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Act. 3.
Sce. 1.
Philotas, Stratocles, Archippus, Leocrates, Molops, in drinking Chaplets, after the Grecian manner.Phil.
Set a watch at the doore, to keepe out sleepe;
He's mortall that offers to betray so much weaknes
As to winke. Here Archippus.
Arch.
May not a man winke without mortality,
When he lets it goe downe? Here Stratocles.
Phil.
I doe state winking in that case divine:
Str.
Come thou uneven lumpe, thou heape of sinnes in
proofe; we will liquor thy Keyes, open thy Cages, and give
thy meager Tenants a Play day, Raskall. Bring the Jarres
nearer. As I hope for fortune, I thinke my soule will passe
into a frogge. Now for a hundred Throats; to thee Molops.
Mol.
You Grecians I thinke have sponges in your mawes;
'tis but setting your hands to your sides, and squeezing your
selves and presently you drinke as much as before.
Leoc.
Off with thy Cup Landlord, and talke not; wee
learn'd it from the Teat, soole.
Mol.
Have at thee, Archippus.
Arch.
I doe not like these healths at randome; let's have
a sober methodicall order for a while.
Phil.
What? shall we drinke by dice then, and let fortune
name the heyre to the Cup?
Str.
Or shall we drinke our Mistresses names, and soake it
Alphabetically?
Leoc.
If we drinke names, let not the Letters passe for
single ones, but as they would in number: I doe pronounce
Alpha no letter till it begin to multiply.
Mol.
I never thought Drinking such a Mystery before;
a blockhead can't be drunke, I see.
Right; shallow braines can ne're attaine to't; that
makes your fooles, and your old governing Philosophers
continue so sober still. The veget Artist, and the vigorous
Poët, whose braines are full and forging still, will streight
get a pleasant madnesse from that that will but warme those
colder Rheumaticke Sages, whose noses alwayes drop like
Still-snoutes.
Str.
The noblest drinking methinkes is the Postures.
Arch.
Let's have'em
Phil.
Bring the Pots in play. But where's the wenches,
and the Musicke you promis'd us, good Molops.
Mol.
For wenches, the Towne will not yeeld any at this
time; and I durst not venture my single wife amongst you
all. For Fidlers, I have provided them, they stand ready
without.
Leoc.
Call'em in sweet Molops.
Strat.
Well, what shall those Raskalls play, whiles we
drinke the Postures?
Phil.
The Battle by all meanes.
Ent. Mus.
Str.
Strike up the Battle then. Thinke your selves all in
service now, and doe as I doe.
They take their pots in their left hands. They take their cups in their right hands, & fill. They blow off the froth.
Right! draw your shafts now, & nock 'em.
Very good! now smooth your feathers.
Well done! Present, and take ayme.
Here's to thee Leocrates.
Leoc.
Have towards thee Philotas.
Phil.
To thee Archippus.
Arch.
Here Molops.
Mol.
Have at you Fidlers.
Str.
Now draw your Bowes and let loose all.
They drinke all together.
Mol.
The other charge, good fellow Souldiers.
Phil.
Let's have a Song betweene, and then have at you.
Leoc.
Fidlers, employ your Throats and sing awhile; you
shall drinke with 'em after.
Str.
Sing that which I made in the Prison; 'tis seasonable
enough.
1.
Now, now, the Sunne is fled
Downe into Tethys bed,
Ceasing his solemne course awhile.
2.
What then?
'Tis not to sleepe, but be
Merry all night, as we;
Gods can be mad sometimes, as well as men.
Cho:
Then laugh we, and quaffe we, untill our rich noses
Grow red, and contest with our Chaplets of Roses.
1.
If he be fled, whence may
We have a second day,
That shall not set till we command?
2.
Here see
A Day that does arise
Like his, but with more eyes,
And warmes us with a better fire, than hee.
Cho:
Then laugh we, &c.
1., 2.
Thus then we chase the night
With these true floods of light,
This Lesbian wine, which with it's sparkling streams,
Darting diviner Graces,
Cast's Glories round our Faces,
And dulls the Tapers with Majestique Beames.
Cho:
Then laugh we, &c.
Str.
Well said! now the other charge to the honour of
Cratander.
Phil.
I feele a rumbling in my head, as if the Cyclops
were forging Thunder in my Braines: But no matter, give
it me: our ancient Orpheus sayes it, Perpetuall drunkennesse
is the reward of Vertue.
Sce. 2.
To them Cratander.Crat.
Which the most vitious have: must I still meet
Some thing must greeve me more than your misfortunes?
The Chayne and Fetter were your Innocence.
