| ACT III SCENE II | Another part of the heath. Storm still. | |
| | Enter KING LEAR and Fool | |
| KING LEAR | Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! | |
| | You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout | |
| | Till you have drench'd our steeples, drown'd the cocks! | |
| | You sulphurous and thought-executing fires, | 5 |
| | Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts, | |
| | Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder, | |
| | Smite flat the thick rotundity o' the world! | |
| | Crack nature's moulds, an germens spill at once, | |
| | That make ingrateful man! | 10 |
| Fool | O nuncle, court holy-water in a dry | |
| | house is better than this rain-water out o' door. | |
| | Good nuncle, in, and ask thy daughters' blessing: | |
| | here's a night pities neither wise man nor fool. | |
| KING LEAR | Rumble thy bellyful! Spit, fire! spout, rain! | 15 |
| | Nor rain, wind, thunder, fire, are my daughters: | |
| | I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness; | |
| | I never gave you kingdom, call'd you children, | |
| | You owe me no subscription: then let fall | |
| | Your horrible pleasure: here I stand, your slave, | 20 |
| | A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man: | |
| | But yet I call you servile ministers, | |
| | That have with two pernicious daughters join'd | |
| | Your high engender'd battles 'gainst a head | |
| | So old and white as this. O! O! 'tis foul! | 25 |
| Fool | He that has a house to put's head in has a good | |
| | head-piece. | |
| | The cod-piece that will house | |
| | Before the head has any, | |
| | The head and he shall louse; | 30 |
| | So beggars marry many. | |
| | The man that makes his toe | |
| | What he his heart should make | |
| | Shall of a corn cry woe, | |
| | And turn his sleep to wake. | 35 |
| | For there was never yet fair woman but she made | |
| | mouths in a glass. | |
| KING LEAR | No, I will be the pattern of all patience; | |
| | I will say nothing. | |
| | Enter KENT | |
| KENT | Who's there? | 40 |
| Fool | Marry, here's grace and a cod-piece; that's a wise | |
| | man and a fool. | |
| KENT | Alas, sir, are you here? things that love night | |
| | Love not such nights as these; the wrathful skies | |
| | Gallow the very wanderers of the dark, | 45 |
| | And make them keep their caves: since I was man, | |
| | Such sheets of fire, such bursts of horrid thunder, | |
| | Such groans of roaring wind and rain, I never | |
| | Remember to have heard: man's nature cannot carry | |
| | The affliction nor the fear. | 50 |
| KING LEAR | Let the great gods, | |
| | That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads, | |
| | Find out their enemies now. Tremble, thou wretch, | |
| | That hast within thee undivulged crimes, | |
| | Unwhipp'd of justice: hide thee, thou bloody hand; | 55 |
| | Thou perjured, and thou simular man of virtue | |
| | That art incestuous: caitiff, to pieces shake, | |
| | That under covert and convenient seeming | |
| | Hast practised on man's life: close pent-up guilts, | |
| | Rive your concealing continents, and cry | 60 |
| | These dreadful summoners grace. I am a man | |
| | More sinn'd against than sinning. | |
| KENT | Alack, bare-headed! | |
| | Gracious my lord, hard by here is a hovel; | |
| | Some friendship will it lend you 'gainst the tempest: | 65 |
| | Repose you there; while I to this hard house-- | |
| | More harder than the stones whereof 'tis raised; | |
| | Which even but now, demanding after you, | |
| | Denied me to come in--return, and force | |
| | Their scanted courtesy. | 70 |
| KING LEAR | My wits begin to turn. | |
| | Come on, my boy: how dost, my boy? art cold? | |
| | I am cold myself. Where is this straw, my fellow? | |
| | The art of our necessities is strange, | |
| | That can make vile things precious. Come, | 75 |
| | your hovel. | |
| | Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart | |
| | That's sorry yet for thee. | |
| Fool | Singing | |
| | He that has and a little tiny wit-- | |
| | With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,-- | 80 |
| | Must make content with his fortunes fit, | |
| | For the rain it raineth every day. | |
| KING LEAR | True, my good boy. Come, bring us to this hovel. | |
| | Exeunt KING LEAR and KENT | |
| Fool | This is a brave night to cool a courtezan. | |
| | I'll speak a prophecy ere I go: | 85 |
| | When priests are more in word than matter; | |
| | When brewers mar their malt with water; | |
| | When nobles are their tailors' tutors; | |
| | No heretics burn'd, but wenches' suitors; | |
| | When every case in law is right; | 90 |
| | No squire in debt, nor no poor knight; | |
| | When slanders do not live in tongues; | |
| | Nor cutpurses come not to throngs; | |
| | When usurers tell their gold i' the field; | |
| | And bawds and whores do churches build; | 95 |
| | Then shall the realm of Albion | |
| | Come to great confusion: | |
| | Then comes the time, who lives to see't, | |
| | That going shall be used with feet. | |
| | This prophecy Merlin shall make; for I live before his time. | 100 |
| | Exit | |
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