DEDICATION
TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE HENRY WRIOTHESLEY, EARL OF SOUTHAMPTON, AND BARON OF
TITCHFIELD
The love I dedicate to your lordship is without end: whereof this pamphlet,
without beginning is but a superfluous moiety. The warrant I have of your
honourable disposition, not the worth of my untutored lines, make it assured of
acceptance. What I have done is yours; what I have to do is yours; being part in
all I have, devoted yours. Were my worth greater, my duty would show greater;
meantime, as it is, it is bound to your lordship, to whom I wish long life still
lengthened with all happiness.
Your lordship's in all duty, William Shakespeare THE ARGUMENT
Lucius Tarquinius, for his excessive pride surnamed Superbus, after he had
caused his own father-in-law Servius Tullius to be cruelly murdered, and,
contrary to the Roman laws and customs, not requiring or staying for the
people's suffrages, had possessed himself of the kingdom, went accompanied with
his sons and other noblemen of Rome, to besiege Ardea. During which siege the
principal men of the army meeting one evening at the tent of Sextus Tarquinius,
the king's son, in their discourses after supper every one commended the virtues
of his own wife; among whom Collatinus extolled the incomparable chastity of his
wife Lucretia. In that pleasant humour they all posted to Rome; and intending,
by their secret and sudden arrival, to make trial of that which every one had
before avouched, only Collatinus finds his wife, though it were late in the
night, spinning amongst her maids: the other ladies were all found dancing and
revelling, or in several disports. Whereupon the noblemen yielded Collatinus the
victory, and his wife the fame. At that time Sextus Tarquinius being inflamed
with Lucrece' beauty, yet smothering his passions for the present, departed with
the rest back to the camp; from whence he shortly after privily withdrew
himself, and was, according to his estate, royally entertained and lodged by
Lucrece at Collatium. The same night he treacherously stealeth into her chamber,
violently ravished her, and early in the morning speedeth away. Lucrece, in this
lamentable plight, hastily dispatcheth messengers, one to Rome for her father,
another to the camp for Collatine. They came, the one accompanied with Junius
Brutus, the other with Publius Valerius; and finding Lucrece attired in mourning
habit, demanded the cause of her sorrow. She, first taking an oath of them for
her revenge, revealed the actor and whole manner of his dealing, and withal
suddenly stabbed herself. Which done, with one consent they all vowed to root
out the whole hated family of the Tarquins; and bearing the dead body to Rome,
Brutus acquainted the people with the doer and manner of the vile deed, with a
bitter invective against the tyranny of the king: wherewith the people were so
moved, that with one consent and a general acclamation the Tarquins were all
exiled, and the state government changed from kings to consuls.
From the besieged Ardea all in post, Borne by the trustless wings of false
desire, Lust-breathed Tarquin leaves the Roman host, And to Collatium bears the
lightless fire Which, in pale embers hid, lurks to aspire And girdle with
embracing flames the waist Of Collatine's fair love, Lucrece the chaste.
Haply that name of chaste unhapp'ly set This bateless edge on his keen
appetite; When Collatine unwisely did not let To praise the clear unmatched red
and white Which triumphed in that sky of his delight, Where mortal stars, as
bright as heaven's beauties, With pure aspects did him peculiar duties.
For he the night before, in Tarquin's tent, Unlocked the treasure of his
happy state; What priceless wealth the heavens had him lent In the possession of
his beauteous mate; Reck'ning his fortune at such high-proud rate That kings
might be espoused to more fame, But king nor peer to such a peerless dame.
O happiness enjoyed but of a few! And, if possessed, as soon decayed and done
As is the morning silver-melting dew Against the golden splendour of the sun! An
expired date, cancelled ere well begun: Honour and beauty, in the owner's arms,
Are weakly fortressed from a world of harms.
Beauty itself doth of itself persuade The eyes of men without an orator; What
needeth then apology be made, To set forth that which is so singular? Or why is
Collatine the publisher Of that rich jewel he should keep unknown From thievish
ears, because it is his own?
Perchance his boast of Lucrece' sov'reignty Suggested this proud issue of a
king; For by our cars our hearts oft tainted be. Perchance that envy of so rich
a thing, Braving compare, disdainfully did sting His high-pitched thoughts, that
meaner men should vaunt That golden hap which their superiors want.
But some untimely thought did instigate His all too timeless speed, if none
of those. His honour, his affairs, his friends, his state, Neglected all, with
swift intent he goes To quench the coal which in his liver glows. O rash-false
heat, wrapped in repentant cold, Thy hasty spring still blasts, and ne'er grows
old!
When at Collatium this false lord arrived, Well was he welcomed by the Roman
dame, Within whose face beauty and virtue strived Which of them both should
underprop her fame: When virtue bragged, beauty would blush for shame; When
beauty boasted blushes, in despite Virtue would stain that o'er with silver
white.
But beauty, in that white entituled, From Venus' doves doth challenge that
fair field; Then virtue claims from beauty beauty's red, Which virtue gave the
golden age to gild Their silver cheeks, and called it then their shield;
Teaching them thus to use it in the fight, When shame assailed, the red should
fence the white.
This heraldry in Lucrece' face was seen, Argued by beauty's red and virtue's
white; Of either's colour was the other queen, Proving from world's minority
their right; Yet their ambition makes them still to fight, The sovereignty of
either being so great That oft they interchange each other's seat.
This silent war of lilies and of roses Which Tarquin viewed in her fair
face's field, In their pure ranks his traitor eye encloses; Where, lest between
them both it should be killed, The coward captive vanquished doth yield To those
two armies that would let him go Rather than triumph in so false a foe.
Now thinks he that her husband's shallow tongue, The niggard prodigal that
praised her so, In that high task hath done her beauty wrong, Which far exceeds
his barren skill to show; Therefore that praise which Collatine doth owe
Enchanted Tarquin answers with surmise, In silent wonder of still-gazing eyes.
This earthly saint, adored by this devil, Little suspecteth the false
worshipper; "For unstained thoughts do seldom dream on evil; "Birds never limed
no secret bushes fear. So guiltless she securely gives good cheer And reverend
welcome to her princely guest, Whose inward ill no outward harm expressed;
For that he coloured with his high estate, Hiding base sin in pleats of
majesty; That nothing in him seemed inordinate, Save sometime too much wonder of
his eye, Which, having all, all could not satisfy; But, poorly rich, so wanteth
in his store That cloyed with much he pineth still for more.
But she, that never coped with stranger eyes, Could pick no meaning from
their parling looks, Nor read the subtle-shining secrecies Writ in the glassy
margents of such books. She touched no unknown baits, nor feared no hooks; Nor
could she moralize his wanton sight, More than his eyes were opened to the
light.
He stories to her ears her husband's fame, Won in the fields of fruitful
Italy; And decks with praises Collatine's high name, Made glorious by his manly
chivalry With bruised arms and wreaths of victory. Her joy with heaved-up hand
she doth express, And wordless so greets heaven for his success.
Far from the purpose of his coming thither, He makes excuses for his being
there. No cloudy show of stormy blust'ring weather Doth yet in his fair welkin
once appear; Till sable Night, mother of dread and fear, Upon the world dim
darkness doth display, And in her vaulty prison stows the day.
For then is Tarquin brought unto his bed, Intending weariness with heavy
sprite; For after supper long he questioned With modest Lucrece, and wore out
the night. Now leaden slumber with life's strength doth fight; And every one to
rest himself betakes, Save thieves and cares and troubled minds that wakes.
As one of which doth Tarquin lie revolving The sundry dangers of his will's
obtaining; Yet ever to obtain his will resolving, Though weak-built hopes
persuade him to abstaining; Despair to gain doth traffic oft for gaining, And
when great treasure is the meed proposed, Though death be adjunct, there's no
death supposed.
Those that much covet are with gain' so fond That what they have not, that
which they possess, They scatter and unloose it from their bond, And so, by
hoping more, they have but less; Or, gaining more, the profit of excess Is but
to surfeit, and such griefs sustain That they prove bankrupt in this poor-rich
gain.
The aim of all is but to nurse the life With honour, wealth and case, in
waning age; And in this aim there is such thwarting strife That one for all or
all for one we gage: As life for honour in fell battle's rage; Honour for
wealth; and oft that wealth doth cost The death of all, and all together lost.
So that in vent'ring ill we leave to be The things we are for that which we
expect; And this ambitious foul infirmity, In having much, torments us with
defect Of that we have; so then we do neglect The thing we have, and, all for
want of wit, Make something nothing by augmenting it.
Such hazard now must doting Tarquin make, Pawning his honour to obtain his
lust; And for himself himself must forsake: Then where is truth, if there be no
self-trust? When shall he think to find a stranger just When he himself himself
confounds, betrays To sland'rous tongues and wretched hateful days?
Now stole upon the time the dead of night, When heavy sleep had closed up
mortal eyes; No comfortable star did lend his light, No noise but owls' and
wolves' death-boding cries; Now serves the season that they may surprise The
silly lambs. Pure thoughts are dead and still, While lust and murder wakes to
stain and kill.
