• Choose a category
• All
• Classic-Fiction

And such an act above all name's a sin

Not to be blotted out; heaven pardon me!

She's banisht from my bosom now for ever.

To lowest ebbes men justly hope a flood;

When vice grows barren, all desires are good.

Enter Waiting Gentlewoman with a Jewel.

GENT.

The noble Prince, I take it, sir?

PRINCE.

You speak me what I should be, Lady.

GENT.

Know, by that name, sir, Queen Artesia greets you.

PRINCE.

Alas, good vertue, how is she mistaken!

GENT.

Commanding her affection in this Jewel, sir.

PRINCE.

She binds my service to her: ha! a Jewel; 'tis

A fair one, trust me, and methinks, it much

Resembles something I have seen with her.

GEN.

It is an artificial crab, Sir.

PRINCE.

A creature that geos backward.

GENT.

True, from the way it looks.

PRINCE.

There is no moral in it aludes to her self?

GENT.

'Tis your construction gives you that, sir;

She's a woman.

PRINCE.

And, like this, may use her legs and eyes

Two several ways.

GENT.

Just like the Sea-crab,

Which on the Mussel prayes, whils he bills at a stone.

PRINCE.

Pretty in troth. Prithee, tell me, art thou honest?

GENT.

I hope I seem no other, sir.

PRINCE.

And those that seem so are sometimes bad enough.

GENT.

If they will accuse themselves for want of witness,

Let them, I am not so foolish.

PRINCE.

I see th'art wise.

Come, speak me truly: what is the greatest sin?

GENT.

That which man never acted; what has been done

Is as the least, common to all as one.

PRINCE.

Dost think thy Lady is of thy opinion?

GENT.

She's a bad Scholar else; I have brought her up,

And she dares owe me still.

PRINCE.

I, 'tis a fault in greatness, they dare owe

Many, e're they pay one. But darest thou

Expose thy scholar to my examining?

GENT.

Yes, in good troth, sir, and pray put her to't too;

'Tis a hard lesson, if she answer it not.

PRINCE.

Thou know'st the hardest?

GENT.

As far as a woman may, sir.

PRINCE.

I commend thy plainness.

When wilt thou bring me to thy Lady?

GENT.

Next opportunity I attend you, sir.

PRINCE.

Thanks, take this, and commend me to her.

GENT.

Think of your Sea-crab, sir, I pray.

(Exit.

PRINCE.

Oh, by any means, Lady -

What should all this tend to?

If it be Love, or Lust, that thus incites her,

The sin is horrid and incestuous;

If to betray my life, what hopes she by it?

Yes, it may be a practice 'twist themselves,

To expel the Brittains and ensure the State

Through our destructions; all this may be

Valid, with a deeper reach in villany

Then all my thoughts can guess at; - however,

I will confer with her, and if I finde

Lust hath given Life to Envy in her minde,

I may prevent the danger: so men wise

By the same step by which they fell, may rise.

Vices are Vertues, if so thought and seen,

And Trees with foulest roots branch soonest green.

(Exit.

ACT 3.

Scene I.

Before the Palace of King AURELIUS.)

Enter CLOWN and his Sister.

CLOWN.

Come, sister, thou that art all fool, all mad-woman.

JOAN.

Prithee, have patience, we are now at Court.

CLOWN.

At Court! ha, ha, that proves thy madness: was there ever any woman

in thy taking travel'd to Court for a husband? 'Slid, 'tis enough

for them to get children, and the City to keep 'em, and the Countrey

to finde Nurses: every thing must be done in his due place, sister.

JOAN.

Be but content a while; for, sure, I know

This Journey will be happy. Oh, dear brother,

This night my sweet Friend came to comfort me;

I saw him and embrac't him in mine arms.

CLOWN.

Why did you not hold him, and call me to help you?

JOAN.

Alas, I thought I had been with him still,

But when I wak't -

CLOWN.

Ah! pox of all Loger-heads, then you were but in a Dream all this while,

and we may still go look him. Well, since we are come to Court,

ast your Cats eyes about you, and either finde him out you dreamt on,

or some other, for Ile trouble my self no further.

Ent(er) DONO(bert), CADOR, Edw(in), & TOCLIO.

See, see, here comes more Courtiers; look about you;