I do rejoice to find myself among The choicest spirits of the age: health, sirs! I would commend your fame to future years, But that I know ere this ye must be old In the conviction, and that ye full oft With sure posterity have shaken hands Over the unstable bridge of present time. MARLOWE. Not so: we write from the full heart within, And leave posterity to find her own. Health, sir!--your good deeds laurel you in heaven. MIDDLETON. 'Twere best men left their fame to chance and fashion, As birds bequeath their eggs to the sun's hatching, Since Genius can make no will. MARLOWE. Troth, can it! But for the consequences of the deed, What fires of blind fatality may catch them! Say, you do love a woman--do adore her-- You may embalm the memory of her worth And chronicle her beauty to all time, In words whereat great Jove himself might flush, And feel Olympus tremble at his thoughts; Yet where is your security? Some clerk Wanting a foolscap, or some boy a kite, Some housewife fuel, or some sportsman wadding To wrap a ball (which hits the poet's brain By merest accident) seizes your record, And to the wind thus scatters all your will, Or, rather, your will's object. Thus, our pride Swings like a planet by a single hair, Obedient to God's breath. More wine! more wine! I preach--and I grow melancholy--wine! _Enter_ DRAWER _with a tankard_. A GENTLEMAN (_rising_). We're wending homeward--gentlemen, good night! MARLOWE. Not yet--not yet--the night has scarce begun-- Nay, Master Heywood--Middleton, you'll stay! Bright skies to those who go--high thoughts go with ye, And constant youth! GENTLEMEN. We thank you, sir--good night! _Exeunt_ GENTLEMEN. HEYWOOD. Let's follow--'tis near morning. MARLOWE. Do not go. I'm ill at ease, touching a certain matter I've taken to heart--don't speak of't--and besides I have a sort of horror of my bed. Last night a squadron charged me in a dream, With Isis and Osiris at the flanks, Towering and waving their colossal arms, While in the van a fiery chariot roll'd, Wherein a woman stood--I knew her well-- Who seem'd but newly risen from the grave!