Venice Preserved | Page 4

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 good, And villains fatten with the brave man's labours.
Pierre. [Returns to L. C.] We've neither safety, unity, nor peace, For the foundation's lost of common good; Justice is lame, as well as blind, amongst us; The laws (corrupted to their ends that make them,) Serve but for instruments of some new tyranny, That every day starts up, t'enslave us deeper. Now [Lays his hand on Jaffier's arm,] could this glorious cause but find out friends