Henry V.

Chorus
O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend​
The brightest heaven of invention,​
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act​
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!​
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,​
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,​
Leash’d in like hounds, should famine, sword and fire
Crouch for employment. But pardon, and gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that have dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth​
So great an object: can this cockpit hold​
The vasty fields of France? or may we cram​
Within this wooden O the very casques​
That did affright the air at Agincourt?​
O, pardon! since a crooked figure may​
Attest in little place a million;​
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,​
On your imaginary forces work.​
Suppose within the girdle of these walls​
Are now confined two mighty monarchies,​
Whose high upreared and abutting fronts​
The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder:​
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts;​
Into a thousand parts divide on man,​
And make imaginary puissance;​
Think when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i’ the receiving earth;​
For ’tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,
Carry them here and there; jumping o’er times,
Turning the accomplishment of many years​
Into an hour-glass: for the which supply,​
Admit me Chorus to this history;​
Who prologue-like your humble patience pray,
Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.
Romeo and Juliet, Wm. Shakespeare

PROLOGUE​

Two households, both alike in dignity,

In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,

From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,

Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.

From forth the fatal loins of these two foes​

A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life;

Whose misadventur’d piteous overthrows

Do with their death bury their parents' strife.​

The fearful passage of their death-mark'd love,​

And the continuance of their parents' rage,​

Which, but their children's end, nought could remove,

Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;​

The which if you with patient ears attend,​

What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

Act 1, Act 1 Prologue

Prologue
I come no more to make you laugh; things now
That bear a weighty and a serious brow,​
Sad, high, and working, full of state and woe:
Such noble scenes as draw the eye to flow,
We now present. Those that can pity, here​
May (if they think it well) let fall a tear;​
The subject will deserve it. Such as give​
Their money out of hope they may believe,
May here find truth too. Those that come to see
Only a show or two, and so agree
The play may pass, if they be still and willing,
I’ll undertake may see away their shilling
Richly in two short hours. Only they​
That come to hear a merry, bawdy play,
A noise of targets, or to see a fellow​
In a long motley coat guarded with yellow,​
Will be deceiv’d. For, gentle hearers, know,​
To rank our chosen truth with such a show​
As fool and fight is, beside forfeiting​
Our own brains and the opinion that we bring​
To make that only true we now intend,​
Will leave us never an understanding friend.
Therefore, for goodness sake, and as you are known
The first and happiest hearers of the town,​
Be sad, as we would make ye. Think ye see​
The very persons of our noble story​
As they were living. Think you see them great,​
And follow’d with the general throng and sweat​
Of thousand friends; then, in a moment, see​
How soon this mightiness meets misery;​
And if you can be merry then, I’ll say​
A man may weep upon his wedding-day.
Troilus and Cressida, Act 1, Prologue

