John Marston

“ Worthy thy wife: go with as high a hand
As worth can rear. I will not stay my lord.
Fight for our country; vent thy youthful heat
In field, not beds: the fruit of honour, Fame,
Be rather gotten than the oft disgrace
Of hapless parents, children. Go, best man,
And make me proud to be a soldier’s wife,
That values his renown above faint pleasures: 220
Think every honour that doth grace thy sword
Trebles my love. By thee I have no lust
But of thy glory. Best lights of heaven with thee!
Like wonder, stand or fall; so, though thou die,
My fortunes may be wretched, but not I.
Mass. ”

“ Herod. Why, Fawn, why?
Herc. ’Fore heaven! you are blest with three rare graces—fine linen, clean linings, a sanguine complexion, and I am sure, an excellent wit, for you are a gentleman born. 60
Herod. Thank thee, sweet Fawn; but why is clean linen such a grace, I prithee?
Herc. O, my excellent and inward dearly-approved friend! What’s your name, sir? Clean linen is the first our life craves, and the last our death enjoys.
Herod. But what hope rests for Nymphadoro? Thou art now within the buttons of the prince. Shall the duke his father marry the lady?
Herc. ’Tis to be hoped not. ”

“ Exit Malheureux.
Free. Now, repentance, the fool’s whip, seize thee;
Nay, if there be no means I’ll be thy friend,
But not thy vices’; and with greatest sense
I’ll force thee feel thy errors to the worst;
The wildest of dangers thou shalt sink into.
No jeweller shall see me; I will lurk
Where none shall know or think; close I’ll withdraw,
And leave thee with two friends—a whore and knave;
But is this virtue in me? No, not pure, 40
Nothing extremely best with us endures ”

“ Palace of the Duke of Urbin.
Enter Faunus and Nymphadoro.
Nym. Faith, Fawn, ’tis my humour, the natural sin of my sanguine complexion. I am most enforcedly in love with all women, almost affecting them all with an equal flame.
Herc. An excellent justice of an upright virtue: you love all God’s creatures with an unpartial affection.
Nym. Right; neither am I inconstant to any one in particular.
Herc. Tho’ you love all in general, true; for when you vow a most devoted love to one, you swear not to tender a most devoted love to another; and indeed why should any man over-love anything? ”

“ O, sir, this were too great ambition! Well, I love and am beloved of a great many; for I court all in the way of honour, in the trade of marriage, Fawn; but above all, I affect the princess,—she’s my utmost end. O, I love a lady whose beauty is joined with fortune, beyond all! yet one of beauty without fortune, for some uses; nay, one of fortune without beauty, for some ends; but never any that has neither fortune nor beauty, but for necessity ”

“ Yet ’tis bad chance: states must not stick too nice,
For Massinissa’s death sense bids forgive: 70
Beware t’offend great men, and let them live;
For ’tis of empire’s body the main arm,—
He that will do no good shall do no harm.
You have my mind.
Gel. Although a stage-like passion, and weak heat,
Full of an empty wording, might suit age,
Know I’ll speak strongly truth. Lords, ne’er mistrust,
That he who’ll not betray a private man
For his country, will ne’er betray his country
For private men; then give Gelosso faith. ”

“ But, sir, I will do what a man of my form may do; and laugh on, laugh on, do Sir Amorous—you have a lady, too. 311
Herod. But, my sweet lord——
Zuc. Do not anger me, lest I most dreadfully curse thee, and wish thee married! O, Zuccone, spit white, spit thy gall out. The only boon I crave of Heaven is——But to have my honours inherited by a bastard! I will be most tyrannous—bloodily tyrannous in my revenge, and most terrible in my curses! Live to grow blind with lust, senseless with use, loathed after, flattered before, hated always, trusted never, abhorred ever! ”

“ Shall Sophonisba then
With me go bound, and wait on Scipio’s wheel?
When th’ whole world’s giddy, one man cannot reel.
Mass. Starve thy lean hopes; and, Romans, now behold
A sight would sad the gods, make Phœbus cold.
Organ and recorders play to a single voice. Enter in the meantime the mournful solemnity of Massinissa’s presenting Sophonisba’s body.
Look, Scipio, see what hard shift we make
To keep our vows. Here, take, I yield her thee;
And Sophonisba, I keep vow, thou’rt still free.
Sy. Burst, my vex’d heart: the torture that most racks 40
An enemy is his foe’s royal acts. ”