Phil.
We don't fire Temples Sir: we kill no Father
Nor Mother, 'tis not Incest to be merry.
Crat.
But to be drunke is all. Doe but consider,
(If that at least you can) how Greece it selfe.
Now suffers in you; thus, say they, the Grecians
Do spend their Nights: Your vices are esteem'd
The Rites and Customes of your Country, whiles
The beastly Revelling of a Slave or two,
Is made the Nations Infamy. Your wreathes
Blush at your Ignominy: what prayse is't
When't shall be said, Philotas stood up still
After the hundreth Flagon; when 'tis knowne
He did not so in warre? you're now just fit
To teach the Spartan boyes sobriety;
Are all good Principles wash'd out? how e're
Be without vices, if not vertuous.
That I should have authority to command
Vices but not forbid 'em! I would put you
Once more into his charge, but that you would
Make even the Dungeon yet more infamous.
Mol.
Gentlemen heare me; Cratander
[Ex. Crat.
Speakes well, and like a good Common-wealth's man.
Arch.
Out you dissembling Raskall; are you of Cratander's
faction.
Mol.
Good Gentlemen don't kicke me: I shall leave all
my drinke behind me, if you doe.
Phil.
Must we still thus be check'd? we live not under
A King, but a Pedagogue: hee's insufferable
Leoc.
Troth hee's so proud now he must be kill'd to make
with him.
Arch.
I never thought he would have beene either so
womanish, as to have been chast himselfe, or so uncivill as to
keepe us so: but hee talkes of lying with surpriz'd Cities,
and committing Fornication with Victory, and making Mars
Pimpe for him.
Str.
These are the fruits of Learning; we suffer all this
meerely because he hath a little familiarity with the Devill
in Philosophy, and can conjure with a few Notions out of
Socrates.
Arch.
In good troth I take it very scurvily at his hands.
that he will not let me deserve hanging. I'd thought to have
done all the villanies in the world, and left a name behinde
me: but hee's severe forsooth, and cryes out Vertue, Mistris
Vertue.
Phil.
Diseases take her; I ne're knew any good she did
in Common-wealth yet. I wonder how he dares be so impudent,
as to be good in a strange place.
I was the Butt he shot at.—What prayse is't,
When't shall be said Philotas stood up still
After the hundreth Flagon, when 'tis knowne
He did not so in warre?—meere, meere upbrayding:
And shall Philotas this? this from Cratander?
Sce. 3.
To them Praxaspes, Masistes.Prax.
Whence this deepe silence? are you sacrificing
To your dumbe Gods of Greece? where are your Cuppes?
Your Loves, your Madnesse?
Leoc.
Do not Ravish me;
I will cry out a Rape, if that you come
Modest an't please the Gods.
Mas.
Fy! fy! We look'd, you should
Have left at least a dozen of great bellies
A peece behinde you upon every Tribe.
Where are your Spirits? had I been in your case,
Nature e're this had been inverted. But
You thinke on your last end, as if the world
Were to expire with you.
Str.
O! we must walke
Discreetly, looke as carefully to our steps,
As if we were to dance on ropes, with Egges
Under our feet: we have left off shackles,
To be worse fetterd.
Prax.
Can a brest of large
And ample thoughts tamely endure the ring?
And be led quietly by th'Patient Nose,
When Licence is Religion? One whose dull
And sluggish temper is call'd wisdome, one
Whose indiscretion kill'd with some formality,
As Quicksilver with fasting spittle, doth passe
For a grave governing Garbe. This heavy lumpe
Dulls all your active fire.
Mas.
You understand not:
For to what end is Liberty indulg'd?
To be oppress'd by a severer Rule?
One newly taken from among your selves,
To make your state worse by his Tyranny?
But you shew what you can endure.
Phil.
By Heav'n
We doe enslave our selves; We can b'as free
As is Cratander, though not so malitious.
Mas.
You are as things of nought with him; for tell me;
When call'd he Stratocles to Councell? when
Ask'd he Leocrates his advice? Philotas,
Archippus, names excluded from his thoughts,
But when he meanes to shew that he hath anger.
Phil.
What Star wert thou borne under Stratocles?
That which all Governours of Market-townes are,
Some lazy Planet, I beleeve.
Phil.
Thou 'wert wont
To exercise upon a throat or two,
To keepe thy hand in ure; now shew thy selfe
Let's slit this graver weazen.
Prax.
Now I see
You have some man about you, now your blouds
Run as they should doe, high and full; you slept
Meerely till now. If that Cratander should
Quit scores with Nature e're his time be out,
The King must chuse againe; the dead you know
Ne're goes for Sacrifice.
