MAR. [_after some reflection_] Sire, your creed is also mine. [_After a pause._ I find I am misunderstood: 'tis as I feared. You see me draw the veil from majesty, And view its mysteries with steadfast eye: How should you know if I regard as holy What I no more regard as terrible? Dangerous I seem, for bearing thoughts too high: My King, I am not dangerous: my wishes Lie buried here. [_Laying his hand on his breast._ The poor and purblind rage Of innovation, that but aggravates The weight o' th' fetters which it cannot break, Will never heat _my_ blood. The century Admits not my ideas: I live a citizen Of those that are to come. Sire, can a picture Break your rest? Your breath obliterates it. KING. No other knows you harbour such ideas? MAR. Such, no one. KING [_rises, walks a few steps, then stops opposite the Marquis. —Aside_]. New at least, this dialect! Flattery exhausts itself: a man of parts Disdains to imitate. For once let's have A trial of the opposite! Why not? The strange is oft the lucky.—If so be This is your principle, why let it pass! I will conform; the crown shall have a servant New in Spain,—a liberal! MAR. Sire, I see How very meanly you conceive of men; How, in the language of the frank true spirit You find but another deeper artifice Of a more practis'd coz'ner: I can also Partly see what causes this. 'Tis men; 'Tis men that force you to it: they themselves Have cast away their own nobility, Themselves have crouch'd to this degraded posture. Man's innate greatness, like a spectre, frights them; Their poverty seems safety; with base skill They ornament their chains, and call it virtue To wear them with an air of grace. Twas thus You found the world; thus from your royal father Came it to you: how in this distorted, Mutilated image could you honour man? KING. Some truth there is in this. MAR. Pity, however, That in taking man from the Creator, And changing him into _your_ handiwork, And setting up yourself to be the god Of this new-moulded creature, you should have Forgotten one essential; you yourself Remained a man, a very child of Adam! You are still a suffering, longing mortal, You call for sympathy, and to a god We can but sacrifice, and pray, and tremble! O unwise exchange! unbless'd perversion! When you have sunk your brothers to be play'd As harp-strings, who will join in harmony With you the player? KING [_aside_]. By Heaven, he touches me!