John Dryden - Delphi Poets Series

by John Dryden

  What have I done, ye powers, what have I done,

  To see my youth, my beauty, and my love,

  No sooner gained, but slighted and betrayed;

  And, like a rose, just gathered from the stalk,

  But only smelt, and cheaply thrown aside,

  To wither on the ground.

  Ter. For heaven’s sake, madam, moderate your passion!

  Leo. Why namest thou heaven? there is no heaven for me.

  Despair, death, hell, have seized my tortured soul!

  When I had raised his grovelling fate from ground,

  To power and love, to empire, and to me;

  When each embrace was dearer than the first;

  Then, then to be contemned; then, then thrown off!

  It calls me old, and withered, and deformed,

  And loathsome! Oh! what woman can bear loathsome?

  The turtle flies not from his billing mate,

  He bills the closer; but, ungrateful man,

  Base, barbarous man! the more we raise our love,

  The more we pall, and kill, and cool his ardour.

  Racks, poison, daggers, rid me of my life;

  And any death is welcome.

  Tor. Be witness all ye powers, that know my heart,

  I would have kept the fatal secret hid;

  But she has conquered, to her ruin conquered:

  Here, take this paper, read our destinies; —

  Yet do not; but, in kindness to yourself,

  Be ignorantly safe.

  Leo. No! give it me,

  Even though it be the sentence of my death.

  Tor. Then see how much unhappy love has made us.

  O Leonora! Oh!

  We two were born when sullen planets reigned;

  When each the other’s influence opposed,

  And drew the stars to factions at our birth.

  Oh! better, better had it been for us,

  That we had never seen, or never loved.

  Leo. There is no faith in heaven, if heaven says so;

  You dare not give it.

  Tor. As unwillingly,

  As I would reach out opium to a friend,

  Who lay in torture, and desired to die.[Gives the Paper.

  But now you have it, spare my sight the pain

  Of seeing what a world of tears it costs you.

  Go, silently, enjoy your part of grief,

  And share the sad inheritance with me.

  Leo. I have a thirsty fever in my soul;

  Give me but present ease, and let me die. [Exeunt Queen and Teresa.

  Enter Lorenzo.

  Lor. Arm, arm, my lord! the city bands are up;

  Drums beating, colours flying, shouts confused;

  All clustering in a heap, like swarming hives,

  And rising in a moment.

  Tor. With design to punish Bertran, and revenge the king;

  ’Twas ordered so.

  Lor. Then you’re betrayed, my lord.

  ’Tis true, they block the castle kept by Bertran,

  But now they cry, “Down with the palace, fire it,

  Pull out the usurping queen!”

  Tor. The queen, Lorenzo! durst they name the queen?

  Lor. If railing and reproaching be to name her.

  Tor. O sacrilege! say quickly, who commands

  This vile blaspheming rout?

  Lor. I’m loth to tell you;

  But both our fathers thrust them headlong on,

  And bear down all before them.

  Tor. Death and hell!

  Somewhat must be resolved, and speedily.

  How say’st thou, my Lorenzo? dar’st thou be

  A friend, and once forget thou art a son,

  To help me save the queen?

  Lor. [Aside.] Let me consider: —

  Bear arms against my father? he begat me; —

  That’s true; but for whose sake did he beget me?

  For his own, sure enough: for me he knew not.

  Oh! but says conscience, — Fly in nature’s face? —

  But how, if nature fly in my face first?

  Then nature’s the aggressor; let her look to’t. —

  He gave me life, and he may take it back:

  No, that’s boys’ play, say I.

  ’Tis policy for a son and father to take different sides:

  For then, lands and tenements commit no treason.

  [To Tor.] Sir, upon mature consideration, I have found my father to be little better than a rebel, and therefore, I’ll do my best to secure him, for your sake; in hope, you may secure him hereafter for my sake.