“ Well, Fawn, whom shall I marry now? O Heaven! that God made for a man no other means of procreation and maintaining the world peopled but by women! O! [254] that we could increase like roses, by being slipp’d one from another, [255] —or like flies, procreate with blowing, or any other way than by a woman,—by women, who have no reason in their love or mercy in their hate, no rule in their pity, no pity in their revenge, no judgment to speak, and yet no patience to hold their tongues;
Man’s opposite, the more held down, they swell; 410
Above them naught but will, beneath them naught but hell. ”

“ Conscience does not repine. Were I to bite an honest gentleman, a poor grogaran poet, or a penurious parson that had but ten pigs’ tails in a twelvemonth, and, for want of learning, had but one good stool in a fortnight, I were damn’d beyond the works of supererogation; but to wring the withers of my gouty-barm’d spiggod-frigging jumbler of elements, Mulligrub, I hold it as lawful as sheep-shearing, taking eggs from hens, caudles from asses, or butter’d shrimps from horses—they make no use of them, were not provided for them. And, therefore, worshipful Cocledemoy, hang toasts! ”

“ Nay, faith, my conceiving days be done. Marry for kissing, I’ll defend that; that’s within my compass; but for my own part, here’s Mistress Beatrice is to be married with the grace of God; a fine gentleman he is shall have her, and I warrant a strong; he has a leg like a post, a nose like a lion, a brow like a bull, and a beard of most fair expectation: this week you must marry him, and I now will read a lecture to you both, how you shall behave yourselves to your husbands the first month of your nuptial ”

“ Ren. My prince and brother, let my blood and love Challenge the freedom of one question.
Herc. You have’t.
Ren. Why, in your steadier age, in strength of life
And firmest wit of time, will you break forth 10
Those stricter limits of regardful state
(Which with severe distinction you still kept) ,
And now to unknown dangers you’ll give up
Yourself, Ferrara’s duke, and in yourself
The state and us? O, my loved brother!
Honour avoids not only just defame,
But flies all means that may ill voice his name. 17
Herc. ”

“ Physicians abuse remedies; lawyers spoil the law; and women only shame women. You ha’ vow’d my death?
Mal. My lust, not I, before my reason would; yet I must use her. That I, a man of sense, should conceive endless pleasure in a body whose soul I know to be so hideously black! 259
Free. That a man at twenty-three should cry, O sweet pleasure! and at forty-three should sigh, O sharp pox! But consider man furnished with omnipotence, and you overthrow him; thou must cool thy impatient appetite. ’Tis fate, ’tis fate!
Mal. I do malign my creation that I am subject to passion. ”

“ Who hath read the book of chance? No, cherish your hope, sweeten your imaginations with thoughts of—ah! why, women are the most giddy, uncertain motions under heaven. ’Tis neither proportion of body, virtue of mind, amplitude of fortune, greatness of blood, but only mere chanceful appetite, sways them; which makes some one like a man, be it but for the paring of his nails. Via! as for inequality, art not a gentleman? ”

“ Things hoped with fear, and got with strugglings, are men’s high pleasures, when duty palls and flats their appetite. 41
Tyse. What a tart monkey is this! By heaven! if thou hadst not so much wit, I could find in my heart to marry thee. Faith, bear with me for all this!
Cris. Bear with thee? I wonder how thy mother could bear thee ten months in her belly, when I cannot endure thee two hours in mine eye.
Tyse. Alas, for your sweet soul! By the Lord, you are grown a proud, scurvy, apish, idle, disdainful, scoffing—God’s foot! ”

“ Room in Sir Hubert Subboys’ house.
Enter Sir Hubert, Sir Lionel, Beatrice, Crispinella, and Nurse, Tysefew following.
Sir Lio. Did no one see him since?—pray God!—nay, all is well.
A little heat; what? he is but withdrawn;
And yet I would to God!—but fear you nothing.
Bea. Pray God that all be well, or would I were not!
Tyse. He’s not to be found, sir, anywhere.
Sir Lio. You must not make a heavy face presage an ill event. I like your sister well, she’s quick and lively: would she would marry, faith.
Cri. Marry, nay and I would marry, methinks an old man’s a quiet thing. ”

