100 Than those I shed for him. What was he like? Par. Save you, fair queen! Hel. And you, monarch! Par. No. Hel. And no. 119 Par. Are you meditating on virginity? Hel. Ay. You have some stain of soldier in you; let me ask you a question. Man is enemy to virginity; how may we barricado it against him? Par. Keep him out. Hel. But he assails; and our virginity, though valiant in the defence, yet is weak. Unfold to us some war-like resistance. Par. There is none: man, sitting down before you, will undermine you and blow you up. Hel. Bless our poor virginity from underminers and blowers up! Is there no military policy, how virgins might blow up men? 131 Par. Virginity being blown down, man will quicklier be blown up: marry, in blowing him down again, with the breach yourselves made, you lose your city. It is not politic in the commonwealth of nature to preserve virginity. Loss of virginity is rational increase, and there was never virgin got till virginity was first lost. That you were made of is metal to make virgins. Virginity, : Vir Par. There's little can be said in 't; 'tis against the rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity is to accuse your mothers, which is most infallible disobedience. He that hangs himself is a virgin virginity murders itself, and should be buried in highways, out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate offendress against nature. ginity breeds mites, much like a cheese, consumes itself to the very paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach. Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but lose by 't. Out with 't! within the year it will make itself two, which is a goodly increase, and the principal itself not much the worse. Away with 't. 160 Hel. How might one do, sir, to lose it to her own liking? Par. Let me see: marry, ill, to like him that ne'er it likes. 'Tis a commodity will lose the gloss with lying; the longer kept, the less worth: off with 't while 'tis vendible; answer the time of request. Virginity, like an old courtier, wears her cap out of fashion; richly suited, but unsuitable just like the brooch and the toothpick, which wear not now. Your date is better in your pie and your porridge than in your cheek: and your virginity, your old virginity, is like one of our French withered pears; it looks ill, it eats drily; marry, 'tis a withered pear; it was formerly better; marry, yet 'tis a withered pear. Will you any thing with it? Hel. Not my virginity yet. 180 There shall your master have a thousand loves, Hel. That I wish well. "Tis pity- 190 Hel. That wishing well had not a body in 't, Which might be felt; that we, the poorer born, Whose baser stars do shut us up in wishes, Might with effects of them follow our friends, And show what we alone must think, which never Returns us thanks. 21 King. Youth, thou bear'st thy father's face; May'st thou inherit too! Welcome to Paris. As when thy father and myself in friendship Par. I am so full of businesses I cannot answer thee acutely. I will return perfect courtier; in the which my instruction shall serve to naturalize thee, so thou wilt be capable of a courtier's counsel, and understand what advice shall thrust upon thee; else thou diest in thine unthankful-To-day in our young lords; but they may jest ness, and thine ignorance makes thee away farewell. When thou hast leisure, say thy prayers; when thou hast none, remember thy friends. Get thee a good husband, and use him as he uses thee: so farewell. Exit. Hel. Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie SCENE II.-Paris. A Room in the KING's Palace. 30 Till their own scorn return to them unnoted He us'd as creatures of another place, 40 In their poor praise he humbled. Such a man now But goers backward. His good remembrance, sir, 51 King. Would I were with him! He would always say, Flourish of cornets. Enter the KING, with letters; Methinks I hear him now: his plausive words Lords and others attending. Kingy. The Florentines and Senoys are by the ears; Have fought with equal fortune, and continue First Lord. So 'tis reported, sir. King. Nay, 'tis most credible: we here receive it He scatter'd not in ears, but grafted them, are 60 Mere fathers of their garments; whose constancies First Lord. You are lov'd, sir; Since the physician at your father's died? 70 Ber. Ber. Thank your majesty. Flourish. Exeunt. SCENE III.-Rousillon. A Room in the COUNTESS's Palace. Enter COUNTESS, Steward, and Clown. Count. I will now hear: what say you of this gentlewoman? Stew. Madam, the care I have had to even your content, I wish might be found in the calendar of my past endeavours; for then we wound our modesty and make foul the clearness of our deservings, when of ourselves we publish them. Count. What does this knave here? Get you gone, sirrah: the complaints I have heard of you I do not all believe: 'tis my slowness that I do not; for I know you lack not folly to commit them, and have ability enough to make such knaveries yours. 13 Clo. 'Tis not unknown to you, madam, I am a poor fellow. Count. Well, sir. Clo. No, madam, 'tis not so well that I am poor, though many of the rich are damned. But, if I may have your ladyship's good will to go to the world, Isbel the woman and I will do as we may. Count. Wilt thou needs be a beggar? 