Cymbeline

1 Enter Posthumus alone, with a bloody handkerchief.
2 POSTHUMUS.
3 Yea, bloody cloth, I’ll keep thee; for I wish’d
4 Thou shouldst be colour’d thus. You married ones,
5 If each of you should take this course, how many
6 Must murder wives much better than themselves
7 For wrying but a little! O Pisanio!
8 Every good servant does not all commands;
9 No bond but to do just ones. Gods! if you
10 Should have ta’en vengeance on my faults, I never
11 Had liv’d to put on this; so had you saved
12 The noble Imogen to repent, and struck
13 Me, wretch more worth your vengeance. But alack,
14 You snatch some hence for little faults; that’s love,
15 To have them fall no more. You some permit
16 To second ills with ills, each elder worse,
17 And make them dread it, to the doers’ thrift.
18 But Imogen is your own. Do your best wills,
19 And make me blest to obey. I am brought hither
20 Among th’ Italian gentry, and to fight
21 Against my lady’s kingdom. ’Tis enough
22 That, Britain, I have kill’d thy mistress; peace!
23 I’ll give no wound to thee. Therefore, good heavens,
24 Hear patiently my purpose. I’ll disrobe me
25 Of these Italian weeds, and suit myself
26 As does a Britain peasant. So I’ll fight
27 Against the part I come with; so I’ll die
28 For thee, O Imogen, even for whom my life
29 Is every breath a death. And thus unknown,
30 Pitied nor hated, to the face of peril
31 Myself I’ll dedicate. Let me make men know
32 More valour in me than my habits show.
33 Gods, put the strength o’ th’ Leonati in me!
34 To shame the guise o’ th’ world, I will begin
35 The fashion less without and more within.
36 [_Exit._]