PROLOGUE​
In Troy, there lies the scene. From isles of Greece
The princes orgulous, their high blood chaf’d,
Have to the port of Athens sent their ships
Fraught with the ministers and instruments​
Of cruel war. Sixty and nine, that wore​
Their crownets regal, from th’ Athenian bay​
Put forth toward Phrygia, and their vow is made
To ransack Troy, within whose strong immures
The ravish’d Helen, Menelaus’ queen,​
With wanton Paris sleeps—and that’s the quarrel.
To Tenedos they come,​
And the deep-drawing barks do there disgorge
Their warlike fraughtage. Now on Dardan plains
The fresh and yet unbruised Greeks do pitch
Their brave pavilions. Priam’s six-gated city,
Dardan and Timbria, Helias, Chetas, Troien,​
And Antenorides, with massy staples​
And corresponsive and fulfilling bolts​
Sperr up the sons of Troy.​
Now expectation, tickling skittish spirits,​
On one and other side, Troyan and Greek,​
Sets all on hazard—and hither am I come,​
A prologue arm’d, but not in confidence​
Of author’s pen or actor’s voice, but suited​
In like conditions as our argument,​
To tell you, fair beholders, that our play​
Leaps o’er the vaunt and firstlings of those broils,
Beginning in the middle; starting thence away​
To what may be digested in a play.​
Like or find fault, do as your pleasures are,​
Now good or bad, ’tis but the chance of war.
PERICLES, Act 1, Prologue, Enter Gower.
GOWER
To sing a song that old was sung,​
From ashes ancient Gower is come,
Assuming man’s infirmities,
To glad your ear and please your eyes.
It hath been sung at festivals,​
On ember-eves and holy-ales;​
And lords and ladies in their lives
Have read it for restoratives.
The purchase is to make men glorious,​
Et bonum quo antiquius, eo melius.​
If you, born in those latter times,​
When wit’s more ripe, accept my rhymes,
And that to hear an old man sing
May to your wishes pleasure bring,​
I life would wish, and that I might
Waste it for you like taper-light.​
This’ Antioch, then; Antiochus the Great
Built up this city for his chiefest seat,
The fairest in all Syria—
I tell you what mine authors say.​
This king unto him took a peer,​
Who died and left a female heir,​
So buxom, blithe, and full of face​
As heaven had lent her all his grace;
With whom the father liking took,​
And her to incest did provoke—​
Bad child, worse father, to entice his own
To evil should be done by none.
But custom what they did begin
Was with long use account’d no sin.
The beauty of this sinful dame
Made many princes thither frame
To seek her as a bedfellow,​
In marriage pleasures playfellow;
Which to prevent he made a law,
o keep her still and men in awe,
That whoso ask’d her for his wife,
His riddle told not, lost his life.​
So for her many a wight did die,​
As yon grim looks do testify.
Points to the heads of the unsuccessful suitors, displayed above.
What now ensues, to the judgment of your eye
I give my cause, who best can justify. Exit.
RICHARD III, Act 1, Scene 1, Enter Richard Duke of Gloucester solus.
RICHARD, DUKE OF GLOUCESTER​
Now is the winter of our discontent​
Made glorious summer by this son of York;
And all the clouds that low’r’d upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths,
Our bruised arms hung up for monuments,​
Our stern alarums chang’d to merry meetings,​
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visag’d War hath smooth’d his wrinkled front;
And now, in stead of mounting barbed steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries,​
He capers nimbly in a lady’s chamber​
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.​
But I, that am not shap’d for sportive tricks,​
Nor made to court an amorous looking-glass;​
I, that am rudely stamp’d, and want love’s majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtail’d of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deform’d, unfinish’d, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them—
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to see my shadow in the sun
And descant on mine own deformity.​
And therefore, since I cannot prove a lover​
To entertain these fair well-spoken days,​
I am determined to prove a villain​
And hate the idle pleasures of these days.​
Plots have I laid, inductions dangerous,​
By drunken prophecies, libels, and dreams,​
To set my brother Clarence and the King​
In deadly hate the one against the other;​
And if King Edward be as true and just​
As I am subtle, false, and treacherous,​
This day should Clarence closely be mew’d up​
About a prophecy, which says that G​
Of Edward’s heirs the murderer shall be.​
Dive, thoughts, down to my soul, here Clarence comes!
MACBETH, Act 1, Scene 1, Thunder and lightning. Enter three Witches.

FIRST WITCH​

When shall we three meet again?​

In thunder, lightning, or in rain?

SECOND WITCH​

When the hurly-burly’s done,​

When the battle’s lost and won.

THIRD WITCH​

That will be ere the set of sun.

FIRST WITCH​

Where the place?​

SECOND WITCH​

Upon the heath.​

THIRD WITCH

There to meet with Macbeth.​

FIRST WITCH​

I come, Graymalkin.​

SECOND WITCH​

Paddock calls.​

THIRD WITCH​

Anon.​

THREE WITCHES​

Fair is foul, and foul is fair,​

Hover through the fog and filthy air.

Exeunt.