| Posthumus |
Yea, bloody cloth, I'll keep thee, for I wish'd |
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Thou shouldst be colour'd thus. You married ones, |
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If each of you should take this course, how many |
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Must murder wives much better than themselves |
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For wrying but a little! O Pisanio! |
5 |
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Every good servant does not all commands: |
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No bond but to do just ones. Gods! if you |
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Should have ta'en vengeance on my faults, I never |
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Had lived to put on this: so had you saved |
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The noble Imogen to repent, and struck |
10 |
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Me, wretch more worth your vengeance. But, alack, |
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You snatch some hence for little faults; that's love, |
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To have them fall no more: you some permit |
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To second ills with ills, each elder worse, |
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And make them dread it, to the doers' thrift. |
15 |
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But Imogen is your own: do your best wills, |
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And make me blest to obey! I am brought hither |
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Among the Italian gentry, and to fight |
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Against my lady's kingdom: 'tis enough |
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That, Britain, I have kill'd thy mistress; peace! |
20 |
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I'll give no wound to thee. Therefore, good heavens, |
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Hear patiently my purpose: I'll disrobe me |
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Of these Italian weeds and suit myself |
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As does a Briton peasant: so I'll fight |
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Against the part I come with; so I'll die |
25 |
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For thee, O Imogen, even for whom my life |
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Is every breath a death; and thus, unknown, |
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Pitied nor hated, to the face of peril |
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Myself I'll dedicate. Let me make men know |
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More valour in me than my habits show. |
30 |
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Gods, put the strength o' the Leonati in me! |
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To shame the guise o' the world, I will begin |
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The fashion, less without and more within. |
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