Cyril Tourneur

“ Bor. That revolution is too short, methinks.
If this life comprehends our happiness,
How foolish to desire to die so soon!
And if our time runs home unto the length
Of nature, how improvident it were
To spend our substance on a minute's pleasure,
And after, live an age in misery!
D'Am. So thou conclud'st that pleasure only flows
Upon the stream of riches?
Bor. Wealth is lord
Of all felicity.
D'Am. 'Tis, oracle.
For what's a man that's honest without wealth?
Bor. Both miserable and contemptible.
D'Am. He's worse, Borachio. ”

“ I am Duchess of Malfi still.
Bos. That makes thy sleeps so broken:
Glories, like glow-worms, afar off shine bright,
But looked to near, have neither heat nor light.
Duch. Thou art very plain.
Bos. My trade is to flatter the dead, not the living; I am a tomb-maker.
Duch. And thou comest to make my tomb?
Bos. Yes.
Duch. Let me be a little merry:—of what stuff wilt thou make it?
Bos. Nay, resolve me first, of what fashion?
Duch. Why do we grow fantastical in our death-bed? do we affect fashion in the grave? ”

“ Fourscore, I hope, my lord.
2nd Noble. And fivescore, I.
3rd Noble. But 'tis my hope, my lord, you shall ne'er die.
Lus. Give me thy hand; these others I rebuke:
He that hopes so is fittest for a duke:
Thou shalt sit next me; take your places, lords;
We're ready now for sports; let 'em set on:
You thing! we shall forget you quite anon!
3rd Noble. I hear 'em coming, my lord.
Enter the Masque of revengers: Vendice and Hippolito, with two Lords.
Lus. Ah, 'tis well!
Brothers and bastard, you dance next in hell! ”

“ Wine, i' faith, my lord, with lees would serve his turn.—
"Your sad imprisonment I'll soon uncharm,
And with a princely uncontrollèd arm
Lead you to Florence, where my love and care
Shall hang your wishes in my silver hair."—
A halter on his strange equivocation!—
"Nor for my years return me the sad willow:
Who prefer blossoms before fruit that's mellow?"—
Rotten, on my knowledge, with lying too long i' the bed-straw—
"And all the lines of age this line convinces,
The gods never wax old, no more do princes."—
A pox on't, tear it; let's have no more atheists, for God's sake. ”

“ Enter Vendice, disguised.
Ven. My honoured lord.
Lus. Away! prythee, forsake us: hereafter we'll not know thee.
Ven. Not know me, my lord! your lordship cannot choose.
Lus. Begone, I say: thou art a false knave.
Ven. Why, the easier to be known, my lord.
Lus. Pish! I shall prove too bitter, with a word
Make thee a perpetual prisoner,
And lay this iron age upon thee.
Ven. Mum!
For there's a doom would make a woman dumb.
Missing the bastard—next him—the wind's come about:
Now 'tis my brother's turn to stay, mine to go out. ”

“ When she first saw Brachiano: you, 'tis said,
Were made his engine and his stalking-horse,
To undo my sister.
Flam. I am a kind of path
To her and mine own preferment.
Mar. Your ruin.
Flam. Hum! thou art a soldier,
Follow'st the great duke, feed'st his victories,
As witches do their serviceable spirits,
Even with thy prodigal blood: what hast got,
But, like the wealth of captains, a poor handful,
Which in thy palm thou bear'st as men hold water?
Seeking to gripe it fast, the frail reward
Steals through thy fingers.
Mar. Sir! ”

“ Exe. In lifting up the axe
I think he's knocked his brains out.
D'Am. What murderer was he that lifted up
My hand against my head?
1st Judge. None but yourself, my lord.
D'Am. I thought he was a murderer that did it.
1st Judge. God forbid!
D'Am. Forbid? You lie, judge. He commanded it.
To tell thee that man's wisdom is a fool.
I came to thee for judgment, and thou think'st
Thyself a wise man, I outreached thy wit
And made thy justice murder's instrument,
In Castabella's death and in Charlemont's,
To crown my murder of Montferrers with
A safe possession of his wealthy state. ”

“ The Revenger's Tragedy is an entangled web of lust, incest, fratricide, rape, adultery, mutual suspicion, hate, and bloodshed, through which runs, like a thread of glittering copper, the vengeance of a cynical plague-fretted spirit. Vendice emerges from the tainted crew of Duke and Duchess, Lussurioso, Spurio and Junior, Ambitioso and Supervacuo, with a kind of blasted splendour. They are curling and engendering, a brood of flat-headed asps, in the slime of their filthy appetites and gross ambitions. He treads and tramples, on them all. ”

