University of Virginia Library

Scena Tertia.

Felix, Polyeuctes, Paulina, Albin,
Paulina.
Which of you two do murther me to day?
Is't both together, or each at his turn?
What? can I neither bend nature, nor love?
And shall I obtain nothing either from
A Husband, or a Father?

Fel.
Speak to your Husbond,

Paul.
Live with Severus.

Paul.
Tiger, murther me
Without this injury.

Pol.
My pitty seeks
As much as possible it may, to comfort you.
Our love doth carry you to such true griefs,
That nothing but another love can cure
Those wounds; since then so great a merit could
Inflame you, his fair presence hath a right
To charm you, you did love him, he doth love you,
And his augmented glory.—

Paul.
Cruel, What have I done unto thee that
Thou treat'st me thus, as to reproach me with,
In contempt of my faith, so great a love
Which I've subdu'd for thee? see now, to make thee
Vanquish so strong an adversary, what attempts
I was to make against my self, what combats
I had to give to thee a heart, so justly
Due to its first subduer; if ingratitude
Sway not my heart, make some attempt upon thee
To give thee to Paulina; learn of her
To force thy proper sentiment, take her vertue
For guide unto thy blindness, suffer her
T'obtain thy life from thee thy self, to live
Still subject to thy laws; but if thou canst
Reject such just desires, at least regard
Her tears, attend her sighs, and make not desperate
A soul that doth adore thee.

Pol.
I've said to you already, and Paulina,
I say again to you, live with Severus,
Or die with me, I despise not your tears,
Nor yet your faith, but henceforth I must have
No commerce with you, nor know you no more
Unless you be a Christian. Felix, 'tis
Enough on't, take again in your anger to you,
And on this insolent revenge your gods
And you.

Paul.
Oh Father! I confess, his crime's
Scarce pardonable, but if he distracted,
You, Sir, are reasonable; nature is too strong,
And its fair characters imprinted in
The blood are ne'r defac'd, a Father is
Always a Father, and on this assurance
I dare hald up some small remains of hope:
Cast a paternall look upon your daughter,
It is decreed my death shall forthwith follow
The death of this dear Criminall, and the gods
Will find her punishment unlawfull, since
She'le mingle innocence and crime together,
And so by this redoublement will change
Into an unjust rigour, a just chastisement.
Our destinies made by your hands inseperable,
We ought to make happy or miserable
Together, and you should be cruell even
Unto the extreamest point to dis-unite
What you have joyned, one heart to another
United once, never retires it self,
You cannot seperate them, unless you tear them;
But you are sensible of my just griefs,
And with a Fathers eye behold my tears.

Fel.
Yes, Daughter, it is true, a Father is
Always a Father, nothing can raze out
The sacred character thereof, I carry
A sensible heart, and you have pierced it,
I joyn me with you against this distracted.
Unfortunate, and wretched Polyeuctes,
Art thou alone insensible, and wilt
Thou only make thy crime unpardonable?
Canst thou hear so many heart-breaking sighs
From such a tender breast? canst thou behold
So much love, and be nothing touched with it?
Acknowledgest thou neither Father-in-Law
Nor Wife, without amity for the one,
Or love for th'other? to resume the names
Of Son and Husband, wilt thou see us both
Fall at thy feet, and so imbrace thy knees?

Pol.
Oh! how unhandsome is this artifice,
After twice having tryed threatning,
After making me see Nearchus dying,
After imploying love, and its effort,
After declaring to me that great thirst
Of baptism to oppose to God the interest
Of God himself. You joyn your selves together?
Oh policy of Hell! must we o'recome
So many times before we triumph? sure
Your resolutions are so slow, take yours
At last, since, I've already taken mine.
I adore but one God, the Master of
The Universe, under whose feet, the Heaven,
The Earth, and Hell doth tremble, one God which
Loving us with an infinite love, dy'd for us
With ignominy, and which by an excess
Of that same love will every day be offer'd
As Victim for us; But I am too blame
To speak of this to those can't understand me:
See the blind error that you dare defend;
You defile all your gods with foulest crimes,
You punish not one sin whose Master's not
I'th' heaven by your accompt,
Adultery, Incest, Prostitution,
Theft, Murther, and what ever we detest,
It is the example which your Deities
Give you to follow; I've profan'd their Temple,
And broken down their Altars, I would do it
Again, if I could reach them, even before
The eyes of Felix, yea, before Severus,
And more, even in the presence of the Senate,
Or of the Emperour himself.

Fel.
At last
My goodness giveth place to my just fury,
Adore them, or thou dy'st.

Pol.
I am a Christian.

Fel.
Thou impious wretch, I say again, adore them,
Or renounce life.

Pol.
I am a Christian.

Fel.
Art thou? O heart too obstinate! Souldiers, execute
The order that I gave,—

Cleon and the other Guards take Polyeuctes away, Paulina follows him.
Paul.
Where lead you him?

Fel.
To death.

Pol.
To glory.
Adiew my dear Paulina, love my memory.

Paul.
I'le follow thee throughout, and even to death.

Pol.
Forsake your errour, or not follow me.

Fel.
Take him away, and see I be obey'd,
Since he desires to dye, 'tis fit he perish.