SCENE 4
A Banquet; the KING seated; on his right ALARCOS.SIDONIA, LEON, the ADMIRAL OF CASTILLE, and other LORDS.Groups of PAGES, CHAMBERLAINS, and SERVING-MEN.
II:4:1 The KING.Would’st match them, cousin, ‘gainst our barbs?II:4:2 ALAR.AgainstOur barbs, Sir!II:4:3 KING.Eh, Lord Leon, you can scanA courser’s points?II:4:4 LEON.O, Sir, your travellersNeed fleeter steeds than we poor shambling folksWho stay at home. To my unskilful sense,Speed for the chase and vigour for the tilt,Meseems enough.II:4:5 ALAR.’If riders be as prompt.II:4:6 LEON.Our tourney is put off, or please your Grace,I’d try conclusions with this marvellous beast,This Pegasus, this courser of the sun,That is to blind us all with his bright raysAnd cloud our chivalry.II:4:7 KING.My Lord Sidonia,You’re a famed judge: try me this Cyprus wine;An English prince did give it me, returningFrom the holy sepulchre.II:4:8 SIDO.Most rare, my liege,And glitters like a gem!II:4:9 KING.It doth contentMe much, your Cyprus wine. Lord Admiral,Hast heard the news? The Saracens have fledBefore the Italian galleys.II:4:10 THE ADMIRAL OF CASTILLE.No one guidesA galley like your Pisan.II:4:11 ALAR.The great DogeOf Venice, sooth, would barely veil his flagTo Pisa.II:4:12 ADM.Your Venetian hath his craft.This Saracenic rent will surely touchOur turbaned neighbours?II:4:13 KING.To the very core,Granada’s all a-mourning. Good, my Lords,One goblet more. We’ll give our cousin’s health.Here’s to the Count Alarcos.II:4:14 OMNES.To the Count Alarcos.[The Guests rise, pay their homage to the KING, and are retiring.]II:4:15 KING.Good night, Lord Admiral; my Lord of Leon,My Lord Sidonia, and my Lord of Lara,Gentle adieus; to you, my Lord, and you,To all and each. Cousin, good night—and yetA moment rest awhile; since your returnI’ve looked on you in crowds, it may become usTo say farewell alone.[The KING waves his hand to the SENESCHAL—the Chamber is cleared.]II:4:16 ALAR.Most gracious Sire,You honour your poor servant.II:4:17 KING.Prithee, sit.This scattering of the Saracen, methinks,Will hold the Moor to his truce?II:4:18 ALAR.It would appearTo have that import.II:4:19 KING.Should he pass the mountains,We can receive him.II:4:20 ALAR.Where’s the crown in SpainMore prompt and more prepared?II:4:21 KING.Cousin, you’re right.We flourish. By St. James, I feel a glowOf the heart to see you here once more, my cousin;I’m low in the vale of years, and yet I thinkI could defend my crown with such a knightOn my right hand.II:4:22 ALAR.Such liege and land would raiseOur lances high.II:4:23 KING.We carry all before us.Leon reduced. The crescent paled in Cordova,Why, if she gain Valencia, AragonMust kick the beam. And shall she gain Valencia?It cheers my blood to find thee by my side;Old days, old days return, when thou to meWert as the apple of mine eye.II:4:24 ALAR.My liege,This is indeed most gracious.II:4:25 KING.Gentle cousin,Thou shalt have pause to say that I am gracious.O! I did ever love thee; and for thatSome passages occurred between us once,That touch my memory to the quick; I wouldEven pray thee to forget them, and to holdI was most vilely practised on, my mindPoisoned, and from a fountain, that to deemTainted were frenzy.II:4:26 ALAR.