Leoc.
Must one of us
Peece up his Reigne then?
Prax.
There's no other way;
The Gods themselves require't.
Leoc.
My Hanches quake,
As if that Molops were to season them,
And put 'em streight in paste for the great Gods
Phil.
Who e're
Succeeds him, shall allow the rest what e're
Nature or Art can yeeld. Nothing shall be
Unlawfull, but to sleepe and mumble Prayers.
Arch., Strat., Leoc.
Agreed, agreed.
Cratander is discover'd over-hearing them.
Phil.
Then fill me out an Oath.
All I presume will binde themselves with this
Good common looser of all cares, but what
Do tend to Liberty to doe the like.
Str.
The motion's worthy; crowne the Goblet then.
Phil.
Would 'twere his bloud. By Truth her self th'Ofspring
And childe of Wine, Cratander dyes e're halfe
The glasse of his short Tyranny run out.
This thē to the infernall Gods.
[powrs some on the ground] & this [he drinkes.
To our just angers, Gods as great as they.
Good Omen! so! the thickned streames run black;
To say, he shall be dead; hee's dead already.
Drinke and prepare for Pleasures.
[They all drinke.
Omnes.
Liberty.
[Exeunt.
Sce. 4.
Cratander, Atossa.Crat.
He must be more than Man that gaynes it backe
Without my will.
Atos.
Your Justice must restore it.
Will your severer Majesty triumph,
With soft spoyles of a Lady's Cabinet?
Crat.
As I would not feigne Favour, and be-ly
A Jewell or a Twist, to gaine the name
Of Creature, or of Servant unto any;
So by your Beauty, (for if Persians may
Sweare by their Sun, I well may sweare by that)
Where honour is transmitted in a true
Mysterious Gage of an Immaculate minde,
I will defend it as some sacred Relique,
Or some more secret pledge, drop'd downe from Heav'n,
To guard me from the dangers of the Earth.
Atos.
But in that
You make it common, you bereave it of
All that you call Divinity.
Crat.
He that vaunts
Of a received Favour, ought to be
Punish'd as Sacrilegious Persons are,
'Cause he doth violate that sacred thing,
Pure, spotlesse Honour. But it may be seene,
And yet not prostitute. I would not smother
My Joyes, and make my happinesse a stealth.
Atos.
How your thoughts flatter your deceived Fancy
Into a State, that when you leave to thinke,
Dyes, as your thoughts that kept it up! what is't
Crat.
I must
Confesse, I have no Merits, whose just heat
May extract ought from you, call'd Love: yet when
I doe consider, that Affection
Cannot looke vertuously on any thing
That is resplendent, but a subtle image
Purely reflecting thence, must needs arise,
And pay that Looke againe; I doe take leave
To say, the carefull Deities provide,
That Love shall ne're be so unhappy, as
To want his Brother.
Atos.
Why? I never spent
A sigh for you; you never had a kisse,
Nor the reversion of one yet.
Crat.
Such Love
Is but Love's Idoll; and these soft ones, that
Confine it to a kisse, or an embrace,
Doe, as the superstitious did of old,
Contract the Godhead into a Bull, or Goat,
Or some such lustfull Creature. Be it far,
Be't far from me to thinke, where e're I see
Cleare streames of Beauty, that I may presume
To trouble them with quenching of my thirst.
Where a full splendor, where a bright effusion
Of immateriall Beames doe meet to
Make up one Body of perfection;
I should account my selfe injurious
Unto that Deity, which hath let downe
Himselfe into those Rayes, if that I should
Draw nigh without an awfull Adoration.
Which my Religion payes to you: but being
You like not the Devotion, be content
To slight the Sacrifice, but spare the Altar.
Atos.
I am so farre from ruining that Breast
In which there lives a sparke of chaster honour,
That I would hazzard this so priz'd a trifle,
Which men call Life, that I might live there still;
The carefull Pow'rs, invented for the safety
And preservation of afflicted goodnesse.
Conceive not hence a passion burning toward you;
For she that speakes like woman, is a Queene.
Crat.
I can distinguish betwixt Love, and Love,
'Tweene Flames and good Intents, nay between Flames
And Flames themselves: the grosser now fly up,
And now fall downe againe, still cov'ting new
Matter for food; consuming, and consum'd.
But the pure clearer Flames, that shoot up alwayes
In one continued Pyramid of lustre,
Know no commerce with Earth, but unmixt still,
And still aspiring upwards, (if that may
Be call'd aspiring, which is Nature) have
This property of Immortality
Still to suffice themselves, neither devouring,
And yet devour'd; and such I knowledge yours.
