ACT V
SCENE I. Sicilia. A Room in the palace of Leontes.
Enter Leontes, Cleomenes, Dion, Paulina and others.
CLEOMENES
Sir, you have done enough, and have perform’d
A saint-like sorrow: no fault could you make
Which you have not redeem’d; indeed, paid down
More penitence than done trespass: at the last,
Do as the heavens have done, forget your evil;
With them, forgive yourself.
LEONTES.
Whilst I remember
Her and her virtues, I cannot forget
My blemishes in them; and so still think of
The wrong I did myself: which was so much
That heirless it hath made my kingdom, and
Destroy’d the sweet’st companion that e’er man
Bred his hopes out of.
PAULINA.
True, too true, my lord.
If, one by one, you wedded all the world,
Or from the all that are took something good,
To make a perfect woman, she you kill’d
Would be unparallel’d.
LEONTES.
I think so. Kill’d!
She I kill’d! I did so: but thou strik’st me
Sorely, to say I did: it is as bitter
Upon thy tongue as in my thought. Now, good now,
Say so but seldom.
CLEOMENES
Not at all, good lady.
You might have spoken a thousand things that would
Have done the time more benefit and grac’d
Your kindness better.
PAULINA.
You are one of those
Would have him wed again.
DION.
If you would not so,
You pity not the state, nor the remembrance
Of his most sovereign name; consider little
What dangers, by his highness’ fail of issue,
May drop upon his kingdom, and devour
Incertain lookers-on. What were more holy
Than to rejoice the former queen is well?
What holier than, for royalty’s repair,
For present comfort, and for future good,
To bless the bed of majesty again
With a sweet fellow to ’t?