[Exit Servant.]
Enter Cupid.
CUPID.
Hail to thee, worthy Timon, and to all
That of his bounties taste! The five best senses
Acknowledge thee their patron and come freely
To gratulate thy plenteous bosom. There
Taste, touch, all, pleased from thy table rise;
They only now come but to feast thine eyes.
TIMON.
They’re welcome all, let ’em have kind admittance.
Music, make their welcome!
FIRST LORD.
You see, my lord, how ample you’re beloved.
Music. Enter a masque of Ladies as Amazons, with lutes in their hands, dancing and playing.
APEMANTUS.
Hoy-day!
What a sweep of vanity comes this way.
They dance? They are madwomen.
Like madness is the glory of this life,
As this pomp shows to a little oil and root.
We make ourselves fools to disport ourselves,
And spend our flatteries to drink those men
Upon whose age we void it up again
With poisonous spite and envy.
Who lives that’s not depraved or depraves?
Who dies that bears not one spurn to their graves
Of their friend’s gift?
I should fear those that dance before me now
Would one day stamp upon me. ’T has been done.
Men shut their doors against a setting sun.
[The Lords rise from table, with much adoring of Timon, and to show their loves each singles out an Amazon, and all dance, men with women, a lofty strain or two to the hautboys, and cease.]
TIMON.
You have done our pleasures much grace, fair ladies,
Set a fair fashion on our entertainment,
Which was not half so beautiful and kind.
You have added worth unto ’t and lustre,
And entertained me with mine own device.
I am to thank you for ’t.
FIRST LADY.
My lord, you take us even at the best.