Abhorred villain! Unnatural, detested, brutish villain!
Worse than brutish! Go, sirrah, seek him. I'll appre- hend him. Abominable villain! Where is he? (I, ii, 75-78)
He does not even stop to consider whether Edgar would do such a thing because he cannot see into Edgar's character. "He did bewray his practice, and received this hurt you see, striving to apprehend him." (II, i, 106-107) At this point, Gloucester's life is headed down a path of damnation similar to Lear's because of a similar lack of sight.
Lear made a monumental mistake when he handed over the British rule to his two evil daughters, Regan and Goneril. This is what eventually led to his mental breakdown and the deaths of many of the heads of Britain. If he had only chosen to keep control over his Kingdom or to give up control to someone trustworthy, no one would have had to suffer as they did. Some people knew he was committing a terrible folly, especially the Earl of Kent. This is apparent when he says:
Thinkest thou that duty shall have dread to speak
When power to flattery bows? To plainness honour's bond
When majesty falls to folly. Reserve thy state
And in thy best consideration …show more content…
Throughout this play, Shakespeare is saying that the world cannot truly be seen with the eye, but with the heart. The physical world that the eye can detect can accordingly hide its evils with physical attributes, and thus clear vision cannot result from the eye alone. Lear's downfall was a result of his failure to comprehend that appearances do not always represent reality. Gloucester avoided a similar demise by learning the relationship between appearance and reality. If Lear had learned to look with more than just his eyes before the end, he might have avoided this tragedy. These two tragic stories unfolding at the same time gave the play a great