Act 3, Scene 4

A hall in TIMON'S House.

[Enter two Servants of VARRO, and the Servant of LUCIUS, meeting TITUS, HORTENSIUS, and other Servants to TIMON's Creditors, waiting his coming out.]
First Varro's Servant
1027 Well met; good morrow, Titus and Hortensius.
Titus
1028 The like to you, kind Varro.
Hortensius
1029 Lucius! What! do we meet together!
Lucius' Servant
1030 Ay, and I think one business does command us all; for mine is
1031 money.
Titus
1032 So is theirs and ours.
[Enter PHILOTUS.]
Lucius' Servant
1033 And Sir Philotus too!
Philotus
1034 Good day at once.
Lucius' Servant
1035 Wlcome, good brother.
1036 What do you think the hour?
Philotus
1037 Labouring for nine.
Lucius' Servant
1038 So much?
Philotus
1039 Is not my lord seen yet?
Lucius' Servant
1040 Not yet.
Philotus
1041 I wonder on't; he was wont to shine at seven.
Lucius' Servant
1042 Ay, but the days are waxed shorter with him:
1043 You must consider that a prodigal course
1044 Is like the sun's, but not, like his, recoverable.
1045 I fear,
1046 'Tis deepest winter in Lord Timon's purse;
1047 That is, one may reach deep enough, and yet
1048 Find little.
Philotus
1049 I am of your fear for that.
Titus
1050 I'll show you how to observe a strange event.
1051 Your lord sends now for money.
Hortensius
1052 Most true, he does.
Titus
1053 And he wears jewels now of Timon's gift,
1054 For which I wait for money.
Hortensius
1055 It is against my heart.
Lucius' Servant
1056 Mark, how strange it shows,
1057 Timon in this should pay more than he owes:
1058 And e'en as if your lord should wear rich jewels,
1059 And send for money for 'em.
Hortensius
1060 I'm weary of this charge, the gods can witness:
1061 I know my lord hath spent of Timon's wealth,
1062 And now ingratitude makes it worse than stealth.
First Varro's Servant
1063 Yes, mine's three thousand crowns; what's yours?
Lucius' Servant
1064 Five thousand mine.
First Varro's Servant
1065 'Tis much deep: and it should seem by the sum,
1066 Your master's confidence was above mine;
1067 Else, surely, his had equall'd.
[Enter FLAMINIUS.]
Titus
1068 One of Lord Timon's men.
Lucius' Servant
1069 Flaminius! Sir, a word. Pray, is my lord ready to
1070 come forth?
Flaminius
1071 No, indeed, he is not.
Titus
1072 We attend his lordship; pray, signify so much.
Flaminius
1073 I need not tell him that; he knows you are too diligent.
[Exit FLAMINUS.]
[Enter FLAVIUS, in a cloak, muffled.]
Lucius' Servant
1074 Ha! is not that his steward muffled so?
1075 He goes away in a cloud: call him, call him.
Titus
1076 Do you hear, sir?
Second Varro's Servant
1077 By your leave, sir.
Flavius
1078 What do you ask of me, my friend?
Titus
1079 We wait for certain money here, sir.
Flavius
1080 Ay,
1081 If money were as certain as your waiting,
1082 'Twere sure enough.
1083 Why then preferr'd you not your sums and bills,
1084 When your false masters eat of my lord's meat?
1085 Then they could smile and fawn upon his debts,
1086 And take down the interest into their gluttonous maws.
1087 You do yourselves but wrong to stir me up;
1088 Let me pass quietly:
1089 Believe't, my lord and I have made an end;
1090 I have no more to reckon, he to spend.
Lucius' Servant
1091 Ay, but this answer will not serve.
Flavius
1092 If 'twill not serve, 'tis not so base as you;
1093 For you serve knaves.
[Exit.]
First Varro's Servant
1094 How! what does his cashiered worship mutter?
Second Varro's Servant
1095 No matter what; he's poor, and that's revenge enough. Who can
1096 speak broader than he that has no house to put his head in? such
1097 may rail against great buildings.
[Enter SERVILIUS.]
Titus
1098 O, here's Servilius; now we shall know some answer.
Servilius
1099 If I might beseech you, gentlemen, to repair some other
1100 hour, I should derive much from't; for, take't of my soul, my
1101 lord leans wondrously to discontent. His comfortable temper has
1102 forsook him; he's much out of health, and keeps his chamber.
Lucius' Servant
1103 Many do keep their chambers are not sick:
1104 And, if it be so far beyond his health,
1105 Methinks he should the sooner pay his debts,
1106 And make a clear way to the gods.
Servilius
1107 Good gods!
Titus
1108 We cannot take this for answer, sir.
[Within.]
Flaminius
1109 Servilius, help! my lord! my lord!
[Enter TIMON, in a rage; FLAMINIUS following.]
Timon
1110 What! are my doors oppos'd against my passage?
1111 Have I been ever free, and must my house
1112 Be my retentive enemy, my gaol?
1113 The place which I have feasted, does it now,
1114 Like all mankind, show me an iron heart?
Lucius' Servant
1115 Put in now, Titus.
Titus
1116 My lord, here is my bill.
Lucius' Servant
1117 Here's mine.
Hortensius
1118 And mine, my lord.
Both Varro's Servants
1119 And ours, my lord.
Philotus
1120 All our bills.
Timon
1121 Knock me down with 'em: cleave me to the girdle.
Lucius' Servant
1122 Alas, my lord—
Timon
1123 Cut my heart in sums.
Titus
1124 Mine, fifty talents.
Timon
1125 Tell out my blood.
Lucius' Servant
1126 Five thousand crowns, my lord.
Timon
1127 Five thousand drops pays that. What yours? and yours?
First Varro's Servant
1128 My lord—
Second Varro's Servant
1129 My lord—
Timon
1130 Tear me, take me; and the gods fall upon you!
[Exit.]
