Venice Preserved | Page 4

thee: For, living here, you're but my cursed
remembrances, I once was happy!
Jaf. You use me thus, because you know my soul Is fond of Belvidera.
You perceive My life feeds on her, therefore thus you treat me Were I
that thief, the doer of such wrongs As you upbraid me with, what
hinders me But I might send her back to you with contumely, And
court my fortune where she would be kinder?
Priuli. You dare not do't.
Jaf. Indeed, my lord, I dare not. My heart, that awes me, is too much
my master: Three years are past since first our vows were plighted,
During which time, the world must bear me witness, I've treated
Belvidera like your daughter, The daughter of a senator of Venice:
Distinction, place, attendance, and observance, Due to her birth, she
always has commanded: Out of my little fortune, I've done this;
Because, (though hopeless e'er to win your nature) The world might see
I loved her for herself; Not as the heiress of the great Priuli.
Priuli. No more.
Jaf. Yes, all, and then, adieu forever. [Pausing with clasped hands.
There's not a wretch that lives on common charity But's happier than I;
for I have known The luscious sweets of plenty; every night Have slept
with soft content about my head, And never waked, but to a joyful
morning: Yet now must fall, like a full ear of corn, Whoso blossom
'scaped, yet's withered in the ripenin.
Priuli. Home, and be humble; study to retrench; Discharge the lazy
vermin of thy hall, Those pageants of thy folly: Reduce the glitt'ring
trappings of thy wife To humble weeds, fit for thy little state: [ Going.
Then to some suburb cottage both retire; Drudge to feed loathsome life;
get brats and starve-- Home, home, I say! [Exit, R.

Jaf. (C.) Yes, if my heart would let me---- This proud, this swelling
heart: home I would go, But that my doors are hateful to my eyes,
Filled and damned up with gaping creditors! I've now not fifty ducats in
the world, Yet still I am in love, and pleased with ruin. Oh, Belvidera!
Oh! she is my wife-- And we will bear our wayward fate together, But
ne'er know comfort more.
Enter Pierre, L. S. E.
Pierre. (L. C.) My friend, good morrow; How fares the honest partner
of my heart? What, melancholy! not a word to spare me!
Jaf. (C.) I'm thinking, Pierre, how that damned starving quality, Called
honesty, got footing in the world.
Pierre. Why, powerful villainy first set it up, For its own ease and
safety. Honest men Are the-soft easy cushions on which knave's
Repose and fatten. Were all mankind villains, They'd starve each other;
lawyers would want practice, Cut-throats, reward: each man would kill
his brother Himself; none would be paid or hanged for murder. Honesty!
'twas a cheat, invented first To bind the hands of bold deserving rogues,
That fools and cowards might sit safe in power, And lord it
uncontrolled above their betters.
Jaf. Then honesty is but a notion?
Pierre. Nothing else; Like wit, much talked of, not to be defined: He
that pretends to most, too, has least share in't Tis a ragged virtue.
Honesty! no more on't.
Jaf. Sure, thou art honest?
Pierre. So, indeed, men think me; But they're mistaken, Jaffier; I'm a
rogue, As well as they; A fine, gay, bold-faced villain as thou seest me!
'Tis true. I pay my debts, when they're contracted; I steal from no man;
would not cut a throat To gain admission to a great man's purse; Would
not betray my friend, To get his place or fortune; I scorn to flatter A
blown-up fool above me, or crush the wretch beneath me; Yet, Jaffier,

for all this, I am a villain.
Jaf. (R. C.) A villain!
Pierre. Yes, a most notorious villain; To see the sufferings of my
fellow-creatures, And own myself a man; to see our senators Cheat the
deluded people with a show Of liberty, which yet they ne'er must taste
of. They say, by them our hands are free from fetters; Yet whom they
please, they lay in basest bonds; Bring whom they please to infamy and
sorrow; Drive us, like wrecks, down the rough tide of power, Whilst no
hold's left to save us from destruction. All that bear this are villains,
and I one, Not to rouse up at the great call of nature, And check the
growth of these domestic spoilers, That make us slaves, and tell us 'tis
our charter!
[Walks, L.
Jaf. I think no safety can be here for virtue, And grieve, my friend, as
much as thou, to live In such a wretched state as this of Venice, Where
all agree to spoil the public