MOROSE

Out Rogue, and must thou blow thy Horn, too? Pain of thy life, be silent. BY your leave, Sir (I am a stranger here) is your name, Master Morose? is your name, Master Morose? F shes! Pythagoreans all! this is strange! What say you, Sir, nothing? Has Harpocrates been here, with his Club, among you? well Sir, I will believe you to be the man, at this time: I will ven ter upon you, Sir. Your friends at Court commend them to you, Sir— Whose Knave are you! Fetch me my Sword— How then, rude companion! Good Sir! have I ever cozened any friends of yours of their Land? bought their Possessions? taken forfeit of their Mortgage? begged a Reversion from them? bastarded their Issue? what have I done, that may deserve this? Why? if I had made and Assassinate upon your Fa there; vitiated your Mother; ravished your Sisters — Why? you do more in this, Sir: It were a ven geance centuple, for all facinorous Acts, that could be named, to do that you do— Oh, what is my sin! what is my sin? Oh, o! Gentle Sir, have you done? have you had your plea sure of me? I'll think of these things. The Horn again Come, have me to my Chamber: but first shut the door. Oh, shut the door, shut the door: Is he come again? Oh Cutberd, Cutberd, Cutberd! here has been a cut throat with me: help me in to my bed, and give me Physic with thy counsel. NAy, and she will, let her refuse, at her own charges: it's nothing to me, Gentlemen. But she will not be invited to the Like Feasts, or Guests, every day. What say you, Lady? speak out, I beseech you. OF my judgement, a divine softness! but can you naturally, Lady, as I enjoin these by doctrine and industry, refer your self to the search of my judgement, and (not taking pleasure in your tongue, which is a woman's chiefest pleasure) think it plausible, to answer me by silent ge stures, so long as my speeches jump right, with what you conceive? Curtsy. (—) Excellent! Divine! if it were possible, she should hold out thus! Peace, Cutherd, thou art made for e ver, as thou hast made me, if this felicity have lasting: but I will try her further. Dear Lady, I am Courtly, I tell you, and I must have mine ears banqueted with pleasant, and witty Conferences, pretty Girds, Scoffs, and Dalliance in her, that I mean to choose for my Bed-pheere. The Ladies in Court, think it a most desperate impair to their quick ness of wit, and good carriage, if they cannot give occasion for a man to court them; and, when and amorous Discourse is set on foot, minister as good matter to continue it, as him self: and do you alone so much differ from all them, that, what they (with so much circumstance) affect, and toil for, to seem learned, to seem judicious, to seem sharp, and conceited, you can bury in your self, with silence? and ra there trust your graces to the fair conscience of Virtue, then to the World's, or your own Proclamation? What say you, Lady? good Lady, speak out. That sorrow does fill me with gladness! Oh Moro see! thou art happy above Mankind! pray that thou mayest contain thy self. I will only put her to it once more, and it shall be with the utmost touch, and test of their Sex. But hear me, fair Lady, I do also love to see her, whom I shall choose for my Heicfar, to be the first and principal in all Fa shions; precede all the Dams at Court, by a sortnight; have her counsel of Tailors, Linneners, Lace-women, Embroy derers, and fit with them sometime twice a day, upon French Intelligences; and then come forth, varied Like Nature, or oftener then she, and better, by the help of Art, her aemu lous Servant. This do I affect. And how will you be able, Lady, with this frugality of speech, to give the manifold (but necessary) instructions, for that Bodies, these Sleeves, those Sirkts, this Cut, that Stitch, this Embroidery, that Lace, this Wire, those Knots, that Ruff, those Roses, this Girdle, that Fan, the tother Scarf, these Gloves? would! what say you, Lady. How, Lady? pray you, rise a note. Admirable Creature! I will trouble you no more: I will not sin against so sweet a simplicity. Let me now be bold to print, on those divine lips, the seal of being mine. Cutberd, I give thee the Lease of thy House free: thank me not, but with thy leg (—) I know what thou wouldst say, she's poor, and her friends deceased; she has brought a wealthy dowry in her silence, Cutberd: and in respect of her poverty, Cutberd, I shall have her more loving, and obedi ent, Cutberd. Go thy ways, and get me a Minister present lie, with a soft, low voice to marry us, and pray him he will not be impertinent, but brief as he can; away: softly, Cut beard. Sirrah, conduct your Mistress into the dining Room, your now-Mistris. Oh my felicity! how I shall be revenged on mine insolent Kinsman, and his plots to fright me from marrying! This night I will get and Heir, and thrust him out of my blood Like a Stranger; he would be knighted, forsooth, and thought by that means to reign over me, his Title must do it: no Kinsman, I will now make you bring me the tenth Lords, and the sixteenth Ladies Letter, Kinsman; and it shall do you no good, Kinsman. Your Knighthood