You cannot dream

To speak to you at once.
The warmth and altitude of my esteem,
And this esteem, this zeal, this love inspires
The first, last, greatest of all my desires,—

To be your friend! My heart, charmed by your merit,
And by the thousand graces you inherit,

Trusts you will love me in your turn, and feel

How true a friend I am—and how genteel.

[During this speech Alceste remains dreamily absorbed, as if unaware that he is being addressed. He becomes attentive only when Oronte resumes.

They are for you-sir-all these eulogies.

Al. For me, sir?

Or.

Aye-they surely can't displease?

Al. Oh, no! Yet, sir, I scarcely can believe My ears- -so great the honor I receive!

Or. By such esteem you scarce can be surprised,

Whose worth by all the world is recognized.

Al. Sir

Or.

There's no office in the state

That for your golden merit is too great.
Al. Sir . . .

Or.

So supreme your worth, your rivals all

Seem but pale copies, you th' original.

May the lightning blast me if I speak
Now on your cheek

One word I do not think!

Let me imprint the seal of amity:

Call me your friend from this day forth, and be
The brother of my soul. Your promise-quick!
You'll be my friend?

Al.

Or.

Sir.

Sure, you do not stick

At swearing
Al.
Sir, you honor me, indeed;
But friendship does not shoot up like a weed;
And men profane its sacred name and nature
Who sanction every random candidature.
It is a compact made with care and choice.
Friendship and love-should wait on reason's voice.
And we might rue it on some later day
If we too quickly give our hearts away.

Or. Gad, sir! you speak like a philosopher.

I love you all the more for't. Let's defer,
Since that's your pleasure, till some future hour
These friendly bonds. Meantime, if I have power
To serve your hopes at court, I'm wholly yours,—
Yours, sir, to make all kinds of overtures.
The King consults me, heeds me, is my friend,
And I have hopes, plans, prospects without end.
Do not forget: I'm yours unto the death!
And, knowing all your skill and your good faith,
To seal our bond I now will bid you sit
In judgment on a sonnet I have writ.

Al. Sir, that's a task too hard for my poor wit;
I beg off . .

Or.

...

Why?

Al.

I lack the skill to feign;

And, if a thing mislikes me, I'm too plain.

Or. The very thing I crave! You would do wrong To make black white, to bracket weak and strong,

To call bad verses good-or good ones bad.

Al. Since you insist, why, sir, I shall be glad ..
Or. A sonnet ('tis a sonnet), Hope-you see

It's for a lady that had smiled on me:

Hope 'tis not high-flown, pompous, swelling verse,
But tender rhyme, sweet, languorous—and terse.

And gentlemanly melody may please,

And that my choice of words will hit your taste.

Al.

We'll see, sir.

Or.

Anyhow, I wrote in haste;

Gad, sir, it scarcely took a half-hour's time.

Al.

Or.

Ph.

Al. vine!

Haste, sir, makes waste; slow time builds lofty rhyme. [Recites.]

Hope, I account thee but a fount
Of mingled joy and sorrow;
Thy waters mount, recede, remount,
Bubbling to-day and dry to-morrow.

A rare beginning! witty, every line!

[Aside.] Rare! Witty! Tell him-do-that it's di

Or.

Ph.

Al.

Or.

Phyllis, before your lips forswore

The love I bore, you murmured, "Yes";
Unless still more you hold in store,

Than heretofore, why acquiesce?

How gallantly you hint at her rebuff.

[Aside.] What! do you praise this namby-pamby stuff?

In this lorn state if I must wait,
I'll antedate my destined fate,
This mortal coil untying;
So negative the hope you give!
So fugitive! why should I live
Still sighing, crying, dying?

Ph. Ah! how enchanting! What a dying fall!

Al.

[Aside.] Plague take you, sycophant! I would this scrawl,

This gimcrack, gibble-gabble, choke-pear sonnet,

Stuck in your throat, that you might strangle on it!
A dying fall, forsooth!

[To Alceste.] But you, sir, you have promised, without

ruth,

In all sincerity, to tell the truth.

Al. It is a ticklish trade to criticize, And only eulogists are counted wise.

Sir, one day to a friend whose name I hide,
That begged me judge his verses, I replied:
"A gentleman indeed may be a poet,

If he but screen the fact so none may know it,
Make rhymes in secret and secrete his rhymes
From past, from present, and from future times;
But, if he violate this golden rule,

The proudest gentleman may play the fool."
Or. And by rehearsing of this little chat
You mean to hint I'm wrong

Al.

I don't say that;

But I did say (to him) that frigid verse
To all who hear it is a baleful curse,
And one is damned by this criterion,
Though in all else he be a paragon.

Or, I half suspect you do not like my sonnet,

And mean to pass an unkind judgment on it.
Al. I don't say that. I merely said, in brief,
That many an honest man thus comes to grief.
Or. Do I, sir, lurk behind this pseudonym?
Al. I don't say that. But, sir, I said (to him),
Why this mad lust to fashion odes and strophes?
And why beset the printer with these trophies?
For making useless books a man can give
One sole excuse: he wrote that he might live.
Believe me, exorcise this silly passion,
Or if some sweating devil makes you fashion
Couplets and quatrains, hide from mortal sight,
'Neath triple bolts and bars, the stuff you write.
You are an honest man, and all men know it,
While not a soul suspects you are a poet;
Then why rush into print and let men scan
A worthless poet in the honest man?
Such were the truths I tried to make him see.

my

Or. I see them perfectly, and quite agree.
But tell me, is there something in my sonnet
Al. Sir, since again you ask verdict on it,
It's downright bad! You've followed foolish models,
Who had no thought of nature in their noddles.
What means this line: I count thee but a fount?
Or this: Thy waters mount, recede, remount?

Or this: In this lorn state if I must wait,
I'll antedate my destined fate?

Or this: So negative the hope you give!

So fugitive!-why should I live . . . ?

Such flights of fancy travesty the heart:
Pure truth and feeling are the soul of art;
And all these far-fetched turns and glittering freaks
Are not the language simple nature speaks.
When whim is sovereign, judgment is displaced.