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The Works of Christopher Marlowe

Tamburlaine Part 2

Act: 5 Scene: 3<<-- -

[Enter] Theridamas, Techelles, Usumcasane.

Theridamas

Weepe heavens, and vanish into liquid teares,

Fal starres that governe his nativity,

And sommon al the shining lamps of heaven

To cast their bootlesse fires to the earth,

And shed their feble influence in the aire.

Muffle your beauties with eternall clowdes,

For hell and darknesse pitch their pitchy tentes,

And Death with armies of Cymerian spirits

Gives battile gainst the heart of Tamburlaine.

Now in defiance of that woonted love,

Your sacred vertues pour'd upon his throne,

And made his state an honor to the heavens,

These cowards invisiblie assaile his soule,

And threaten conquest on our Soveraigne:

But if he die, your glories are disgrac'd,

Earth droopes and saies, that hell in heaven is plac'd.

Techelles

O then ye Powers that sway eternal seates,

And guide this messy substance of the earthe,

If you retaine desert of holinesse,

As your supreame estates instruct our thoughtes,

Be not inconstant, carelesse of your fame,

Beare not the burthen of your enemies joyes,

Triumphing in his fall whom you advaunst,

But as his birth, life, health and majesty

Were strangely blest and governed by heaven,

So honour heaven til heaven dissolved be,

His byrth, his life, his health and majesty.

Usumcasane

Blush heaven to loose the honor of thy name,

To see thy foot-stoole set upon thy head,

And let no basenesse in thy haughty breast,

Sustaine a shame of such inexcellence:

To see the devils mount in Angels throanes,

And Angels dive into the pooles of hell.

And though they think their painfull date is out,

And that their power is puissant as Joves,

Which makes them manage armes against thy state,

Yet make them feele the strength of Tamburlain,

Thy instrument and note of Majesty,

Is greater far, than they can thus subdue.

For if he die, thy glorie is disgrac'd,

Earth droopes and saies that hel in heaven is plac'd.

[Enter Tamburlaine, drawn by the captive kings; Amyras, Celebinus, Physitians.]

Tamburlaine

What daring God torments my body thus,

And seeks to conquer mighty Tamburlaine,

Shall sicknesse proove me now to be a man,

That have bene tearm'd the terrour of the world?

Techelles and the rest, come take your swords,

And threaten him whose hand afflicts my soul,

Come let us march against the powers of heaven,

And set blacke streamers in the firmament,

To signifie the slaughter of the Gods.

Ah friends, what shal I doe, I cannot stand,

Come carie me to war against the Gods,

That thus invie the health of Tamburlaine.

Theridamas

Ah good my Lord, leave these impatient words,

Which ad much danger to your malladie.

Tamburlaine

Why, shal I sit and languish in this paine?

No, strike the drums, and in revenge of this,

Come let us chardge our speares and pierce his breast,

Whose shoulders beare the Axis of the world,

That if I perish, heaven and earth may fade.

Theridamas, haste to the court of Jove,

Will him to send Apollo hether straight,

To cure me, or Ile fetch him downe my selfe.

Techelles

Sit stil my gratious Lord, this griefe wil cease ,

And cannot last, it is so violent.

Tamburlaine

Not last Techelles, no, for I shall die.

See where my slave, the uglie monster death

Shaking and quivering, pale and wan for feare,

Stands aiming at me with his murthering dart,

Who flies away at every glance I give,

And when I look away, comes stealing on:

Villaine away, and hie thee to the field,

I and myne armie come to lode thy barke

With soules of thousand mangled carkasses.

Looke where he goes, but see, he comes againe

Because I stay: Techelles let us march,

And weary Death with bearing soules to hell.

Phisitian

Pleaseth your Majesty to drink this potion,

Which wil abate the furie of your fit,

And cause some milder spirits governe you.

Tamburlaine

Tel me, what think you of my sicknes now?

Phisitian

I view'd your urine, and the Hipostasis

Thick and obscure doth make your danger great,

Your vaines are full of accidentall heat,

Whereby the moisture of your blood is dried,

The Humidum and Calor, which some holde

Is not a parcell of the Elements,

But of a substance more divine and pure,

Is almost cleane extinguished and spent,

Which being the cause of life, imports your death.

Besides my Lord, this day is Criticall,

Dangerous to those, whose chrisis is as yours:

Your Artiers which alongst the vaines convey

The lively spirits which the heart ingenders

Are partcht and void of spirit, that the soule

Wanting those Organnons by which it mooves,

Can not indure by argument of art.

Yet if your majesty may escape this day,

No doubt, but you shal soone recover all.

Tamburlaine

Then will I comfort all my vital parts,

And live in spight of death above a day.

Alarme within.

[Enter a Messenger.]

Messenger

My Lord, yong Callapine that lately fled from your majesty, hath nowe gathered a fresh Armie, and hearing your absence in the field, offers to set upon us presently.

Tamburlaine

See my Phisitions now, how Jove hath sent

A present medicine to recure my paine:

My looks shall make them flie, and might I follow,

There should not one of all the villaines power

Live to give offer of another fight.

Usumcasane

I joy my Lord, your highnesse is so strong,

That can endure so well your royall presence,

Which onely will dismay the enemy.

Tamburlaine

I know it wil Casane: draw you slaves,

In spight of death I will goe show my face.

Alarme, Tamburlaine goes in, and comes out againe with al the rest.

Thus are the villaines, cowards fled for feare,

Like Summers vapours, vanisht by the Sun.

And could I but a while pursue the field,

That Callapine should be my slave againe.

But I perceive my martial strength is spent,

In vaine I strive and raile against those powers,

That meane t'invest me in a higher throane,

As much too high for this disdainfull earth.