it self shall come on it's knees, and it shall be rejected; it shall be sued for it's fees to execution, and not be redeemed; it shall cheat at the twelve-penny Ordinary, it Knighthood, for it's Diet all the Termtime, and tell Tales for it in the Vacation, to the Hostess: or it Knighthood shall do worse; take Sanctuary in Cole-harbor, and fast. It shall fright all it friends, with borrowing Letters, and when one of the fourscore hath brought it Knighthood ten shillings, it Knighthood shall go to the Cranes, or the Bear at the Bridge -foot, and be drunk in fear: it shall not have money to discharge one Tavern reckoning, to invite the old Creditors, to forbear it Knighthood; or the new, that should be, to trust it Knighthood. It shall be the tenth name in the Bound, to take up the commodity of Pipkins and stone Jugs; and the partly thereof shall not furnish it Knighthood forth, for the attempting of a Bakers Widow, a brown Bakers Widow. It shall give it Knighthoods name, for a stallion, to all gamesome Citizens Wives, and be refused; when the Master of a Dancing School, or ( How do you call him) the worst Reveller in the Town is taken: it shall want Clothes, and by reason of that, wit, to fool to Law years. It shall not have hope to repair it self by Constanti nople, Ireland, or Virginia; but the best, and last fortune to it Knighthood shall be, to make Dol Tear-sheet, or Kate-Common, a Lady: and so, it Knighthood may eat. ARe you sure he is not gone by? What says he, Cutberd? No more. I thank him. Oh, o, stay Cutberd! let him give me five shillings of my money back. As it is bounty to reward benefits, so is it e quity to mulct injuries. I will have it. What says he? It must be changed. What says he? Away, away with him, stop his mouth, away, I for give it.— How! You can speak then! Speak out I mean. She can talk! What, Sirrah. None of my Knaves there? where is this Impostor, Cutberd? She is my Regent already! I have married a Pen thesilea, a Semiramis, sold my liberty to a Distaff! WHere's Master Morose? Is he come again! Lord have mercy up on me. She has acquaintance, too! What hour, Sir? How should you arrive at the knowledge of so much! Bar my doors! bar my doors! where are all my eaters? my mouths now? baire up my doors, you Varlets. Oh Amazonian impudence! Oh, my torment, my torment! Of my affliction. Good Sir, depart, and let her do it alone. That cursed Barber! I have married his Cittern, that's common to all men. Some plague above the plague— Revenge me on him. No, let the Wretch live wretched. May he get the Itch, and his Shop so lousy, as no man dare come at him, nor he come at no man. Let his Warming-Pan be ever cold. Let him never hope to see fire again. His Chairs be always empty, his Scissors rust, and his Combes mould in their Cases. Let there be no Baud carted that year, to em ploy a Basin of his: but let him be glad to eat his Sponge, for Bred. Or, for want of Bred— No, beat the old ones to poulder, and make Bred of them. May all the Botches, and Burns, that he has cured on others, break out upon him. Blessed minute, that they would whisper thus ever. Oh, it was too miraculously good to last! Had I known your Ladyships Painter, I would. Madame— Will it please your Ladyship command a Cham ber, and be private with hour friend? you shall have your choice of Rooms, to retire to after: my whole House is yours. I know, it hath been your Ladishis errand, into the City, at other times, how ever now you have been unhap pily diverted upon me but I shall be loath to break any honourable custom of your Ladyships. And therefore, good Madame— Is this your Brau , Ladies? Music of all sorts. Oh, a plot, a plot, a plot, a plot upon me! This day, I shall be their Anvil to work on, they will grate me a sunder. It's worse then the noise of a Saw. Is that Gorgon, that Medusa come? Hide me, hide me. Oh, o, o. The Drum, and Trum pets found, Follow, follow, follow. WAs there ever poor Bridegroom so tormented? or man indeed? Morose speaks from above: the Trumpets sounding. Villains, Murderers, Sons of the Earth, and Traitors, what do you there? Morose des cends with a longsword I will have no such examples in my House, Lady Otter. Mistress Marry Ambree, your examples are dange rous. Rogues, Hellhounds, Stentors, out of my doors, you sons of noise and tumult, begotten on and ill May -day, or when the Galley-foist is afloat to Westminster! A Trumpet ter could not be conceived but then! They have rend my Roof, Walls, and all my Windores asunder, with their brazen throats. What mean you, Gentlemen? Shall I have a Lecture read upon me alive? Let me go. Oh, no. Labour not to stop her. She is Like a Con duit-pipe, that will gush out with more force, when she oh pens again. Oh misery! I think so. Nay, Gentlemen, I am tame. This is but and exercise, I know a Marriage Ceremony, which I must endure. O. Sure, he would do well enough, if he could sleep. No, I should do well enough, if you could sleep. Have I no friend that will make her drunk? or give her a little ladanum? or opium? How! Oh, redeem me, Fate, redeem me, Fate. For how how