Act 1, Scene 5

Britain. A room in Cymbeline's palace.

[Enter QUEEN, Ladies, and CORNELIUS]
Queen
465 Whiles yet the dew's on ground, gather those flowers;
466 Make haste: who has the note of them?
Lady
467 I, madam.
Queen
468 Dispatch.
[Exeunt Ladies]
Queen
469 Now, master doctor, have you brought those drugs?
Cornelius
470 Pleaseth your highness, ay: here they are, madam:
[Presenting a small box]
Cornelius
471 But I beseech your grace, without offence,—
472 My conscience bids me ask—wherefore you have
473 Commanded of me those most poisonous compounds,
474 Which are the movers of a languishing death;
475 But though slow, deadly?
Queen
476 I wonder, doctor,
477 Thou ask'st me such a question. Have I not been
478 Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learn'd me how
479 To make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so
480 That our great king himself doth woo me oft
481 For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,—
482 Unless thou think'st me devilish—is't not meet
483 That I did amplify my judgment in
484 Other conclusions? I will try the forces
485 Of these thy compounds on such creatures as
486 We count not worth the hanging, but none human,
487 To try the vigour of them and apply
488 Allayments to their act, and by them gather
489 Their several virtues and effects.
Cornelius
490 Your highness
491 Shall from this practise but make hard your heart:
492 Besides, the seeing these effects will be
493 Both noisome and infectious.
Queen
494 O, content thee.
[Enter PISANIO]
[Aside]
Queen
495 Here comes a flattering rascal; upon him
496 Will I first work: he's for his master,
497 An enemy to my son. How now, Pisanio!
498 Doctor, your service for this time is ended;
499 Take your own way.
[Aside]
Cornelius
500 I do suspect you, madam;
501 But you shall do no harm.
[To PISANIO]
Queen
502 Hark thee, a word.
[Aside]
Cornelius
503 I do not like her. She doth think she has
504 Strange lingering poisons: I do know her spirit,
505 And will not trust one of her malice with
506 A drug of such damn'd nature. Those she has
507 Will stupefy and dull the sense awhile;
508 Which first, perchance, she'll prove on
509 cats and dogs,
510 Then afterward up higher: but there is
511 No danger in what show of death it makes,
512 More than the locking-up the spirits a time,
513 To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd
514 With a most false effect; and I the truer,
515 So to be false with her.
Queen
516 No further service, doctor,
517 Until I send for thee.
Cornelius
518 I humbly take my leave.
[Exit]
Queen
519 Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think in time
520 She will not quench and let instructions enter
521 Where folly now possesses? Do thou work:
522 When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son,
523 I'll tell thee on the instant thou art then
524 As great as is thy master, greater, for
525 His fortunes all lie speechless and his name
526 Is at last gasp: return he cannot, nor
527 Continue where he is: to shift his being
528 Is to exchange one misery with another,
529 And every day that comes comes to decay
530 A day's work in him. What shalt thou expect,
531 To be depender on a thing that leans,
532 Who cannot be new built, nor has no friends,
533 So much as but to prop him?
[The QUEEN drops the box: PISANIO takes it up]
Queen
534 Thou takest up
535 Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour:
536 It is a thing I made, which hath the king
537 Five times redeem'd from death: I do not know
538 What is more cordial. Nay, I prethee, take it;
539 It is an earnest of a further good
540 That I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how
541 The case stands with her; do't as from thyself.
542 Think what a chance thou changest on, but think
543 Thou hast thy mistress still, to boot, my son,
544 Who shall take notice of thee: I'll move the king
545 To any shape of thy preferment such
546 As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly,
547 That set thee on to this desert, am bound
548 To load thy merit richly. Call my women:
549 Think on my words.
[Exit PISANIO]
Queen
550 A sly and constant knave,
551 Not to be shaked; the agent for his master
552 And the remembrancer of her to hold
553 The hand-fast to her lord. I have given him that
554 Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her
555 Of liegers for her sweet, and which she after,
556 Except she bend her humour, shall be assured
557 To taste of too.
[Re-enter PISANIO and Ladies]
Queen
558 So, so: well done, well done:
559 The violets, cowslips, and the primroses,
560 Bear to my closet. Fare thee well, Pisanio;
561 Think on my words.
[Exeunt QUEEN and Ladies]
Pisanio
562 And shall do:
563 But when to my good lord I prove untrue,
564 I'll choke myself: there's all I'll do for you.
[Exit]

