Act 5, Scene 4

A British prison.

[Enter POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and two Gaolers]
First Gaoler
2957 You shall not now be stol'n, you have locks upon you;
2958 So graze as you find pasture.
Second Gaoler
2959 Ay, or a stomach.
[Exeunt Gaolers]
Posthumus
2960 Most welcome, bondage! for thou art away,
2961 think, to liberty: yet am I better
2962 Than one that's sick o' the gout; since he had rather
2963 Groan so in perpetuity than be cured
2964 By the sure physician, death, who is the key
2965 To unbar these locks. My conscience, thou art fetter'd
2966 More than my shanks and wrists: you good gods, give me
2967 The penitent instrument to pick that bolt,
2968 Then, free for ever! Is't enough I am sorry?
2969 So children temporal fathers do appease;
2970 Gods are more full of mercy. Must I repent?
2971 I cannot do it better than in gyves,
2972 Desired more than constrain'd: to satisfy,
2973 If of my freedom 'tis the main part, take
2974 No stricter render of me than my all.
2975 I know you are more clement than vile men,
2976 Who of their broken debtors take a third,
2977 A sixth, a tenth, letting them thrive again
2978 On their abatement: that's not my desire:
2979 For Imogen's dear life take mine; and though
2980 'Tis not so dear, yet 'tis a life; you coin'd it:
2981 'Tween man and man they weigh not every stamp;
2982 Though light, take pieces for the figure's sake:
2983 You rather mine, being yours: and so, great powers,
2984 If you will take this audit, take this life,
2985 And cancel these cold bonds. O Imogen!
2986 I'll speak to thee in silence.
[Sleeps]
[Solemn music. Enter, as in an apparition, SICILIUS LEONATUS, father to Posthumus Leonatus, an old man, attired like a warrior; leading in his hand an ancient matron, his wife, and mother to Posthumus Leonatus, with music before them: then, after other music, follow the two young Leonati, brothers to Posthumus Leonatus, with wounds as they died in the wars. They circle Posthumus Leonatus round, as he lies sleeping]
