_Bel._ This is weakness--worse Than a scared beldam's dreaming of the dead, 350 And waking in the dark.--Go to--go to. _Arb._ Methought he looked like Nimrod as he spoke, Even as the proud imperial statue stands Looking the monarch of the kings around it, And sways, while they but ornament, the temple. _Bel._ I told you that you had too much despised him, And that there was some royalty within him--What then? he is the nobler foe. _Arb._ But we The meaner.--Would he had not spared us! _Bel._ So-- Wouldst thou be sacrificed thus readily? 360 _Arb._ No--but it had been better to have died Than live ungrateful. _Bel._ Oh, the souls of some men! Thou wouldst digest what some call treason, and Fools treachery--and, behold, upon the sudden, Because for something or for nothing, this Rash reveller steps, ostentatiously, 'Twixt thee and Salemenes, thou art turned Into--what shall I say?--Sardanapalus! I know no name more ignominious. _Arb._ But An hour ago, who dared to term me such 370 Had held his life but lightly--as it is, I must forgive you, even as he forgave us-- Semiramis herself would not have done it. _Bel._ No--the Queen liked no sharers of the kingdom, Not even a husband.[17] _Arb._ I must serve him truly---- _Bel._ And humbly? _Arb._ No, sir, proudly--being honest. I shall be nearer thrones than you to heaven; And if not quite so haughty, yet more lofty. You may do your own deeming--you have codes, And mysteries, and corollaries of 380 Right and wrong, which I lack for my direction, And must pursue but what a plain heart teaches. And now you know me. _Bel._ Have you finished? _Arb._ Yes-- With you. _Bel._ And would, perhaps, betray as well As quit me? _Arb._ That's a sacerdotal thought, And not a soldier's. _Bel._ Be it what you will-- Truce with these wranglings, and but hear me. _Arb._ No-- There is more peril in your subtle spirit Than in a phalanx. _Bel._ If it must be so-- I'll on alone. _Arb._ Alone! _Bel._ Thrones hold but one. 390 _Arb._ But this is filled.