Masters of the Theatre

by Delphi Classics

  This is the day I am to perfect for him

  The magisterium, our great work, the stone;

  And yield it, made, into his hands: of which

  He has, this month, talked as he were possess’d.

  And now he’s dealing pieces on’t away. —

  Methinks I see him entering ordinaries,

  Dispensing for the pox, and plaguy houses,

  Reaching his dose, walking Moorfields for lepers,

  And offering citizens’ wives pomander-bracelets,

  As his preservative, made of the elixir;

  Searching the spittal, to make old bawds young;

  And the highways, for beggars, to make rich.

  I see no end of his labours. He will make

  Nature asham’d of her long sleep: when art,

  Who’s but a step-dame, shall do more than she,

  In her best love to mankind, ever could:

  If his dream lasts, he’ll turn the age to gold.

  [EXEUNT.]

  ACT 2

  SCENE 1

  AN OUTER ROOM IN LOVEWIT’S HOUSE.

  ENTER SIR EPICURE MAMMON AND SURLY.

  MAM. Come on, sir. Now, you set your foot on shore

  In Novo Orbe; here’s the rich Peru:

  And there within, sir, are the golden mines,

  Great Solomon’s Ophir! he was sailing to’t,

  Three years, but we have reached it in ten months.

  This is the day, wherein, to all my friends,

  I will pronounce the happy word, BE RICH;

  THIS DAY YOU SHALL BE SPECTATISSIMI.

  You shall no more deal with the hollow dye,

  Or the frail card. No more be at charge of keeping

  The livery-punk for the young heir, that must

  Seal, at all hours, in his shirt: no more,

  If he deny, have him beaten to’t, as he is

  That brings him the commodity. No more

  Shall thirst of satin, or the covetous hunger

  Of velvet entrails for a rude-spun cloke,

  To be display’d at madam Augusta’s, make

  The sons of Sword and Hazard fall before

  The golden calf, and on their knees, whole nights

  Commit idolatry with wine and trumpets:

  Or go a feasting after drum and ensign.

  No more of this. You shall start up young viceroys,

  And have your punks, and punketees, my Surly.

  And unto thee I speak it first, BE RICH.

  Where is my Subtle, there? Within, ho!

  FACE [WITHIN]. Sir, he’ll come to you by and by.

  MAM. That is his fire-drake,

  His Lungs, his Zephyrus, he that puffs his coals,

  Till he firk nature up, in her own centre.

  You are not faithful, sir. This night, I’ll change

  All that is metal, in my house, to gold:

  And, early in the morning, will I send

  To all the plumbers and the pewterers,

  And by their tin and lead up; and to Lothbury

  For all the copper.

  SUR. What, and turn that too?

  MAM. Yes, and I’ll purchase Devonshire and Cornwall,

  And make them perfect Indies! you admire now?

  SUR. No, faith.

  MAM. But when you see th’ effects of the Great Medicine,

  Of which one part projected on a hundred

  Of Mercury, or Venus, or the moon,

  Shall turn it to as many of the sun;

  Nay, to a thousand, so ad infinitum:

  You will believe me.

  SUR. Yes, when I see’t, I will.

  But if my eyes do cozen me so, and I

  Giving them no occasion, sure I’ll have

  A whore, shall piss them out next day.

  MAM. Ha! why?

  Do you think I fable with you? I assure you,

  He that has once the flower of the sun,

  The perfect ruby, which we call elixir,

  Not only can do that, but, by its virtue,

  Can confer honour, love, respect, long life;

  Give safety, valour, yea, and victory,

  To whom he will. In eight and twenty days,

  I’ll make an old man of fourscore, a child.

  SUR. No doubt; he’s that already.

  MAM. Nay, I mean,

  Restore his years, renew him, like an eagle,

  To the fifth age; make him get sons and daughters,

  Young giants; as our philosophers have done,

  The ancient patriarchs, afore the flood,

  But taking, once a week, on a knife’s point,

  The quantity of a grain of mustard of it;

  Become stout Marses, and beget young Cupids.