Sicilius Leonatus
2987 No more, thou thunder-master, show
2988 Thy spite on mortal flies:
2989 With Mars fall out, with Juno chide,
2990 That thy adulteries
2991 Rates and revenges.
2992 Hath my poor boy done aught but well,
2993 Whose face I never saw?
2994 I died whilst in the womb he stay'd
2995 Attending nature's law:
2996 Whose father then, as men report
2997 Thou orphans' father art,
2998 Thou shouldst have been, and shielded him
2999 From this earth-vexing smart.
Mother
3000 Lucina lent not me her aid,
3001 But took me in my throes;
3002 That from me was Posthumus ript,
3003 Came crying 'mongst his foes,
3004 A thing of pity!
Sicilius Leonatus
3005 Great nature, like his ancestry,
3006 Moulded the stuff so fair,
3007 That he deserved the praise o' the world,
3008 As great Sicilius' heir.
First Brother
3009 When once he was mature for man,
3010 In Britain where was he
3011 That could stand up his parallel;
3012 Or fruitful object be
3013 In eye of Imogen, that best
3014 Could deem his dignity?
Mother
3015 With marriage wherefore was he mock'd,
3016 To be exiled, and thrown
3017 From Leonati seat, and cast
3018 From her his dearest one,
3019 Sweet Imogen?
Sicilius Leonatus
3020 Why did you suffer Iachimo,
3021 Slight thing of Italy,
3022 To taint his nobler heart and brain
3023 With needless jealosy;
3024 And to become the geck and scorn
3025 O' th' other's villany?
Second Brother
3026 For this from stiller seats we came,
3027 Our parents and us twain,
3028 That striking in our country's cause
3029 Fell bravely and were slain,
3030 Our fealty and Tenantius' right
3031 With honour to maintain.
First Brother
3032 Like hardiment Posthumus hath
3033 To Cymbeline perform'd:
3034 Then, Jupiter, thou king of gods,
3035 Why hast thou thus adjourn'd
3036 The graces for his merits due,
3037 Being all to dolours turn'd?
Sicilius Leonatus
3038 Thy crystal window ope; look out;
3039 No longer exercise
3040 Upon a valiant race thy harsh
3041 And potent injuries.
Mother
3042 Since, Jupiter, our son is good,
3043 Take off his miseries.
Sicilius Leonatus
3044 Peep through thy marble mansion; help;
3045 Or we poor ghosts will cry
3046 To the shining synod of the rest
3047 Against thy deity.
First and Second Brother
3048 Help, Jupiter; or we appeal,
3049 And from thy justice fly.
[Jupiter descends in thunder and lightning, sitting upon an eagle: he throws a thunderbolt. The Apparitions fall on their knees]
Jupiter
3050 No more, you petty spirits of region low,
3051 Offend our hearing; hush! How dare you ghosts
3052 Accuse the thunderer, whose bolt, you know,
3053 Sky-planted batters all rebelling coasts?
3054 Poor shadows of Elysium, hence, and rest
3055 Upon your never-withering banks of flowers:
3056 Be not with mortal accidents opprest;
3057 No care of yours it is; you know 'tis ours.
3058 Whom best I love I cross; to make my gift,
3059 The more delay'd, delighted. Be content;
3060 Your low-laid son our godhead will uplift:
3061 His comforts thrive, his trials well are spent.
3062 Our Jovial star reign'd at his birth, and in
3063 Our temple was he married. Rise, and fade.
3064 He shall be lord of lady Imogen,
3065 And happier much by his affliction made.
3066 This tablet lay upon his breast, wherein
3067 Our pleasure his full fortune doth confine:
3068 and so, away: no further with your din
3069 Express impatience, lest you stir up mine.
3070 Mount, eagle, to my palace crystalline.
[Ascends]
Sicilius Leonatus
3071 He came in thunder; his celestial breath
3072 Was sulphurous to smell: the holy eagle
3073 Stoop'd as to foot us: his ascension is
3074 More sweet than our blest fields: his royal bird
3075 Prunes the immortal wing and cloys his beak,
3076 As when his god is pleased.
All
3077 Thanks, Jupiter!
Sicilius Leonatus
3078 The marble pavement closes, he is enter'd
3079 His radiant root. Away! and, to be blest,
3080 Let us with care perform his great behest.
[The Apparitions vanish]
[Waking]
Posthumus
3081 Sleep, thou hast been a grandsire, and begot
3082 A father to me; and thou hast created
3083 A mother and two brothers: but, O scorn!
3084 Gone! they went hence so soon as they were born:
3085 And so I am awake. Poor wretches that depend
3086 On greatness' favour dream as I have done,
3087 Wake and find nothing. But, alas, I swerve:
3088 Many dream not to find, neither deserve,
3089 And yet are steep'd in favours: so am I,
3090 That have this golden chance and know not why.
3091 What fairies haunt this ground? A book? O rare one!
3092 Be not, as is our fangled world, a garment
3093 Nobler than that it covers: let thy effects
3094 So follow, to be most unlike our courtiers,
3095 As good as promise.
[Reads]
Posthumus
3096 'When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself unknown,
3097 without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of
3098 tender air; and when from a stately cedar shall be
3099 lopped branches, which, being dead many years,
3100 shall after revive, be jointed to the old stock and
3101 freshly grow; then shall Posthumus end his miseries,
3102 Britain be fortunate and flourish in peace and plenty.'
3103 'Tis still a dream, or else such stuff as madmen
3104 Tongue and brain not; either both or nothing;
3105 Or senseless speaking or a speaking such
3106 As sense cannot untie. Be what it is,
3107 The action of my life is like it, which
3108 I'll keep, if but for sympathy.
[Re-enter First Gaoler]
First Gaoler
3109 Come, sir, are you ready for death?
Posthumus
3110 Over-roasted rather; ready long ago.
First Gaoler
3111 Hanging is the word, sir: if
3112 you be ready for that, you are well cooked.
