University of Virginia Library

SCENE III.

Dolabella,
solus.
I am not half the villain of this Verres,
And yet I am a villain. 'Tis too plain.
To be a villain, and yet hate a villain,
To feel that vigilant and solemn monitor,
Conscience, put in her caveat to a deed,
And yet to supersede her holy mandates,
And give that deed effect; what is it else,
Than to be multiplied into two men,
That wage continual war against each other?
Would I were of a piece! either all honest,
Or else above sensation of remorse.
Enter an Officer.
What would you?

Officer.
The relations of the sufferers
Most humbly sue you, they may have their bodies
For all due rites.

Dolabella.
See that they have my order.
[Exit Officer.
It were not yet too late to bid them live!
But then I must refund m' ill-gotten wealth.
Thou hast betray'd me, all-corrupting gold,
And thaw'd the yielding principles of honesty
Into a puddle of corrupted trash!
Ha! Conscience! thou art but the fear of shame!
I am not superstitious, yet am startled,
That he, who, perhaps, never heard of Cicero,
Should mark him in his lineaments so strongly;
Methought I felt myself beneath the lash,
The scorpion lash, of his all-awing tongue.
I'll think no more on't—Innocence, once quitted.
Turns irrecov'rably her back upon us.
Let none, untried by pow'r, think himself virtuous,
But for authority I'd still been honest.

[Exit.