Go wife to Dunmow, and demaund your flitch. _Widow._ Goe gentle maide, goe leade the Apes in hell. _Wife._ Goe widow make some younger brother rich, And then take thought and die, and all is well. Alas poore maid, that hast no help nor stay. _Widow._ Alas poore wife, that nothing dost possesse; _Maid._ Alas poore widdow, charitie doth say, Pittie the widow and the fatherlesse. _Widow._ But happy widdowes haue the world at will. _Wife._ But happier wiues, whose ioys are euer double. _Maid._ But happiest maids whose hearts are calme and still, Whom feare, nor hope, nor loue, nor hate doth trouble. _Wife._ Euery true wife hath an indented[149] heart, Wherein the covenants of loue are writ, Whereof her husband keepes the counterpart, And reads his comforts and his ioyes in it. _Widow._ But euery widdowes heart is like a booke, Where her ioyes past, imprinted doe remaine, But when her iudgements eye therein doth looke; She doth not wish they were to come againe. _Maid._ But the maids heart a faire white table is, Spotlesse and pure, where no impressions be But the immortal Caracters of blisse, Which onely God doth write, and Angels see. _Wife._ But wiues haue children, what a ioy is this? _Widow._ Widows haue children too, but maids haue none. _Maid._ No more haue Angels, yet they haue more blisse Then euer yet to mortall man was knowne. _Wife._ The wife is like a faire manurèd[150] field; _Widow._ The widow once was such, but now doth rest. _Maid._ The maide, like Paradice, vndrest, vntil'd, Beares crops of natiue vertue in her breast. _Wife._ Who would not dye as wife, as Lucrece died? _Widow._ Or liue a widdow, as Penelope? _Maid._ Or be a maide, and so be stellified,[151] As all the vertues and the graces be. _Wife._ Wiues are warme Climates well inhabited; But maids are frozen zones where none may dwel. _Maid._ But fairest people in the North are bred, Where Africa breeds Monsters blacke as hell. _Wife._ I haue my husbands honour and his place. _Widow._ My husbands fortunes all suruiue to me. _Maid._ The moone doth borrow light, you borrow grace, When maids by their owne vertues gracèd be. White is my colour; and no hew but this It will receiue, no tincture can it staine. _Wife._ My white hath tooke one colour, but it is My honourable purple dyed in graine.[152] _Widow._ But it hath beene my fortune to renue My colour twice from that it was before. But now my blacke will take no other hue, And therefore now I meane to change no more.