Posthumus
3113 So, if I prove a good repast to the
3114 spectators, the dish pays the shot.
First Gaoler
3115 A heavy reckoning for you, sir. But the comfort is,
3116 you shall be called to no more payments, fear no
3117 more tavern-bills; which are often the sadness of
3118 parting, as the procuring of mirth: you come in
3119 flint for want of meat, depart reeling with too
3120 much drink; sorry that you have paid too much, and
3121 sorry that you are paid too much; purse and brain
3122 both empty; the brain the heavier for being too
3123 light, the purse too light, being drawn of
3124 heaviness: of this contradiction you shall now be
3125 quit. O, the charity of a penny cord! It sums up
3126 thousands in a trice: you have no true debitor and
3127 creditor but it; of what's past, is, and to come,
3128 the discharge: your neck, sir, is pen, book and
3129 counters; so the acquittance follows.
Posthumus
3130 I am merrier to die than thou art to live.
First Gaoler
3131 Indeed, sir, he that sleeps feels not the
3132 tooth-ache: but a man that were to sleep your
3133 sleep, and a hangman to help him to bed, I think he
3134 would change places with his officer; for, look you,
3135 sir, you know not which way you shall go.
Posthumus
3136 Yes, indeed do I, fellow.
First Gaoler
3137 Your death has eyes in 's head then; I have not seen
3138 him so pictured: you must either be directed by
3139 some that take upon them to know, or do take upon
3140 yourself that which I am sure you do not know, or
3141 jump the after inquiry on your own peril: and how
3142 you shall speed in your journey's end, I think you'll
3143 never return to tell one.
Posthumus
3144 I tell thee, fellow, there are none want eyes to
3145 direct them the way I am going, but such as wink and
3146 will not use them.
First Gaoler
3147 What an infinite mock is this, that a man should
3148 have the best use of eyes to see the way of
3149 blindness! I am sure hanging's the way of winking.
[Enter a Messenger]
Messenger
3150 Knock off his manacles; bring your prisoner to the king.
Posthumus
3151 Thou bring'st good news; I am called to be made free.
First Gaoler
3152 I'll be hang'd then.
Posthumus
3153 Thou shalt be then freer than a gaoler; no bolts for the dead.
[Exeunt POSTHUMUS LEONATUS and Messenger]
First Gaoler
3154 Unless a man would marry a gallows and beget young
3155 gibbets, I never saw one so prone. Yet, on my
3156 conscience, there are verier knaves desire to live,
3157 for all he be a Roman: and there be some of them
3158 too that die against their wills; so should I, if I
3159 were one. I would we were all of one mind, and one
3160 mind good; O, there were desolation of gaolers and
3161 gallowses! I speak against my present profit, but
3162 my wish hath a preferment in 't.
[Exeunt]

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Word definitions on hover

Notes

TLN 2960syntax grammar
“Most welcome, bondage! for thou art away”
Posthumus addresses his imprisonment directly, calling it 'welcome.' The logic turns on 'thou art away': bondage of the body is a path away from conscience, which imprisons him more severely. The sentence pivots on the suppressed word 'a' — 'thou art [a] way' — meaning bondage is a road or means toward freedom, even as it is itself a state of captivity.
TLN 2964rhetorical device
“the sure physician, death, who is the key”
Death is personified as a reliable doctor — a 'sure physician' who cures suffering by the simple remedy of ending life. The metaphor extends: he 'unlocks' the bolts of the prison, so death is simultaneously a healer and a key-bearer. Shakespeare commonly figures death as a releasing physician in the tragedies and late plays.
TLN 2967archaic vocab
“The penitent instrument to pick that bolt”
'Penitent instrument' means the tool or means of repentance — the thing that will open the lock of his guilty conscience. Posthumus is asking the gods for whatever act of penitence will 'pick' (unlock) the moral restraint he feels more keenly than any iron bolt. 'Bolt' here is the bar securing a lock, not a thunderbolt.