And now this lustful lord, leaped from his bed, Throwing his mantle rudely
o'er his arm, Is madly tossed between desire and dread; Th' one sweetly
flatters, th' other feareth harm; But honest fear, bewitched with lust's foul
charm, Doth too too oft betake him to retire, Beaten away by brain-sick rude
desire.
His falchion on a flint he softly smiteth, That from the cold stone sparks of
fire do fly, Whereat a waxen torch forthwith he lighteth, Which must be
lode-star to his lustful eye; And to the flame thus speaks advisedly: 'As from
this cold flint I enforced this fire, So Lucrece must I force to my desire.'
Here pale with fear he doth premeditate The dangers of his loathsome
enterprise, And in his inward mind he doth debate What following sorrow may on
this arise; Then, looking scornfully, he doth despise His naked armour of
still-slaughtered lust, And justly thus controls his thoughts unjust:
'Fair torch, burn out thy light, and lend it not To darken her whose light
excelleth thine; And die, unhallowed thoughts, before you blot With your
uncleanness that which is divine; Offer pure incense to so pure a shrine; Let
fair humanity abhor the deed That spots and stains love's modest snow-white
weed.
'O shame to knighthood and to shining arms! O foul dishonour to my
household's grave! O impious act, including all foul harms! A martial man to be
soft fancy's slave! True valour still a true respect should have; Then my
digression is so vile, so base, That it will live engraven in my face.
'Yea, though I die, the scandal will survive, And be an eye-sore in my golden
coat; Some loathsome dash the herald will contrive, To cipher me how fondly I
did dote; That my posterity, shamed with the note, Shall curse my bones, and
hold it for no sin To wish that I their father had not been.
'What win I, if I gain the thing I seek? A dream, a breath, a froth of
fleeting joy- Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week? Or sells eternity to get
a toy? For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy? Or what fond beggar, but
to touch the crown, Would with the sceptre straight be strucken down'
'If Collatinus dream of my intent, Will he not wake, and in a desp'rate rage
Post hither, this vile purpose to prevent?- This siege that hath engirt his
marriage, This blur to youth,' this sorrow to the sage, This dying virtue, this
surviving shame, Whose crime will bear an ever-during blame.
'O what excuse can my invention make, When thou shalt charge me with so black
a deed? Will not my tongue be mute, my frail joints shake, Mine eyes forego
their light, my false heart bleed? The guilt being great, the fear doth still
exceed; And extreme fear can neither fight nor fly, But coward-like with
trembling terror die.
'Had Collatinus killed my son or sire, Or lain in ambush to betray my life,
Or were he not my dear friend, this desire Might have excuse to work upon his
wife, As in revenge or quittal of such strife; But as he is my kinsman, my dear
friend, The shame and fault finds no excuse nor end.
'Shameful it is-ay, if the fact be known; Hateful it is-there is no hate in
loving; I'll beg her love-but she is not her own; The worst is but denial and
reproving. My will is strong, past reason's weak removing.- Who fears a sentence
or an old man's saw Shall by a painted cloth be kept in awe.'
Thus graceless holds he disputation 'Tween frozen conscience and hot-burning
will, And with good thoughts makes dispensation, Urging the worser sense for
vantage still; Which in a moment doth confound and kill All pure effects, and
doth so far proceed That what is vile shows like a virtuous deed.
Quoth he, 'She took me kindly by the hand, And gazed for tidings in my eager
eyes, Fearing some hard news from the warlike band Where her beloved Collatinus
lies. O how her fear did make her colour rise! First red as roses that on lawn
we lay, Then white as lawn, the roses took away.
'And how her hand, in my hand being locked, Forced it to tremble with her
loyal fear! Which struck her sad, and then it faster rocked Until her husband's
welfare she did hear; Whereat she smiled with so sweet a cheer That had
Narcissus seen her as she stood Self-love had never drowned him in the flood.
'Why hunt I then for colour or excuses? All orators are dumb when beauty
pleadeth; Poor wretches have remorse in poor abuses; Love thrives not in the
heart that shadows dreadeth; Affection is my captain, and he leadeth; And when
his gaudy banner is displayed, The coward fights and will not be dismayed.
'Then childish fear avaunt! debating die! Respect and reason wait on wrinkled
age! My heart shall never countermand mine eye; Sad pause and deep regard
beseems the sage; My part is youth, and beats these from the stage: Desire my
pilot is, beauty my prize; Then who fears sinking where such treasure lies?'
As corn o'ergrown by weeds, so heedful fear Is almost choked by unresisted
lust. Away he steals with open list'ning car, Full of foul hope and full of fond
mistrust; Both which, as servitors to the unjust, So cross him with their
opposite persuasion That now he vows a league and now invasion.
Within his thought her heavenly image sits, And in the selfsame seat sits
Collatine. That eye which looks on her confounds his wits; That eye which him
beholds, as more divine, Unto a view so false will not incline; But with a pure
appeal seeks to the heart, Which once corrupted takes the worser part;
And therein heartens up his servile powers, Who, flatt'red by their leader's
jocund show, Stuff up his lust, as minutes fill up hours; And as their captain,
so their pride doth grow, Paying more slavish tribute than they owe. By
reprobate desire thus madly led, The Roman lord marcheth to Lucrece' bed.
The locks between her chamber and his will, Each one by him enforced, retires
his ward; But, as they open, they all rate his ill, Which drives the creeping
thief to some regard. The threshold grates the door to have him heard;
Night-wand'ring weasels shriek to see him there; They fright him, yet he still
pursues his fear.
As each unwilling portal yields him way, Through little vents and crannies of
the place The wind wars with his torch to make him stay, And blows the smoke of
it into his face, Extinguishing his conduct in this case; But his hot heart,
which fond desire doth scorch, Puffs forth another wind that fires the torch;
And being lighted, by the light he spies Lucretia's glove, wherein her needle
sticks; He takes it from the rushes where it lies, And griping it, the needle
his finger pricks, As who should say 'This glove to wanton tricks Is not inured.
Return again in haste; Thou see'st our mistress' ornaments are chaste.'
But all these poor forbiddings could not stay him; He in the worst sense
consters their denial: The doors, the wind, the glove, that did delay him, He
takes for accidental things of trial; Or as those bars which stop the hourly
dial, Who with a ling'ring stay his course doth let, Till every minute pays the
hour his debt.
'So, so,' quoth he, 'these lets attend the time, Like little frosts that
sometime threat the spring, To add a more rejoicing to the prime, And give the
sneaped birds more cause to sing. Pain pays the income of each precious thing;
Huge rocks; high winds, strong pirates, shelves and sands The merchant fears,
ere rich at home he lands.'
Now is he come unto the chamber door That shuts him from the heaven of his
thought, Which with a yielding latch, and with no more, Hath barred him from the
blessed thing he sought. So from himself impiety hath wrought, That for his prey
to pray he doth begin, As if the heavens should countenance his sin.
But in the midst of his unfruitful prayer, Having solicited th' eternal power
That his foul thoughts might compass his fair fair, And they would stand
auspicious to the hour, Even there he starts; quoth he 'I must deflower: The
powers to whom I pray abhor this fact; How can they then assist me in the act?
'Then Love and Fortune be my gods, my guide! My will is backed with
resolution. Thoughts are but dreams.till their effects be tried; The blackest
sin is cleared with absolution; Against love's fire fear's frost hath
dissolution. The eye of heaven is out, and misty night Covers the shame that
follows sweet delight.'
This said, his guilty hand plucked up the latch, And with his knee the door
he opens wide. The dove sleeps fast that this night-owl will catch. Thus treason
works ere traitors be espied. Who sees the lurking serpent steps aside; But she,
sound sleeping, fearing no such thing, Lies at the mercy of his mortal sting.
Into the chamber wickedly he stalks And gazeth on her yet unstained bed. The
curtains being close, about he walks, Rolling his greedy eyeballs in his head.
By their high treason is his heart misled, Which gives the watch-word to his
hand full soon To draw the cloud that hides the silver moon.
Look as the fair and fiery-pointed sun, Rushing from forth a cloud, bereaves
our sight; Even so, the curtain drawn, his eyes begun To wink, being blinded
with a greater light; Whether it is that she reflects so bright That dazzleth
them, or else some shame supposed, But blind they are, and keep themselves
enclosed.
O, had they in that darksome prison died! Then had they seen the period of
their ill; Then Collatine again, by Lucrece' side, In his clear bed might have
reposed still; But they must ope, this blessed league to kill; And
holy-thoughted Lucrece to their sight Must sell her joy, her life, her world's
delight.
Her lily hand her rosy cheek lies under, Coz'ning the pillow of a lawful
kiss; Who, therefore angry, seems to part in sunder, Swelling on either side to
want his bliss; Between whose hills her head entombed is; Where, like a virtuous
monument, she lies, To be admired of lewd unhallowed eyes.
Without the bed her other fair hand was, On the green coverlet; whose perfect
white Showed like an April daisy on the grass, With pearly sweat resembling dew
of night. Her eyes, like marigolds, had sheathed their light, And canopied in
darkness sweetly lay, Till they might open to adorn the day.