21 Clo. In Isbel's case and mine own. Service is no heritage; and I think I shall never have the blessing of God till I have issue o' my body, for they say barnes are blessings. Count. Tell me thy reason why thou wilt 30 marry. Clo. My poor body, madam, requires it: I am driven on by the flesh; and he must needs go that the devil drives. Count. Is this all your worship's reason? Clo. Faith, madam, I have other holy reasons, such as they are. Count. May the world know them? Clo. I have been, madam, a wicked creature, as you and all flesh and blood are; and indeed, I do marry that I may repent. Count. Thy marriage, sooner than thy wicked ness. 40 Clo. I am out o' friends, madam; and I hope to have friends for my wife's sake. Count. Such friends are thine enemies, knave. Clo. You're shallow, madam, in great friends; for the knaves come to do that for me which I am aweary of. He that ears my land spares my team, and gives me leave to in the crop: if I be his cuckold, he's my drudge. He that comforts my wife is the cherisher of my flesh and blood; he that cherishes my flesh and blood loves my flesh and blood; he that loves my flesh and blood is my friend: ergo, he that kisses my wife is my friend. If men could be contented to be what they are, there were no fear in marriage; for young Charbon the puritan, and old Poysam the papist, howsome'er their hearts are severed in religion, their heads are both one; they may joll horns together, like any deer i' the herd. 60 Count. Wilt thou ever be a foul-mouthed and calumnious knave? Clo. A prophet I, madam; and I speak the truth the next way: Count. What! one good in ten? you corrupt the song, sirrah. Clo. One good woman in ten, madam; which is a purifying o' the song. Would God would serve the world so all the year! we'd find no fault with the tithe-woman if I were the parson. One in ten, quoth a'! An we might have a good woman born but for every blazing star, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery well: a man may draw his heart out ere a' pluck one. Count. You'll be gone, sir knave, and do as I command you! Clo. That man should be at woman's command, and yet no hurt done! Though honesty be no puritan, yet it will do no hurt; it will wear the surplice of humility over the black gown of a big heart. I am going, forsooth: the business is for Helen to come hither. Count. Well, now. Exit. 102 Stew. I know, madam, you love your gentlewoman entirely. Count. Faith, I do : her father bequeathed her to me; and she herself, without other advantage, may lawfully make title to as much love as she finds: there is more owing her than is paid, and more shall be paid her than she 'll demand. 110 Stew. Madam, I was very late more near her than I think she wished me: alone she was, and did communicate to herself her own words to her own ears; she thought, I dare vow for her, they touched not any stranger sense. Her matter was, she loved your son: Fortune, she said, was no goddess, that had put such difference betwixt their two estates; Love, no god, that would not extend his might, only where qualities were level; Dian, no queen of virgins, that would suffer her poor knight surprised, without rescue in the first assault or ransom afterward. This she delivered in the most bitter touch of sorrow that e'er I heard virgin exclaim in; which I held my duty speedily to acquaint you withal, sithence in the loss that may happen, it concerns you something to know it. 127 Count. You have discharged this honestly: keep it to yourself. Many likelihoods informed me of this before, which hung so tottering in the balance that I could neither believe nor misdoubt. Pray you, leave me : stall this in your bosom; and I thank you for your honest care. | If it be not, forswear 't: howe'er, I charge thee, Enter HELENA. Exit Steward. 150 Hel. Mine honourable mistress. Count. Nay, a mother: Why not a mother? When I said 'a mother,' Methought you saw a serpent: what's in 'mother' That you start at it? I say, I am your mother; And put you in the catalogue of those That were enwombed mine: 'tis often seen Adoption strives with nature, and choice breeds A native slip to us from foreign seeds; You ne'er oppress'd me with a mother's groan, Yet I express to you a mother's care. God's mercy, maiden! does it curd thy blood To say I am thy mother? What's the matter, That this distemper'd messenger of wet, The many-colour'd Iris, rounds thine eye? Why that you are my daughter? Hel. That I am not. 160 Count. 180 So strive upon your pulse. What! pale again? Hel. 191 Good madam, pardon me! Your pardon, noble mistress! Count. Do you love my son? Hel. Hel. Do not you love him, madam ? Count. Go not about; my love hath in't a bond. Whereof the world takes note: come, come, disclose The state of your affection, for your passions Hel. Then, I confess, Here on my knee, before high heaven and you, That before you, and next unto high heaven, 200 I love your son. 210 My friends were poor, but honest; so 's my love: Madam, I had. Wherefore? tell true. Hel. I will tell truth; by grace itself I swear. You know my father left me some prescriptions Of rare and prov'd effects, such as his reading And manifest experience had collected 230 For general sovereignty; and that he will'd me For Paris, was it? speak. This was your motive That doth my life besiege. Farewell, young lords; 20 King. Those girls of Italy, take heed of them: Both. Our hearts receive your warnings. Par. 'Tis not his fault, the spark. O! 'tis brave wars. Par. Most admirable: I have seen those wars. Ber. Iam commanded here, and kept a coil with 'Too young,' and 'the next year,' and 'tis too early.' Par. An thy mind stand to 't, boy, steal away bravely. Ber. I shall stay here the forehorse to a smock, Creaking my shoes on the plain masonry, Till honour be bought up and no sword worn 31 But one to dance with. By heaven! I'll steal away. First Lord. There 's honour in the theft. Ber. I grow to you, and our parting is a tortured body. First Lord. Farewell, captain. Second Lord. Sweet Monsieur Parolles ! Par. Noble heroes, my sword and yours are kin. Good sparks and lustrous, a word, good metals: you shall find in the regiment of the Spinii one Captain Spurio, with his cicatrice, an emblem of war, here on his sinister cheek: it was this very sword entrenched it: say to him, I live, and observe his reports for me. Second Lord. We shall, noble captain. 45 That's able to breathe life into a stone, Is powerful to araise King Pepin, nay, King. If you will see her: now, by my faith and honour, |