[Falling on his knee, and taking the KING’s hand.]My most gracious liege,This morn to thee I did my fealty pledge.Believe me, Sire, I did so with clear breast,And with no thought to thee and to thy lineBut fit devotion.II:4:27 KING.O, I know it well,I know thou art right true. Mine eyes are moistTo see thee here again.II:4:28 ALAR.It is my post,Nor could I seek another.II:4:29 KING.Thou dost knowThat Hungary leaves us?II:4:30 ALAR.I was grieved to hearThere were some crosses.II:4:31 KING.Truth, I am not grieved.Is it such joy this fair Castillian realm,This glowing flower of Spain, be rudely pluckedBy a strange hand? To see our chambers filledWith foreign losels; our rich fiefs and abbeysThe prey of each bold scatterling, that findsNo heirship in his country? Have I livedAnd laboured for this end, to swell the sailsOf alien fortunes? O my gentle cousin,There was a time we had far other hopes!I suffer for my deeds.II:4:32 ALAR.We must forget,We must forget, my liege.II:4:33 KING.Is’t then so easy?Thou hast no daughter. Ah! thou canst not tellWhat ‘tis to feel a father’s policyHath dimmed a child’s career. A child so peerless!Our race, though ever comely, veiled to her.A palm tree in its pride of sunny youthMates not her symmetry; her step was noticedAs strangely stately by her nurse. Dost know,I ever deemed that winning smile of hersMournful, with all its mirth? But ah! no moreA father gossips; nay, my weakness ‘tis not.‘Tis not with all that I would prattle thus;But you, my cousin, know Solisa well,And once you loved her.II:4:34 ALAR.[Rising.]Once! O God!Such passions are eternity.II:4:35 KING.[Advancing.]What then,Shall this excelling creature, on a throneAs high as her deserts, shall she becomeA spoil for strangers? Have I cause to grieveThat Hungary quit us? O that I could findSome noble of our land might dare to mixHis equal blood with our Castillian seed!Art thou more learned in our pedigrees?Hast thou no friend, no kinsman? Must this realmFall to the spoiler, and a foreign graftBe nourished by our sap?II:4:36 ALAR.Alas! alas!II:4:37 KING.Four crowns; our paramount Castille, and Leon,Seviglia, Cordova, the future hopeOf Murcia, and the inevitable doomThat waits the Saracen; all, all, all;And with my daughter!II:4:38 ALAR.Ah! ye should have blastedMy homeward path, ye lightnings!II:4:39 KING.Such a sonShould grudge his sire no days. I would not liveTo whet ambition’s appetite. I’m old;And fit for little else than hermit thoughts.The day that gives my daughter, gives my crown:A cell’s my home.II:4:40 ALAR.O, life, I will not curse theeLet hard and shaven crowns denounce thee vain;To me thou wert no shade! I loved thy stirAnd panting struggle. Power, and pomp, and beautyCities and courts, the palace and the fane,The chace, the revel, and the battle-field,Man’s fiery glance, and woman’s thrilling smile,I loved ye all. I curse not thee, O life!But on my start; confusion. May they fallFrom out their spheres, and blast our earth no moreWith their malignant rays, that mocking placedAll the delight of life within my reach,And chained me film fruition.II:4:41 KING.Gentle cousin,Thou art disturbed; I fear these words of mine,Chance words ere I did say to thee good night,For O, ‘twas joy to see thee here again,Who art my kinsman, and my only one,Have touched on some old cares for both of us.And yet the world has many charms for thee;Thou’rt not like us, and thy unhappy childThe world esteems so favoured.II:4:42 ALAR.Ah, the worldIII estimates the truth of any lot.Their speculation is too far and reachesOnly externals, they are ever fair.There are vile cankers in your gaudiest flowers,But you must pluck and peer within the leavesTo catch the pest.II:4:43 KING.Alas! my gentle cousin,To hear thou hast thy sorrows too, like us,It pains me much, and yet I’ll not believe it,For with so fair a wife—II:4:44 ALAR.Torture me not,Although thou art a King.II:4:45 KING.My gentle cousin,f spoke to solace thee. We all do hearThou art most favoured in a right fair wife.We do desire to see her; can she findA friend becomes her better than our child?II:4:46 ALAR.My wife? would she were not!II:4:47 KING.I say so too,Would she were not!II:4:48 ALAR.Ah me! why did I marry?II:4:49 KING.Truth, it was very