  SUR. The decay’d vestals of Pict-hatch would thank you,

  That keep the fire alive, there.

  MAM. ’Tis the secret

  Of nature naturis’d ‘gainst all infections,

  Cures all diseases coming of all causes;

  A month’s grief in a day, a year’s in twelve;

  And, of what age soever, in a month:

  Past all the doses of your drugging doctors.

  I’ll undertake, withal, to fright the plague

  Out of the kingdom in three months.

  SUR. And I’ll

  Be bound, the players shall sing your praises, then,

  Without their poets.

  MAM. Sir, I’ll do’t. Mean time,

  I’ll give away so much unto my man,

  Shall serve the whole city, with preservative

  Weekly; each house his dose, and at the rate —

  SUR. As he that built the Water-work, does with water?

  MAM. You are incredulous.

  SUR. Faith I have a humour,

  I would not willingly be gull’d. Your stone

  Cannot transmute me.

  MAM. Pertinax, [my] Surly,

  Will you believe antiquity? records?

  I’ll shew you a book where Moses and his sister,

  And Solomon have written of the art;

  Ay, and a treatise penn’d by Adam —

  SUR. How!

  MAM. Of the philosopher’s stone, and in High Dutch.

  SUR. Did Adam write, sir, in High Dutch?

  MAM. He did;

  Which proves it was the primitive tongue.

  SUR. What paper?

  MAM. On cedar board.

  SUR. O that, indeed, they say,

  Will last ‘gainst worms.

  MAM. ’Tis like your Irish wood,

  ‘Gainst cob-webs. I have a piece of Jason’s fleece, too,

  Which was no other than a book of alchemy,

  Writ in large sheep-skin, a good fat ram-vellum.

  Such was Pythagoras’ thigh, Pandora’s tub,

  And, all that fable of Medea’s charms,

  The manner of our work; the bulls, our furnace,

  Still breathing fire; our argent-vive, the dragon:

  The dragon’s teeth, mercury sublimate,

  That keeps the whiteness, hardness, and the biting;

  And they are gathered into Jason’s helm,

  The alembic, and then sow’d in Mars his field,

  And thence sublimed so often, till they’re fixed.

  Both this, the Hesperian garden, Cadmus’ story,

  Jove’s shower, the boon of Midas, Argus’ eyes,

  Boccace his Demogorgon, thousands more,

  All abstract riddles of our stone.

  [ENTER FACE, AS A SERVANT.]

  — How now!

  Do we succeed? Is our day come? and holds it?

  FACE. The evening will set red upon you, sir;

  You have colour for it, crimson: the red ferment

  Has done his office; three hours hence prepare you

  To see projection.

  MAM. Pertinax, my Surly.

  Again I say to thee, aloud, Be rich.

  This day, thou shalt have ingots; and to-morrow,

  G
ive lords th’ affront. — Is it, my Zephyrus, right?

  Blushes the bolt’s-head?

  FACE. Like a wench with child, sir,

  That were but now discover’d to her master.

  MAM. Excellent witty Lungs! — my only care

  Where to get stuff enough now, to project on;

  This town will not half serve me.

  FACE. No, sir! buy

  The covering off o’ churches.

  MAM. That’s true.

  FACE. Yes.

  Let them stand bare, as do their auditory;

  Or cap them, new, with shingles.

  MAM. No, good thatch:

  Thatch will lie light upon the rafters, Lungs. —

  Lungs, I will manumit thee from the furnace;

  I will restore thee thy complexion, Puffe,

  Lost in the embers; and repair this brain,

  Hurt with the fume o’ the metals.

  FACE. I have blown, sir,

  Hard for your worship; thrown by many a coal,

  When ’twas not beech; weigh’d those I put in, just,

  To keep your heat still even; these blear’d eyes

  Have wak’d to read your several colours, sir,

  Of the pale citron, the green lion, the crow,

  The peacock’s tail, the plumed swan.

  MAM. And, lastly,

  Thou hast descry’d the flower, the sanguis agni?

  FACE. Yes, sir.