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Word definitions on hover

Notes

TLN 473archaic vocab
“most poisonous compounds, Which are the movers of a languishing death”
'Compounds' are pharmaceutical mixtures of several ingredients. 'Movers of a languishing death' means agents that produce a slow, wasting death rather than a sudden one — Cornelius is pressing the Queen to explain why she wants preparations capable of killing gradually.
TLN 479archaic vocab
“make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so That our great king himself doth woo me oft For my confections”
'Confections' are prepared medicinal or cosmetic compounds — here the Queen's perfumes, distillations, and preserves that she says even the King prizes. The word could cover anything from a physician's electuary (a paste drug) to a perfumer's scent; the Queen uses it to make her chemistry sound innocent and domestic.
TLN 483archaic vocab
“amplify my judgment in Other conclusions”
'Conclusions' here means experiments or trials — the Queen says she wants to extend her pharmaceutical knowledge by testing ('trying') the effects of these compounds on animals. The modern sense of 'conclusion' as a logical outcome came later; in Shakespeare 'conclusions' often means the experiments themselves.
TLN 488archaic vocab
“Allayments to their act, and by them gather Their several virtues and effects”
'Allayments' are remedies or alleviating agents — antidotes applied after the poison has acted. 'Their several virtues and effects' means the individual properties and results of each compound. The Queen presents herself as a systematic pharmacologist studying both the harmful action of each drug and the medicines that counteract it.
TLN 492archaic vocab
“the seeing these effects will be Both noisome and infectious”
'Noisome' does not mean 'noisy': it means harmful, noxious, or foul-smelling — from the same root as 'annoy.' Cornelius warns the Queen that watching creatures die from poison will be 'both noisome and infectious': an offensive, corrupting spectacle that hardens the heart of the watcher.
TLN 511archaic vocab
“No danger in what show of death it makes, More than the locking-up the spirits a time, To be more fresh, reviving”
Cornelius explains in an aside that the drug he actually gave the Queen only produces the appearance of death ('show of death') by temporarily suspending the body's vital functions ('locking-up the spirits'). 'Spirits' in Renaissance medicine were the subtle fluids believed to animate the body; 'locking them up' means causing a cataleptic state from which the person revives. This is the drug Imogen will later drink.
TLN 536archaic vocab
“It is a thing I made, which hath the king Five times redeem'd from death: I do not know What is more cordial”
'Cordial' literally means 'of or relating to the heart' (Latin cor, heart) and in medical usage meant a preparation believed to strengthen or stimulate the heart and revive a person near death — a restorative tonic. The Queen is presenting the drugged box to Pisanio as a life-saving remedy, claiming it has already brought the King back from the brink five times. The dramatic irony is that it will later nearly kill Imogen.
TLN 539archaic vocab
“It is an earnest of a further good That I mean to thee”
'Earnest' here is a legal and commercial term: a payment made in advance as a pledge that the full sum will follow — a deposit or down payment. The Queen is telling Pisanio that the poisoned box is just a token of the larger rewards (social advancement, her son's patronage) she promises if he betrays Posthumus and helps her scheme.
TLN 551archaic vocab
“the agent for his master And the remembrancer of her to hold The hand-fast to her lord”
'Remembrancer' is an official term: a person whose duty is to keep another mindful of an obligation or interest. Here the Queen acknowledges — grudgingly, in a soliloquy — that Pisanio acts as Posthumus's agent at court and also as the one who keeps Imogen mindful ('holds her') to her marriage vow ('hand-fast'). 'Hand-fast' is an archaic term for a formal betrothal or binding contract, especially a marriage pledge sealed by joining hands.
TLN 554archaic vocab
“shall quite unpeople her Of liegers for her sweet”
The Queen reveals that the drug given to Pisanio is intended to kill him — 'unpeopling' Imogen of her 'liegers.' A 'lieger' (also 'leger') is a resident agent or representative who remains at a post on another's behalf; here it means Imogen's loyal intermediaries and advocates at court — primarily Pisanio. Without them, Imogen (her 'sweet,' a term of contempt from the Queen) will be isolated and undefended.