rash.II:4:50 ALAR.Who made me rash?Who drove me from my hearth, and sent me forthOn the unkindred earth? With the dark spleenGoading injustice, that ‘tis vain to quell,Entails on restless spirits. Yes, I married,As men do oft, from very wantonness;To tamper with a destiny that’s cross,To spite my fate, to put the seal uponA balked career, in high and proud defianceOf hopes that yet might mock me, to beat downFalse expectation and its damned lures,And fix a bar betwixt me and defeat.II:4:51 KING.These bitter words would rob me of my hope,That thou at least wert happy.II:4:52 ALAR.Would I sleptWith my grey fathers!II:4:53 KING.And my daughter too!O most unhappy pair!II:4:54 ALAR.There is a way.To cure such woes, one only.II:4:55 KING.‘Tis my thought.II:4:56 ALAR.No cloister shall entomb this life; the graveShall be my refuge,II:4:57 KING.Yet to die were witless,When Death, who with his fatal finger tapsAt princely doors, as freely as he givesHis summons to the serf, may at this instantHave sealed the only life that throws a shadeBetween us and the sun.II:4:58 ALAR.She’s very young.II:4:59 KING.And may live long, as I do hope she will;Yet have I known as blooming as she die,And that most suddenly. The air of citiesTo unaccustomed lungs is very fatal;Perchance the absence of her accustomed sports,The presence of strange faces, and a longingFor those she has been bred among: I’ve knownThis most pernicious: she might droop and pine,And when they fail, they sink most rapidly.God grant she may not; yet I do remind theeOf this wild chance, when speaking of thy lot.In truth ‘tis sharp, and yet I would not dieWhen Time, the great enchanter, may change all,By bringing somewhat earlier to thy gateA doom that must arrive.II:4:60 ALAR.Would it were there!II:4:61 KING.‘Twould be the day thy hand should clasp my daughter’s,That thou hast loved so Ion; ‘twould be the dayMy crown, the crown of all my realms, Alarcos,Should bind thy royal brow. Is this the mornBreaks in our chamber? Why, I did but meanTo say good night unto my gentle cousinSo long unseen. O, we have gossiped, coz,So cheering dreams![Exeunt.]
END OF THE SECOND ACT.
SCENE 1
Interior of the Cathedral of Burgos.The High Altar illuminated;in the distance, various Chapels lighted, and in each of which Mass iscelebrating:in all directions groups of kneeling Worshippers.Before the High Altar the Prior of Burgos officiates, attended by hisSacerdotal Retinue.In the front of the Stage, opposite to the Audience, a Confessional.The chanting of a solemn Mass here commences; as it ceases,[Enter ALARCOS.]
III:1:1 ALAR.Would it were done! and yet I dare not sayIt should be done. O, that some natural cause,Or superhuman agent, would step in,And save me from its practice! Will no pestDescend upon her blood? Must thousands dieDaily, and her charmed life be spared? As youngAre hourly plucked from out their hearths. A life!Why, what’s a life? A loan that must returnTo a capricious creditor; recalledOften as soon as lent. I’d wager mineTo-morrow like the dice, were my blood pricked.Yet now,When all that endows life with all its price,Hangs on some flickering breath I could puff out,I stand agape. I’ll dream ‘tis done: what then?Mercy remains? For ever, not for everI charge my soul? Will no contrition ransom,Or expiatory torments compensateThe awful penalty? Ye kneeling worshippers,That gaze in silent ecstacy beforeYon flaming altar, you come here to bowBefore a God of mercy. Is’t not so?