Her hair, like golden threads, played with her breath- O modest wantons!
wanton modesty!- Showing life's triumph in the map of death, And death's dim
look in life's mortality: Each in her sleep themselves so beautify As if between
them, twain there were no strife, But that life lived in death and death in
life.
Her breasts, like ivory globes circled with blue, A pair of maiden worlds
unconquered, Save of their lord no bearing yoke they knew, And him by oath they
truly honoured. These worlds in Tarquin new ambition bred, Who like a foul
usurper went about From this fair throne to heave the owner out.
What could he see but mightily he noted? What did he note but strongly he
desired? What he beheld, on that he firmly doted, And in his will his wilful eye
he tired. With more than admiration he admired Her azure veins, her alabaster
skin, Her coral lips, her snow-white dimpled chin.
As the grim lion fawneth o'er his prey, Sharp hunger by the conquest
satisfied, So o'er this sleeping soul doth Tarquin stay, His rage of lust by
gazing qualified; Slacked, not suppressed; for standing by her side, His eye,
which late this mutiny restrains, Unto a greater uproar tempts his veins;
And they, like straggling slaves for pillage fighting, Obdurate vassals fell
exploits effecting, In bloody death and ravishment delighting, Nor children's
tears nor mothers' groans respecting, Swell in their pride, the onset still
expecting. Anon his beating heart, alarum striking Gives the hot charge, and
bids them do their liking.
His drumming heart cheers up his burning eye, His eye commends the leading to
his hand; His hand, as proud of such a dignity, Smoking with pride, marched on
to make his stand On her bare breast, the heart of all her land; Whose ranks of
blue veins as his hand did scale, Left their round turrets destitute and pale.
They, must'ring to the quiet cabinet Where their dear governess and lady
lies, Do tell her she is dreadfully beset, And fright her with confusion of
their cries. She, much amazed, breaks ope her locked-up eyes, Who, peeping forth
this tumult to behold, Are by his flaming torch dimmed and controlled.
Imagine her as one in dead of night From forth dull sleep by dreadful fancy
waking, That thinks she hath beheld some ghastly sprite, Whose grim aspect sets
every joint a-shaking; What terror 'tis! but she, in worser taking, From sleep
disturbed, heedfully doth view The sight which makes supposed terror true.
Wrapped and confounded in a thousand fears, Like to a new-killed bird she
trembling lies; She dares not look; yet, winking, there appears Quick-shifting
antics, ugly in her eyes. "Such shadows are the weak brain's forgeries, Who,
angry that the eyes fly from their lights, In darkness daunts them with more
dreadful sights.
His hand that yet remains upon her breast- Rude ram, to batter such an ivory
wall!- May feel her heart, poor citizen, distressed, Wounding itself to death,
rise up and fall, Beating her bulk, that his hand shakes withal. This moves in
him more rage and lesser pity, To make the breach and enter this sweet city.
First like a trumpet doth his tongue begin To sound a parley to his heartless
foe, Who o'er the white sheet peers her whiter chin, The reason of this rash
alarm to know, Which he by dumb demeanour seeks to show; But she with vehement
prayers urgeth still Under what colour he commits this ill.
Thus he replies: 'The colour in thy face, That even for anger makes the lily
pale And the red rose blush at her own disgrace, Shall plead for me and tell my
loving tale. Under that colour am I come to scale Thy never-conquered fort. The
fault is thine, For those thine eyes betray thee unto mine.
'Thus I forestall thee, if thou mean to chide: Thy beauty hath ensnared thee
to this night, Where thou with patience must my will abide, My will that marks
thee for my earth's delight, Which I to conquer sought with all my might; But as
reproof and reason beat it dead, By thy bright beauty was it newly bred.
'I see what crosses my attempt will bring; I know what thorns the growing
rose defends; I think the honey guarded with a sting; All this beforehand
counsel comprehends. But will is deaf and hears no heedful friends; Only he hath
an eye to gaze on beauty, And dotes on what he looks, 'gainst law or duty.
'I have debated, even in my soul, What wrong, what shame, what sorrow I shall
breed; But nothing can affection's course control, Or stop the headlong fury of
his speed. I know repentant tears ensue the deed, Reproach, disdain and deadly
enmity; Yet strive I to embrace mine infamy.'
This said, he shakes aloft his Roman blade, Which, like a falcon tow'ring in
the skies, Coucheth the fowl below with his wings' shade, Whose crooked beak
threats if he mount he dies. So under his insulting falchion lies Harmless
Lucretia, marking what he tells With trembling fear, as fowl hear falcons'
bells.
'Lucrece,' quoth he, 'this night I must enjoy thee. If thou deny, then force
must work my way, For in thy bed I purpose to destroy thee; That done, some
worthless slave of thine I'll slay, To kill thine honour with thy life's decay;
And in thy dead arms do I mean to place him, Swearing I slew him, seeing thee
embrace him.
'So thy surviving husband shall remain The scornful mark of every open eye;
Thy kinsmen hang their heads at this disdain, Thy issue blurred with nameless
bastardy; And thou, the author of their obloquy, Shalt have thy trespass cited
up in rhymes And sung by children in succeeding times.
'But if thou yield, I rest thy secret friend: The fault unknown is as a
thought unacted; "A little harm done to a great good end For lawful policy
remains enacted. "The poisonous simple sometime is compacted In a pure compound;
being so applied, His venom in effect is purified.
'Then, for thy husband and thy children's sake, Tender my suit; bequeath not
to their lot The shame that from them no device can take, The blemish that will
never be forgot; Worse than a slavish wipe or birth-hour's blot; For marks
descried in men's nativity Are nature's faults, not their own infamy.'
Here with a cockatrice' dead-killing eye He rouseth up himself, and makes a
pause; While she, the picture of pure piety, Like a white hind under the gripe's
sharp claws, Pleads in a wilderness where are no laws To the rough beast that
knows no gentle right, Nor aught obeys but his foul appetite.
But when a black-faced cloud the world doth threat, In his dim mist th'
aspiring mountains hiding, From earth's dark womb some gentle gust doth get,
Which blows these pitchy vapours from their biding, Hind'ring their present fall
by this dividing; So his unhallowed haste her words delays, And moody Pluto
winks while Orpheus plays.
Yet, foul night-waking cat, he doth but dally, While in his hold-fast foot
the weak mouse panteth; Her sad behaviour feeds his vulture folly, A swallowing
gulf that even in plenty wanteth; His ear her prayers admits, but his heart
granteth No penetrable entrance to her plaining. "Tears harden lust, though
marble wear with raining.
Her pity-pleading eyes are sadly fixed In the remorseless wrinkles of his
face; Her modest eloquence with sighs is mixed, Which to her oratory adds more
grace. She puts the period often from his place, And midst the sentence so her
accent breaks That twice she doth begin ere once she speaks.
She conjures him by high almighty Jove, By knighthood, gentry, and sweet
friendship's oath, By her untimely tears, her husband's love, By holy human law
and common troth, By heaven and earth, and all the power of both, That to his
borrowed bed he make retire, And stoop to honour, not to foul desire.
Quoth she: 'Reward not hospitality With such black payment as thou hast
pretended; Mud not the fountain that gave drink to thee; Mar not the thing that
cannot be amended; End thy ill aim before thy shoot be ended. He is no woodman
that doth bend his bow To strike a poor unseasonable doe.
'My husband is thy friend-for his sake spare me; Thyself art mighty-for thine
own sake leave me; Myself a weakling-do not then ensnare me; Thou look'st not
like deceit-do not deceive me. My sighs like whirlwinds labour hence to heave
thee. If ever man were moved with woman's moans, Be moved with my tears, my
sighs, my groans;
'All which together, like a troubled ocean, Beat at thy rocky and
wrack-threat'ning heart, To soften it with their continual motion; For stones
dissolved to water do convert. O, if no harder than a stone thou art, Melt at my
tears, and be compassionate! Soft pity enters at an iron gate.
'In Tarquin's likeness I did entertain thee; Hast thou put on his shape to do
him shame? To all the host of heaven I complain me Thou wrong'st his honour,
wound'st his princely name. Thou art not what thou seem'st; and if the same,
Thou seem'st not what thou art, a god, a king; For kings, like gods should
govern every thing.
'How will thy shame be seeded in thine age, When thus thy vices bud before
thy spring? If in thy hope thou dar'st do such outrage, What dar'st thou not
when once thou art a king? O, be rememb'red, no outrageous thing From vassal
actors can be wiped away; Then kings' misdeeds cannot be hid in clay.
'This deed will make thee only loved for fear, But happy monarchs still are
feared for love; With foul offenders thou perforce must bear, When they in thee
the like offences prove. If but for fear of this, thy will remove; For princes
are the glass, the school, the book, Where subjects' eyes do learn, do read, do
look.
'And wilt thou be the school where Lust shall learn? Must he in thee read
lectures of such shame? Wilt thou be glass wherein it shall discern Authority
for sin, warrant for blame, To privilege dishonour in thy name? Thou back'st
reproach against long-living laud, And mak'st fair, reputation but a bawd.
'Hast thou command? by him that gave it thee, From a pure heart command thy
rebel will; Draw not thy sword to guard iniquity, For it was lent thee all that
brood to kill. Thy princely office how canst thou fulfill, When patterned by thy
fault foul sin may say He learned to sin, and thou didst teach the way?