  Tor. Put on thy utmost speed to head the troops,

  Which every moment I expect to arrive;

  Proclaim me, as I am, the lawful king:

  I need not caution thee for Raymond’s life,

  Though I no more must call him father now.

  Lor. [Aside.] How! not call him father? I see 469 preferment alters a man strangely; this may serve me for a use of instruction, to cast off my father when I am great. Methought too, he called himself the lawful king; intimating sweetly, that he knows what’s what with our sovereign lady: — Well if I rout my father, as I hope in heaven I shall, I am in a fair way to be the prince of the blood. — Farewell, general; I will bring up those that shall try what mettle there is in orange tawny.

  [Exit.

  Tor. [At the Door.]

  Haste there; command the guards be all drawn up

  Before the palace-gate. — By heaven, I’ll face

  This tempest, and deserve the name of king!

  O Leonora, beauteous in thy crimes,

  Never were hell and heaven so matched before!

  Look upward, fair, but as thou look’st on me;

  Then all the blest will beg, that thou may’st live,

  And even my father’s ghost his death forgive.[Exit.

  SCENE II. — The Palace-Yard. Drums and Trumpets within.

  Enter Raymond, Alphonso, Pedro, and their Party.

  Raym. Now, valiant citizens, the time is come,

  To show your courage, and your loyalty.

  You have a prince of Sancho’s royal blood,

  The darling of the heavens, and joy of earth;

  When he’s produced, as soon he shall, among you,

  Speak, what will you adventure to reseat him

  Upon his father’s throne?

  Omn. Our lives and fortunes.

  Raym. What then remains to perfect our success;

  But o’er the tyrant’s guards to force our way?

  Omn. Lead on, lead on. [Drums and Trumpets on the other side.

  Enter Torrismond and his Party: As they are going to fight, he speaks.

  Tor. [To his.] Hold, hold your arms.

  Raym. [To his.] Retire.

  Alph. What means this pause?

  Ped. Peace; nature works within them. [Alph. and Ped. go apart.

  Tor. How comes it, good old man, that we two meet

  On these harsh terms? thou very reverend rebel;

  Thou venerable traitor, in whose face

  And hoary hairs treason is sanctified,

  And sin’s black dye seems blanched by age to virtue.

  Raym. What treason is it to redeem my king,

  And to reform the state?

  Tor. That’s a stale cheat;

  The primitive rebel, Lucifer, first used it,

  And was the first reformer of the skies.

  Raym. What, if I see my prince mistake a poison,

  Call it a cordial, — am I then a traitor,

  Because I hold his hand, or break the glass?

  Tor. How darest thou serve thy king against his will?

  Raym. Because ’tis then the only time to serve him.

  Tor. I take the blame of all upon myself;

  Discharge thy weight on me.

  Raym. O never, never!

  Why, ’tis to leave a ship, tossed in a tempest,

  Without the pilot’s care.


  Tor. I’ll punish thee;

  By heaven, I will, as I would punish rebels,

  Thou stubborn loyal man!

  Raym. First let me see

  Her punished, who misleads you from your fame;

  Then burn me, hack me, hew me into pieces,

  And I shall die well pleased.

  Tor. Proclaim my title,

  To save the effusion of my subjects’ blood; and thou shalt still

  Be as my foster-father near my breast,

  And next my Leonora.

  Raym. That word stabs me.

  You shall be still plain Torrismond with me;

  The abettor, partner, (if you like that name,)

  The husband of a tyrant; but no king,

  Till you deserve that title by your justice.

  Tor. Then farewell, pity; I will be obeyed. —

  [To the People.] Hear, you mistaken men, whose loyalty

  Runs headlong into treason: See your prince!

  In me behold your murdered Sancho’s son;

  Dismiss your arms, and I forgive your crimes.

  Raym. Believe him not; he raves; his words are loose

  As heaps of sand, and scattering wide from sense.

  You see he knows not me, his natural father;

  But, aiming to possess the usurping queen,

  So high he’s mounted in his airy hopes,

  That now the wind is got into his head,

  And turns his brains to frenzy.

