Early Modern Drama · Character Archetypes

TOUCHING

in Microcosmus

Metadata

PlayMicrocosmus
Year (catalogued)1637
First performance1637
Decade1630s
GenreMorality;Masque
Play typeOccasional;Adult Professional;Professional
CompanyQueen Henrietta Maria's Men
TheaterSalisbury Court;Indoor Professional
Speech prefix(es)Touch.
Words200
Characters1090
Typicality0.46 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP idA07975
BritDrama no.2543
ClusterCluster 0 — Clowns, beggars & street sellers

Important excerpts

No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).

Full speech

Touching mine. I am my Ladies Gentleman-usher, and kill Spiders for her Monkey. I am always her foreman in public, and sometime in private: which makes way for me to her favour in reversion, if she survive two or three defective husbands, and her yet uncloyed appetite can pretend and expectation of issue. Mean time a hand ull of ringoes and a little tickling w ds me and the waiting women in her closet with more vows and protestations then a wanting gallant makes when he borrows money. We will conduct my Lady to her Bower, where she prepares to entertain you. Exit. I was a spruce observer of formality; wore good clothes at the second hand, and paid for them quarterly. Together with my Ladies my fortune ell, and of her gentleman usher I became her applesquire, to hold the door, and keep centinel at taverns. I can play the Bravo where my affronting is upon sure advan tage otherwise I can be kicked with as much patience, as a hungry fiddler, when he expects the reversion of a Gall lants oysters. I may yet be serviceable to the Sum ubi in hell, but other preferment I despair of.

Plot summary

Plot — Microcosmus
The four elements, children of Nature and Janus, fight with one another. Janus' attempts to discipline them prove ineffectual, so Nature tries to persuade them to procreate. She invokes the help of Love, who creates concord between the elements through the music of the spheres. Earth gives birth to Physander, the perfect being. The four humours become his servants, and Love brings him Bellanima to be his wife. But Bellanima brings with her a good and bad genius, who can each influence Physander's moral actions. He succumbs to temptation, dismisses the good genius, and seeks out the whore Sensuality. The four humours suggest ways of wooing her: Choler proposes violence, Blood, dance, Phlegm, language, and Melancholy, pathos. The five senses, Sensuality's servants, conduct him to her, and she seduces him with the promise of luxury. Bellanima attempts to reclaim him, but he refuses her. After sleeping with Sensuality, Physander falls ill. The humours drunkenly attack him, and Sensuality disowns him. He feels ashamed at having left his wife for a whore. Bellanima summons Temperance to cure his wounds; she prescribes a simple life and frugal diet, and he is cured. The evil genius still maliciously seeks his destruction, and plans to drive him to suicide through remorse. He is tormented by Furies and accused before the court of Conscience; Despair prosecutes, andHope speaks for thedefence. Physander admits his marital crimes, but his penitence and commitment to future fidelity save him from punishment. With no further power over him, the evil genius can only torment herself; Sensuality, reduced to beggary, joins her on the road to Hell. Love accepts Physander and Bellanima into Elysium, and they are crowned with stars.