But apart from their sincerity and range, how different are the two tributes: Florizel’s all innocence and simplicity, Antony’s raffiné and sophisticated. We feel from his words that he would endorse Shakespeare’s ambiguous praise of his own dark lady:
Whence hast thou this becoming of things ill,
That in the very refuse of thy deeds
There is such strength and warrantise of skill,
That, in my mind, thy worst all best exceeds?
(Sonnet cl. 5.)
Does not Enobarbus speak in almost exactly the same way of the Cleopatra that Antony adores?
Vilest things
Become themselves in her; that the holy priests
Bless her when she is riggish.