Act II., Sc. 3]
AGLAURA
103
Think how unsafe you are, if she should now
Not sell her honour at a lower rate55
Than your place in his bed.
Orb. And would not you prove false, too, then?
Ari. By this—
And this—love's breakfast! [kisses her] By his feasts, too, yet
To come! by all the beauty in this face,
Divinity too great to be profan'd!60
Orb. O, do not swear by that;
Cankers may eat that flower upon the stalk
(For sickness and mischance are great devourers);
And, when there is not in these cheeks and lips
Left red enough to blush at perjury,65
When you shall make it, what shall I do then?
Ari. Our souls by that time, madam,
Will by long custom so acquainted be,
They will not need that duller trouch-man, Flesh;
But freely, and without those poorer helps,70
Converse and mingle: meantime we'll teach
Our loves to speak, not thus to live by signs;
And action is his native language, madam.
Enter Ziriff unseen
This box but open'd to the sense will do it.
Orb. I undertake I know not what.
Ari. Thine own safety,75
Dearest: let it be this night, if thou dost love
Thyself or me.[Whisper and kiss
Orb. That's very sudden.
Ari. Not
If we be so, and we must now be wise:
For when their sun sets, ours begin to rise.[Exeunt
Ziriff solus
Zir. Then all my fears are true, and she is false,80
False as a falling star or glowworm's fire.
This devil Beauty is compounded strangely:
It is a subtle point, and hard to know,
Whether it has in it more active tempting,
Or [is] more passive tempted;85
So soon it forces, and so soon it yields.
Good Gods! she seiz'd my heart, as if from you