Poor naked wretches, whereso’er you are,
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm,
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides,
Your loop’d and window’d raggedness, defend you
From seasons such as these? O, 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.
– William Shakespeare
King Lear, Act 3, Scene 4. Being homeless now himself, Lear shows some compassion for the vulnerability of the homeless and poor in the terrible storm. Prior to this he had never really thought about their plight. But in the storm he is learning to empathize with those at the bottom of society. He acknowledges that as King when he had the power and authority to effect social change he could have done more for them. Men who live in luxury should expose themselves to what the poor and homeless feel, he declares, so they can give their surplus wealth to them and make the world a more just place.