case to be lamented: this grief is crowned with consolation; your old smock brings forth a new petticoat: and indeed the tears live in an onion that should water this sorrow. |
Antony |
The business she hath broached in the state
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Enobarbas | And the business you have broached here cannot be without you; especially that of Cleopatra’s, which wholly depends on your abode. |
Antony |
No more light answers. Let our officers
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Enobarbas | I shall do’t. Exeunt. |
Scene III
The same. Another room.
Enter Cleopatra, Charmian, Iras, and Alexas. | |
Cleopatra | Where is he? |
Charmian | I did not see him since. |
Cleopatra |
See where he is, who’s with him, what he does:
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Charmian |
Madam, methinks, if you did love him dearly,
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Cleopatra | What should I do, I do not? |
Charmian | In each thing give him way, cross him nothing. |
Cleopatra | Thou teachest like a fool; the way to lose him. |
Charmian |
Tempt him not so too far; I wish, forbear:
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Enter Antony. | |
Cleopatra | I am sick and sullen. |
Antony | I am sorry to give breathing to my purpose— |
Cleopatra |
Help me away, dear Charmian; I shall fall:
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Antony | Now, my dearest queen— |
Cleopatra | Pray you, stand farther from me. |
Antony | What’s the matter? |
Cleopatra |
I know, by that same eye, there’s some good news.
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Antony | The gods best know— |
Cleopatra |
O, never was there queen
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Antony | Cleopatra— |
Cleopatra |
Why should I think you can be mine and true,
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Antony | Most sweet queen— |
Cleopatra |
Nay, pray you, seek no colour for your going,
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Antony | How now, lady! |
Cleopatra |
I would I had thy inches; thou shouldst know
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Antony |
Hear me, queen:
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Cleopatra |
Though age from folly could not give me freedom,
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Antony |
She’s dead, my queen:
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Cleopatra |
O most false love!
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Antony |
Quarrel no more, but be prepared to know
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Cleopatra |
Cut my lace, Charmian, come;
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Antony |
My precious queen, forbear;
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Cleopatra |
So Fulvia told me.
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Antony | You’ll heat my blood: no more. |
Cleopatra | You can do better yet; but this is meetly. |
Antony | Now, by my sword— |
Cleopatra |
And target. Still he mends;
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Antony | I’ll leave you, lady. |
Cleopatra |
Courteous lord, one word.
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Antony |
But that your royalty
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Cleopatra |
’Tis sweating labour
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Antony |
Let us go. Come;
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Scene IV
Rome. Caesar’s house.
Enter Octavius Caesar, reading a letter, Lepidus, and their Train. | |
Caesar |
You may see, Lepidus, and henceforth know,
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Lepidus |
I must not think there are
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Caesar |
You are too indulgent. Let us grant, it is not
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Enter a Messenger. | |
Lepidus | Here’s more news. |
Messenger |
Thy biddings have been done; and every hour,
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Caesar |
I should have known no less.
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Messenger |
Caesar, I bring thee word,
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Caesar |
Antony,
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Lepidus | ’Tis pity of him. |
Caesar |
Let his shames quickly
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Lepidus |
To-morrow, Caesar,
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Caesar |
Till which encounter,
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Lepidus |
Farewell, my lord: what you shall know meantime
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Caesar |
Doubt not, sir;
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Scene V
Alexandria. Cleopatra’s palace.
Enter Cleopatra, Charmian, Iras, and Mardian. | |
Cleopatra | Charmian! |
Charmian | Madam? |
Cleopatra |
Ha, ha!
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Charmian | Why, madam? |
Cleopatra |
That I might sleep out this great gap of time
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Charmian | You think of him too much. |
Cleopatra | O, ’tis treason! |
Charmian | Madam, I trust, not so. |
Cleopatra | Thou, eunuch Mardian! |
Mardian | What’s your highness’ pleasure? |
Cleopatra |
Not now to hear thee sing; I take no pleasure
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Mardian | Yes, gracious madam. |
Cleopatra | Indeed! |
Mardian |
Not in deed, madam; for I can do nothing
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Cleopatra |
O Charmian,
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Enter Alexas. | |
Alexas | Sovereign of Egypt, hail! |
Cleopatra |
How much unlike art thou Mark Antony!
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Alexas |
Last thing he did, dear queen,
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Cleopatra | Mine ear must pluck it thence. |
Alexas |
“Good friend,” quoth he,
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Cleopatra | What, was he sad or merry? |
Alexas |
Like to the time o’ the year between the extremes
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Cleopatra |
O well-divided disposition! Note him,
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Alexas |
Ay, madam, twenty several messengers:
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Cleopatra |
Who’s born that day
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Charmian | O that brave Caesar! |
Cleopatra |
Be choked with such another emphasis!
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Charmian | The valiant Caesar! |
Cleopatra |
By Isis, I will give thee bloody teeth,
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Charmian |
By your most gracious pardon,
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Cleopatra |
My salad days,
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