For me, I force 1 not argument a straw.
Since that my case is past the help of iaw.
'In vain I rail at Opportunity,
At Time, at Tarquin, and uncheerful night;
In vain I cavil with my infamy;
In vain I spurn at my confirm'd despite :
This helpless smoke of words doth me no right. The remedy indeed to do me good,
Is to let forth my foul, defiled blood.
'Poor hand, why quiver'st thou at this decree?
Honor thyself to rid me of this shame :
For if I die, my honor lives in thee;
But if I live, thou livest in my defame:
Since thou couldst not defend thy loyal dame,
And wast afeard to scratch her wicked foe,
Kill both thyself and her for yielding so.'
This said, from her betumbled couch she starteth,
To find some desperate instrument of death:
But this no slaughter-house no tool imparteth,
To make more vent for passage of her breath,
Which, thronging through her lips, so vanisheth
As smoke from Etna, that in air consumes,
Or that which from discharged cannon fumes.
In vain,' quoth she, I live, and seek in vain
Some happy mean to end a hapless life.
I fear'd by Tarquin's falchion to be slain,
Yet for the selfsame purpose seek a knife:
But when I fear'd, I was a loyal wife;
So am I now.-O, no, that cannot be :
Of that true type hath Tarquin rifled me.
O, that is gone, for which I sought to live;
And therefore now I need not fear to die :
To clear this spot by death, at least I give
A badge of fame to slander's livery;
A dying life to living infamy.
Poor, helpless help, the treasure stolen away,
To burn the guiltless casket where it lay!
'Well, well, dear Collatine, thou shalt not know The stained taste of violated troth;
I will not wrong thy true affection so,
To flatter thee with an infringed oath :
This bastard graff shall never come to growth:
He shall not boast, who did thy stock pollute,
That thou art doting father of his fruit :
Nor shall he smile at thee in secret thought, Nor laugh with his companions at thy state; But thou shalt know thy interest was not bought Basely with gold, but stolen from forth thy gate. For me, I am the mistress of my fate;
And with my trespass never will dispense,
'Till life to death acquit my forced offence.
'I will not poison thee with my attaint,
Nor fold my fault in cleanly-coin'd excuses;
My sable ground of sin I will not paint,
To hide the truth of this false night's abuses:
My tongue shall utter all; mine eyes, like sluices,
As from a mountain-spring that feeds a dale,
Shall gush pure streams to purge my impure tale.'
By this, lamenting Philomel had ended
The well-tuned warble of her nightly sorrow;
And solemn night with slow-sad gait descended
To ugly hell; when, lo, the blushing morrow
Lends light to all fair eyes that light will borrow:
But cloudy Lucrece shames herself to see,
And therefore still in night would cloister'd be.
Revealing day through every cranny spies,
And seems to point her out where she sits weeping;
To whom she sobbing speaks :-' O eye of eyes,
Why pry'st thou through my window? leave thy
peeping:
Mock with thy tickling beams eyes that are sleeping:
Brand not my forehead with thy piercing light, For day hath naught to do what's done by night.'
Thus cavils she with every thing she sees.
True grief is fond1 and testy as a child,
Who, wayward once, his mood with naught agrees.
Old woes, not infant sorrows, bear them mild :
Continuance tames the one; the other wild,
Like an unpractised swimmer plunging still,
With too much labor drowns for want of skill.
So she, deep-drenched in a sea of care,
Holds disputation with each thing she views,
And to herself all sorrow doth compare :
No object but her passion's strength renews;
And as one shifts, another straight ensues:
Sometime her grief is dumb, and hath no words;
Sometime 'tis mad, and too much talk affords.
The little birds, that tune their morning's joy,
Make her moans mad with their sweet melody:
For mirth doth search the bottom of annoy;
Sad souls are slain in merry company;
Grief best is pleased with grief's society.
True sorrow then is feelingly sufficed,
When with like semblance it is sympathised.
'Tis double death to drown in ken of shore; He ten times pines, that pines beholding food; To see the salve doth make the wound ache more; Great grief grieves most at that would do it good;
Deep woes roll forward like a gentle flood,
Who, being stopp'd, the bounding banks o'er
Grief dallied with nor law nor limit knows.
You mocking birds,' quoth she, your tanes
Within your hollow-swelling, feather'd breasts,
And in my hearing be you mute and dumb!
(My restless discord loves no stops nor rests;
A woful hostess brooks not merry guests)
nimble notes to pleasing1 ears; Distress likes dumps, when time is kept with
Come, Philomel, that sing'st of ravishment,
Make thy sad grove in my dishevell❜d hair.
As the dank earth weeps at thy languishment,
So I at each sad strain will strain a tear,
And with deep groans the diapason bear:
For burthen-wise I'll hum on Tarquin still,
While thou on Tereus descant'st, better skill:
And whiles against a thorn thou bear'st thy part ; To keep thy sharp woes waking, wretched I,
To imitate thee well, against my heart
Will fix a sharp knife, to affright mine eye;
Who, if it wink, shall thereon fall and die.
These means, as frets upon an instrument,
Shall tune our heart-strings to true languish-
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