University of Virginia Library

SCENE VI.

Enter SLAVES.

What would you?

Lyc.
Bring some fetters.

Strob.
I beseech you,
Hear me, and then command me to be bound
Ev'n at your pleasure.

Lyc.
Well,—I hear you, speak,
But make dispatch.

Strob.
What if you order them
To torture me to death, behold the consequence:
You lose a slave, and then you cannot get
What you desire: but had you tempted me
With the reward of precious liberty,
You had obtain'd possession long ago.
By nature we are all born free; by nature
We are all fond of freedom: slavery
Is worse than any ill that can befal us.
Whom Jupiter pursues with his displeasure,
He makes him first a slave.

Lyc.
I own, there's reason
In what you say.

Strob.
Now prithee hear the rest.
The masters of our age are all too niggardly.
I call them Gripe-alls, Harpies, Tantalusses:
Poor are they in the height of affluence,
And thirsty in the middle of the ocean.
No riches can content them, not the wealth
Of Midas, or of Crœsus: all the opulence
Of the whole Persian state combin'd together
Were not enough to glut their hellish avarice.
Masters deal hardly with their servants; these
Requite the wrong by slacking of their duty:
So all things are amiss on either side.
Old niggardly curmudgeons lock up all,
Their pantries, cellars, with a thousand keys,
And bar the entrance even to their children.
The servants on their part, a knavish, sly,
Designing set of fellows, pick the locks,
Steal, pilfer, waste, consume, and ravage all;
Nor, though you torture them a thousand ways,
Can you extort confession of their thefts.
Thus slaves avenge them of their slavery
By tricks and pranks; and this is my conclusion,
That liberality makes faithful servants.

Lyc.
Right, but you've been more tedious than you promis'd.
If I reward you with your liberty,
You'll give me what I want.

Strob.
I will.—But hold,—
I must have witnesses. Pardon me, Sir,
I have but little faith in what you say.

Lyc.
E'en at your pleasure; you may call an hundred,
With all my heart.

Strob.
Eunomia, Megadorus,
Let me intreat you,—please you to step hither.
Come forth—and when the business is concluded,
You may return forthwith.