  Tor. Hear me yet; I am —

  Raym. Fall on, fall on, and hear him not;

  But spare his person, for his father’s sake.

  Ped. Let me come; if he be mad, I have that shall cure him. There’s no surgeon in all Arragon has so much dexterity as I have at breathing of the temple-vein.

  Tor. My right for me!

  Raym. Our liberty for us!

  Omn. Liberty, liberty!

  As they are ready to Fight, enter Lorenzo and his Party.

  Lor. On forfeit of your lives, lay down your arms.

  Alph. How, rebel, art thou there?

  Lor. Take your rebel back again, father mine: The beaten party are rebels to the conquerors. I have been at hard-head with your butting citizens; I have routed your herd; I have dispersed them; and now they are retreated quietly, from their extraordinary vocation of fighting in the streets, to their ordinary vocation of cozening in their shops.

  Tor. [To Raym.]

  You see ’tis vain contending with the truth;

  Acknowledge what I am.

  Raym. You are my king; — would you would be your own!

  But, by a fatal fondness, you betray

  Your fame and glory to the usurper’s bed.

  Enjoy the fruits of blood and parricide,

  Take your own crown from Leonora’s gift,

  And hug your father’s murderer in your arms!

  Enter Queen, Teresa, and Women.

  Alph. No more; behold the queen.

  Raym. Behold the basilisk of Torrismond,

  That kills him with her eyes — I will speak on;

  My life is of no farther use to me:

  I would have chaffered it before for vengeance;

  Now let it go for failing.

  Tor. My heart sinks in me while I hear him speak,

  And every slackened fibre drops its hold,

  Like nature letting down the springs of life;

  So much the name of father awes me still — [Aside.

  Send off the crowd; for you, now I have conquered,

  I can hear with honour your demands.

  Lor. [To Alph.] Now, sir, who proves the traitor? My conscience is true to me; it always whispers right, when I have my regiment to back it.

  [Exeunt Lor. Alph. Ped. &c.

  Tor. O Leonora, what can love do more?

  I have opposed your ill fate to the utmost;

  Combated heaven and earth to keep you mine;

  And yet at last that tyrant justice! Oh —

  Leo. ’Tis past, ’tis past, and love is ours no more;

  Yet I complain not of the powers above;

  They made me a miser’s feast of happiness,

  And could not furnish out another meal.

  Now, by yon stars, by heaven, and earth, and men,

  By all my foes at once, I swear, my Torrismond,

  That to have had you mine for one short day,

  Has cancelled half my mighty sum of woes!

  Say but you hate me not.

  Tor. I cannot hate you.

  Raym. Can you not? say that once more,

  That all the saints may witness it against you.

  Leo. Cruel Raymond!

  Can he not punish me, but he must hate?

  O, ’tis not justice, but a brutal rage,

  Which hates the offender’s person with his crimes!

  I have enough to overwhelm one woman,

  To lose a crown and lover in a day:

  Let pity lend a tear, when rigour strikes.

  Raym. Then, then you should have thought of tears and pity,

  When virtue, majesty, and hoary age,

  Pleaded for Sancho’s life.

  Leo. My future days shall be one whole contrition:

  A chapel will I build, with large endowment,

  Where every day an hundred aged men

  Shall all hold up their withered hands to heaven,

  To pardon Sancho’s death.

  Tor. See, Raymond, see; she makes a large amends:

  Sancho is dead; no punishment of her

  Can raise his cold stiff limbs from the dark grave;

  Nor can his blessed soul look down from heaven,

  Or break the eternal sabbath of his rest,

  To see, with joy, her miseries on earth.

  Raym. Heaven may forgive a crime to penitence,

  For heaven can judge if penitence be true;

  But man, who knows not hearts, should make examples

  Which, like a warning piece, must be shot off,

  To fright the rest from crimes.

  Leo. Had I but known that Sancho was his father,

  I would have poured a deluge of my blood,

  To save one drop of his.