'Think but how vile a spectacle it were To view thy present trespass in
another. Men's faults do seldom to themselves appear; Their own transgressions
partially they smother; This guilt would seem death-worthy in thy brother. O,
how are they wrapped in with infamies That from their own misdeeds askance their
eyes!
'To thee, to thee, my heaved-up hands, appeal, Not to seducing lust, thy rash
relier; I sue for exiled majesty's repeal; Let him return, and flatt'ring
thoughts retire. His true respect will prison false desire, And wipe the dim
mist from thy doting eyne, That thou shalt see thy state and pity mine.'
'Have done, quoth he, 'my uncontrolled tide Turns not, but swells the higher
by this let. Small lights are soon blown out, huge fires abide, And with the
wind in greater fury fret. The petty streams that pay a daily debt To their salt
sovereign, with their fresh falls' haste Add to his flow, but alter not his
taste.'
'Thou art', quoth she, 'a sea, a sovereign king; And, lo, there falls into
thy boundless flood Black lust, dishonour, shame, misgoverning, Who seek to
stain the ocean of thy blood. If all these petty ills shall change thy good; Thy
sea within a puddle's womb is hearsed, And not the puddle in thy sea dispersed.
'So shall these slaves be king, and thou their slave; Thou nobly base, they
basely dignified; Thou their fair life, and they thy fouler grave; Thou loathed
in their shame, they in thy pride. The lesser thing should not the greater hide;
The cedar stoops not to the base shrub's foot, But low shrubs wither at the
cedar's root.
'So let thy thoughts, low vassals to thy state- "No more,' quoth he; 'by
heaven, I will not hear thee. Yield to my love; if not, enforced hate, Instead
of love's coy touch, shall rudely tear thee; That done, despitefully I mean to
bear thee Unto the base bed of some rescal groom, To be thy partner in this
shameful doom.'
This said, he sets his foot upon the light, For light and lust are deadly
enemies; Shame folded up in blind concealing night, When most unseen, then most
doth tyrannize. The wolf hath seized his prey, the poor lamb cries, Till with
her own white fleece her voice controlled Entombs her outcry in her lips' sweet
fold;
For with the nightly linen that she wears He pens her piteous clamours in her
head, Cooling his hot face in the chastest tears That ever modest eyes with
sorrow shed. O, that prone lust should stain so pure a bed! The spots whereof
could weeping purify, Her tears should drop on them perpetually.
But she hath lost a dearer thing than life, And he hath won what he would
lose again. This forced league doth force a further strife; This momentary joy
breeds months of pain; This hot desire converts to cold disdain; Pure Chastity
is rifled of her store, And Lust, the thief, far poorer than before.
Look as the full-fed hound or gorged hawk, Unapt for tender smell or speedy
flight, Make slow pursuit, or altogether balk The prey wherein by nature they
delight, So surfeit-taking Tarquin fares this night: His taste delicious, in
digestion souring, Devours his will, that lived by foul devouring.
O, deeper sin than bottomless conceit Can comprehend in still imagination!
Drunken Desire must vomit his receipt, Ere he can see his own abomination. While
Lust is in his pride, no exclamation Can curb his heat or rein his rash desire,
Till, like a jade, Self-will himself doth tire.
And then with lank and lean discoloured cheek, With heavy eye, knit brow, and
strengthless pace, Feeble Desire, all recreant, poor and meek, Like to a
bankrupt beggar wails his case: The flesh being proud, Desire doth fight with
Grace, For there it revels, and when that decays The guilty rebel for remission
prays.
So fares it with this faultful lord of Rome, Who this accomplishment so hotly
chased; For now against himself he sounds this doom, That through the length of
times he stands disgraced; Besides, his soul's fair temple is defaced, To whose
weak ruins muster troops of cares, To ask the spotted princess how she fares.
She says her subjects with foul insurrection Have battered down her
consecrated wall, And by their mortal fault brought in subjection Her
immortality, and made her thrall To living death and pain perpetual; Which in
her prescience she controlled still, But her foresight could not forestall their
will.
Ev'n in this thought through the dark night he stealeth, A captive victor
that hath lost in gain; Bearing away the wound that nothing healeth, The scar
that will, despite of cure, remain; Leaving his spoil perplexed in greater pain.
She bears the load of lust he left behind, And he the burden of a guilty mind.
He like a thievish dog creeps sadly thence; She like a wearied lamb lies
panting there; He scowls, and hates himself for his offence; She, desperate,
with her nails her flesh doth tear; He faintly flies, sweating with guilty fear;
She stays, exclaiming on the direful night; He runs, and chides his vanished,
loathed delight.
He thence departs a heavy convertite; She there remains a hopeless castaway;
He in his speed looks for the morning light; She prays she never may behold the
day. 'For day', quoth she, 'night's scapes doth open lay, And my true eyes have
never practised how To cloak offences with a cunning brow.
'They think not but that every eye can see The same disgrace which they
themselves behold; And therefore would they still in darkness be, To have their
unseen sin remain untold; For they their guilt with weeping will unfold, And
grave, like water that doth eat in steel, Upon my cheeks what helpless shame I
feel.'
Here she exclaims against repose and rest, And bids her eyes hereafter still
be blind. She wakes her heart by beating on her breast, And bids it leap from
thence, where it may find Some purer chest to close so pure a mind. Frantic with
grief thus breathes she forth her spite Against the unseen secrecy of night:
'O comfort-killing Night, image of hell! Dim register and notary of shame!
Black stage for tragedies and murders fell! Vast sin-concealing chaos! nurse of
blame! Blind muffled bawd! dark harbour for defame! Grim cave of death!
whisp'ring conspirator With close-tongued treason and the ravisher!
'O hateful, vaporous and foggy Night! Since thou art guilty of my cureless
crime, Muster thy mists to meet the eastern light, Make war against proportioned
course of time; Or if thou wilt permit the sun to climb His wonted height, yet
ere he go to bed, Knit poisonous clouds about his golden head.
'With rotten damps ravish the morning air; Let their exhaled unwholesome
breaths make sick The life of purity, the supreme fair, Ere he arrive his weary
noon-tide prick; And let thy musty vapours march so thick That in their smoky
ranks his smoth'red light May set at noon and make perpetual night.
'Were Tarquin Night, as he is but Night's child, The silver-shining queen he
would distain; Her twinkling handmaids too, by him defiled, Through Night's
black bosom should not peep again; So should I have co-partners in my pain; And
fellowship in woe doth woe assuage, As palmers' chat makes short their
pilgrimage.
'Where now I have no one to blush with me, To cross their arms and hang their
heads with mine, To mask their brows and hide their infamy; But I alone alone
sit and pine, Seasoning the earth with show'rs of silver brine, Mingling my talk
with tears, my grief with groans, Poor wasting monuments of lasting moans.
'O Night, thou furnace of foul-reeking smoke, Let not the jealous Day behold
that face Which underneath thy black all-hiding cloak Immodestly lies martyred
with disgrace! Keep still possession of thy gloomy place, That all the faults
which in thy reign are made May likewise be sepulchred in thy shade!
'Make me not object to the tell-tale Day. The light will show, charactered in
my brow, The story of sweet chastity's decay, The impious breach of holy wedlock
vow; Yea, the illiterate, that know not how To cipher what is writ in learned
books, Will quote my loathsome trespass in my looks.
'The nurse, to still her child, will tell my story, And fright her crying
babe with Tarquin's name; The orator, to deck his oratory, Will couple my
reproach to Tarquin's shame; Feast-finding minstrels, tuning my defame, Will tie
the hearers to attend each line, How Tarquin wronged me, I Collatine
'Let my good name, that senseless reputation, For Collatine's dear love be
kept unspotted; If that be made a theme for disputation, The branches of another
root are rotted, And undeserved reproach to him allotted That is as clear from
this attaint of mine As I ere this was pure to Collatine.
'O unseen shame! invisible disgrace! O unfelt sore! crest-wounding, private
scar! Reproach is stamped in Collatinus' face, And Tarquin's eye may read the
mot afar, "How he in peace is wounded, not in war. "Alas, how many bear such
shameful blows, Which not themselves, but he that gives them knows!
'If, Collatine, thine honour lay in me, From me by strong assault it is
bereft. My honey lost, and I, a drone-like bee, Have no perfection of my summer
left, But robbed and ransacked by injurious theft. In thy weak hive a wand'ring
wasp hath crept, And sucked the honey which thy chaste bee kept.
'Yet am I guilty of thy honour's wrack; Yet for thy honour did I entertain
him; Coming from thee, I could not put him back, For it had been dishonour to
disdain him; Besides, of weariness he did complain him, And talked of virtue: O
unlooked-for evil, When virtue is profaned in such a devil!
'Why should the worm intrude the maiden bud? Or hateful cuckoos hatch in
sparrows' nests? Or toads infect fair founts with venom mud? Or tyrant folly
lurk in gentle breasts? Or kings be breakers of their own behests? "But no
perfection is so absolute That some impurity doth not pollute.