[ALARCOS walks towards the High Altar and kneels.][A Procession advances front the back of the Scene, singing a solemn Mass,and preceding the Prior of Burgos, who seats himself in the Confessionalhis Train filing of on each side of the Scene:the lights of the High Altar are extinguished,but the Chapels remain illuminated.]III:1:2 THE PRIOR.Within this chair I sit, and hold the keysThat open realms no conqueror can subdue,And where the monarchs of the earth must fainSolicit to be subjects: Heaven and Hades,Lands of Immortal light and shores of gloom.Eternal as the chorus of their wail,And the dim isthmus of that middle space,Where the compassioned soul may purge its sinsIn pious expiation. Then advanceYe children of all sorrows, and all sins,Doubts that perplex, and hopes that tantalize,All the wild forms the fiend Temptation takesTo tamper with the soul! Come with the careThat eats your daily life; come with the thoughtThat is conceived in the noon of night,And makes us stare around us though alone;Come with the engendering sin, and with the crimeThat is full-born. To counsel and to soothe,I sit within this chair.[ALARCOS advances and kneels by the Confessional.]III:1:3 ALAR.O, holy fatherMy soul is burthened with a crime.III:1:4 PRIOR.My son,The church awaits thy sin.III:1:5 ALAR.It is a sinMost black and terrible. Prepare thine earFor what must make it tremble.III:1:6 PRIOR.Thou dost speakTo Power above all passion, not to man.III:1:7 ALAR.There was a lady, father, whom I loved,And with a holy love, and she loved meAs holily. Our vows were blessed, if favourHang on a father’s benediction.III:1:8 PRIOR.HerMother?III:1:9 ALAR.She had a mother, if to bearChildren be all that makes a mother: oneWho looked on me, about to be her child,With eyes of lust.III:1:10 PRIOR.And thou?III:1:11 ALAR.O, if to traceBut with the memory’s too veracious aidThis tale be anguish, what must be its lifeAnd terrible action? Father, I abjuredThis lewd she-wolf. But ah! her fatal vengeanceStruck to my heart. A banished scatterlingI wandered on the earth.III:1:12 PRIOR.Thou didst return?III:1:13 ALAR.And found the being that I loved, and foundHer faithful still.III:1:14 PRIOR.And thou, my son, wert happy?III:1:15 ALAR.Alas! I was no longer free. Strange tiesHad bound a hopeless exile. But she I had loved,And never ceased to love, for in the form,Not in the spirit was her faith more pure,She looked upon me with a glance that toldHer death but in my love. I struggled, nay,‘Twas not a struggle, ‘twas an agony.Her aged sire, her dark impending doom,And the overwhelming passion of my soul:My wife died suddenly.III:1:16 PRIOR.And by a lifeThat should have shielded hers?III:1:17 ALAR.Is there hope of mercy?Can prayers, can penances, can they avail?What consecration of my wealth, for I’m rich,Can aid me? Can it aid me? Can endowments?Nay, set no bounds to thy unlimited schemesOf saving charity. Can shrines, can chauntries,Monastic piles, can they avail? What ifI raise a temple not less proud than this,Enriched with all my wealth, with all, with all?Will endless masses, will eternal prayers,Redeem me from perdition?III:1:18 PRIOR.What, would goldRedeem the sin it prompted?III:1:19 ALAR.No, by Heaven!No, Fate had dowered me with wealth might feedAll but a royal hunger.III:1:20 PRIOR.And aloneThy fatal passion urged theeIII:1:21 ALAR.Hah!III:1:22 PRIOR.Probe deepThy wounded soul.III:1:23 ALAR.‘Tis torture: fathomlessI feel the fell incision.III:1:24 PRIOR.There is a lureThou dost not own, and yet its awful shadeLowers in the back-ground of thy soul: thy tongueTrifles the church’s ear. Beware, my son,And tamper not with Paradise.III:1:25 ALAR.A breath,A shadow, essence subtler far than love:And yet I loved her, and for love had daredAll that I ventured for this twin-born lureCradled with love, for which I soiled my soul.O, father, it was Power.III:1:26 PRIOR.And this dominionPurchased by thy soul’s mortgage, still is’t thine?III:1:27 ALAR.Yea, thousands bow to him, who bows