  MAM. Where’s master?

  FACE. At his prayers, sir, he;

  Good man, he’s doing his devotions

  For the success.

  MAM. Lungs, I will set a period

  To all thy labours; thou shalt be the master

  Of my seraglio.

  FACE. Good, sir.

  MAM. But do you hear?

  I’ll geld you, Lungs.

  FACE. Yes, sir.

  MAM. For I do mean

  To have a list of wives and concubines,

  Equal with Solomon, who had the stone

  Alike with me; and I will make me a back

  With the elixir, that shall be as tough

  As Hercules, to encounter fifty a night. —

  Thou’rt sure thou saw’st it blood?

  FACE. Both blood and spirit, sir.

  MAM. I will have all my beds blown up, not stuft;

  Down is too hard: and then, mine oval room

  Fill’d with such pictures as Tiberius took

  From Elephantis, and dull Aretine

  But coldly imitated. Then, my glasses

  Cut in more subtle angles, to disperse

  And multiply the figures, as I walk

  Naked between my succubae. My mists

  I’ll have of perfume, vapour’d ‘bout the room,

  To lose ourselves in; and my baths, like pits

  To fall into; from whence we will come forth,

  And roll us dry in gossamer and roses. —

  Is it arrived at ruby? — Where I spy

  A wealthy citizen, or [a] rich lawyer,

  Have a sublimed pure wife, unto that fellow

  I’ll send a thousand pound to be my cuckold.

  FACE. And I shall carry it?

  MAM. No. I’ll have no bawds,

  But fathers and mothers: they will do it best,

  Best of all others. And my flatterers

  Shall be the pure and gravest of divines,

  That I can get for money. My mere fools,

  Eloquent burgesses, and then my poets

  The same that writ so subtly of the fart,

  Whom I will entertain still for that subject.

  The few that would give out themselves to be

  Court and town-stallions, and, each-where, bely

  Ladies who are known most innocent for them;

  Those will I beg, to make me eunuchs of:

  And they shall fan me with ten estrich tails

  A-piece, made in a plume to gather wind.

  We will be brave, Puffe, now we have the med’cine.

  My meat shall all come in, in Indian shells,

  Dishes of agat set in gold, and studded

  With emeralds, sapphires, hyacinths, and rubies.

  The tongues of carps, dormice, and camels’ heels,

  Boil’d in the spirit of sol, and dissolv’d pearl,

  Apicius’ diet, ‘gainst the epilepsy:

  And I will eat these broths with spoons of amber,

  Headed with diamond and carbuncle.

  My foot-boy shall eat pheasants, calver’d salmons,

  Knots, godwits, lampreys: I myself will have

  The beards of barbels served, instead of sallads;

  Oil’d mushrooms; and the swelling unctuous paps

  Of a fat pregnant sow, newly cut off,

  Drest with an exquisite, and poignant sauce;

  For which, I’ll say unto my cook, “There’s gold,

  Go forth, and be a knight.”

  FACE. Sir, I’ll go look

  A little, how it heightens.

  [EXIT.]

  MAM. Do. — My shirts

  I’ll have of taffeta-sarsnet, soft and light

  As cobwebs; and for all my other raiment,

  It shall be such as might provoke the Persian,

  Were he to teach the world riot anew.

  My gloves of fishes’ and birds’ skins, perfumed

  With gums of paradise, and eastern air —

  SUR. And do you think to have the stone with this?

  MAM. No, I do think t’ have all this with the stone.

  SUR. Why, I have heard he must be homo frugi,

  A pious, holy, and religious man,

  One free from mortal sin, a very virgin.

  MAM. That makes it, sir; he is so: but I buy it;

  My venture brings it me. He, honest wretch,

  A notable, superstitious, good soul,

  Has worn his knees bare, and his slippers bald,

  With prayer and fasting for it: and, sir, let him

  Do it alone, for me, still. Here he comes.

  Not a profane word afore him: ’tis poison. —

  [ENTER SUBTLE.]

  Good morrow, father.

