_Di._ By heaven, it falls from off me like the rain From the oil-coat. I seem in spirit to see How he and I at some great day shall meet Before some awful judgment-seat of truth; And I could deem that I behold him there Come praying for the pardon I give now, Did I not think these matters too, too small For any record on the leaves of time. O thou great Watcher of this noisy world, What are they in Thy sight? or what in his Who finds some end of action in his life? What e’en in his whose sole permitted course Is to pursue his peaceful byway walk, And live his brief life purely in Thy sight, And righteously towards his brother-men? _Sp._ And whether, so you’re just and fair, Other folks are so, you don’t care; You who profess more love than others For your poor sinful human brothers. _Di._ For grosser evils their gross remedies The laws afford us; let us be content; For finer wounds the law would, if it could, Find medicine too; it cannot, let us bear; For sufferance is the badge of all men’s tribes. _Sp._ Because we can’t do all we would, Does it follow, to do nothing’s good? No way to help the law’s rough sense By equities of self-defence? Well, for yourself it may be nice To serve vulgarity and vice: Must sisters, too, and wives and mothers, Fare like their patient sons and brothers? _Di._ He that loves sister, mother, more than me—— _Sp._ But the injustice—the gross wrong! To whom on earth does it belong If not to you, to whom ’twas done, Who saw it plain as any sun, To make the base and foul offender Confess, and satisfaction render? At least before the termination of it Prove your own lofty reprobation of it. Though gentleness, I know, was born in you, Surely you have a little scorn in you? _Di._ Heaven! to pollute one’s fingers to pick up The fallen coin of honour from the dirt— Pure silver though it be, let it rather lie! To take up any offence, where’t may be said That temper, vanity—I know not what— Had led me on! To have so much as e’en half felt of one That ever one was angered for oneself! Beyond suspicion Cæsar’s wife should be, Beyond suspicion this bright honour shall. Did he say scorn? I have some scorn, thank God.