TLN 2971archaic vocab
“in gyves”
'Gyves' (pronounced 'jivez') are leg-irons or shackles — iron rings chained around a prisoner's ankles. Posthumus says he would rather do his penance here in chains than at liberty, because his guilt makes the imprisonment deserved.
TLN 2976cultural context
“broken debtors take a third, A sixth, a tenth”
Posthumus compares himself to an insolvent debtor. In Elizabethan commercial practice, a creditor who held a 'broken' (bankrupt) debtor might agree to accept a fraction of what was owed — a third, a sixth, a tenth — and forgive the rest, letting the debtor 'thrive again on their abatement.' Posthumus tells the gods he does not want such a partial deal: take his whole life for Imogen's.
TLN 2981archaic vocab
“they weigh not every stamp; Though light, take pieces for the figure's sake”
'Stamp' is the design pressed into a coin when it is minted; 'figure' is the monarch's head or royal image on that coin. Posthumus argues: when merchants exchange coins, they do not weigh every one individually — they accept even a light (underweight) coin for the sake of the king's image it bears. His life is a 'light' coin, but it was 'coined' by the gods and bears their stamp; he asks them to accept it at face value.
TLN 3000classical allusion
“Lucina lent not me her aid, But took me in my throes”
Lucina was the Roman goddess of childbirth — the divine midwife who helped mothers through labour. The Mother's ghost says Lucina 'lent not her aid' but instead 'took' her while she was in her 'throes' (birth-pains), meaning she died giving birth to Posthumus. 'From me was Posthumus ript' may mean he was delivered by a primitive form of caesarean section after his mother died.
classical Lucina, goddess of childbirth
TLN 3024archaic vocab
“become the geck and scorn O' th' other's villany”
A 'geck' is an Elizabethan word for a dupe or fool — someone made a laughing-stock. The ghost of Sicilius complains that Posthumus was allowed to become the dupe and mockery of Iachimo's villainy, tricked into believing his wife was unfaithful. The word is rare and dialect-coloured, from Low German.
TLN 3030historical topical
“Tenantius' right With honour to maintain”
Tenantius is Cymbeline's father — the previous king of Britain — as named in Holinshed's Chronicles. The Leonati brothers say they died in battle to uphold Tenantius's legitimate royal line, the house Cymbeline inherits. The name roots the play in a quasi-historical British past drawn from the same source Shakespeare used for Lear and Macbeth.
historical Ancient Britain and the Roman tribute
TLN 3034classical allusion
“Jupiter, thou king of gods, Why hast thou thus adjourn'd The graces for his merits due”
The First Brother addresses Jupiter directly as 'king of gods,' the supreme Roman deity of sky and thunder. 'Adjourn'd' means postponed or deferred — the graces (gifts, rewards) Posthumus has earned by his merit have been delayed without cause. The complaint is the core of the ghosts' petition: they cannot understand why a god who controls all things allows a good man to suffer.
classical Jupiter, king of the gods
TLN 3050stage direction note
“No more, you petty spirits of region low, Offend our hearing; hush!”
Jupiter descends on a mechanical eagle through a trap in the stage roof (the 'heavens') to appear in person — a theatrical device called a theophany, from the Greek for a god's visible manifestation. This was achieved at the Blackfriars Theatre, where Cymbeline was first performed, using a flying machine that lowered large properties and actors from above. He speaks in the royal plural ('our hearing'), the register of divine sovereignty.
classical Jupiter, king of the gods
TLN 3054classical allusion
“Poor shadows of Elysium, hence, and rest Upon your never-withering banks of flowers”
Jupiter dismisses the ghosts back to Elysium — the classical afterlife paradise where the virtuous and heroic dead dwell in perpetual ease on flower-covered meadows. The 'never-withering banks' are the asphodels of the Elysian Fields, which in Roman poetry bloom without season or decay. The phrase reassures the Leonati: they are in bliss, and their concern for living Posthumus is misplaced from there.