On which I looke as on refin'd Ideas,
That know no mixture or corruption,
Being one eternall simplenesse; that these
Should from the Circle of their chaster Glories
Dart out a beame on me, is farre beyond
All humane merit; and I may conclude,
They've only their owne Nature for a cause,
And that they're good, they are diffusive too.
Atos.
Your tongue hath spoke your thoughts so nobly that
I beare a pity to your vertues, which
E're night shed Poppy twice o're th'weary'd world,
Must only be in these two Registers;
Annalls, and Memory. Could you but contrive,
How you might live without an injury
Unto Religion, you should have this glory,
To have a Queene your Instrument.
Crat.
There's nothing
Can wooe my heart unto a thought of life,
But that your presence will be wanting to me,
When I'm shut up in silence: yet I have
An equall faith 'twixt Greece and Persia:
That like a river running 'twixt two fields,
I may give growth and verdure unto both.
Praxaspes, and Masistes, potent Lords,
Are both 'gainst my designes; so that I shall not
Obtaine an Army, for they thinke I have
That vile minde in me to betray this kingdome.
To which I've sworne fidelity; when by
Your selfe, by all thats good, my 'intent is only
To perfect great Arsamnes Conquest, and
In that be beneficiall to my Country.
In which if that your Majesty will descend
To act a part, after the Scene is shut,
I'le downe t'Elysium, with a joyfull minde,
And teach our Grecian Poëts your blest name
And vertues, for an everlasting Song.
Atos.
Were it against my selfe, I'de not deny it.
Walke in, I'le follow you. In great designes.
[Ex. Crat.
Valour helps much, but vertuous Love doth more.
Sce. 5.
To her Arsamnes.Arsam.
Was't not enough that you perus'd his Actions,
And surfetted your Eyes upon his follies,
Seeing, and seene againe, but you must cast him
A Chayne, an Emblematicke Chayne?
Atos.
'Tis not
The veyle that hinders the quicke busie Eye
From reading o're the Face, but Modesty.
He hath a weake defence, that doth entrust
The preservation of a chaster Love
Unto a silken Cloud.
Arsam.
I stand not much
Your Chayne.—Your Favour—that—.Do'y'thinke 'tis fit
A Queene should send one linke unto a Slave?
Atos.
Doth not the Sun (the Sun, which yet you worship)
Send beames to others than your selfe? yet those
Which dwell on you loose neither light, nor heat,
Comming not thence lesse vigorous, or lesse chast.
Would you seale up a Fountaine? or confine
The Ayre unto your walke? would you enjoyne
The Flow'r to cast no smell, but as you passe?
Love is as free as Fountaine, Aire, or Flower.
For't stands not in a poynt; 'tis large, and may,
Like streams, give verdure to this Plant, that Tree,
Nay that whole field of Flow'rs, and yet still runne
In a most faithfull course toward the bosome
Of the lov'd Ocean.
Arsam.
But when you divert
And breake the Streame into small Rivulets,
You make it runne more weake, then when it kept
United in one Channell.
Atos.
If it branch
Into a smaller twining here, and there,
The water is not lost, nor doth it quit
The former Name; this is not to destroy,
But to enlarge the streame: did it dry up,
And leave the Fountaine destitute, indeed
You'd reason to be angry.
Arsam.
But what should make you
Present him with a guift? you might have smother'd
A good opinion of him in your Breast,
(As some digressing streames flow under ground)
And so have rested; but you shew it now,
And make the world partaker.
Atos.
Who would stifle
An honest Fire? that flame's to be suspected
That hides it selfe. When that a man of valour
Graceth his Country with a good attempt,
You give a Sword, an Horse, a Mannoure, nay
A sense of Vertue too, as well as you:
And shall we be deny'd the Liberty
To shew we have that sense? A Favour is
The Almes of Love; I doe not passe away
My heart in Charity. Vertuous Cratander
Shewes forth so full a Transcript of your life,
In all but his misfortunes, that methinkes
You may admire your selfe in him, as in
Your shade. But yet let chast Atossa rather
Not be at all, than not be wholly yours.
Arsam.
Thou art still vertuous my Atossa, still
Transparent as thy Crystall, but more spotlesse.
Fooles that we are, to thinke the Eye of Love
Must alwayes looke on us. The Vine that climbes
By conjugall Embracements 'bout the Elme,
May with a ring or two perhaps encircle
Some neighbouring bough, and yet this twining prove.
Not the Offence, but Charity of Love.
[Exeunt.
Finis Act. 3.
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