to thee.III:1:28 PRIOR.Thine is a fearful deed.III:1:29 ALAR.O, is there mercy?III:1:30 PRIOR.Say, is there penitence?III:1:31 ALAR.How shall I gauge it?What temper of contrition might the churchRequire from such a sinner?III:1:32 PRIOR.Is’t thy wish,Nay, search the very caverns of thy thought,Is it thy wish this deed were now undone?III:1:33 ALAR.Undone, undone! It is; O, say it were,And what am I? O, father, wer’t not done,I should not be less tortured than I’m now;My life less like a dream of haunting thoughtsTempting to unknown enormities. The sunWould rise as beamless on my darkened days,Night proffer the same torments. Food would flyMy lips the same, and the same restless bloodQuicken my harassed limbs. Undone! undone!I have no metaphysic facultyTo deem this deed undone.III:1:34 PRIOR.Thou must repentThis terrible deed. Look through thy heart. Thy wife,There was a time thou lov’dst her?III:1:35 ALAR.I’ll not thinkThere was a time.III:1:36 PRIOR.And was she fair?III:1:37 ALAR.A formDazzling all eyes but mine.III:1:38 PRIOR.And pure?III:1:39 ALAR.No saintMore chaste than she. Her consecrated shapeShe kept as ‘twere a shrine, and just as fullOf holy thoughts; her very breath was incense,And all her gestures sacred as the formsOf priestly offices!III:1:40 PRIOR.I’ll save thy soul.Thou must repent that one so fair and pure,And loving thee so well—III:1:41 ALAR.Father, in vain.There is a bar betwixt me and repentance.And yet—III:1:42 PRIOR.Ay, yet—III:1:43 ALAR.The day may come, I’ll kneelIn such a mood, and might there then be hope?III:1:44 PRIOR.We hold the keys that bind and loosen all:But penitence alone is mercy’s portal.The obdurate soul is doomed. Remorseful tearsAre sinners’ sole ablution. O, my son,Bethink thee yet, to die in sin like thine;Eternal masses profit not thy soul,Thy consecrated wealth will but upraiseThe monument of thy despair. Once more,Ere yet the vesper lights shall fade away,I do adjure thee, on the church’s bosomPour forth thy contrite heart.III:1:45 ALAR.A contrite heart!A stainless hand would count for more. I seeNo drops on mine. My head is weak, my heartA wilderness of passion. Prayers, thy prayers![ALARCOS rises suddenly and exit.]
SCENE 2
Chamber in the Royal Palace.The INFANTA seated in despondency; the KING standing by her side.
III:2:1 KING.Indeed, ‘tis noticed.III:2:2 SOL.Solitude is allI ask; and is it then so great a boon?III:2:3 KING.Nay, solitude’s no princely appanage.Our state’s a pedestal, which men have raisedThat they may gaze on greatness.III:2:4 SOL.A false idol,And weaker than its worshippers. I’ve livedTo feel my station’s vanity. O, Death,Thou endest all!III:2:5 KING.Thou art too young to die,And yet may be too happy. Moody youthToys in its talk with the dark thought of death,As if to die were but to change a robe.It is their present refuge for all caresAnd each disaster. When the sere has touchedTheir flowing locks, they prattle less of death,Perchance think more of it.III:2:6 SOL.Why, what is greatness?Will’t give me love, or faith, or tranquil thoughts?No, no, not even justice.III:2:7 KING.‘Tis thyselfThat does thyself injustice. Let the worldHave other speculation than the breachOf our unfilled vows. They bear too nearAnd fine affinity to what we would,Ay, what we will. I would not choose this moment,Men brood too curiously upon the causeOf the late rupture, for the cause detectedMay bar the consequence.III:2:8 SOL.A day, an hourSufficed to crush me. Weeks and weeks pass onSince I was promised right.III:2:9 KING.Take thou my sceptreAnd do thyself this right. Is’t, then, so easy?III:2:10 SOL.Let him who did the wrong, contrive the meansOf his atonement.III:2:11 KING.All a father can,I have performed.III:2:12 SOL.Ah! then