'The aged man that coffers up his gold Is plagued with cramps and gouts and
painful fits, And scarce hath eyes his treasure to behold, But like still-pining
Tantalus he sits, And useless barns the harvest of his wits, Having no other
pleasure of his gain But torment that it cannot cure his pain.
'So then he hath it when he cannot use it, And leaves it to be mast'red by
his young; Who in their pride do presently abuse it. Their father was too weak,
and they strong, To hold their cursed-blessed fortune long. "The sweets we wish
for turn to loathed sours "Even in the moment that we call them ours.
'Unruly blasts wait on the tender spring; Unwholesome weeds take root with
precious flowers: The adder hisses where the sweet birds sing; What virtue
breeds iniquity devours. We have no good that we can say is ours But ill-annexed
Opportunity Or kills his life or else his quality.
'O Opportunity, thy guilt is great! 'Tis thou that execut'st the traitor's
treason; Thou sets the wolf where he the lamb may get; Whoever plots the sin,
thou point'st the season; 'Tis thou that spurn'st at right, at law, at reason;
And in thy shady cell, where none may spy him, Sits Sin, to seize the souls that
wander by him.
'Thou mak'st the vestal violate her oath; Thou blow'st the fire when
temperance is thawed; Thou smother'st honesty, thou murd'rest troth; Thou foul
abettor! thou notorious bawd! Thou plantest scandal and displacest laud. Thou
ravisher, thou traitor, thou false thief, Thy honey turns to gall, thy joy to
grief!
'Thy secret pleasure turns to open shame, Thy private feasting to a public
fast, Thy smoothing titles to a ragged name, Thy sugared tongue to bitter
wormwood taste; Thy violent vanities can never last; How comes it then, vile
Opportunity, Being so bad, such numbers seek for thee?
'When wilt thou be the humble suppliant's friend, And bring him where his
suit may be obtained? When wilt thou sort an hour great strifes to end? Or free
that soul which wretchedness hath chained? Give physic to the sick, ease to the
pained? The poor, lame, blind, halt, creep, cry out for thee; But they ne'er
meet with Opportunity.
'The patient dies while the physician sleeps; The orphan pines while the
oppressor feeds; Justice is feasting while the widow weeps; Advice is sporting
while infection breeds; Thou grant'st no time for charitable deeds; Wrath, envy,
treason, rape, and murder's rages, Thy heinous hours wait on them as their
pages.
'When Truth and Virtue have to do with thee, A thousand crosses keep them
from thy aid; They buy thy help, but Sin ne'er gives a fee; He gratis comes, and
thou art well appaid As well to hear as grant what he hath said. My Collatine
would else have come to me When Tarquin did, but he was stayed by thee.
'Guilty thou art of murder and of theft, Guilty of perjury and subornation,
Guilty of treason, forgery and shift, Guilty of incest, that abomination; An
accessary by thine inclination To all sins past and all that are to come, From
the creation to the general doom.
'Misshapen Time, copesmate of ugly Night, Swift subtle post, carrier of
grisly care, Eater of youth, false slave to false delight, Base watch of woes,
sin's pack-horse, virtue's snare; Thou nursest all and murd'rest all that are.
O, hear me then, injurious, shifting Time! Be guilty of my death, since of my
crime.
'Why hath thy servant Opportunity Betrayed the hours thou gavest me to
repose, Cancelled my fortunes and enchained me To endless date of never-ending
woes? Time's office is to fine the hate of foes, To eat up errors by opinion
bred, Not spend the dowry of a lawful bed.
'Time's glory is to calm contending kings, To unmask falsehood and bring
truth to light, To stamp the seal of time in aged things, To wake the morn and
sentinel the night, To wrong the wronger till he render right, To ruinate proud
buildings with thy hours And smear with dust their glitt'ring golden towers;
'To fill with worm-holes stately monuments, To feed oblivion with decay of
things, To blot old books and alter their contents, To pluck the quills from
ancient ravens' wings, To dry the old oak's sap and cherish springs, To spoil
antiquities of hammered steel And turn the giddy round of Fortune's wheel;
'To show the beldam daughters of her daughter, To make the child a man, the
man a child, To slay the tiger that doth live by slaughter, To tame the unicorn
and lion wild, To mock the subtle in themselves beguiled, To cheer the ploughman
with increased crops, And waste huge stones with little water-drops.
'Why work'st thou mischief in thy pilgrimage, Unless thou couldst return to
make amends? One poor retiring minute in an age Would purchase thee a thousand
thousand friends, Lending him wit that to bad debtors lends. O, this dread
night, wouldst thou one hour come back, I could prevent this storm and shun thy
wrack!
'Thou ceaseless lackey to eternity, With some mischance cross Tarquin in his
flight; Devise extremes beyond extremity, To make him curse this cursed crimeful
night; Let ghastly shadows his lewd eyes affright, And the dire thought of his
committed evil Shape every bush a hideous shapeless devil.
'Disturb his hours of rest with restless trances, Afflict him in his bed with
bedrid groans; Let there bechance him pitiful mischances, To make him moan, but
pity not his moans. Stone him with hard'ned hearts, harder than stones; And let
mild, women to him lose their mildness, Wilder to him than tigers in their
wildness.
'Let him have time to tear his curled hair, Let him have time against himself
to rave, Let him have time of time's help to despair, Let him have time to live
a loathed slave, Let him have time a beggar's orts to crave, And time to see one
that by alms doth live Disdain to him disdained scraps to give.
'Let him have time to see his friends his foes, And merry fools to mock at
him resort; Let him have time to mark how slow time goes In time of sorrow, and
how swift and short His time of folly and his time of sport; And ever let his
unrecalling crime Have time to wail th' abusing of his time.
'O Time, thou tutor both to good and bad, Teach me to curse him that thou
taught'st this ill! At his own shadow let the thief run mad, Himself himself
seek every hour to kill! Such wretched hands such -wretched blood should spill;
For who so base would such an office have As sland'rous deathsman to so base a
slave?
'The baser is he, coming from a king, To shame his hope with deeds
degenerate. The mightier man, the mightier is the thing That makes him honoured
or begets him hate; For greatest scandal waits on greatest state. The moon being
clouded presently is missed, But little stars may hide them when they list.
'The crow may bathe his coal-black wings in mire And unperceived fly with the
filth away; But if the like the snow-white swan desire, The stain upon his
silver down will stay. Poor grooms are sightless night, kings glorious day.
Gnats are unnoted wheresoe'er they fly, But eagles gazed upon with every eye.
'Out, idle words, servants to shallow fools! Unprofitable sounds, weak
arbitrators! Busy yourselves in skill-contending schools; Debate where leisure
serves with dull debaters; To trembling clients be you mediators. For me, I
force not argument a straw, Since that my case is past the help of law.
'In vain I rail at Opportunity, At Time, at Tarquin, and uncheerful Night; In
vain I cavil with mine infamy, In vain I spurn at my confirmed 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? Honour thyself to rid me of
this shame; For if I die, my honour 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 desp'rate
instrument of death. But this no slaughterhouse 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 feared by Tarquin's falchion to be slain, Yet for the selfsame
purpose seek a knife; But when I feared 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 stol'n 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 int'rest was not bought Basely with gold,
but stol'n 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-coined
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 cloist'red 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 nought to
do what's done by night.'
Thus cavils she with every thing she sees. True grief is fond and testy as a
child, Who wayward once, his mood with nought 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 labour 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 sympathized.
"'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 stopped, the bounding banks o'erflows; Grief dallied with nor
law nor limit knows.
'You mocking birds,' quoth she, your tunes entomb Within your hollow-swelling
feathered breasts, And in my hearing be you mute and dumb. My restless discord
loves no stops nor rests; "A woeful hostess brooks not merry guests. Relish your
nimble notes to pleasing ears; "Distress likes dumps when time is kept with
tears.
'Come, Philomel, that sing'st of ravishment, Make thy sad grove in my
dishevelled 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
burden-wise I'll hum on Tarquin still, While thou on Tereus descants 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
languishment.
'And for, poor bird, thou sing'st not in the day, As shaming any eye should
thee behold, Some dark deep desert, seated from the way, That knows not parching
heat nor freezing cold, Will we find out; and there we will unfold To creatures
stern sad tunes, to change their kinds. Since men prove beasts, let beasts bear
gentle minds.'
As the poor frighted deer, that stands at gaze, Wildly determining which way
to fly, Or one encompassed with a winding maze That cannot tread the way out
readily; So with herself is she in mutiny, To live or die which of the twain
were better, When life is shamed and death reproach's debtor.
'To kill myself,' quoth she, 'alack, what were it, But with my body my poor
soul's pollution? They that lose half with greater patience bear it Than they
whose whole is swallowed in confusion. That mother tries a merciless conclusion
Who, having two sweet babes, when death takes one, Will slay the other and be
nurse to none.
'My body or my soul, which was the dearer, When the one pure, the other made
divine? Whose love of either to myself was nearer, When both were kept for
heaven and Collatine? Ay me! the bark pilled from the lofty pine, His leaves
will wither and his sap decay; So must my soul, her bark being pilled away.