TLN 3058rhetorical device
“Whom best I love I cross; to make my gift, The more delay'd, delighted”
Jupiter states the play's central theological idea: that divine love does not prevent suffering but deliberately works through it. 'I cross' means I thwart, afflict, or obstruct — those the gods love most are given the hardest trials. The paradox ('the more delay'd, delighted') means that a blessing deferred and then given is sweeter than one given at once. This is the play's governing providence, applied directly to Posthumus.
classical Jupiter, king of the gods
TLN 3062cultural context
“Our Jovial star reign'd at his birth, and in Our temple was he married”
'Jovial star' is the planet Jupiter: in Renaissance astrology, Jupiter was the benign ruling planet ('jove-ial' — of Jove), and its ascendancy at birth was a sign of a fortunate, generous character. The god himself confirms that Posthumus was born under Jupiter's direct patronage, and that his marriage to Imogen was solemnised in Jupiter's own temple — an exceptionally auspicious beginning.
TLN 3072archaic vocab
“holy eagle Stoop'd as to foot us: his ascension is More sweet than our blest fields: his royal bird Prunes the immortal wing and cloys his beak”
Three falconry terms: 'stoop' is when a hawk plunges steeply toward prey — here the eagle swooped down as if to seize them ('foot us' = to seize with the talons, to 'put his foot on'). 'Prunes' is the technical term for a hawk preening and dressing its feathers after a flight. 'Cloys' means to satisfy the appetite — after a kill, a hawk 'cloys the gorge' (cleans the beak). Sicilius describes the eagle's behavior as if it were a satisfied, triumphant hunting bird returning to its perch in the sky.
TLN 3081syntax grammar
“Sleep, thou hast been a grandsire, and begot A father to me”
On waking, Posthumus addresses sleep itself and thanks it, with playful logic, for the family he has just seen: sleep 'begot' a father (Sicilius), a mother, and two brothers for him in the vision. The conceit personifies sleep as a grandfather who has, impossibly, generated an entire family during the dream. Posthumus never knew his own family — his father died before he was born, his brothers in the wars — and the vision gave him, briefly, their presence.
TLN 3092archaic vocab
“Be not, as is our fangled world, a garment Nobler than that it covers”
'Fangled' means obsessively devoted to novelty and fashion — 'new-fangled' means enamoured of anything new; 'fangled' alone heightens the rebuke. Posthumus hopes the prophetic book will not be like the 'fangled world' — a fashionable garment whose fine appearance covers something worthless. He is already half-sceptical about whether this strange text means anything.
TLN 3096rhetorical device
“When as a lion's whelp shall, to himself unknown, without seeking find, and be embraced by a piece of tender air”
Jupiter's prophetic tablet delivers the play's central prophecy in deliberate riddles. The 'lion's whelp' is Posthumus (a prince in nature, a warrior, yet a child — 'whelp' — 'unknown to himself,' unaware of his true standing). 'A piece of tender air' is Imogen — the Soothsayer later explains 'mulier' (Latin for woman) is close to 'mollis aer' (soft, tender air). 'Lopped branches' that revive on the 'old stock' are the lost princes Guiderius and Arviragus restored to Cymbeline.
classical Jupiter, king of the gods
TLN 3114archaic vocab
“the dish pays the shot”
'Shot' is a tavern-bill or the reckoning at the end of a meal — what you owe for your food and drink. Posthumus is answering the gaoler's image of a 'good repast': if his execution entertains the watching crowd, the entertainment itself (the 'dish' of the spectacle) pays the bill — he dies but the debt is settled. It is a grim pun on 'shot' meaning both a tavern score and a bullet.
TLN 3125cultural context
“the charity of a penny cord! It sums up thousands in a trice: you have no true debitor and creditor but it”
The gaoler offers a grotesque economic sermon: a hangman's rope costs barely a penny yet 'sums up thousands' of debts — once you are hanged, every obligation is discharged. 'Debitor and creditor' was an Elizabethan accounting term for the double-entry ledger; 'your neck is pen, book and counters' means the gallows turns the prisoner's neck into the accounting instrument that closes all accounts. The gaoler's joke depends on commercial vocabulary for what is really a death-sentence.