SCENE I. The woods. Before TIMON's cave

Enter POET and PAINTER

  PAINTER. As I took note of the place, it cannot be far where he
    abides.
  POET. to be thought of him? Does the rumour hold for true that he's
    so full of gold?
  PAINTER. Certain. Alcibiades reports it; Phrynia and Timandra had
    gold of him. He likewise enrich'd poor straggling soldiers with
    great quantity. 'Tis said he gave unto his steward a mighty sum.
  POET. Then this breaking of his has been but a try for his friends?
  PAINTER. Nothing else. You shall see him a palm in Athens again,
    and flourish with the highest. Therefore 'tis not amiss we tender
    our loves to him in this suppos'd distress of his; it will show
    honestly in us, and is very likely to load our purposes with what
    they travail for, if it be just and true report that goes of his
    having.
  POET. What have you now to present unto him?
  PAINTER. Nothing at this time but my visitation; only I will
    promise him an excellent piece.
  POET. I must serve him so too, tell him of an intent that's coming
    toward him.
  PAINTER. Good as the best. Promising is the very air o' th' time;
    it opens the eyes of expectation. Performance is ever the duller
    for his act, and but in the plainer and simpler kind of people
    the deed of saying is quite out of use. To promise is most
    courtly and fashionable; performance is a kind of will or
    testament which argues a great sickness in his judgment that
    makes it.

Enter TIMON from his cave

  TIMON. [Aside] Excellent workman! Thou canst not paint a man so bad
    as is thyself.
  POET. I am thinking what I shall say I have provided for him. It
    must be a personating of himself; a satire against the softness
    of prosperity, with a discovery of the infinite flatteries that
    follow youth and opulency.
  TIMON. [Aside] Must thou needs stand for a villain in thine own
    work? Wilt thou whip thine own faults in other men? Do so, I have
    gold for thee.
  POET. Nay, let's seek him;
    Then do we sin against our own estate
    When we may profit meet and come too late.
  PAINTER. True;
    When the day serves, before black-corner'd night,
    Find what thou want'st by free and offer'd light.
    Come.
  TIMON. [Aside] I'll meet you at the turn. What a god's gold,
    That he is worshipp'd in a baser temple
    Than where swine feed!
    'Tis thou that rig'st the bark and plough'st the foam,
    Settlest admired reverence in a slave.
    To thee be worship! and thy saints for aye
    Be crown'd with plagues, that thee alone obey!
    Fit I meet them. [Advancing from his cave]
  POET. Hail, worthy Timon!
  PAINTER. Our late noble master!
  TIMON. Have I once liv'd to see two honest men?
  POET. Sir,
    Having often of your open bounty tasted,
    Hearing you were retir'd, your friends fall'n off,
    Whose thankless natures- O abhorred spirits!-
    Not all the whips of heaven are large enough-
    What! to you,
    Whose star-like nobleness gave life and influence
    To their whole being! I am rapt, and cannot cover
    The monstrous bulk of this ingratitude
    With any size of words.
  TIMON. Let it go naked: men may see't the better.
    You that are honest, by being what you are,
    Make them best seen and known.
  PAINTER. He and myself
    Have travail'd in the great show'r of your gifts,
    And sweetly felt it.
  TIMON. Ay, you are honest men.
  PAINTER. We are hither come to offer you our service.
  TIMON. Most honest men! Why, how shall I requite you?
    Can you eat roots, and drink cold water- No?
  BOTH. What we can do, we'll do, to do you service.
  TIMON. Y'are honest men. Y'have heard that I have gold;
    I am sure you have. Speak truth; y'are honest men.
  PAINTER. So it is said, my noble lord; but therefore
    Came not my friend nor I.
  TIMON. Good honest men! Thou draw'st a counterfeit
    Best in all Athens. Th'art indeed the best;
    Thou counterfeit'st most lively.
  PAINTER. So, so, my lord.
  TIMON. E'en so, sir, as I say. [To To POET] And for thy fiction,
    Why, thy verse swells with stuff so fine and smooth
    That thou art even natural in thine art.
    But for all this, my honest-natur'd friends,
    I must needs say you have a little fault.
    Marry, 'tis not monstrous in you; neither wish I
    You take much pains to mend.
  BOTH. Beseech your honour
    To make it known to us.
  TIMON. You'll take it ill.
  BOTH. Most thankfully, my lord.
  TIMON. Will you indeed?
  BOTH. Doubt it not, worthy lord.
  TIMON. There's never a one of you but trusts a knave
    That mightily deceives you.
  BOTH. Do we, my lord?
  TIMON. Ay, and you hear him cog, see him dissemble,
    Know his gross patchery, love him, feed him,
    Keep in your bosom; yet remain assur'd
    That he's a made-up villain.
  PAINTER. I know not such, my lord.
  POET. Nor I.
  TIMON. Look you, I love you well; I'll give you gold,
    Rid me these villains from your companies.
    Hang them or stab them, drown them in a draught,
    Confound them by some course, and come to me,
    I'll give you gold enough.
  BOTH. Name them, my lord; let's know them.
  TIMON. You that way, and you this- but two in company;
    Each man apart, all single and alone,
    Yet an arch-villain keeps him company.
    [To the PAINTER] If, where thou art, two villians shall not be,
    Come not near him. [To the POET] If thou wouldst not reside
    But where one villain is, then him abandon.-
    Hence, pack! there's gold; you came for gold, ye slaves.
    [To the PAINTER] You have work for me; there's payment; hence!
    [To the POET] You are an alchemist; make gold of that.-
    Out, rascal dogs! [Beats and drives them out]

Enter FLAVIUS and two SENATORS

  FLAVIUS. It is vain that you would speak with Timon;
    For he is set so only to himself
    That nothing but himself which looks like man
    Is friendly with him.
  FIRST SENATOR. Bring us to his cave.
    It is our part and promise to th' Athenians
    To speak with Timon.
  SECOND SENATOR. At all times alike
    Men are not still the same; 'twas time and griefs
    That fram'd him thus. Time, with his fairer hand,
    Offering the fortunes of his former days,
    The former man may make him. Bring us to him,
    And chance it as it may.
  FLAVIUS. Here is his cave.
    Peace and content be here! Lord Timon! Timon!
    Look out, and speak to friends. Th' Athenians
    By two of their most reverend Senate greet thee.
    Speak to them, noble Timon.

