Our court shall be a little Academe,

Still and contemplative in living art.

You three, Biron, Dumain, and Longaville,

Have sworn for three years' term to live with me,
My fellow-scholars, and to keep those statutes
That are recorded in this schedule here:

Your oaths are pass'd, and now subscribe your names;
That his own hand may strike his honour down,
That violates the smallest branch herein:

If you are arm'd to do, as sworn to do,

Subscribe to your deep oath a, and keep it too.
LONG. I am resolved: 't is but a three years' fast;
The mind shall banquet, though the body pine:
Fat paunches have lean pates; and dainty bits
Make rich the ribs, but bankerout the wits.
DUM. My loving lord, Dumain is mortified.

The grosser manner of these world's delights
He throws upon the gross world's baser slaves:
To love, to wealth, to pomp, I pine and die;
With all these living in philosophy ©.
BIRON. I can but say their protestation over,

So much, dear liege, I have already sworn,
That is, to live and study here three years.
But there are other strict observances:
As, not to see a woman in that term;
Which, I hope well, is not enrolled there :
And, one day in a week to touch no food,
And but one meal on every day beside;
The which, I hope, is not enrolled there :
And then to sleep but three hours in the night,
And not be seen to wink of all the day;
(When I was wont to think no harm all night,
And make a dark night too of half the day;)
Which, I hope well, is not enrolled there:

O, these are barren tasks, too hard to keep;
Not to see ladies,-study,-fast, not sleep.
KING. Your oath is pass'd to pass away from these.
BIRON. Let me say no, my liege, an if you please;

I only swore, to study with your grace,

And stay here in your court for three years' space. LONG. You swore to that, Biron, and to the rest.

a Oath. The original copies have oaths.

So the folio. The quarto of 1598 reads "bank'rout quite."

• With all these. To love, to wealth, to pomp, Dumain is dead; but philosophy, in which he lives, includes them all.

BIRON. By yea and nay, sir, then I swore in jest.

What is the end of study? let me know.

KING. Why, that to know, which else we should not know.

BIRON. Things hid and barr'd, you mean, from common sense?
KING. Ay, that is study's godlike recompense.

BIRON. Come on then, I will swear to study so,

To know the thing I am forbid to know:
As thus, To study where I well may dine,
When I to fast expressly am forbid a ;
Or, study where to meet some mistress fine,
When mistresses from common sense are hid:
Or, having sworn too hard-a-keeping oath,
Study to break it, and not break my troth.
If study's gain be thus, and this be so,
Study knows that, which yet it doth not know:
Swear me to this, and I will ne'er say, no.
KING. These be the stops that hinder study quite,
And train our intellects to vain delight.

BIRON. Why, all delights are vain; and that most vain,
Which, with pain purchas'd, doth inherit pain:
As, painfully to pore upon a book,

To seek the light of truth; while truth the while
Doth falsely blind the eyesight of his look:

Light, seeking light, doth light of light beguile :
So, ere you find where light in darkness lies,
Your light grows dark by losing of your eyes.
Study me how to please the eye indeed,

By fixing it upon a fairer eye;

Who dazzling so, that eye shall be his heed,
And give him light that it was blinded by.
Study is like the heaven's glorious sun,

That will not be deep-search'd with saucy looks;
Small have continual plodders ever won,
Save base authority from others' books.
These earthly godfathers of heaven's lights,
That give a name to every fixed star,

Have no more profit of their shining nights,

Than those that walk, and wot not what they are.

Too much to know is, to know nought but fame;

And every godfather can give a name.

Forbid. The old copies read "to fast expressly am forbid." This appears, at first, to be the converse of the oath. But for-bid was a very ancient mode of making bid more emphatical. Biron will study to know what he is forbid to know;-he uses here forbid in its common acceptation. But he is expressly for-bid to fast-expressly bid to fast; and he will receive the word as if he were forbidden-bid from fasting. With this view of Biron's casuistry we restore the old word fast.

KING. How well he 's read, to reason against reading!
DUM. Proceeded well, to stop all good proceeding!
LONG. He weeds the corn, and still lets grow the weeding.
BIRON. The spring is near, when green geese are a-breeding.
DUM. How follows that?

KING. Biron is like an envious sneaping frost,

That bites the first-born infants of the spring.

BIRON. Well, say I am; why should proud summer boast,
Before the birds have any cause to sing?

Why should I joy in any a abortive birth?

At Christmas I no more desire a rose,

Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled shows;
But like of each thing that in season grows.

So you, to study now it is too late,

Climb o'er the house to unlock the little gate.
KING. Well, sit you out"; go home, Biron; adieu!

BIRON. No, my good lord; I have sworn to stay with you:
And, though I have for barbarism spoke more,
Than for that angel knowledge you can say;

Yet, confident I'll keep what I have swore,

And bide the penance of each three years' day, Give me the paper,-let me read the same;

And to the strictest decrees I'll write my named. KING. How well this yielding rescues thee from shame! BIRON. [Reads.]

