ARIEL             (Sings and helps to attire him.) Where the bee sucks, there suck I, In a cowslip’s bell I lie; There I couch when owls do cry. On the bat’s back I do fly After summer merrily. Merrily, merrily, shall I live now, Under the blossom that hangs on the bough. PROSPERO     Why, that’s my […]

PROSPERO                 [aside] Their understanding Begins to swell, and the approaching tide Will shortly fill the reasonable shore That now lies foul and muddy. Not one of them That yet looks on me or would know me.—Ariel, Fetch me the hat and rapier in my cell. [Exit Ariel and returns immediately.] I will discase me and […]

PROSPERO                 [aside] The charm dissolves apace, And as the morning steals upon the night, Melting the darkness, so their rising senses Begin to chase the ignorant fumes that mantle Their clearer reason.—O good Gonzalo, My true preserver and a loyal sir To him thou follow’st, I will pay thy graces Home, both in word and […]

Here enters ARIEL before; then ALONSO with a frantic gesture, attended by GONZALO; SEBASTIAN and ANTONIO in like manner, attended by ADRIAN and FRANCISCO. They all enter the circle which Prospero had made and there stand charmed, which Prospero observing, speaks: PROSPERO     A solemn air and the best comforter To an unsettled fancy, cure thy brains (Now useless) boiled within thy skull. […]

PROSPERO                             But this rough magic I here abjure; and when I have required Some heavenly music (which even now I do) To work mine end upon their senses that This airy charm is for, I’ll break my staff, Bury it certain fathoms in the earth, And deeper than did ever plummet sound I’ll drown my […]

PROSPERO                             … by whose aid— Weak masters though ye be—I have bedimmed The noontide sun, called forth the mutinous winds, And ’twixt the green sea and the azured vault Set roaring war; to the dread-rattling thunder Have I given fire and rifted Jove’s stout oak With his own bolt: the strong based promontory Have I […]

PROSPERO     [Traces a circle.] Ye elves of hills, brooks, standing lakes and groves, And ye that on the sands with printless foot Do chase the ebbing Neptune, and do fly him When he comes back; you demi-puppets that By moonshine do the green sour ringlets make, Whereof the ewe not bites; and you whose pastime […]

PROSPERO     Hast thou, which art but air, a touch, a feeling Of their afflictions, and shall not myself (One of their kind, that relish all as sharply, Passion as they) be kindlier moved than thou art? Though with their high wrongs I am struck to th’quick, Yet with my nobler reason ’gainst my fury Do […]

ARIEL                                                             The King, His brother and yours abide all three distracted, And the remainder mourning over them, Brimful of sorrow and dismay, but chiefly Him that you termed, sir, the good old Lord Gonzalo. His tears run down his beard like winter’s drops From eaves of reeds. Your charm so strongly works ’em That […]

Enter PROSPERO, in his magic robes, and ARIEL. PROSPERO     Now does my project gather to a head. My charms crack not; my spirits obey; and time Goes upright with his carriage. How’s the day? ARIEL             On the sixth hour, at which time, my lord, You said our work should cease. PROSPERO                                                     I did say so, When first […]