Hortensius
1131 Faith, I perceive our masters may throw their caps at their
1132 money: these debts may well be called desperate ones, for a
1133 madman owes 'em.
[Exeunt.]
[Re-enter TIMON and FLAVIUS.]
Timon
1134 They have e'en put my breath from me, the slaves.
1135 Creditors? devils!
Flavius
1136 My dear lord—
Timon
1137 What if it should be so?
Flaminius
1138 My lord—
Timon
1139 I'll have it so. My steward!
Flavius
1140 Here, my lord.
Timon
1141 So fitly! Go, bid all my friends again:
1142 Lucius, Lucullus, and Sempronius; all:
1143 I'll once more feast the rascals.
Flavius
1144 O my lord!
1145 You only speak from your distracted soul;
1146 There is not so much left to furnish out
1147 A moderate table.
Timon
1148 Be it not in thy care: go.
1149 I charge thee, invite them all: let in the tide
1150 Of knaves once more; my cook and I'll provide.
[Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 1037archaic vocab
“Labouring for nine”
'Labouring for nine' means the hour is struggling toward nine — it is nearly, but not quite, nine in the morning. The creditors have been waiting since before the household officially opened its doors.
TLN 1041rhetorical device
“he was wont to shine at seven”
Philotus compares Timon to the sun — he used to 'shine' (hold court, be visible and generous) by seven in the morning. Lucius' Servant then extends the metaphor: a spendthrift's course is 'like the sun's' in that it rises and falls, but unlike the sun it cannot recover and rise again the next day.
classical Fortune and her wheel
TLN 1046rhetorical device
“deepest winter in Lord Timon's purse”
Lucius' Servant uses a seasonal metaphor: 'deepest winter' in Timon's purse means it is at its barest — a purse in midwinter, like the earth, has nothing growing or available in it. He then sharpens it: you can reach deep into it and still find nothing.
TLN 1083historical topical
“preferr'd you not your sums and bills”
A 'bill' is a written demand for repayment of a debt — what we would call an invoice or a promissory note. Flavius angrily asks why the creditors did not submit these written demands while their masters were still feasting at Timon's table and enjoying his generosity.
TLN 1094archaic vocab
“his cashiered worship”
'Cashiered' means dismissed from service — Flavius has been discharged as Timon's steward because there is no household left to manage. 'Worship' is a courtesy title for a man of rank or position, used here with cutting sarcasm by the First Varro's Servant: a steward 'of worship' who has lost his place.
TLN 1095rhetorical device
“Who can speak broader than he that has no house to put his head in? such may rail against great buildings”
Second Varro's Servant says that a man who has lost everything is free to speak as broadly (as openly, as frankly) as he likes, because he has nothing left to lose. The penniless can afford to curse great buildings — rich men's houses — because they no longer own property those buildings could threaten or take from them. Poverty grants a bitter kind of freedom of speech.
TLN 1101archaic vocab
“His comfortable temper has forsook him”
'Comfortable temper' means his habitual ease of mind and generosity of spirit — the mental disposition that made him hospitable and cheerful. 'Forsook him' means has abandoned him. Servilius is saying that Timon's characteristic good nature is gone.
TLN 1105wordplay
“he should the sooner pay his debts, And make a clear way to the gods”
Lucius' Servant is being darkly sardonic: if Timon is truly so sick, he should settle his debts before he dies and 'make a clear way to the gods' — die with a clean conscience. The phrase is brutal because it implies Timon's death would be convenient for the creditors, yet is framed as religious good sense.
TLN 1121rhetorical device
“Knock me down with 'em: cleave me to the girdle”
Timon responds to the flood of bills with grotesque hyperbole: knock me down with the papers, split me in half with them down to the belt ('girdle'). His violence of imagery is the sign of a mind breaking under the weight of creditors — he is not literally asking to be killed, but the language of physical ruin mirrors the financial ruin he cannot otherwise express.
TLN 1125archaic vocab
“Tell out my blood”
'Tell out' means to count out — as coins are told (counted) from a purse. Timon is saying that each debt-demand is a drop of blood drawn from him: pay the sum in blood, count it out drop by drop. The phrase fuses the financial ('tell out' a sum of money) with the physical (blood as life and currency).
TLN 1131archaic vocab
“throw their caps at their money”
'Throw their caps at' something means to give it up as hopeless — the way a man throws his cap in the air and walks away from a lost cause. Hortensius says their masters may as well abandon hope of ever seeing their money again, because a madman owes it. The term 'desperate' in the next line is a pun: debts were legally called 'desperate' when recovery was considered impossible, and Timon is behaving like a madman.
TLN 1141stage direction note
“bid all my friends again: Lucius, Lucullus, and Sempronius; all: I'll once more feast the rascals”
Timon abruptly decides to invite the same friends who refused him loans to a great dinner. Flavius warns there is barely enough left for 'a moderate table.' The audience, who has seen those friends deny Timon in the three preceding scenes, understands this is not a reconciliation: the feast will be a trap. Timon adds 'my cook and I'll provide,' suggesting he has something specific in mind.
historical Timon's mock-banquet