GLOUCESTER:

1. As noted above, [1.2.108-121, p. 35] Gloucester comes in and says that oracles predict disaster.

“These late eclipses in the sun and moon portend no good to us...` 

(Do these things come true?)

2. Before his eyes are put out he says

"All cruels else subscribe,
but I shall see the winged vengeance overtake such children"
[3.7.79-80, p. 163] 

3. Gloucester comes to believe that the gods are simply playing with man:

"As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods,
they kill us for their sport" [4.1.41-42, p. 173]

Basically saying this is like the story of Job -- God and Satan making a wager.

KENT:
[2.2.188-89, p. 95]

Kent: Fortune good night; smile once more, turn thy wheel.

[4.3.38-41, p. 187]
"It is the stars,/ the stars above us, govern our conditions,/
Else one self mate and make could not beget/
Such different issues."

EDGAR:

1. Continuously moralizes both as himself and as Tom o'Bedlam.

Typical moralizing speeches by Edgar:
[3.4.86-89, p. 141]

"Take heed o' th' foul fiend. Obey thy parents, keep thy
word's justice, swear not, commit not with man's sworn
spouse, set not thy sweet heart on proud array. Tom's a-cold."

(Almost a parody of the ten commandments.)

 [3.6.111-120, p. 157]
"When we our betters see bearing our woes,
We scarcely think our miseries our foes.
Who alone suffers, suffers most in the mind…."

[4.1. 1-6, p. 171]
“Yet better thus and known to be contemned,
Than still contemned and flattered. To be worst,
The lowest and most dejected thing of fortune,
Stands still in esperance, lives not in fear.
The lamentable change is from the best;
The worst returns to laughter."

But then when he sees his father, blinded, he says:

"O gods, who is't can say 'I am the worst'?

I am worse than e'er I was
And worse I may be yet. The worst is no
So long as we can say, 'This is the worst.'

Even after his father shows up blind, instead of revealing himself to his father, and comforting him, he goes off with him to Dover to help him "commit suicide." Why?

"Thy Life's a Miracle" [4.6.69, p. 199]

But what happens when he finally reveals himself to his father? [5.3. 217-234, pp. 249-51]

LEAR:
1. In the first half of the play Lear appeals constantly to the gods and to nature. Why?

2. Divine right of kings

[1.1.120. p. 15] Swears to the gods an oath banishing Cordelia

Video: McKellan on Lear and faith

[1.4. 289-303, pp. 59-61] Cursing Goneril with sterility

[2.4.180-190, p. 109] (cursing Goneril again)
"You nimble lightnings, dart your blinding flames
Into her scornful eyes! Infect her beauty,
you fen-sucked fogs, drawn by the powerful sun,
To fall and blister!"

[2.4.313-315, p. 117]
"You see me here, gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age, and wretched in both."

[2.4.218, p. 111]
"O Heavens!/ If you do love old men, if your sweet sway/
Allow obedience, if you yourselves are old,/
Make it your cause; send down, and take my part."

Act 3 Scene 2
Storm seems unnatural in intensity, and Lear keeps trying to make it mean something

[3.2.1 p. 127]
"Blow winds and crack your cheeks, rage, blow"

[3.2.52-63 p. 131]
“Let the great gods
That keep this dreadful pudder o’er our heads
Find out their enemies now….
I am a man more sinned against than sinning."

EXAMPLES OF THE HEALING POWER OF COMPASSION

A. Metaphor of motherhood:

Edgar says about himself:
“A most poor man, made tame to Fortune's blows;
Who, by the art of known and feeling sorrows,
Am pregnant to good pity."
[4.4.218-20]

But is Edgar “pregnant to good pity?”

B. Does Lear learn compassion?

The Fool tells him:
“Fathers that wear rags
Do make their children blind,
But fathers that bear bags
Shall see their children kind.
Fortune, that arrant whore,
Ne’er turns the key to th’ poor.”

Lear: [2.4. 62-64, p. 101]
"Oh, how this mother swells up toward my heart!
Hysterica passio, down, thy climbing sorrow!
Thy element's below."

Scene outside Tom o' Bedlam's hut: Blow winds etc. (3. 2 video of different versions)

Right after the line " a man more sinned against than sinning" he suddenly changes, and begins to think about other people besides himself.

p. 131 Lear starts to act caring toward the fool

p 137 Lear tells the fool to go into the hovel first

[3.4. 32-41. p. 137]
Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your looped and windowed raggedness defend you
From seasons such as these? Oh, I have ta’en
Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp.
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel,
That thou may’st shake the superflux to them
And show the heavens more just.”

Gloucester, after his eyes are gouged out, and thinks he is going to commit suicide offers his purse to Edgar, thinking him a mad beggar:

[4.1. 74-80, pp. 175-76]
“Here take this purse, thou whom the heavens’ plagues
Have humbled to all strokes. Heavens, deal so still:
Let the superfluous and the lust-dieted man,
That slaves your ordinance, that will not see
Because he does not feel, fell your power quickly.
So distribution should undo excess
And each man have enough.”