there is no hope.The Bishop of Ossuna, you did sayHe was the learnedest clerk of Christendom,And you would speak to him?III:2:13 KING.What says Alarcos?III:2:14 SOL.I spoke not to him since I first receivedHis princely pledge.III:2:15 KING.Call on him to fulfil it.III:2:16 SOL.Can he do more than kings?III:2:17 KING.Yes, he alone;Alone it rests with him. This learn from me.There is no other let.III:2:18 SOL.I learn from theeWhat other lips should tell me.III:2:19 KING.Girl, art sureOf this same lover?III:2:20 SOL.O! I’ll never doubt him.III:2:21 KING.And yet may be deceived.III:2:22 SOL.He is as trueAs talismanic steel.III:2:23 KING.Why, then thou art,At least thou should’st be, happy. Smile, Solisa;For since the Count is true, there is no bar.Why dost not smile?III:2:24 SOL.I marvel that AlarcosHath been so mute on this.III:2:25 KING.But thou art sureHe is most true.III:2:26 SOL.Why should I deem him true?Have I found truth in any? Woe is me,I feel as one quite doomed. I know not whyI ever was ill-omened.III:2:27 KING.Listen, girl;Probe this same lover to the core; ‘tmay be,I think he is, most true; he should be soIf there be faith in vows, and men ne’er breakThe pledge its profits them to keep. And yet—III:2:28 SOL.And what?III:2:29 KING.To be his Sovereign’s cherished friend,And smiled on by the daughter of his King,Why that might profit him, and please so much,His wife’s ill humour might be borne withal.III:2:30 SOL.You think him false?III:2:31 KING.I think he might be true:But when a man’s well placed, he loves not change.[Enter at the back of the Scene Count ALARCOS disguised.He advances, dropping his Hat and Cloak.]Ah, gentle cousin, all our thoughts were thine.III:2:32 ALAR.I marvel men should think. Lady, I’ll hopeThy thoughts are like thyself, most fair.III:2:33 KING.Her thoughtsAre like her fortunes, lofty, but aroundThe peaks cling vapours.III:2:34 ALAR.Eagles live in clouds,And they draw royal breath.III:2:35 KING.I’d have her quit,This strange seclusion, cousin. Give thine aidTo festive purposes.III:2:36 ALAR.A root, an egg,Why there’s a feast with a holy mind.III:2:37 KING.If everI find my seat within a hermitage,I’ll think the same.III:2:38 ALAR.You have built shrines, sweet lady?III:2:39 SOL.What then, my lord?III:2:40 ALAR.Why then you might be worshipped,If your image were in front; I’d bow downTo anything so fair.III:2:41 KING.Dost know, my cousin,Who waits me now? The deputies from Murcia.The realm is ours,[whispers him]is thine.III:2:42 ALAR.The church has realmsWider than both Castilles. But which of themWill be our lot; that’s it.III:2:43 KING.Mine own Solisa,They wait me in my cabinet;[aside to her]Bethink theeWith whom all rests.[Exit the KING.]III:2:44 SOL.You had sport to-day, my lord?The King was at the chace.III:2:45 ALAR.I breathed my barb.III:2:46 SOL.They say the chace hath charm to cheer the spirit,III:2:47 ALAR.‘Tis better than prayers.III:2:48 SOL.Indeed, I think I’ll hunt.You and my father seem so passing gay.III:2:49 ALAR.Why this is no confessional, no shrineHaunted with presaged gloom. I should be gayTo look at thee and listen to thy voice;For if fair pictures and sweet sounds enchantThe soul of man, that are but artifice,How then am I entranced, this living pictureBright by my side, and listening to this musicThat nature gave thee. What’s eternal lifeTo this inspired mortality! Let priestsAnd pontiffs thunder, still I feel that hereIs all my joy.III:2:50 SOL.Ah! why not say thy woe?Who stands between thee and thy rights but me?Who stands between thee and thine ease but me?Who bars thy progress, brings thee cares, but me?Lures thee to impossible contracts, goads thy faithTo mad performance, welcomes thee with sighs,And parts from