'Her house is sacked, her quiet interrupted, Her mansion battered by the
enemy; Her sacred temple spotted, spoiled, corrupted, Grossly engirt with daring
infamy; Then let it not be called impiety If in this blemished fort I make some
hole Through which I may convey this troubled soul.
'Yet die I will not till my Collatine Have heard the cause of my untimely
death, That he may vow, in that sad hour of mine, Revenge on him that made me
stop my breath. My stained blood to Tarquin I'll bequeath, Which by him tainted
shall for him be spent, And as his due writ in my testament.
'My honour I'll bequeath unto the knife That wounds my body so dishonoured.
'Tis honour to deprive dishonoured life; The one will live, the other being
dead. So of shame's ashes shall my fame be bred; For in my death I murder
shameful scorn. My shame so dead, mine honour is new born.
'Dear lord of that dear jewel I have lost, What legacy shall I bequeath to
thee? My resolution, love, shall be thy boast, By whose example thou revenged
mayst be. How Tarquin must be used, read it in me: Myself, thy friend, will kill
myself, thy foe, And, for my sake, serve thou false Tarquin so.
'This brief abridgement of my will I make: My soul and body to the skies and
ground; My resolution, husband, do thou take; Mine honour be the knife's that
makes my wound; My shame be his that did my fame confound; And all my fame that
lives disbursed be To those that live and think no shame of me.
'Thou, Collatine, shalt oversee this will; How was I overseen that thou shalt
see it! My blood shall wash the slander of mine ill; My life's foul deed, my
life's fair end shall free it. Faint not, faint heart, but stoutly say "So be
it". Yield to my hand; my hand shall conquer thee; Thou dead, both die and both
shall victors be.'
This plot of death when sadly she had laid, And wiped the brinish pearl from
her bright eyes, With untuned tongue she hoarsely calls her maid, Whose swift
obedience to her mistress hies; "For fleet-winged duty with thought's feathers
flies. Poor Lucrece' cheeks unto her maid seem so As winter meads when sun doth
melt their snow.
Her mistress she doth give demure good-morrow With soft slow tongue, true
mark of modesty, And sorts a sad look to her lady's sorrow, For why her face
wore sorrow's livery, But durst not ask of her audaciously Why her two suns were
cloud-eclipsed so, Nor why her fair cheeks over-washed with woe.
But as the earth doth weep, the sun being set, Each flower moist'ned like a
melting eye, Even so the maid with swelling drops 'gan wet Her circled eyne,
enforced by sympathy Of those fair suns set in her mistress' sky, Who in a
salt-waved ocean quench their light, Which makes the maid weep like the dewy
night.
A pretty while these pretty creatures stand, Like ivory conduits coral
cisterns filling. One justly weeps; the other takes in hand No cause but company
of her drops spilling: Their gentle sex to weep are often willing, Grieving
themselves to guess at others' smarts, And then they drown their eyes or break
their hearts.
For men have marble, women waxen, minds, And therefore are they formed as
marble will; The weak oppressed, th' impression of strange kinds Is formed in
them by force, by fraud, or skill. Then call them not the authors of their ill,
No more than wax shall be accounted evil Wherein is stamped the semblance of a
devil.
Their smoothness, like a goodly champaign plain, Lays open all the little
worms that creep; In men, as in a rough-grown grove, remain Cave-keeping evils
that obscurely sleep. Through crystal walls each little mote will peep. Though
men can cover crimes with bold stern looks, Poor women's faces are their own
faults' books.
No man inveigh against the withered flower, But chide rough winter that the
flower hath killed. Not that devoured, but that which doth devour, Is worthy
blame. O, let it not be hild Poor women's faults that they are so fulfilled With
men's abuses: those proud lords to blame Make weak-made women tenants to' their
shame.
The precedent whereof in Lucrece view, Assailed by night with circumstances
strong Of present death, and shame that might ensue By that her death, to do her
husband wrong. Such danger to resistance did belong, That dying fear through all
her body spread; And who cannot abuse a body dead?
By this, mild patience bid fair Lucrece speak To the poor counterfeit of her
complaining. 'My girl,' quoth she, 'on what occasion break Those tears from thee
that down thy cheeks are raining? If thou dost weep for grief of my sustaining,
Know, gentle wench, it small avails my mood; If tears could help, mine own would
do me good.
'But tell me, girl, when went'-and there she stayed Till after a deep
groan-'Tarquin from hence?' 'Madam, ere I was up,' replied the maid, 'The more
to blame my sluggard negligence. Yet with the fault I thus far can dispense:
Myself was stirring ere the break of day, And ere I rose was Tarquin gone away.
'But, lady, if your maid may be so bold, She would request to know your
heaviness.' 'O, peace!' quoth Lucrece: 'if it should be told, The repetition
cannot make it less, For more it is than I can well express; And that deep
torture may be called a hell When more is felt than one hath power to tell.
'Go, get me hither paper, ink and pen; Yet save that labour, for I have them
here. What should I say? One of my husband's men Bid thou be ready by and by to
bear A letter to my lord, my love, my dear. Bid him with speed prepare to carry
it; The cause craves haste and it will soon be writ.'
Her maid is gone, and she prepares to write, First hovering o'er the paper
with her quill. Conceit and grief an eager combat fight; What wit sets down is
blotted straight with will; This is too curious-good, this blunt and ill: Much
like a press of people at a door, Throng her inventions, which shall go before.
At last she thus begins: 'Thou worthy lord Of that unworthy wife that
greeteth thee, Health to thy person! next vouchsafe t'afford- If ever, love, thy
Lucrece thou wilt see- Some present speed to come and visit me. So I commend me,
from our house in grief; My woes are tedious, though my words are brief.'
Here folds she up the tenor of her woe, Her certain sorrow writ uncertainly.
By this short schedule Collatine may know Her grief, but not her grief's true
quality; She dares not thereof make discovery, Lest he should hold it her own
gross abuse, Ere she with blood had stained her stained excuse.
Besides, the life and feeling of her passion She hoards, to spend when he is
by to hear her, When sighs and groans and tears may grace the fashion Of her
disgrace, the better so to clear her From that suspicion which the world might
bear her. To shun this blot, she would not blot the letter With words, till
action might become them better.
To see sad sights moves more than hear them told; For then the eye interprets
to the car The heavy motion that it doth behold, When every part a part of woe
doth bear. 'Tis but a part of sorrow that we hear: Deep sounds make lesser noise
than shallow fords, And sorrow ebbs, being blown with wind of words.
Her letter now is sealed and on it writ 'At Ardea to my lord with more than
haste.' The post attends, and she delivers it, Charging the sour-faced groom to
hie as fast As lagging fowls before the northern blast. Speed more than speed
but dull and slow she deems: Extremity still urgeth such extremes.
The homely villain curtsies to her low, And blushing on her, with a steadfast
eye Receives the scroll without or yea or no, And forth with bashful innocence
doth hie. But they whose guilt within their bosoms lie Imagine every eye beholds
their blame; For Lucrece thought he blushed to see her shame:
When, silly groom, God wot, it was defect Of spirit, life and bold audacity.
Such harmless creatures have a true respect To talk in deeds, while others
saucily Promise more speed but do it leisurely. Even so this pattern of the
worn-out age Pawned honest looks, but laid no words to gage.
His kindled duty kindled her mistrust, That two red fires in both their faces
blazed; She thought he blushed, as knowing Tarquin's lust, And blushing with
him, wistly on him gazed; Her earnest eye did make him more amazed; The more she
saw the blood his cheeks replenish, The more she thought he spied in her some
blemish.
But long she thinks till he return again, And yet the duteous vassal scarce
is gone. The weary time she cannot entertain, For now 'tis stale to sigh, to
weep and groan; So woe hath wearied woe, moan tired moan, That she her plaints a
little while doth stay, Pausing for means to mourn some newer way.
At last she calls to mind where hangs a piece Of skilful painting, made for
Priam's Troy, Before the which is drawn the power of Greece, For Helen's rape
the city to destroy, Threat'ning cloud-kissing Ilion with annoy; Which the
conceited painter drew so proud As heaven, it seemed, to kiss the turrets bowed.
A thousand lamentable objects there, In scorn of nature, art gave lifeless
life: Many a dry drop seemed a weeping tear, Shed for the slaught'red husband by
the wife; The red blood reeked, to show the painter's strife; And dying eyes
gleamed forth their ashy lights, Like dying coals burnt out in tedious nights.
There might you see the labouring pioneer Begrimed with sweat and smeared all
with dust; And from the towers of Troy there would appear The very eyes of men
through loop-holes thrust, Gazing upon the Greeks with little lust. Such sweet
observance in this work was had That one might see those far-off eyes look sad.
In great commanders grace and majesty You might behold, triumphing in their
faces; In youth, quick bearing and dexterity; And here and there the painter
interlaces Pale cowards marching on with trembling paces, Which heartless
peasants did so well resemble That one would swear he saw them quake and
tremble.
In Ajax and Ulysses, O what art Of physiognomy might one behold! The face of
either ciphered either's heart; Their face their manners most expressly told: In
Ajax's eyes blunt rage and rigour rolled; But the mild glance that sly Ulysses
lent Showed deep regard and smiling government.