  SUB. Gentle son, good morrow,

  And to your friend there. What is he, is with you?

  MAM. An heretic, that I did bring along,

  In hope, sir, to convert him.

  SUB. Son, I doubt

  You are covetous, that thus you meet your time

  In the just point: prevent your day at morning.

  This argues something, worthy of a fear

  Of importune and carnal appetite.

  Take heed you do not cause the blessing leave you,

  With your ungovern’d haste. I should be sorry

  To see my labours, now even at perfection,

  Got by long watching and large patience,

  Not prosper where my love and zeal hath placed them.

  Which (heaven I call to witness, with your self,

  To whom I have pour’d my thoughts) in all my ends,

  Have look’d no way, but unto public good,

  To pious uses, and dear charity

  Now grown a prodigy with men. Wherein

  If you, my son, should now prevaricate,

  And, to your own particular lusts employ

  So great and catholic a bliss, be sure

  A curse will follow, yea, and overtake

  Your subtle and most secret ways.

  MAM. I know, sir;

  You shall not need to fear me; I but come,

  To have you confute this gentleman.

  SUR. Who is,

  Indeed, sir, somewhat costive of belief

  Toward your stone; would not be gull’d.

  SUB. Well, son,

  All that I can convince him in, is this,

  The WORK IS DONE, bright sol is in his robe.

  We have a medicine of the triple soul,

  The glorified spirit. Thanks be to heaven,

  And make us wort
hy of it! — Ulen Spiegel!

  FACE [WITHIN]. Anon, sir.

  SUB. Look well to the register.

  And let your heat still lessen by degrees,

  To the aludels.

  FACE [WITHIN]. Yes, sir.

  SUB. Did you look

  On the bolt’s-head yet?

  FACE [WITHIN]. Which? on D, sir?

  SUB. Ay;

  What’s the complexion?

  FACE [WITHIN]. Whitish.

  SUB. Infuse vinegar,

  To draw his volatile substance and his tincture:

  And let the water in glass E be filter’d,

  And put into the gripe’s egg. Lute him well;

  And leave him closed in balneo.

  FACE [WITHIN]. I will, sir.

  SUR. What a brave language here is! next to canting.

  SUB. I have another work, you never saw, son,

  That three days since past the philosopher’s wheel,

  In the lent heat of Athanor; and’s become

  Sulphur of Nature.

  MAM. But ’tis for me?

  SUB. What need you?

  You have enough in that is perfect.

  MAM. O but —

  SUB. Why, this is covetise!

  MAM. No, I assure you,

  I shall employ it all in pious uses,

  Founding of colleges and grammar schools,

  Marrying young virgins, building hospitals,

  And now and then a church.

  [RE-ENTER FACE.]

  SUB. How now!

  FACE. Sir, please you,

  Shall I not change the filter?

  SUB. Marry, yes;

  And bring me the complexion of glass B.

  [EXIT FACE.]

  MAM. Have you another?

  SUB. Yes, son; were I assured —

  Your piety were firm, we would not want

  The means to glorify it: but I hope the best. —

  I mean to tinct C in sand-heat to-morrow,

  And give him imbibition.

  MAM. Of white oil?

  SUB. No, sir, of red. F is come over the helm too,

  I thank my Maker, in S. Mary’s bath,

  And shews lac virginis. Blessed be heaven!

  I sent you of his faeces there calcined:

  Out of that calx, I have won the salt of mercury.

  MAM. By pouring on your rectified water?

  SUB. Yes, and reverberating in Athanor.

  [RE-ENTER FACE.]

  How now! what colour says it?

  FACE. The ground black, sir.

  MAM. That’s your crow’s head?

  SUR. Your cock’s-comb’s, is it not?

  SUB. No, ’tis not perfect. Would it were the crow!

  That work wants something.

  SUR [ASIDE]. O, I looked for this.

  The hay’s a pitching.

  SUB. Are you sure you loosed them

  In their own menstrue?

  FACE. Yes, sir, and then married them,

  And put them in a bolt’s-head nipp’d to digestion,