Item, That no woman shall come within a mile of my court

Hath this been proclaim'd?

LONG. Four days ago.

BIRON. Let's see the penalty. [Reads.]

-On pain of losing her tongue.—

Who devis'd this penalty?

LONG. Marry, that did I.

BIRON. Sweet lord, and why?

LONG. To fright them hence with that dread penalty.

a For any Pope gave us an. Why? The freedom of dramatic rhythm was no part of his system of versification.

So the quarto of 1598. The folio has

"That were to climb o'er the house t' unlock the gate."

Sit you out. The folio has "fit you out."

It is usual to close the sentence at "three years' day;" but the construction requires the rejection of such a pause.

BIRON. A dangerous law against gentility".

[Reads.]

Item, If any man be seen to talk with a woman within the term of three years, he shall endure such public shame as the rest of the court shall possibly devise.—

This article, my liege, yourself must break;

For, well you know, here comes in embassy

The French king's daughter, with yourself to speak,-
A maid of grace, and complete majesty,-

About surrender-up of Aquitain

To her decrepit, sick, and bed-rid father: Therefore this article is made in vain,

Or vainly comes th' admired princess hither.
KING. What say you, lords? why, this was quite forgot.
BIRON. So study evermore is over-shot;

While it doth study to have what it would,
It doth forget to do the thing it should:
And when it hath the thing it hunteth most,
"T is won, as towns with fire; so won, so lost.
KING. We must, of force, dispense with this decree;
She must lieb here on mere necessity.
BIRON. Necessity will make us all forsworn

Three thousand times within this three years' space:
For every man with his affects is born;

c

Not by might master'd, but by special grace. If I break faith, this word shall speak for me, I am forsworn on mere necessity.—

So to the laws at large I write my name:

And he that breaks them in the least degree
Stands in attainder of eternal shame:

Suggestions are to others, as to me;
But, I believe, although I seem so loth,
I am the last that will last keep his oath.
But is there no quick recreation granted?

KING. Ay, that there is: our court, you know, is haunted
With a refined traveller of Spain;

A man in all the world's new fashion planted,

That hath a mint of phrases in his brain:

[Subscribes.

a In the early editions this line is given to Longaville. It seems more properly to belong to Biron, and we therefore receive Theobald's correction, especially as Biron is reading the paper, and the early copies do not mark this when they give the line of comment upon the previous item to Longaville.

To lie to reside. We have the sense in Wotton's punning definition of an ambassador-" an honest man sent to lie abroad for the good of his country."

The folio reads break.

d Suggestions-temptations.

One whoa the music of his own vain tongue

Doth ravish, like enchanting harmony;

A man of complements", whom right and wrong
Have chose as umpire of their mutiny:
This child of fancy, that Armado hight,

For interim to our studies, shall relate,
In high-born words, the worth of many a knight
From tawny Spain, lost in the world's debate'.
How you delight, my lords, I know not, I;
But, I protest, I love to hear him lie,

And I will use him for my minstrelsy.
BIRON. Armado is a most illustrious wight,

A man of fire-new words, fashion's own knight. LONG. Costard the swain, and he, shall be our sport; And, so to study, three years is but short.

Enter DULL, with a letter, and COSTARD.

DULL. Which is the duke's own person?

BIRON. This, fellow. What wouldst?

DULL. I myself reprehend his own person, for I am his grace's tharborough: but I would see his own person in flesh and blood.

BIRON. This is he.

DULL. Signior Arme-Arme-commends you. There's villainy abroad; this letter will tell you more.

COST. Sir, the contempts thereof are as touching me.

KING. A letter from the magnificent Armado.

BIRON. How low soever the matter, I hope in God for high words.

LONG. A high hope for a low heaven: God grant us patience!

BIRON. To hear? or forbear hearing?

LONG. To hear meekly, sir, and to laugh moderately; or to forbear both. BIRON. Well, sir, be it as the style shall give us cause to climb in the merriness f.

a Who. So the old copies. The more correct whom of the modern editions is a deviation from the idiom of Shakspere's time.

b Complements-a man versed in ceremonial distinctions-in punctilios-a man who brings forms to decide the mutiny between right and wrong. Compliment and complement were originally written without distinction; and though the first may be taken to mean ceremonies, and the second accomplishments, both the one and the other have the same origin-they each make that perfect which was wanting. In this passage we have the meaning of ceremonies; but in Act III., where Moth says, "these are complements," we have the meaning of accomplishments.

• Fire-new and bran-new,—that is, brand new,-new off the irons,-have each the same origin. 4 Tharborough-thirdborough-a peace-officer.

• Heaven. This is the reading of the early copies; but it was changed by Theobald to having. Biron has somewhat profanely said, "I hope in God for high words;" and Longaville reproves him by saying, your hope is expressed in strong terms for a very paltry gratification—" A high hope for a low heaven."

Climb in the merriness. It has been proposed to read chime. The meaning is surely clear