There pleading might you see grave Nestor stand, As 'twere encouraging the
Greeks to fight, Making such sober action with his hand That it beguiled
attention, charmed the sight. In speech, it seemed, his beard all silver white
Wagged up and down, and from his lips did fly Thin winding breath which purled
up to the sky.
About him were a press of gaping fades, Which seemed to swallow up his sound
advice, All jointly list'ning, but with several graces, As if some mermaid did
their ears entice, Some high, some low, the painter was so nice; The scalps of
many, almost hid behind, To jump up higher seemed, to mock the mind.
Here one man's hand leaned on another's head, His nose being shadowed by his
neighbour's ear; Here one being thronged bears back, all boll'n and red; Another
smothered seems to pelt and swear; And in their rage such signs, of rage of rage
they bear As, but for loss of Nestor's golden words, It seemed they would debate
with angry swords.
For much imaginary work was there; Conceit deceitful, so compact, so kind,
That for Achilles' image stood his spear Griped in an armed hand; himself behind
Was left unseen, save to the eye of mind: A hand, a foot, a face, a leg, a head,
Stood for the whole to be imagined.
And from the walls of strong-besieged Troy When their brave hope, bold
Hector, marched to field, Stood many Trojan mothers sharing joy To see their
youthful sons bright weapons wield; And to their hope they such odd action yield
That through their light joy seemed to appear, Like bright things stained, a
kind of heavy fear.
And from the strand of Dardan where they fought To Simois' reedy banks the
red blood ran, Whose waves to imitate the battle sought With swelling ridges;
and their ranks began To break upon the galled shore, and than Retire again,
till meeting greater ranks They join and shoot their foam at Simois' banks.
To this well-painted piece is Lucrece come, To find a face where all distress
is stelled. Many she sees where cares have carved some, But none where all
distress and dolour dwelled, Till she despairing Hecuba beheld, Staring on
Priam's wounds with her old eyes, Which bleeding under Pyrrhus' proud foot lies.
In her the painter had anatomized Time's ruin, beauty's wrack, and grim
care's reign; Her cheeks with chaps and wrinkles were disguised; Of what she was
no semblance did remain; Her blue blood changed to black in every vein, Wanting
the spring that those shrunk pipes had fed, Showed life imprisoned in a body
dead.
On this sad shadow Lucrece spends her eyes, And shapes her sorrow to the
beldam's woes, Who nothing wants to answer her but cries, And bitter words to
ban her cruel foes: The painter was no god to lend her those; And therefore
Lucrece swears he did her wrong, To give her so much grief and not a tongue.
'Poor instrument', quoth she, 'without a sound, I'll tune thy woes with my
lamenting tongue, And drop sweet balm in Priam's painted wound, And rail on
Pyrrhus that hath done him wrong, And with my tears quench Troy that burns so
long, And with my knife scratch out the angry eyes Of all the Greeks that are
thine enemies.
'Show me the strumpet that began this stir, That with my nails her beauty I
may tear. Thy heat of lust, fond Paris, did incur This load of wrath that
burning Troy doth bear. Thy eye kindled the fire that burneth here; And here in
Troy, for trespass of thine eye, The sire, the son, the dame and daughter die.
'Why should the private pleasure of some one Become the public plague of many
moe? Let sin, alone committed, light alone Upon his head that hath transgressed
so; Let guiltless souls be freed from guilty woe. For one's-offence why should
so many fall, To plague a private sin in general?
'Lo, here weeps Hecuba, here Priam dies, Here manly Hector faints, here
Troilus swounds, Here friend by friend in bloody channel lies, And friend to
friend gives unadvised wounds, And one man's lust these many lives confounds.
Had doting Priam checked his son's desire, Troy had been bright with fame and
not with fire.'
Here feelingly she weeps Troy's painted woes; For sorrow, like a
heavy-hanging bell Once set on ringing, with his own weight goes; Then little
strength rings out the dolefull knell; So Lucrece, set a-work, sad tales doth
tell To pencilled pensiveness and coloured sorrow; She lends them words, and she
their looks doth borrow.
She throws her eyes about the painting round, And who she finds forlorn she
doth lament. At last she sees a wretched image bound That piteous looks to
Phrygian shepherds lent; His face,.though full of cares, yet showed content;
Onward to Troy with the blunt swains he goes, So mild that Patience seemed to
scorn his woes.
In him the painter laboured with his skill To hide deceit and give the
harmless show An humble gait, calm looks, eyes wailing still, A brow unbent that
seemed to welcome woe; Cheeks neither red nor pale, but mingled so That blushing
red no guilty instance gave, Nor ashy pale the fear that false hearts have.
But, like a constant and confirmed devil, He entertained a show so seeming
just, And therein so ensconced his secret evil, That jealousy itself could not
mistrust False creeping craft and perjury should thrust Into so bright a day
such black-faced storms, Or blot with hell-born sin such saint-like forms.
The well-skilled workman this mild image drew For perjured Sinon, whose
enchanting story The credulous old Priam after slew; Whose words, like wildfire,
burnt the shining glory Of rich-built Ilion, that the skies were sorry, And
little stars shot from their fixed places, When their glass fell wherein they
viewed their faces.
This picture she advisedly perused, And chid the painter for his wondrous
skill, Saying, some shape in Sinon's was abused; So fair a form lodged not a
mind so ill; And still on him she gazed, and gazing still Such signs of truth in
his plain face she spied That she concludes the picture was belied.
'It cannot be', quoth she, 'that so much guile'- She would have said 'can
lurk in such a look'; But Tarquin's shape came in her mind the while, And from
her tongue 'can lurk' from 'cannot' took; 'It cannot be' she in that sense
forsook, And turned it thus, 'It cannot be, I find, But such a face should bear
a wicked mind;
'For even as subtle Sinon here is painted, So sober-sad, so weary and so
mild, As if with grief or travail he had fainted, To me came Tarquin armed to
beguild With outward honesty, but yet defiled With inward vice. As Priam him did
cherish, So did I Tarquin; so my Troy did perish.
Look, look, how list'ning Priam wets his eyes, To see those borrowed tears
that Sinon sheds. Priam, why art thou old and yet not wise? For every tear he
falls a Trojan bleeds; His eye drops fire, no water thence proceeds; Those round
clear pearls of his that move thy pity Are balls of quenchless fire to burn thy
city.
'Such devils steal effects from lightless hell; For Sinon in his fire doth
quake with cold, And in that cold hot-burning fire doth dwell; These contraries
such unity do hold Only to flatter fools and make them bold; So Priam's trust
false Sinon's tears doth flatter That he finds means to burn his Troy with
water.'
Here, all enraged, such passion her assails, That patience is quite beaten
from her breast. She tears the senseless Sinon with her nails, Comparing him to
that unhappy guest Whose deed hath made herself herself At last she smilingly
with this gives o'er: 'Fool, fool!' quoth she, 'his wounds will not be sore.'
Thus ebbs and flows the current of her sorrow, And time doth weary time with
her complaining. She looks for night, and then she longs for morrow, And both
she thinks too long with her remaining. Short time seems long in sorrow's sharp
sustaining; Though woe be heavy, yet it seldom sleeps, And they that watch see
time how slow it creeps.
Which all this time hath overslipped her thought That she with painted images
hath spent, Being from the feeling of her own grief brought By deep surmise of
others' detriment, Losing her woes in shows of discontent. It easeth some,
though none it ever cured, To think their dolour others have endured.
But now the mindful messenger come back Brings home his lord and other
company; Who finds his Lucrece clad in mourning black, And round about her
tear-distained eye Blue circles streamed, like rainbows in the sky. These
water-galls in her dim element Foretell new storms to those already spent.
Which when her sad-beholding husband saw, Amazedly in her sad face he stares:
Her eyes, though sod in tears, looked red and raw, Her lively colour killed with
deadly cares. He hath no power to ask her how she fares; Both stood, like old
acquaintance in a trance, Met far from home, wond'ring each other's chance.
At last he takes her by the bloodless hand, And thus begins: 'What uncouth
ill event Hath thee befall'n. that thou dost trembling stand? Sweet love, what
spite hath thy fair colour spent? Why art thou thus attired in discontent?
Unmask, dear dear, this moody heaviness, And tell thy grief, that we may give
redress.'
Three times with sighs she gives her sorrow fire Ere once she can discharge
one word of woe; At length addressed to answer his desire, She modestly prepares
to let them know Her honour is ta'en prisoner by the foe; While Collatine and
his consorted lords With sad attention long to hear her words.
And now this pale swan in her wat'ry nest Begins the sad dirge of her certain
ending. 'Few words', quoth she, 'shall fit the trespass best, Where no excuse
can give the fault amending: In me moe woes than words are now depending; And my
laments would be drawn out too long, To tell them all with one poor tired
tongue.
'Then be this all the task it hath to say: Dear husband, in the interest of
thy bed A stranger came, and on that pillow lay Where thou wast wont to rest thy
weary head; And what wrong else may be imagined By foul enforcement might be
done to me, From that, alas, thy Lucrece is not free.
'For in the dreadful dead of dark midnight, With shining falchion in my
chamber came: A creeping creature with a flaming light, And softly cried "Awake,
thou Roman dame, And entertain my love; else lasting shame On thee and thine
this night I will inflict, If thou my love's desire do contradict.
