A Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 1

Most of the Plays in the present Collection have not been reprinted, and some have not been printed at all. In the second volume there will be published for the first time a fin...

_Anto_. Great are thy fortunes _Nero_, great thy power, Thy Empyre lymited with natures bounds; Upon thy ground the Sunne doth set and ryse; The day and night are thine, Nor can...

_Nero_. I know I did; or[18] bruised in my fall? Hurt! I protest I felt no griefe in it. Goe, _Tigellinus_, fetch the villaines head. This makes me see his heart in other things...

_Nero_. What may I easily doe? Kill thee or him: How may I rid you all? Where is the Man That will all others end and last himselfe? O that I had thy Thunder in my hand, Thou id...

_Piso_. Part of us are already tak'n; the rest Amaz'd and seeking holes. Our hidden ends You see laid open; Court and Citie arm'd And for feare ioyning to the part they feare. W...

_Neoph_. I wonder what makes him so confident In this revolt now growne unto a warre, And ensignes in the field; when in the other, Being but a plot of a conspiracie, He shew'd...

_Phy_. A lawfull oath in an vnlawfull cause Is first dispenc't withall by reasons lawes; Then, next, respect must to the end be had, Because th'intent doth make it good or bad....

By the moone we sport and play, With the night begins our day; As we daunce, the deaw doth fall; Trip it little vrchins all, Lightly as the little Bee, Two by two and three by t...

_Asca_. A smal offence comparde with my disease; No doubt ingratitude in time may cease And be forgot: my grief out lives all howres, Raining on my head continual, haplesse show...

_Eu_. As in another world of greater blis My daunted spirits doo stand amazde at this. So great a tyde of comfort overflowes As what to say my faltering tongue scarse knowes, Bu...

_Belliz_. No, _Victoria_; Those were Rewards that we bestow'd on others; We gave, but tooke none backe. Had we not you At home to heare our noble Victories Our Fame should want...

_Clown_. And when he whets his Tuskes you would sweare there were a sea in's belly, and that his chops were the shore to which the Foame was beaten: if his Foame were frothy Yes...

_Anton_. You, noble Hubert, are the man[164] chosen out From all our _Vandal_ Leaders to be chiefe O'er a new army, which the King will raise To roote out from our land these Ch...

_Vict_. What's the Kings will? I am here. Are your tormentors ready to give battaile? I am ready for them, and though I lose My life hope to winne the day.

_King_. Oh, I know I wrastle with a Lyonesse: to imprison her And force her too't I dare not. Death! what King Did ever say I dare not? I must have it. A Bastard have I by her;...

_Med_. No more, trust not the ayre With our projections, let us all revenge Wrongs done to our most noble kinswoman: Action is honours language, swords are tongues, Which both s...

_Bal_. A great mans vices, that can raise all hell. What woo'd you call that man, who under-saile In a most goodly ship wherein he ventures His life, fortunes and honours, yet i...

_Bal_. If men should pull the Sun out of heaven every time 'tis ecclips'd, not all the Wax nor Tallow in Spaine woo'd serve to make us Candles for one yeare.

[111] These four lines are from the old ballad of _Fortune my foe_, which will be found printed entire in the _Bagford Ballads_ (Ed. J.W. Ebsworth, part iv. pp. 962-3); the musi...