  Tor. Mark that, inexorable Raymond, mark!

  ’Twas fatal ignorance, that caused his death.

  Raym. What! if she did not know he was your father,

  She knew he was a man, the best of men;

  Heaven’s image double-stamped, as man and king.

  Leo. He was, he was, even more than you can say;

  But yet —

  Raym. But yet you barbarously murdered him.

  Leo. He will not hear me out!

  Tor. Was ever criminal forbid to plead?

  Curb your ill-mannered zeal.

  Raym. Sing to him, syren;

  For I shall stop my ears: Now mince the sin,

  And mollify damnation with a phrase;

  Say, you consented not to Sancho’s death,

  But barely not forbade it.

  Leo. Hard-hearted man, I yield my guilty cause;

  But all my guilt was caused by too much love.

  Had I, for jealousy of empire, sought

  Good Sancho’s death, Sancho had died before.

  ’Twas always in my power to take his life;

  But interest never could my conscience blind,

  Till love had cast a mist before my eyes,

  And made me think his death the only means

  Which could secure my throne to Torrismond.

  Tor. Never was fatal mischief meant so kind,

  For all she gave has taken all away.

  Malicious powers! is this to be restored?

  ’Tis to be worse deposed than Sancho was.

  Raym. Heaven has restored you, you depose yourself.

  Oh, when young kings begin with scorn of justice,

  They make an omen to their after reign,

  And blot their annals in the foremost page.

  Tor. No more; lest
you be made the first example,

  To show how I can punish.

  Raym. Once again:

  Let her be made your father’s sacrifice,

  And after make me hers.

  Tor. Condemn a wife!

  That were to atone for parricide with murder.

  Raym. Then let her be divorced: we’ll be content

  With that poor scanty justice; let her part.

  Tor. Divorce! that’s worse than death, ’tis death of love.

  Leo. The soul and body part not with such pain,

  As I from you; but yet ’tis just, my lord:

  I am the accurst of heaven, the hate of earth,

  Your subjects’ detestation, and your ruin;

  And therefore fix this doom upon myself.

  Tor. Heaven! Can you wish it, to be mine no more?

  Leo. Yes, I can wish it, as the dearest proof,

  And last, that I can make you of my love.

  To leave you blest, I would be more accurst

  Than death can make me; for death ends our woes,

  And the kind grave shuts up the mournful scene:

  But I would live without you, to be wretched long;

  And hoard up every moment of my life,

  To lengthen out the payment of my tears,

  Till even fierce Raymond, at the last, shall say, —

  Now let her die, for she has grieved enough.

  Tor. Hear this, hear this, thou tribune of the people!

  Thou zealous, public blood-hound, hear, and melt!

  Raym. [Aside.]

  I could cry now; my eyes grow womanish,

  But yet my heart holds out.

  Leo. Some solitary cloister will I chuse,

  And there with holy virgins live immured:

  Coarse my attire, and short shall be my sleep,

  Broke by the melancholy midnight bell.

  Now, Raymond, now be satisfied at last:

  Fasting and tears, and penitence and prayer,

  Shall do dead Sancho justice every hour.

  Raym. [Aside.] By your leave, manhood! [Wipes his eyes.

  Tor. He weeps! now he is vanquished.

  Raym. No: ’tis a salt rheum, that scalds my eyes.

  Leo. If he were vanquished, I am still unconquered.

  I’ll leave you in the height of all my love,

  Even when my heart is beating out its way,

  And struggles to you most.

  Farewell, a last farewell, my dear, dear lord!

  Remember me! — speak, Raymond, will you let him?

  Shall he remember Leonora’s love,

  And shed a parting tear to her misfortunes?

  Raym. [Almost crying.] Yes, yes, he shall; pray go.

  Tor. Now, by my soul, she shall not go: why, Raymond,

  Her every tear is worth a father’s life.

  Come to my arms, come, my fair penitent!

  Let us not think what future ills may fall.