Today’s Totally Random
Lines
But now return,
And with their faint reply, this answer join:
Who bates mine honour shall not know my
coin.
Sempronius
Timon of Athens Act III, Scene iii, Line 26
This is the
part in the play where Timon realizes that he’s running out of money and starts
asking his friends for financial help. Sempronius is one of those friends, and
he’s talking to Timon’s servant who’s been sent with the request for funds. As
you can see, the answer is no. He’s using the excuse that Timon asked his other
friends first, and they all said no. Sempronius is saying that he feels
slighted that Timon didn’t ask him first, and therefore he is answering no,
just like all the rest. It’s nonsense.
Timon’s servant ends this short scene, alone, with a soliloquy about the nature of man that is reflected in this situation. I’m tempted to put it here, but it’s sixteen lines long, and you probably wouldn’t read it. Oh, what the heck.
Excellent! Your lordship’s a goodly villain. The devil knew not what he did when he made man politic (crafty and self-serving),- he crost himself by’t: and I cannot think but, in the end, the villainies of man will set him clear. How fairly this lord strives to appear foul! Takes virtuous copies to be wicked; like those that, under hot ardent zeal, would set whole realms on fire:
Of such
nature is his politic love.
This was
my lord’s last hope; now all are fled,
Save the
gods only: now his friends are dead,
Doors,
that were ne’er acquainted with their wards
Many a
bounteous year, must be emploly’d
Now to guard
sure their master,
And this
is all a liberal course allows;
Who
cannot keep his wealth must keep his house.
[Exit]
And that’s the end of the scene. Kind of interesting that this little speech begins in prose and ends in verse. What do you think of that?
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