Page:Richard III (1927) Yale.djvu/146

132

K. Rich. Give me another horse! bind up my wounds!

Have mercy, Jesu! Soft! I did but dream.

O coward conscience, how dost thou afflict me!

The lights burn blue. It is now dead midnight.

Cold fearful drops stand on my trembling flesh.

What? do I fear myself? there's none else by:

Richard loves Richard; that is, I am I.

Is there a murtherer here? No. Yes, I am:

Then fly: what! from myself? Great reason: why?

Lest I revenge. What? myself upon myself?

Alack! I love myself. Wherefore? for any good

That I myself have done unto myself?

O no: alas! I rather hate myself

For hateful deeds committed by myself.

I am a villain. Yet I lie; I am not.

Fool, of thyself speak well: fool, do not flatter.

My conscience hath a thousand several tongues,

And every tongue brings in a several tale,

And every tale condemns me for a villain.

Perjury, [perjury,] in the high'st degree:

Murther, stern murther, in the dir'st degree;

All several sins, all us'd in each degree,

Throng all to the bar, crying all, 'Guilty! guilty!'

I shall despair. There is no creature loves me;

And if I die, no soul shall pity me:

Nay, wherefore should they, since that I myself

Find in myself no pity to myself?

Methought the souls of all that I had murther'd

Came to my tent; and every one did threat

To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Richard.

 180 coward conscience; cf. n.

181 lights blue; cf. n.

now; cf. n.

183 Cf. n.

200 bar: i.e. of justice

202 shall; cf. n.

