Page 3196 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

Ere thou hadst power or we had cause of fear, [15]
We sent to thee, to give thy rages balm,
To wipe out our ingratitude, with loves
Above their quantity.

SECOND SENATOR
So did we woo

Transformed Timon to our city’s love
By humble message and by promis’d means. [20]
We were not all unkind, nor all deserve

The common stroke of war.

FIRST SENATOR

These walls of ours
Were not erected by their hands from whom
You have receiv’d your grief; nor are they such
That these great tow’rs, trophies, and schools should fall [25]

For private faults in them.

SECOND SENATOR
Nor are they living
Who were the motives that you first went out;
Shame, that they wanted cunning in excess,

Hath broke their hearts. March, noble lord,
Into our city with thy banners spread; [30]
By decimation and a tithed death,
If thy revenges hunger for that food
Which nature loathes, take thou the destin’d tenth,

And by the hazard of the spotted die
Let die the spotted.

FIRST SENATOR
All have not offended. [35]
For those that were, it is not square to take

On those that are, revenge: crimes, like lands,
Are not inherited. Then, dear countryman,
Bring in thy ranks, but leave without thy rage;
Spare thy Athenian cradle and those kin [40]