many causes may a man be divorced, Nephew? I will not rest, I will not think of any other hope or comfort till I know. For what? Oh, no! there is such a noise in the Court, that they have frighted me home, with more violence then I went! such speaking, and counter-speaking, with their several voices of Citations, Appellations, Allegations, Certificates, Attachments, Intergatories, References, Convictions, and Afflictions indeed, among the Doctors and Proctors! that the noise here is silence too't! a kind of midnight! Can you Master Tru-wit? Yes, and are very sober graven persons, that will dispatch it in a Chamber, with a whisper, or two. Good Sir, shall I hope this benefit from you, and trust my self into your hands? Do your pleasure with me, Gentlemen; I be leave in you: and that deserves no delusion— Are these the two learned men? Salute them? I had rather do any thing, then wear out time so unfruitfully, Sir. I wonder, how these common forms, as God save you, and you are welcome, are come to be a habit in our lives! or, I am glad to see you! when I cannot see, what the profit can be of these words, so long as it is no whit better with him, whose affairs are sad, and grievous, that he hears this salutation. Nay, good Gentlemen, do not throw me into cir cumstances. Let your comforts ar iue quickly at me, those that are. Be swift in affording me my peace, if so I shall hope any. I love not your Dispurations, or your Court-tu mults. And that it be not strange to you, I will tell you. My Father, in my education, was wont to advise me, that I should always collect, and contain my mind, not suffering it to flow loosely; that I should look to what things were necessary to the carriage of my life, and what not: embra cing the one and eschewing the other. In short, that I should endear my self to rest, and avoid turmoil: which now is grown to be another nature to me. So that I come not to your public pleadings, or your places of noise; not that I neglect those things, that make for the dignity of the Come mon-wealth: but for the mere avoiding of clamours, and impertinences of Orators, that know not how to be silent. And for the cause of noise, am I now a suitor to you You do not know in what a misery I have been exercised this day, what a torrent of evil! My very House turns round with the tumult! I dwell in a Windmill! The perpetual about motion is here, and not at Eltham. Yet again! No excursions upon words, good Doctor, to the question briefly. I understood you, before: good Sir, avoid your impertinency of Translation. Yet more! How? is that, Sir, a lawful impediment? One at once, I pray you Gentlemen. Nay, Gentlemen, quarrel not in that question; it concerns not my case: pass to the third. No, nor I care not, Sir: they offer me no comfort in the question, I am sure, Oh me! to end the Controversy, I never was a God father, I never was a Godfather id my life, Sir. Pass to the next. No, I would rather she were of none, then be put to the trouble of it! By no means, good Sir, on to the rest: shall you ever come to and end, think you? Oh no, it was too voluntary, mine: too voluntary. No matter, Master Parson: would she would go into a Nunnery yet. I thrust my self too soon into these Fetters. I feel no air of comfort blowing to me, in all this. Heyday, now they begin. What's all this to me? (Oh, this was it, I feared.) Good Sir, let me escape. Oh, mine ears! Good Echo's, forbear. I will do any thing— Yet more? Oh, the variety, and changes of my torment! Oh, Mankind Generation! Ladies, I must crave all your pardons— For a wrong I have done to your whole sex, in marrying this fair, and virtuous Gentlewoman— Being guilty of and infirmity, which before I con ferred with these learned men, I thought I might have con ceald— I am no man, Ladies. Utterly vn-abled in nature, by reason of frigidity, to perform the duties, or any the least office of a Husband. Oh me, must I undergo that! Our on me, worse! Worst of all! Worse, worse then worst! What then, Sir? What is true Gentlemen? what do you assure me? Oh, let me worship and adore you, Gentlemen! Yes, to my hand, I thank these Knights: Master Parson, let me thank you otherwise. Oh my heart! wilt thou break? wilt thou break? this is worst of all worst worsts! that Hell could have devised! Marry a Whore! and so much noise! Oh, do not talk to me, take not from me the plea sure of dying in silence, Nephew. (It cannot be.) Oh, what thou wilt, Nephew! thou shalt deserve me, and have me. That, and any thing beside. Make thine own con ditions. My whole estate is thine. Manage it, I will become thy Ward. Thou shalt have it, Nephew. I will do it, and more. Where is the Writing? I will seal to it, that, or to a Blank, and write thine own conditions. Oh, my Nephew knows you belike: away Crocodile. Come Nephew: give me the Pen. I will subscribe to any thing, and seal to what thou wilt, for my deliue rance. Thou art my restorer. Here, I deliver it thee as my Deed. If there be a word in it lacking, or writ with false Orthography, I protest before—I will not take the aduan tage. And, for her favours?