Page 151 - Shakespeare - Vol. 4

As friends to Antioch, we may feast in Tyre.
Exeunt.

Scene IV IT

Enter Cleon, the Governor of Tarsus, with Dionyza, his wife, and others.

CLEON

My Dionyza, shall we rest us bere
And, by relating tales of others’ griefs,
See if ’twill teach us to forget our own?

DIONYZA
That were to blow at fire in hope to quench it,
For who digs hills because they do aspire [5]

Throws down one mountain to cast up a higher.
O my distressed lord, even such our griefs are:
Here they are but felt, and seen with mischief’s eyes,

But like to groves, being topped, they higher rise.

CLEON

O Dionyza, [10]
Who wanteth food and will not say he wants it,
Or can conceal his hunger till he famish?
Our tongues and sorrows to sound deep

Our woes into the air, our eyes to weep,
Till tongues fetch breath that may proclaim them louder, [15]
That, if heaven slumber while their creatures want,
They may awake their helps to comfort them?

I’ll then discourse our woes, felt several years,
And, wanting breath to speak, help me with tears.

DIONYZA
I’ll do my best, sir. [20]

CLEON
This Tarsus, o’er which I have the government,