Enter TIMON out of his cave

  TIMON. Thou sun that comforts, burn. Speak and be hang'd!
    For each true word a blister, and each false
    Be as a cauterizing to the root o' th' tongue,
    Consuming it with speaking!
  FIRST SENATOR. Worthy Timon-
  TIMON. Of none but such as you, and you of Timon.
  FIRST SENATOR. The senators of Athens greet thee, Timon.
  TIMON. I thank them; and would send them back the plague,
    Could I but catch it for them.
  FIRST SENATOR. O, forget
    What we are sorry for ourselves in thee.
    The senators with one consent of love
    Entreat thee back to Athens, who have thought
    On special dignities, which vacant lie
    For thy best use and wearing.
  SECOND SENATOR. They confess
    Toward thee forgetfulness too general, gross;
    Which now the public body, which doth seldom
    Play the recanter, feeling in itself
    A lack of Timon's aid, hath sense withal
    Of it own fail, restraining aid to Timon,
    And send forth us to make their sorrowed render,
    Together with a recompense more fruitful
    Than their offence can weigh down by the dram;
    Ay, even such heaps and sums of love and wealth
    As shall to thee blot out what wrongs were theirs
    And write in thee the figures of their love,
    Ever to read them thine.
  TIMON. You witch me in it;
    Surprise me to the very brink of tears.
    Lend me a fool's heart and a woman's eyes,
    And I'll beweep these comforts, worthy senators.
  FIRST SENATOR. Therefore so please thee to return with us,
    And of our Athens, thine and ours, to take
    The captainship, thou shalt be met with thanks,
    Allow'd with absolute power, and thy good name
    Live with authority. So soon we shall drive back
    Of Alcibiades th' approaches wild,
    Who, like a boar too savage, doth root up
    His country's peace.
  SECOND SENATOR. And shakes his threat'ning sword
    Against the walls of Athens.
  FIRST SENATOR. Therefore, Timon-
  TIMON. Well, sir, I will. Therefore I will, sir, thus:
    If Alcibiades kill my countrymen,
    Let Alcibiades know this of Timon,
    That Timon cares not. But if he sack fair Athens,
    And take our goodly aged men by th' beards,
    Giving our holy virgins to the stain
    Of contumelious, beastly, mad-brain'd war,
    Then let him know- and tell him Timon speaks it
    In pity of our aged and our youth-
    I cannot choose but tell him that I care not,
    And let him take't at worst; for their knives care not,
    While you have throats to answer. For myself,
    There's not a whittle in th' unruly camp
    But I do prize it at my love before
    The reverend'st throat in Athens. So I leave you
    To the protection of the prosperous gods,
    As thieves to keepers.
  FLAVIUS. Stay not, all's in vain.
  TIMON. Why, I was writing of my epitaph;
    It will be seen to-morrow. My long sickness
    Of health and living now begins to mend,
    And nothing brings me all things. Go, live still;
    Be Alcibiades your plague, you his,
    And last so long enough!
  FIRST SENATOR. We speak in vain.
  TIMON. But yet I love my country, and am not
    One that rejoices in the common wreck,
    As common bruit doth put it.
  FIRST SENATOR. That's well spoke.
  TIMON. Commend me to my loving countrymen-
  FIRST SENATOR. These words become your lips as they pass through
    them.
  SECOND SENATOR. And enter in our ears like great triumphers
    In their applauding gates.
  TIMON. Commend me to them,
    And tell them that, to ease them of their griefs,
    Their fears of hostile strokes, their aches, losses,
    Their pangs of love, with other incident throes
    That nature's fragile vessel doth sustain
    In life's uncertain voyage, I will some kindness do them-
    I'll teach them to prevent wild Alcibiades' wrath.
  FIRST SENATOR. I like this well; he will return again.
  TIMON. I have a tree, which grows here in my close,
    That mine own use invites me to cut down,
    And shortly must I fell it. Tell my friends,
    Tell Athens, in the sequence of degree
    From high to low throughout, that whoso please
    To stop affliction, let him take his haste,
    Come hither, ere my tree hath felt the axe,
    And hang himself. I pray you do my greeting.
  FLAVIUS. Trouble him no further; thus you still shall find him.
  TIMON. Come not to me again; but say to Athens
    Timon hath made his everlasting mansion
    Upon the beached verge of the salt flood,
    Who once a day with his embossed froth
    The turbulent surge shall cover. Thither come,
    And let my gravestone be your oracle.
    Lips, let sour words go by and language end:
    What is amiss, plague and infection mend!
    Graves only be men's works and death their gain!
    Sun, hide thy beams. Timon hath done his reign.
                                        Exit TIMON into his cave
  FIRST SENATOR. His discontents are unremovably
    Coupled to nature.
  SECOND SENATOR. Our hope in him is dead. Let us return
    And strain what other means is left unto us
    In our dear peril.
  FIRST SENATOR. It requires swift foot. Exeunt