Act I

On a ship at sea: a tempestuous noise of thunder and lightning heard.

The king and prince at prayers! let’s assist them, For our case is as theirs.

We are merely cheated of our lives by drunkards: This wide-chapp’d rascal⁠—would thou mightst lie drowning The washing of ten tides!

He’ll be hang’d yet, Though every drop of water swear against it And gape at widest to glut him.

A confused noise within: “Mercy on us!” “We split, we split!”⁠—“Farewell, my wife and children!”⁠— “Farewell, brother!”⁠—“We split, we split, we split!”

The island. Before Prospero’s cell.

If by your art, my dearest father, you have Put the wild waters in this roar, allay them. The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch, But that the sea, mounting to the welkin’s cheek, Dashes the fire out. O, I have suffered With those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel, Who had, no doubt, some noble creature in her, Dash’d all to pieces. O, the cry did knock Against my very heart. Poor souls, they perish’d. Had I been any god of power, I would Have sunk the sea within the earth or ere It should the good ship so have swallow’d and The fraughting souls within her.

Be collected: No more amazement: tell your piteous heart There’s no harm done.

No harm. I have done nothing but in care of thee, Of thee, my dear one, thee, my daughter, who Art ignorant of what thou art, nought knowing Of whence I am, nor that I am more better Than Prospero, master of a full poor cell, And thy no greater father.

More to know Did never meddle with my thoughts.

’Tis time I should inform thee farther. Lend thy hand, And pluck my magic garment from me. So: Lays down his mantle. Lie there, my art. Wipe thou thine eyes; have comfort. The direful spectacle of the wreck, which touch’d The very virtue of compassion in thee, I have with such provision in mine art So safely ordered that there is no soul⁠— No, not so much perdition as an hair Betid to any creature in the vessel Which thou heard’st cry, which thou saw’st sink. Sit down; For thou must now know farther.

You have often Begun to tell me what I am, but stopp’d And left me to a bootless inquisition, Concluding “Stay: not yet.”

The hour’s now come; The very minute bids thee ope thine ear; Obey and be attentive. Canst thou remember A time before we came unto this cell? I do not think thou canst, for then thou wast not Out three years old.

By what? by any other house or person? Of any thing the image tell me that Hath kept with thy remembrance.

’Tis far off And rather like a dream than an assurance That my remembrance warrants. Had I not Four or five women once that tended me?

Thou hadst, and more, Miranda. But how is it That this lives in thy mind? What seest thou else In the dark backward and abysm of time? If thou remember’st aught ere thou camest here, How thou camest here thou mayst.