“ Thou art a box of worm-seed, at best but a salvatory of green mummy. What's this flesh? a little crudded milk, fantastical puff-paste. Our bodies are weaker than those paper-prisons boys use to keep flies in; more contemptible, since ours is to preserve earth-worms. Didst thou ever see a lark in a cage? Such is the soul in the body: this world is like her little turf of grass, and the Heaven o'er our heads, like her looking-glass, only gives us a miserable knowledge of the small compass of our prison.
Duch. Am not I thy duchess? ”

“ Ven. Heart! was't not for your good, my lord?
Ant. My good! Away with 'em: such an old man as he!
You, that would murder him, would murder me.
Ven. Is't come about?
Hip. 'Sfoot, brother, you begun.
Ven. May not we set as well as the duke's son?
Thou hast no conscience, are we not revenged?
Is there one enemy left alive amongst those?
'Tis time to die, when we're ourselves our foes:
When murderers shut deeds close, this curse does seal 'em:
If none disclose 'em, they themselves reveal 'em! ”

“ Exeunt Francisco de Medicis, Monticelso, and Giovanni. Flamineo retires.
Re-enter Isabella.
You are in health, we see.
Isab. And above health,
To see my lord well.
Brach. So. I wonder much
What amorous whirlwind hurried you to Rome.
Isab. Devotion, my lord.
Brach. Devotion!
Is your soul charged with any grievous sin?
Isab. 'Tis burdened with too many; and I think,
The oftener that we cast our reckonings up,
Our sleeps will be the sounder.
Brach. Take your chamber.
Isab. Nay, my dear lord, I will not have you angry:
Doth not my absence from you, now two months,
Merit one kiss? ”

“ SCENE IV.—An Apartment in D'Amville's Mansion.
Enter D'Amville and Castabella.
D'Am. Daughter, you do not well to urge me. I
Ha' done no more than justice. Charlemont
Shall die and rot in prison, and 'tis just.
Cast. O father, mercy is an attribute
As high as justice, an essential part
Of his unbounded goodness, whose divine
Impression, form, and image man should bear!
And, methinks, man should love to imitate
His mercy, since the only countenance
Of justice were destruction, if the sweet
And loving favour of his mercy did
Not mediate between it and our weakness. ”

“ O gold, what a god art thou! and O man, what a devil art thou to be tempted by that cursed mineral! Your diversivolent lawyer, mark him: knaves turn informers, as maggots turn to flies; you may catch gudgeons with either. A cardinal! I would he would hear me: there's nothing so holy but money will corrupt and putrify it, like victual under the line. You are happy in England, my lord: here they sell justice with those weights they press men to death with. O horrible salary!
Eng. Am. Fie, fie, Flamineo! ”

“ John Webster.
COMMENDATORY VERSES. IN THE JUST WORTH OF THAT WELL-DESERVER, MR. JOHN WEBSTER, AND UPON THIS MASTER-PIECE OF TRAGEDY.
In this thou imitat'st one rich and wise,
That sees his good deeds done before he dies:
As he by works, thou by this work of fame
Hath well provided for thy living name.
To trust to others' honourings is worth's crime,
Thy monument is raised in thy life-time;
And 'tis most just; for every worthy man
Is his own marble, and his merit can
Cut him to any figure, and express
More art than death's cathedral palaces
Where royal ashes keep their court. ”

“ Would I had rotted in some surgeon's house at Venice, built upon the pox as well as on piles, ere I had served Brachiano!
Savoy Am. You must have comfort.
Flam. Your comfortable words are like honey; they relish well in your mouth that's whole, but in mine that's wounded they go down as if the sting of the bee were in them. O, they have wrought their purpose cunningly, as if they would not seem to do it of malice! In this a politician imitates the devil, as the devil imitates a cannon; wheresoever he comes to do mischief, he comes with his backside towards you. ”

“ Ant. 'Tis a noble old fellow.
Delio. What course do you mean to take, Antonio?
Ant. This night I mean to venture all my fortune,
Which is no more than a poor lingering life,
To the cardinal's worst of malice: I have got
Private access to his chamber; and intend
To visit him about the mid of night,
As once his brother did our noble duchess. ”

“ Churchmen turned revellers!
Carlo. Isabella! Isabella!
Lod. Do you know us now?
Flam. Lodovico! and Gasparo!
Lod. Yes; and that Moor the duke gave pension to
Was the great Duke of Florence.
Vit. Cor. O, we are lost!
Flam. You shall not take justice from forth my hands,—
O, let me kill her!—I'll cut my safety
Through your coats of steel. Fate's a spaniel,
We cannot beat it from us. What remains now?
Let all that do ill, take this precedent,—
Man may his fate foresee, but not prevent:
And of all axioms this shall win the prize,—
'Tis better to be fortunate than wise. ”