them with tears? Is this joy? No!I am thine evil genius.III:2:51 ALAR.Say my starOf inspiration. This realityBaffles their mystic threats. Who talks of cares?Why, what’s a Prince, if his imperial willBe bitted by a priest! There’s nought impossible.Thy sighs are sighs of love, and all thy tearsBut affluent tenderness.III:2:52 SOL.You sing as sweetAs did the syrens; is it from the heart,Or from the lips, that voice?III:2:53 ALAR.Solisa!III:2:54 SOL.Ay!My ear can catch a treacherous tone; ‘tis trainedTo perfidy. My Lord Alarcos, look meStraight in the face. He quails not.III:2:55 ALAR.O my soul,Is this the being for whose love I’ve pledgedEven thy forfeit!III:2:56 SOL.Alarcos, dear Alarcos,Look not so stern! I’m mad; yes, yes, my lifeUpon thy truth; I know thou’rt true: he saidIt rested but with thee; I said it not,Nor thought it.III:2:57 ALAR.Lady!III:2:58 SOL.Not that voice!III:2:59 ALAR.I’ll knowThy thought; the King hath spoken?III:2:60 SOL.Words of joyAnd madness. With thyself alone he saysIt rests.III:2:61 ALAR.Nor said he more?III:2:62 SOL.It had found me deaf,For he touched hearings quick.III:2:63 ALAR.Thy faith in meHath gone.III:2:64 SOL.I’ll doubt our shrined miraclesBefore I doubt Alarcos.III:2:65 ALAR.He’ll believe thee,For at this moment he has much to endure,And that he could not.III:2:66 SOL.And yet I must chooseThis time to vex thee. O, I am the curseAnd blight of the existence, which to blessIs all my thought! Alarcos, dear Alarcos,I pray thee pardon me. I am so wretched:This fell suspense is like a frightful dreamWherein we fall from heights, yet never reachThe bottomless abyss. It wastes my spirit,Wears down my life, gnaws ever at my heart,Makes my brain quick when others are asleep,And dull when theirs is active. O, Alarcos,I could lie down and die.III:2:67 ALAR.[Advancing in soliloquy.]Asleep, awake,In dreams, and in the musing moods that waitOn unfulfilled purposes, I’ve done it;And thought upon it afterwards, nor shrunkFrom the fell retrospect.III:2:68 SOL.He’s wrapped in thought;Indeed his glance was wild when first he entered,And his speech lacked completeness.III:2:69 ALAR.How is it then,The body that should be the viler part,And made for servile uses, should rebel‘Gainst the mind’s mandate, and should hold its aidAloof from our adventure? Why the sinIs in the thought, not in the deed; ‘tis notThe body pays the penalty, the soulMust clear that awful scot. What palls my arm?It is not pity; trumpet-tongued ambitionStifles her plaintive voice; it is not love,For that inspires the blow! Art thou Solisa?III:2:70 SOL.I am that luckless maiden whom you love.III:2:71 ALAR.You could lie down and die. Who speaks of death?There is no absolution for self-murder.Why ‘tis the greater sin of the two. There isMore peril in’t. What, sleep upon your postBecause you are wearied? No, we must spy onAnd watch occasions. Even now they are ripe.I feel a turbulent throbbing at my heartWill end in action: for there spiritual tumultsHerald great deeds.III:2:72 SOL.It is the church’s schemeEver to lengthen suits.III:2:73 ALAR.The church?III:2:74 SOL.OssanaLeans much to Rome.III:2:75 ALAR.And how concerns us that?III:2:76 SOL.His Grace spoke to the Bishop, you must know?III:2:77 ALAR.Ah, yes! his Grace, the church, it is our friend.And truly should be so. It gave our griefs,And it should bear their balm.III:2:78 SOL.Hast pardoned meThat I was querulous? But lovers crossedWrangle with those that love them, as it were,To spite affection.III:2:79 ALAR.We are bound togetherAs the twin powers of the storm. Very loveNow makes me callous. The great bond is sealed;Look bright; if gloomy, mortgage future blissFor present comfort. Trust me ‘tis good ‘surance.I’ll to the King.[Exeunt both.]