Give me a Map, then let me see how much

Is left for me to conquer all the world,

That these my boies may finish all my wantes.

One brings a Map.

Here I began to martch towards Persea,

Along Armenia and the Caspian sea,

And thence unto Bythinia, where I tooke

The Turke and his great Empresse prisoners,

Then martcht I into Egypt and Aralia,

And here not far from Alexandria,

Whereas the Terren and the red sea meet,

Being distant lesse than ful a hundred leagues,

I meant to cut a channell to them both,

That men might quickly saile to India.

From thence to Nubia neere Borno Lake,

And so along the Ethiopian sea,

Cutting the Tropicke line of Capricorne,

I conquered all as far as Zansibar .

Then by the Northerne part of Affrica ,

I came at last to Graecia, and from thence

To Asia, where I stay against my will,

Which is from Scythia, where I first began,

Backeward and forwards nere five thousand leagues.

Looke here my boies, see what a world of ground,

Lies westward from the midst of Cancers line,

Unto the rising of this earthly globe,

Whereas the Sun declining from our sight,

Begins the day with our Antypodes:

And shall I die, and this unconquered?

Loe here my sonnes, are all the golden Mines,

Inestimable drugs and precious stones,

More worth than Asia, and the world beside,

And from th'Antartique Pole, Eastward behold

As much more land, which never was descried,

Wherein are rockes of Pearle, that shine as bright

As all the Lamps that beautifie the Sky,

And shal I die, and this unconquered?

Here lovely boies, what death forbids my life,

That let your lives commaund in spight of death.

Amyras

Alas my Lord, how should our bleeding harts

Wounded and broken with your Highnesse griefe,

Retaine a thought of joy, or sparke of life?

Your soul gives essence to our wretched subjects ,

Whose matter is incorporat in your flesh.

Celebinus

Your paines do pierce our soules, no hope survives,

For by your life we entertaine our lives.

Tamburlaine

But sons, this subject not of force enough,

To hold the fiery spirit it containes,

Must part, imparting his impressions,

By equall portions into both your breasts:

My flesh devided in your precious shapes,

Shal still retaine my spirit, though I die,

And live in all your seedes immortally:

Then now remoove me, that I may resigne

My place and proper tytle to my sonne:

First take my Scourge and my imperiall Crowne, [To Amyras.]

And mount my royall chariot of estate,

That I may see thee crown'd before I die.

Help me (my Lords) to make my last remoove.

Theridamas

A woful change my Lord, that daunts our thoughts,

More than the wine of our proper soules.

Tamburlaine

Sit up my sonne, let me see how well

Thou wilt become thy fathers majestie.

They crowne him.

Amyras

With what a flinty bosome should I joy,

The breath of life, and burthen of my soule,

If not resolv'd into resolved paines,

My bodies mortified lineaments

Should exercise the motions of my heart,

Pierc'd with the joy of any dignity?

O father, if the unrelenting eares

Of death and hell be shut against my praiers,

And that the spightfull influence of heaven,

Denie my soule fruition of her joy,

How should I step or stir my hatefull feete,

Against the inward powers of my heart,

Leading a life that onely strives to die,

And plead in vaine, unpleasing soverainty.

Tamburlaine

Let not thy love exceed thyne honor sonne,

Nor bar thy mind that magnanimitie,

That nobly must admit necessity:

Sit up my boy, and with those silken raines,

Bridle the steeled stomackes of those Jades.

Theridamas

My Lord, you must obey his majesty,

Since Fate commands, and proud necessity.

Amyras

Heavens witnes me, with what a broken hart

And damned spirit I ascend this seat,

And send my soule before my father die,

His anguish and his burning agony.

Tamburlaine

Now fetch the hearse of faire Zenocrate,

Let it be plac'd by this my fatall chaire,

And serve as parcell of my funerall.

Usumcasane

Then feeles your majesy no sovereraigne ease,

Nor may our hearts all drown'd in teares of blood,

Joy any hope of your recovery?

Tamburlaine

Casane no, the Monarke of the earth,

And eielesse Monster that torments my soule,

Cannot behold the teares ye shed for me,

And therefore stil augments his cruelty.

Techelles

Then let some God oppose his holy power,

Against the wrath and tyranny of death,

That his teare-thyrsty and unquenched hate,

May be upon himselfe reverberate.

They bring in the hearse.

Tamburlaine

Now eies, injoy your latest benefite,

And when my soule hath vertue of your sight,

Pierce through the coffin and the sheet of gold,

And glut your longings with a heaven of joy.

So, raigne my sonne, scourge and controlle those slaves,

Guiding thy chariot with thy Fathers hand.

As precious is the charge thou undertak'st

As that which Clymens brainsicke sonne did guide,

When wandring Phœbes Ivory cheeks were scortcht

And all the earth like Aetna breathing fire:

Be warn'd by him then, learne with awfull eie

To sway a throane as dangerous as his:

For if thy body thrive not full of thoughtes

As pure and fiery as Phyteus beames,

The nature of these proud rebelling Jades

Wil take occasion by the slenderest haire,

And draw thee peecemeale like Hyppolitus,

Through rocks more steepe and sharp than Caspian cliftes.

The nature of thy chariot wil not beare

A guide of baser temper than my selfe,

More then heavens coach, the pride of Phaeton.

Farewel my boies, my dearest friends, farewel,

My body feeles, my soule dooth weepe to see

Your sweet desires depriv'd my company,

For Tamburlaine, the Scourge of God must die.

[Dies.]

Amyras

Meet heaven and earth, and here let al things end,

For earth hath spent the pride of all her fruit,

And heaven consum'd his choicest living fire.

Let earth and heaven his timelesse death deplore,

For both their woorths wil equall him no more.

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