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Home » Quotes » Henry IV Pt 2 » Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me

Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me

Falstaff
Men of all sorts take a pride to gird at me.
The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man, is
not able to invent anything that intends to laughter
more than I invent, or is invented on me. I am not
only witty in myself, but the cause that wit is in
other men. I do here walk before thee like a sow
that hath overwhelmed all her litter but one. If the
Prince put thee into my service for any other reason
than to set me off, why then I have no judgment.

The brain of this foolish-compounded clay, man,
is not able to invent anything that intends to laughter
more than I invent, or is invented on me.

Thou whoreson mandrake, thou art fitter to be
worn in my cap than to wait at my heels. I was never
manned with an agate till now, but I will inset you
neither in gold nor silver, but in vile apparel, and
send you back again to your master for a jewel. The
juvenal, the Prince your master, whose chin is not
yet fledge—I will sooner have a beard grow in the
palm of my hand than he shall get one off his cheek,
and yet he will not stick to say his face is a face
royal. God may finish it when He will. ’Tis not a hair
amiss yet. He may keep it still at a face royal, for a
barber shall never earn sixpence out of it, and yet
he’ll be crowing as if he had writ man ever since his
father was a bachelor. He may keep his own grace,
but he’s almost out of mine, I can assure him. What
said Master Dommelton about the satin for my
short cloak and my slops?
Page
He said, sir, you should procure him better
assurance than Bardolph. He would not take his
band and yours. He liked not the security.
Falstaff
Let him be damned like the glutton! Pray
God his tongue be hotter! A whoreson Achitophel, a
rascally yea-forsooth knave, to bear a gentleman in
hand and then stand upon security! The whoreson
smoothy-pates do now wear nothing but high shoes
and bunches of keys at their girdles; and if a man is
through with them in honest taking up, then they
must stand upon security. I had as lief they would
put ratsbane in my mouth as offer to stop it with
“security.” I looked he should have sent me two-and-twenty
yards of satin, as I am a true knight, and
he sends me “security.” Well, he may sleep in
security, for he hath the horn of abundance, and the
lightness of his wife shines through it, and yet
cannot he see though he have his own lantern to
light him. Where’s Bardolph?
Page
He’s gone in Smithfield to buy your Worship a horse.
Falstaff
I bought him in Paul’s, and he’ll buy me a
horse in Smithfield. An I could get me but a wife in
the stews, I were manned, horsed, and wived.

Source:
Act 1
Scene 2
Line 6

Source Type:

Spoken by:
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