in If It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It) — Dekker, Thomas
Metadata
Play
If It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It)
Author
Dekker, Thomas
Year (catalogued)
1612
First performance
1611
Decade
1610s
Genre
Comedy
Play type
Adult Professional
Company
Queen Anne's Men
Theater
Red Bull;Outdoor Professional
Speech prefix(es)
Erm: | Erm. | Er. | Eri.
Words
362
Characters
1868
Typicality
0.52 (cosine to cluster centroid)
TCP id
A20066
BritDrama no.
1641
Cluster
Cluster 4 — Constant hearts & virtuous ladies
Important excerpts
No keyword-matching excerpt could be extracted (the cluster label doesn't share vocabulary with this character's speech).
Full speech
You have good Law against me, (playing the thief) Your Grace may keep me prisoner. I herd the story, tell't not over again, It cruelty to wound men, being half slain. And yet am neither, from ̄ my father's court Came I (being sued by Princes too) for this? To see him, his subjects scorn, and my self his? Once thought I that his love had been (as fate) Unmoveable; and st now turned to hate? Yes, yes, he's wavering as the running stream, And far more idle than a madmans dream. Worse than a diuor e No: to his eyes since hateful I am grown, I'll leave his Court and him, and die unknown. 'Tis no delusion (father) am I the ground Of this your quarrel, which must both confound If you go on: your battles thus isle p to, The first blow given, shall run clean through my heart O constant maid, forgive my wrongs, The of heaven to a pining spring such comfort give as thy glad presence my bosom. Daughter to the Calabriam Duke. The hapless troth plighted wife to your sad King. I confess, Loaded with your Kings contempt and loath to bear Shame to my country who from thence came freighted With many glorious honours, I preferred And obscure life before a public shame; Oh then (good there) be it not my blame If my supposed death, on the King have thrown, Dangers, which from himself are merely grown. I do con ure you sir, by all the bonds Tie you to pious Acts, you would make way To my incensed father; give him these lines, This Ring, pledge of that blessing he delivered me At our last parting: add unto these, if ever His daughters memory to him were deer, To wound the Prince let his rash hand forbear: S nce through each wou ̄ worser he gives him, I am slain, If the sad king you meet, venture to tell him That more for him, than he for me, I bide, And am his subject still, though not his bride. Fears follow me so, I know not where nor when. Las I have none.
Plot summary
Plot — If It Be Not Good, the Devil Is in It (If This Be Not a Good Play, the Devil Is in It)
Hell has a population problem: so few new souls are arriving that Charon’s earnings are in decline, but Pluto is reluctant to allow him to raise his fare lest the new price should prove a deterrent. Instead, he sends devils to Naples in human disguise to tempt people into sin in the court, the abbey, and the city. They are later to rendezvous in a grove to report their progress. Ruffman goes to court, assuming the identity of the foreign courtier Bohor. The newly crowned King of ===== PAGE 144 ===== Is In It Naples, Alfonso, intends to be a just and godly ruler, and plans out his week to devote each day toa different state task. Bohor persuades him to spend more time on pleasure and less on duty, so Saturday is designated a day of hedonism. Alfonso proclaims a reward for whoever entertains him best, and Bohor wins with a display of airborne fireballs. Alfonso’s devotion to pleasure starts to extend beyond Saturdays, and he neglects his state duties. He also breaks off his engagement with Princess Ermenhild, who retires to a convent and lets it be known that she is dead. Shackle-Soul becomes Friar Rush, a novice in the abbey. On learning that the friars eat frugally, he tempts them to gluttony and is appointed the abbey cook. Only Clement, the Sub-Prior, dissents, and Rush identifies him as an enemy who will have to be dealt with. He also makes an enemy of Scumbroth, his predecessor as cook, when he lays an untrue accusation of unchastity. Obtaining gold from a spirit, he tempts Clement: when Clement goes to fetch water, he finds his pot filled instead with gold, which he gives away to Scumbroth. After squandering the money, Scumbroth returns to the grove to get more, witnesses the diabolic rendezvous there, and realizes that Friar Rush is a devil. Ermenhild hears that her father, the Duke of Calabria, has declared war on Naples over her apparent death. She asks Friar Clement to deliver him a letter establishing that she is in fact alive. Clement continues to withstand Rush’s temptations, proving insensible to the pleasures of music, dancing, and voluptuous women, and is steadfast even when Rush reverts to diabolic form and tells him he is to die that night. Grumball adopts the name Lurchall and enters the service of the corrupt merchant Bartervile, who attempts to cheat his client Innocentio: the terms of Innocentio’s loan require him to repay it at a set time, or else his mortgaged estate will revert to Bartervile; so Bartervile tries unsuccessfully to…