You that are old
consider
not the capacities of us
that are young; you do measure the heat of our livers with the
bitterness of your galls; and we that are in the vaward of our
youth, must confess, are wags too.
that are young; you do measure the heat of our livers with the
bitterness of your galls; and we that are in the vaward of our
youth, must confess, are wags too.
Shakespeare
CHIEF JUSTICE. What! you are as a candle, the better part burnt
out.
FALSTAFF. A wassail candle, my lord- all tallow; if I did say of
wax, my growth would approve the truth.
CHIEF JUSTICE. There is not a white hair in your face but should
have his effect of gravity.
FALSTAFF. His effect of gravy, gravy,
CHIEF JUSTICE. You follow the young Prince up and down, like his
ill angel.
FALSTAFF. Not so, my lord. Your ill angel is light; but hope he
that looks upon me will take me without weighing. And yet in some
respects, I grant, I cannot go- I cannot tell. Virtue is of so
little regard in these costermongers' times that true valour is
turn'd berod; pregnancy is made a tapster, and his quick wit
wasted in giving reckonings; all the other gifts appertinent to
man, as the malice of this age shapes them, are not worth a
gooseberry.
You that are old consider not the capacities of us
that are young; you do measure the heat of our livers with the
bitterness of your galls; and we that are in the vaward of our
youth, must confess, are wags too.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Do you set down your name in the scroll of youth,
that are written down old with all the characters of age? Have
you not a moist eye, a dry hand, a yellow cheek, a white beard, a
decreasing leg, an increasing belly? Is not your voice broken,
your wind short, your chin double, your wit single, and every
part about you blasted with antiquity? And will you yet call
yourself young? Fie, fie, fie, Sir John!
FALSTAFF. My lord, I was born about three of the clock in the
afternoon, with a white head and something a round belly. For my
voice- I have lost it with hallooing and singing of anthems. To
approve my youth further, I will not. The truth is, I am only old
in judgment and understanding; and he that will caper with me for
a thousand marks, let him lend me the money, and have at him. For
the box of the ear that the Prince gave you- he gave it like a
rude prince, and you took it like a sensible lord. I have check'd
him for it; and the young lion repents- marry, not in ashes and
sackcloth, but in new silk and old sack.
CHIEF JUSTICE. Well, God send the Prince a better companion!
