_Phi._ O, I beseech you, sir, reclaim his wits;
My master's mad, stark mad, alas! for love.
_Qua._ For love? Nay, and he be not mad for hate,
'Tis amiable fortune. I tell thee, youth,
Right rare and geason.[403] Strange? Mad for love!
O show me him; I'll give him reasons straight--
So forcible, so all invincible,
That it shall drag love out. Run mad for love?
What mortally exists, on which our hearts
Should be enamoured with such passion? 10
For love! Come, Philus; come, I'll change his fate;
Instead of love, I'll make him mad for hate.
But, troth, say what strain's his madness of?
_Phi._ Fantastical.
_Qua._ Immure him; sconce him; barricado him in't,
Fantastical mad! thrice blessèd heart!
Why hark, good Philus (O that thy narrow sense
Could but contain me now!), all that exists,
Takes valuation from opinion,
A giddy minion now. Pish! thy taste is dull, 20
And canst not relish me. Come; where's Jacomo?
_Enter_ JACOMO, _unbraced, and careless dressed._
_Phi._ Look, where he comes. O map of boundless woe!
_Jaco._ Yon gleam is day; darkness, sleep, and fear,
Dreams, and the ugly visions of the night,
Are beat to hell by the bright palm of light;
Now roams the swain, and whistles up the morn:
Deep silence breaks; all things start up with light,
Only my heart, that endless night and day,
Lies bed-rid, crippled by coy Celia.[404]
_Qua._ There's a strain, law. 30
Nay, now I see he's mad most palpable;
He speaks like a player: ha! poetical.
_Jaco._ The wanton spring lies dallying with the earth,
And pours fresh blood in her decayèd veins;
Look how the new-sapp'd branches are in child
With tender infants! how the sun draws out,
And shapes their moisture into thousand forms
Of sprouting buds! all things that show or breathe
Are now instaur'd,[405] saving my wretched breast,
That is eternally congeal'd with ice 40
Of frozed despair. O Celia! coy, too nice!
_Qua._ Still, sans question, mad?
_Jaco._ O where doth piety and pity rest?
_Qua._ Fetch cords; he's irrecoverable; mad, rank mad.
He calls for strange chimeras, fictions,
That have no being since the curse of death
Was thrown on man. Pity and piety,
Who'll deign converse with them? Alas! vain head,
Pity and piety are long since dead.
_Jaco._ Ruin to chance, and all that strive to stand 50
Like swoll'n Colossus on her tottering base!
Fortune is blind--
_Qua._ You lie! you lie!
None but a madman would term fortune blind.
How can she see to wound desert so right,
Just in the speeding-place?[406] to girt lewd brows
With honor'd wreath? Ha! Fortune blind? Away!
How can she, hood-wink'd, then so rightly see
To starve rich worth and glut iniquity?
_Jaco._ O love!
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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