“ I'll instantly steal forth the Prince Giovanni,
And make for Padua. You two with your old mother,
And young Marcello that attends on Florence,
If you can work him to it, follow me:
I will advance you all:—for you, Vittoria,
Think of a duchess' title.
Flam. Lo you, sister!—
Stay, my lord; I'll tell you a tale. The crocodile, which lives in the river Nilus, hath a worm breeds i' the teeth of't, which puts it to extreme anguish: a little bird, no bigger than a wren, is barber-surgeon to this crocodile; flies into the jaws of't, picks out the worm, and brings present remedy. ”

“ SCENE II.—A Hall of Justice.
Enter the Duke, Lussurioso, the Duchess, Spurio, Ambitioso, and Supervacuo; the Duchess' Youngest Son brought out by Officers. Two Judges.
Duke. Duchess, it is your youngest son, we're sorry
His violent act has e'en drawn blood of honour,
And stained our honours;
Thrown ink upon the forehead of our state;
Which envious spirits will dip their pens into
After our death; and blot us in our tombs:
For that which would seem treason in our lives
Is laughter, when we're dead. ”

“ Know, many glorious women that are famed
For masculine virtue have been vicious,
Only a happier silence did betide them:
She hath no faults who hath the art to hide them.
Vit. Cor. My soul, like to a ship in a black storm,
Is driven, I know not whither.
Flam. Then cast anchor.
Prosperity doth bewitch men, seeming clear;
But seas do laugh, show white, when rocks are near.
We cease to grieve, cease to be fortune's slaves,
Nay, cease to die, by dying. Art thou gone?
And thou so near the bottom? false report,
Which says that women vie with the nine Muses
For nine tough durable lives! ”

“ Vit. Cor. You shall not kill her first; behold my breast:
I will be waited on in death; my servant
Shall never go before me.
Gas. Are you so brave?
Vit. Cor. Yes, I shall welcome death
As princes do some great ambassadors;
I'll meet thy weapon half way.
Lod. Thou dost tremble:
Methinks fear should dissolve thee into air.
Vit. Cor. O, thou art deceived, I am too true a woman:
Conceit can never kill me. I'll tell thee what,
I will not in my death shed one base tear;
Or if look pale, for want of blood, not fear.
Carlo. Thou art my task, black Fury,
Zanche. ”

“ O, my lord,
The law doth sometimes mediate, thinks it good
Not ever to steep violent sins in blood:
This gentle penance may both end your crimes,
And in the example better these bad times.
Lod. So; but I wonder, then, some great men scape
This banishment: there's Paulo Giordano Ursini,
The Duke of Brachiano, now lives in Rome,
And by close panderism seeks to prostitute
The honour of Vittoria Corombona;
Vittoria, she that might have got my pardon
For one kiss to the duke.
Ant. Have a full man within you. ”

“ He wounds the Cardinal, and, in the scuffle, gives Bosola his death-wound.
There flies your ransom.
Card. O justice!
I suffer now for what hath former bin:
Sorrow is held the eldest child of sin.
Ferd. Now you're brave fellows. Cæsar's fortune was harder than Pompey's; Cæsar died in the arms of prosperity, Pompey at the feet of disgrace. You both died in the field. The pain's nothing: pain many times is taken away with the apprehension of greater, as the toothache with the sight of the barber that comes to pull it out: there's philosophy for you. ”

“ Where, my lord?—I smell a fox.
D'Am. Here i' the churchyard.
Lang. Tush! tush! their walking spirits are mere imaginary fables. There's no such thing in rerum natura. Here is a man slain. And with the spirit of consideration I rather think him to be the murderer got into that disguise than any such fantastic toy.
D'Am. My brains begin to put themselves in order. I apprehend thee now.—'Tis e'en so.—Borachio, I will search the centre, but I'll find the murderer. ”

“ Exeunt Antonio and his Son.
Duch. My laurel is all withered.
Cari. Look, madam, what a troop of armèd men
Make towards us.
Duch. O, they are very welcome:
When Fortune's wheel is over-charged with princes,
The weight makes it move swift: I would have my ruin
Be sudden.
Re-enter Bosola visarded, with a Guard.
I am your adventure, am I not?
Bos. You are: you must see your husband no more.
Duch. What devil art thou that counterfeit'st Heaven's thunder? ”