"'For some hard-favoured groom of thine," quoth he, "Unless thou yoke thy
liking to my will, I'll murder straight, and then I'll slaughter thee, And swear
I found you where you did fulfill The loathsome act of lust, and so did kill The
lechers in their deed: this act will be My fame, and thy perpetual infamy."
'With this, I did begin to start and cry, And then against my heart he set
his sword, Swearing, unless I took all patiently, I should not live to speak
another word; So should my shame still rest upon record, And never be forgot in
mighty Rome Th' adulterate death of Lucrece and her groom.
'Mine enemy was strong, my poor self weak, And far the weaker with so strong
a fear. My bloody judge forbade my tongue to speak; No rightful plea might plead
for justice there. His scarlet lust came evidence to swear That my poor beauty
had purloined his eyes, And when the judge is robbed, the prisoner dies.
'O, teach me how to make mine own excuse! Or, at the least, this refuge let
me find: Though my gross blood be stained with this abuse, Immaculate and
spotless is my mind; That was not forced; that never was inclined To accessary
yieldings, but still pure Doth in her poisoned closet yet endure.'
Lo, here, the hopeless merchant of this loss, With head declined, and voice
damned up with woe, With sad-set eyes and wreathed arms across, From lips new
waxen pale begins to blow The grief away that stops his answer so; But, wretched
as he is, he strives in vain; What he breathes out his breath drinks up again.
As through an arch the violent roaring tide Outruns the eye that doth behold
his haste, Yet in the eddy boundeth in his pride Back to the strait that forced
him on so fast, In rage sent out, recalled in rage, being past; Even so his
sighs, his sorrows, make a saw, To push grief on and back the same grief draw.
Which speechless woe of his poor she attendeth And his untimely frenzy thus
awaketh: 'Dear lord, thy sorrow to my sorrow lendeth Another power; no flood by
raining slaketh. My woe too sensible thy passion maketh More feeling-painful.
Let it then suffice To drown one woe, one pair of weeping eyes.
'And for my sake, when I might charm thee so, For she that was thy Lucrece,
now attend me: Be suddenly revenged on my foe, Thine, mine, his own; suppose
thou dost defend me From what is past. The help that thou shalt lend me Comes
all too late, yet let the traitor die; "For sparing justice feeds iniquity.
'But ere I name him, you fair lords', quoth she, Speaking to those that came
with Collatine, 'Shall plight your honourable faiths to me, With swift pursuit
to venge this wrong of mine; For 'tis a meritorious fair design To chase
injustice with revengeful arms: Knights, by their oaths, should right poor
ladies' harms.'
At this request, with noble disposition Each present lord began to promise
aid, As bound in knighthood to her imposition, Longing to hear the hateful foe
bewrayed. But she, that yet her sad task hath not said, The protestation stops.
'O, speak,' quoth she, 'How may this forced stain be wiped from me?
'What is the quality of my offence, Being constrained with dreadful
circumstance? May my pure mind with the foul act dispense, My low-declined
honour to advance? May any terms acquit me from this chance? The poisoned
fountain clears itself again; And why not I from this compelled stain?'
With this, they all at once began to say, Her body's stain her mind untainted
clears; While with a joyless smile she turns. away The face, that map which deep
impression bears Of hard misfortune, carved in it with tears. 'No, no,' quoth
she, 'no dame hereafter living By my excuse shall claim excuse's giving.'
Here with a sigh, as if her heart would break, She throws forth Tarquin's
name: 'He, he,' she says, But more than 'he' her poor tongue could not speak;
Till after many accents and delays, Untimely breathings, sick and short assays,
She utters this: 'He, he, fair lords, 'tis he, That guides this hand to give
this wound to me.'
Even here, she sheathed in her harmless breast A harmful knife, that thence
her soul unsheathed: That blow did bail it from the deep unrest Of that polluted
prison where it breathed. Her contrite sighs unto the clouds bequeathed Her
winged sprite and through her wounds doth fly Life's lasting date from cancelled
destiny.
Stone-still, astonished with this deadly deed, Stood Collatine and all his
lordly crew; Till Lucrece' father, that beholds her bleed, Himself on her
self-slaught'red body threw; And from the purple fountain Brutus drew The
murd'rous knife, and, as it left the place, Her blood, in poor revenge, held it
in chase;
And bubbling from her breast, it doth divide In two slow rivers, that the
crimson blood Circles her body in on every side, Who like a late-sacked island
vastly stood Bare and unpeopled in this fearful flood. Some of her blood still
pure and red remained, And some looked black, and that false Tarquin stained.
About the mourning and congealed face Of that black blood a wat'ry rigol
goes, Which seems to weep upon the tainted place; And ever since, as pitying
Lucrece' woes, Corrupted blood some watery token shows; And blood untainted
still doth red abide, Blushing at that which is so putrified.
'Daughter, dear daughter,' old Lucretius cries, 'That life was mine which
thou hast here deprived. If in the child the father's image lies, Where shall I
live now Lucrece is unlived? Thou wast not to this end from me derived. If
children predecease progenitors, We are their offspring, and they none of ours.
'Poor broken glass, I often did behold In thy sweet semblance my old age new
born; But now that fair fresh mirror, dim and old, Shows me a bare-boned death
by time outworn; O, from thy cheeks my image thou hast torn, And shivered all
the beauty of my glass, That I no more can see what once I was.
'O time, cease thou thy course and last no longer, If they surcease to be
that should survive. Shall rotten death make conquest of the stronger, And leave
the falt'ring feeble souls alive? The old bees die, the young possess their
hive. Then live, sweet Lucrece, live again, and see Thy father die, and not thy
father thee.'
By this, starts Collatine as from a dream, And bids Lucretius give his sorrow
place; And then in key-cold Lucrece' bleeding stream He falls, and bathes the
pale fear in his face, And counterfeits to die with her a space; Till manly
shame bids him possess his breath, And live to be revenged on her death.
The deep vexation of his inward soul Hath served a dumb arrest upon his
tongue; Who, mad that sorrow should his use control Or keep him from
heart-easing words so long, Begins to talk; but through his lips do throng Weak
words, so thick come in his poor heart's aid That no man could distinguish what
he said.
Yet sometime 'Tarquin' was pronounced plain, But through his teeth, as if the
name he tore. This windy tempest, till it blow up rain, Held back his sorrow's
tide, to make it more; At last it rains, and busy winds give o'er; Then son and
father weep with equal strife Who should weep most, for daughter or for wife.
The one doth call her his, the other his, Yet neither may possess the claim
they lay. The father says 'She's mine'. 'O, mine she is,' Replies her husband:
'do not take away My sorrow's interest; let no mourner say He weeps for her, for
she was only mine, And only must be wailed by Collatine.'
'O,' quoth Lucretius, 'I did give that life Which she too early and too late
hath spilled.' 'Woe, woe,' quoth Collatine, 'she was my wife; I owed her, and
'tis mine that she hath killed.' 'My daughter' and 'my wife' with clamours
filled The dispersed air, who, holding Lucrece' life, Answered their cries, 'my
daughter' and 'my wife'.
Brutus, who plucked the knife from Lucrece' side, Seeing such emulation in
their woe, Began to clothe his wit in state and pride, Burying in Lucrece' wound
his folly's show. He with the Romans was esteemed so As silly jeering idiots are
with kings, For sportive words and utt'ring foolish things.
But now he throws that shallow habit by Wherein deep policy did him disguise,
And armed his long-hid wits advisedly To check the tears in Collatinus' eyes.
'Thou wronged lord of Rome,' quoth he, 'arise; Let my unsounded self, supposed a
fool, Now set thy long-experienced wit to school.
'Why, Collatine, is woe the cure for woe? Do wounds help wounds, or grief
help grievous deeds? Is it revenge to give thyself a blow For his foul act by
whom thy fair wife bleeds? Such childish humour from weak minds proceeds. Thy
wretched wife mistook the matter so To slay herself, that should have slain her
foe.
'Courageous Roman, do not steep thy heart In such relenting dew of
lamentations, But kneel with me and help to bear thy part To rouse our Roman
gods with invocations That they will suffer these abominations, Since Rome
herself in them doth stand disgraced, By our strong arms from forth her fair
streets chased.
'Now by the Capitol that we adore, And by this chaste blood so unjustly
stained, By heaven's fair sun that breeds the fat earth's store, By all our
country rights in Rome maintained, And by chaste Lucrece' soul that late
complained Her wrongs to us, and by this bloody knife, We will revenge the death
of this true wife.'
This said, he struck his hand upon his breast, And kissed the fatal knife to
end his vow, And to his protestation urged the rest, Who, wond'ring at him, did
his words allow; Then jointly to the ground their knees they bow, And that deep
vow which Brutus made before He doth again repeat, and that they swore.
When they had sworn to this advised doom, They did conclude to bear dead
Lucrece thence, To show her bleeding body thorough Rome, And so to publish
Tarquin's foul offence; Which being done with speedy diligence, The Romans
plausible did give consent To Tarquin's everlasting banishment.
-THE END-
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