“ I cannot contain,—he saw thee not that left thee.
If there be wisdom, reason, honour, grace,
Of any foolishly-esteemèd virtue,
In giving o’er possession of such beauty,
Let me be vicious, so I may be loved.
Passion, I am thy slave; sweet, it shall be my grace,
That I account thy love my only virtue:
Shall I swear I am thy most vowèd servant?
Fra. Mine vowed? Go! go! go! I cannot more of love. No! no! no! You bin all unconstant. O unfaithful men—tyrants—betrayers—de very enjoying us loseth us; and when you only ha’ made us hateful, you only hate us. ”

“ At the other door, Massinissa and Jugurth. Cornets sound marches.
Mass. Let not the virtue of the world suspect
Sad Massinissa’s faith; nor once condemn
Our just revolt. Carthage first gave me life;
Her ground gave food, her air first lent me breath:
The earth was made for men, not men for earth.
Scipio, I do not thank the gods for life,
Much less vile men, or earth; know, best of lords,
It is a happy being, breath well famed,
For which Jove sees these thus. [349] Men, be not fool’d
With piety to place, tradition’s fear; 10
A just man’s country Jove makes everywhere. ”

“ Beatrice’s chamber.
Enter Beatrice and Crispinella.
Bea. Sister, cannot a woman kill herself? is it not lawful to die when we should not live?
Cri. O sister, ’tis a question not for us; we must do what God will.
Bea. What God will? Alas, can torment be His glory, or our grief His pleasure! Does not the nurse’s nipple, juiced over with wormwood, bid the child it should not suck? And does not Heaven, when it hath made our breath bitter unto us, say we should not live? ”

“ Exeunt Dulcimel and Philocalia.
I will not lose the glory of reproof.
Is this the office of ambassadors,
My Lord Tiberio?
Nay, duty of a son; nay, piety of a man?—
(A figure call’d in art gradatio:
With some learned, Climax) —to court a royal lady
For’s master, father, or perchance his friend,
And yet intend the purchase of his beauty 410
To his own use?
Tib. Your grace doth much amaze me.
Gon. Ay, feign dissemble; ’las! we are now grown old, weak-sighted; alas! any one fools us.
Tib. I deeply vow, my lord——
Gon. Peace, be not damn’d, have pity on your soul. ”

“ Phi. Only you shall then deserve such a husband. O love, how violent are thy passages!
Dul. Pish, Philocalia! ’tis against the nature of love not to be violent.
Phi. And against the condition of violence to be constant.
Dul. Constancy?—constancy and patience are virtues in no living creatures but centinels and anglers. Here’s our father!
Enter Gonzago, Hercules, and Granuffo.
Gon. What, did he think to walk invisibly before our eyes? And he had Gyges’ ring I would find him.
Herc. ’Fore Jove, you rated him with emphasis.
Gon. Did we not shake the prince with energy? ”

“ She, whose noble industries hath made her breast rich in true glories and undying habilities? she, that whilst other ladies spend the life of earth, Time, in reading their glass, their jewels, and (the shame of poesy) lustful sonnets, gives her soul meditations—those meditations wings that cleave the air, fan bright celestial fires, whose true reflection makes her see herself and them? she whose pity is ever above her envy, loving nothing less than insolent prosperity, and pitying nothing more than virtue destitute of fortune? ”

“ Gar. Ignoble villain! that I might but see thee wretched without pity and recovery! Well!
Enter Herod and Nymphadoro.
Herc. Stand, Herod; you are full met, sir. 100
Herod. But not met full, sir. I am as gaunt as a hunting gelding after three train’d scents! ’Fore Venus, Fawn, I have been shaling [233] of peascods. Upon [234] four great madonnas have I this afternoon grafted the forked tree!
Herc. Is’t possible?
Herod. Possible! Fie on this satiety!—’tis a dull, blunt, weary, and drowsy passion. Who would be a proper fellow to be thus greedily devoured and swallowed among ladies? ”