No, bully boy, no: I’ve never been rich enough to keep a conscience: never! With us poor devils conscience is like a court-suit put by for state occasions and then used as little as may be: we pawn it sometimes for a dinner. Conscience, look ye, is a jade that still cries “No, no!” and never helps with brave encouragement: a good defender of the rich; but a born foe of the poor, laming enterprise. No, no, lad, no conscience for me; a bad one’s worse than a belly-ache, and with a good one I’d starve. Conscience is like a shrewish wife (have I touched ye there, Ben?), as long as you listen to her she makes you miserable, and when you no longer care for her, why should you keep her? To conclude: Conscience, boys, is a bogey to frighten the feeble from frolic. Ha ha! JONSON: But as a man, aren’t you ashamed to cheat a poor woman? CHETTLE: Have at ye again, lad! In this world we all cheat and are cheated. You cheat the groundlings and orange-girls out of their crosses with a bad play when they’ve paid to hear a good ’un, and I cheat by giving soft words instead of coins. And the conclusion! The girls are angry with you, while my hostess is in love with me. True virtue is good-humour, Ben: and a pleasant smile’s more than all the commandments. FLETCHER: Chettle’s putting up for a saint. CHETTLE: And why not, lad, why not? The greatest sinners always make the greatest saints. Reason: they’ve more stuff in ’em for good or evil and better wits to shape the mass to a purpose. Reason again. How can you help others to resist temptation unless you feel the strength of it in your own flesh? JONSON: You are the sum of all sins—a glutton, drunkard, letcher and shameless to boot: how can you talk of being a saint! CHETTLE: Sins of the flesh, my lad, find pardon easier than malice of the spirit; I’d be a saint to-morrow, but the living’s thin and ye’re all such unbelieving rascals that ye’d make me misdoubt my own virtue! JONSON: Virtue in you would be like a lump of butter in a raging fire, ’Twould feed the flames! CHETTLE: That’s the unbelief in ye, that still keeps me a sinner, a villainous sinner! BURBAGE: At this rate, Chettle, you’ll make us all late. Come, boys, come, there’s much to do. CHETTLE: ’Tis a churl would leave a good dinner, but no one would leave good talk but a chough, and that was good, wasn’t it, Ben? JONSON: Like your dinners, Chettle; more to be praised for quantity than quality, but still—— CHETTLE: Have with you, lads: I’ve a Court cloak in white sarsenet; the colour of fear and of conscience, it takes a stain in every weather and from every touch! Ha! ha! ha! [_Exit all save Jonson, who calls the drawer by stamping on the floor._] SCENE III. JONSON: [_To drawer._] Bring me inkhorn and paper: I would write. DRAWER: [_Wiping the table._] Coming, sir, coming! [_Exit drawer._] _Enter Shakespeare._ SCENE IV. JONSON: