No More Learning

_ I would be loth they should: it breeds contempt
For herds to listen, or presume to pry,
When the hurt lion groans within his den:
But is't not strange?

_Bend. _ To love? not more than 'tis to live; a tax
Imposed on all by nature, paid in kind,
Familiar as our being.

_Emp. _ Still 'tis strange
To me: I know my soul as wild as winds,
That sweep the desarts of our moving plains;
Love might as well be sowed upon our sands,
As in a breast so barren.
To love an enemy, the only one
Remaining too, whom yester sun beheld
Mustering her charms, and rolling, as she past
By every squadron, her alluring eyes,
To edge her champions' swords, and urge my ruin.
The shouts of soldiers, and the burst of cannon,
Maintain even still a deaf and murmuring noise;
Nor is heaven yet recovered of the sound,
Her battle roused: Yet, spite of me, I love.

_Bend. _ What then controuls you?
Her person is as prostrate as her party.

_Emp. _ A thousand things controul this conqueror:
My native pride to own the unworthy passion,
Hazard of interest, and my people's love.
To what a storm of fate am I exposed! --
What if I had her murdered! --'tis but what
My subjects all expect, and she deserves,--
Would not the impossibility
Of ever, ever seeing, or possessing,
Calm all this rage, this hurricane of soul?

_Bend. _ That _ever, ever,_--
I marked the double,--shows extreme reluctance
To part with her for ever.

_Emp. _ Right, thou hast me.
I would, but cannot kill: I must enjoy her:
I must, and what I must, be sure I will.
What's royalty, but power to please myself?
And if I dare not, then am I the slave,
And my own slaves the sovereigns:--'tis resolved.
Weak princes flatter, when they want the power
To curb their people; tender plants must bend:
But when a government is grown to strength,
Like some old oak, rough with its armed bark,
It yields not to the tug, but only nods,
And turns to sullen state.

_Bend. _ Then you resolve
To implore her pity, and to beg relief?

_Emp. _ Death! must I beg the pity of my slave?
Must a king beg? --Yes; love's a greater king;
A tyrant, nay, a devil, that possesses me:
He tunes the organs of my voice, and speaks,
Unknown to me, within me; pushes me,
And drives me on by force. --
Say I should wed her, would not my wise subjects
Take check, and think it strange? perhaps revolt?

_Bend. _ I hope they would not.

_Emp. _ Then thou doubtst they would?

_Bend. _ To whom?

_Emp. _ To her
Perhaps,--or to my brother,--or to thee.

_Bend. _ [_in disorder. _]
To me! me, did you mention? how I tremble!
The name of treason shakes my honest soul.
If I am doubted, sir,
Secure yourself this moment, take my life.

_Emp. _ No more: If I suspected thee--I would.

_Bend. _ I thank your kindness. --Guilt had almost lost me. [_Aside. _

_Emp. _ But clear my doubts:--thinkst thou they may rebel?

_Bend. _ This goes as I would wish. -- [_Aside. _
'Tis possible:
A secret party still remains, that lurks
Like embers raked in ashes,--wanting but
A breath to blow aside the involving dust,
And then they blaze abroad.

_Emp. _ They must be trampled out.

_Bend. _ But first be known.

_Emp. _ Torture shall force it from them.

_Bend. _ You would not put a nation to the rack?

_Emp. _ Yes, the whole world; so I be safe, I care not.

_Bend. _ Our limbs and lives
Are yours; but mixing friends with foes is hard.

_Emp. _ All may be foes; or how to be distinguished,
If some be friends?

_Bend. _ They may with ease be winnowed.
Suppose some one, who has deserved your trust,
Some one, who knows mankind, should be employed
To mix among them, seem a malcontent,
And dive into their breasts, to try how far
They dare oppose your love?

_Emp. _ I like this well; 'tis wholesome wickedness.

_Bend. _ Whomever he suspects, he fastens there,
And leaves no cranny of his soul unsearched;
Then like a bee bag'd with his honeyed venom,
He brings it to your hive;--if such a man,
So able and so honest, may be found;
If not, my project dies.

_Emp. _ By all my hopes, thou hast described thyself:
Thou, thou alone, art fit to play that engine,
Thou only couldst contrive.

_Bend. _ Sure I could serve you:
I think I could:--but here's the difficulty;
I am so entirely yours,
That I should scurvily dissemble hate;
The cheat would be too gross.

_Emp. _ Art thou a statesman,
And canst not be a hypocrite? Impossible!
Do not distrust thy virtues.

_Bend. _ If I must personate this seeming villain,
Remember 'tis to serve you.

_Emp. _ No more words:
Love goads me to Almeyda, all affairs
Are troublesome but that; and yet that most. [_Going. _
Bid Dorax treat Sebastian like a king;
I had forgot him;--but this love mars all,
And takes up my whole breast. [_Exit_ EMPEROR.

_Bend. _ [_To the_ EMP. ] Be sure I'll tell him--
With all the aggravating circumstances [_Alone. _
I can, to make him swell at that command.
The tyrant first suspected me;
Then with a sudden gust he whirled about,
And trusted me too far:--Madness of power!
Now, by his own consent, I ruin him.
For, should some feeble soul, for fear or gain.
Bolt out to accuse me, even the king is cozened,
And thinks he's in the secret.
How sweet is treason, when the traitor's safe!

_Sees the_ MUFTI _and_ DORAX _entering, and seeming to confer. _

The Mufti, and with him my sullen Dorax.
That first is mine already:
'Twas easy work to gain a covetous mind,
Whom rage to lose his prisoners had prepared:
Now caught himself,
He would seduce another. I must help him:
For churchmen, though they itch to govern all,
Are silly, woeful, aukward politicians:
They make lame mischief, though they mean it well:
Their interest is not finely drawn, and hid,
But seams are coarsely bungled up, and seen.

_Muf. _ He'll tell you more.

_Dor. _ I have heard enough already,
To make me loath thy morals.

_Bend. _ [_To_ DOR. ] You seem warm;
The good man's zeal perhaps has gone too far.

_Dor. _ Not very far; not farther than zeal goes;
Of course a small day's journey short of treason.

_Muf. _ By all that's holy, treason was not named:
I spared the emperor's broken vows, to save
The slaves from death, though it was cheating heaven;
But I forgave him that.

_Dor. _ And slighted o'er
The wrongs himself sustained in property;
When his bought slaves were seized by force, no loss
Of his considered, and no cost repaid. [_Scornfully. _

_Muf. _ Not wholly slighted o'er, not absolutely. --
Some modest hints of private wrongs I urged.

_Dor. _ Two-thirds of all he said: there he began
To shew the fulness of his heart; there ended.
Some short excursions of a broken vow
He made indeed, but flat insipid stuff;
But, when he made his loss the theme, he flourished,
Relieved his fainting rhetoric with new figures,
And thundered at oppressing tyranny.

_Muf. _ Why not, when sacrilegious power would seize
My property? 'tis an affront to heaven,
Whose person, though unworthy, I sustain.

_Dor. _ You've made such strong alliances above,
That 'twere profaneness in us laity
To offer earthly aid.
I tell thee, Mufti, if the world were wise,
They would not wag one finger in your quarrels.
Your heaven you promise, but our earth you covet;
The Phætons of mankind, who fire that world,
Which you were sent by preaching but to warm.

_Bend. _ This goes beyond the mark.

_Muf. _ No, let him rail;
His prophet works within him;
He's a rare convert.

_Dor. _ Now his zeal yearns
To see me burned; he damns me from his church,
Because I would restrain him to his duty. --
Is not the care of souls a load sufficient?
Are not your holy stipends paid for this?
Were you not bred apart from worldly noise,
To study souls, their cures and their diseases?
If this be so, we ask you but our own:
Give us your whole employment, all your care.
The province of the soul is large enough
To fill up every cranny of your time,
And leave you much to answer, if one wretch
Be damned by your neglect.

_Bend. _ [_To the_ MUFTI. ] He speaks but reason.

_Dor. _ Why, then, these foreign thoughts of state-employments,
Abhorrent to your function and your breedings?
Poor droning truants of unpractised cells,
Bred in the fellowship of bearded boys,
What wonder is it if you know not men?
Yet there you live demure, with down-cast eyes,
And humble as your discipline requires;
But, when let loose from thence to live at large,
Your little tincture of devotion dies:
Then luxury succeeds, and, set agog
With a new scene of yet untasted joys,
You fall with greedy hunger to the feast.
Of all your college virtues, nothing now
But your original ignorance remains;
Bloated with pride, ambition, avarice,
You swell to counsel kings, and govern kingdoms.

_Muf. _ He prates as if kings had not consciences,
And none required directors but the crowd.

_Dor. _ As private men they want you, not as kings;
Nor would you care to inspect their public conscience,
But that it draws dependencies of power
And earthly interest, which you long to sway;
Content you with monopolizing heaven,
And let this little hanging ball alone:
For, give you but a foot of conscience there,
And you, like Archimedes, toss the globe.
We know your thoughts of us that laymen are,
Lag souls, and rubbish of remaining clay,
Which heaven, grown weary of more perfect work,
Set upright with a little puff of breath,
And bid us pass for men.

_Muf. _ I will not answer,
Base foul-mouthed renegade; but I'll pray for thee,
To shew my charity. [_Exit_ MUFTI.

_Dor. _ Do; but forget not him who needs it most:
Allow thyself some share. --He's gone too soon;
I had to tell him of his holy jugglings;
Things that would startle faith, and make us deem
Not this, or that, but all religions false.

_Bend. _ Our holy orator has lost the cause. [_Aside. _
But I shall yet redeem it. --[_To_ DORAX. ] Let him go;
For I have secret orders from the emperor,
Which none but you must hear: I must confess,
I could have wished some other hand had brought them.
When did you see your prisoner, great Sebastian?

_Dor. _ You might as well have asked me, when I saw
A crested dragon, or a basilisk;
Both are less poison to my eyes and nature,
He knows not I am I; nor shall he see me,
Till time has perfected a labouring thought,
That rolls within my breast.

_Bend. _ 'Twas my mistake.
I guessed indeed that time, and his misfortunes,
And your returning duty, had effaced
The memory of past wrongs; they would in me,
And I judged you as tame, and as forgiving.

_Dor. _ Forgive him! no: I left my foolish faith,
Because it would oblige me to forgiveness.

_Bend. _ I can't but grieve to find you obstinate,
For you must see him; 'tis our emperor's will,
And strict command.

_Dor. _ I laugh at that command.

_Bend. _ You must do more than see; serve, and respect him.

_Dor. _ See, serve him, and respect! and after all
My yet uncancelled wrongs, I must do this! --
But I forget myself.

_Bend. _ Indeed you do.

_Dor. _ The emperor is a stranger to my wrongs;
I need but tell my story, to revoke
This hard commission.

_Bend. _ Can you call me friend,
And think I could neglect to speak, at full,
The affronts you had from your ungrateful master?

_Dor. _ And yet enjoined my service and attendance!

_Bend.
_ And yet enjoined them both: would that were all!
He screwed his face into a hardened smile,
And said, Sebastian knew to govern slaves.

_Dor. _ Slaves are the growth of Africk, not of Europe. --
By heaven! I will not lay down my commission;
Not at his foot, I will not stoop so low:
But if there be a part in all his face
More sacred than the rest, I'll throw it there.

_Bend. _ You may; but then you lose all future means
Of vengeance on Sebastian, when no more
Alcayde of this fort.

_Dor. _ That thought escaped me.

_Bend. _ Keep your command, and be revenged on both:
Nor sooth yourself; you have no power to affront him;
The emperor's love protects him from insults;
And he, who spoke that proud, ill-natured word,
Following the bent of his impetuous temper,
May force your reconcilement to Sebastian;
Nay, bid you kneel, and kiss the offending foot,
That kicked you from his presence. --
But think not to divide their punishment;
You cannot touch a hair of loathed Sebastian,
While Muley-Moluch lives.

_Dor. _ What means this riddle?

_Bend. _ 'Tis out;--there needs no OEdipus to solve it.
Our emperor is a tyrant, feared and hated;
I scarce remember, in his reign, one day
Pass guiltless o'er his execrable head.
He thinks the sun is lost, that sees not blood:
When none is shed, we count it holiday.
We, who are most in favour, cannot call
This hour our own. --You know the younger brother,
Mild Muley-Zeydan?

_Dor. _ Hold, and let me think.

_Bend. _ The soldiers idolize you;
He trusts you with the castle,
The key of all his kingdom.

_Dor. _ Well; and he trusts you too.

_Bend. _ Else I were mad,
To hazard such a daring enterprize.

_Dor. _ He trusts us both; mark that! --Shall we betray him;
A master, who reposes life and empire
On our fidelity:--I grant he is a tyrant,
That hated name my nature most abhors:
More,--as you say,--has loaded me with scorn,
Even with the last contempt, to serve Sebastian;
Yet more, I know he vacates my revenge,
Which, but by this revolt, I cannot compass:
But, while he trusts me, 'twere so base a part,
To fawn, and yet betray,--I should be hissed,
And whooped in hell for that ingratitude.

_Bend. _ Consider well what I have done for you.

_Dor. _ Consider thou, what thou wouldst have me do.

_Bend. _ You've too much honour for a renegade.

_Dor. _ And thou too little faith to be a favourite.
Is not the bread thou eat'st, the robe thou wear'st,
Thy wealth, and honours, all the pure indulgence
Of him thou would'st destroy?
And would his creature, nay, his friend, betray him?
Why then no bond is left on human kind!
Distrusts, debates, immortal strifes ensue;
Children may murder parents, wives their husbands;
All must be rapine, wars, and desolation,
When trust and gratitude no longer bind.

_Bend. _ Well have you argued in your own defence;
You, who have burst asunder all those bonds,
And turned a rebel to your native prince.

_Dor. _ True, I rebelled: But when did I betray? --
Indignities, which man could not support,
Provoked my vengeance to this noble crime;
But he had stripped me first of my command,
Dismissed my service, and absolved my faith;
And, with disdainful language, dared my worst:
I but accepted war, which he denounced.
Else had you seen, not Dorax, but Alonzo,
With his couched lance, against your foremost Moors;
Perhaps, too, turned the fortune of the day,
Made Africk mourn and Portugal triumph.

_Bend. _ Let me embrace thee!

_Dor. _ Stand off, sycophant,
And keep infection distant.

_Bend. _ Brave and honest!

_Dor. _ In spite of thy temptations.

_Bend. _ Call them, trials;
They were no more. Thy faith was held in balance,
And nicely weighed by jealousy of power.
Vast was the trust of such a royal charge:
And our wise emperor might justly fear,
Sebastian might be freed and reconciled,
By new obligements, to thy former love.

_Dor. _ I doubt thee still: Thy reasons were too strong,
And driven too near the head, to be but artifice:
And, after all, I know thou art a statesman,
Where truth is rarely found.

_Bend. _ Behold the emperor:--

_Enter Emperor,_ SEBASTIAN, _and_ ALMEYDA.

Ask him, I beg thee,--to be justified,--
If he employed me not to ford thy soul,
And try the footing, whether false or firm.

_Dor. _ Death to my eyes, I see Sebastian with him!
Must he be served? --Avoid him: If we meet,
It must be like the crush of heaven and earth,
To involve us both in ruin. [_Exit. _

_Bend. _ 'Twas a bare saving game I made with Dorax;
But better so than lost. He cannot hurt me;
That I precautioned: I must ruin him. --
But now this love; ay, there's the gathering storm!
The tyrant must not wed Almeyda: No!
That ruins all the fabric I am raising.
Yet, seeming to approve, it gave me time;
And gaining time gains all. [_Aside. _
[BENDUCAR _goes and waits behind the Emperor.
The Emperor,_ SEBASTIAN, _and_ ALMEYDA,
_advance to the front of the stage: Guards
and Attendants. _

_Emp. _ to _Seb. _ I bade them serve you; and, if they obey not,
I keep my lions keen within their dens,
To stop their maws with disobedient slaves.

_Seb. _ If I had conquered,
They could not have with more observance waited:
Their eyes, hands, feet,
Are all so quick, they seem to have but one motion,
To catch my flying words. Only the alcayde
Shuns me; and, with a grim civility,
Bows, and declines my walks.

_Emp. _ A renegade:
I know not more of him, but that he's brave,
And hates your Christian sect. If you can frame
A farther wish, give wing to your desires,
And name the thing you want.

_Seb. _ My liberty;
For were even paradise itself my prison,
Still I should long to leap the crystal walls.

_Emp. _ Sure our two souls have somewhere been acquainted
In former beings; or, struck out together,
One spark to Afric flew, and one to Portugal.
Expect a quick deliverance: Here's a third, [_Turning to_ ALMEYDA.
Of kindred sold to both: pity our stars
Have made us foes! I should not wish her death.

_Alm. _ I ask no pity; if I thought my soul
Of kin to thine, soon would I rend my heart-strings,
And tear out that alliance; but thou, viper,
Hast cancelled kindred, made a rent in nature,
And through her holy bowels gnawed thy way,
Through thy own blood, to empire.

_Emp. _ This again!
And yet she lives, and only lives to upbraid me!

_Seb. _ What honour is there in a woman's death!
Wronged, as she says, but helpless to revenge;
Strong in her passion, impotent of reason,
Too weak to hurt, too fair to be destroyed.
Mark her majestic fabric; she's a temple
Sacred by birth, and built by hands divine;
Her souls the deity that lodges there;
Nor is the pile unworthy of the god.

_Emp. _ She's all that thou canst say, or I can think;
But the perverseness of her clamourous tongue
Strikes pity deaf.

_Seb. _ Then only hear her eyes!
Though they are mute, they plead; nay, more, command;
For beauteous eyes have arbitrary power.
All females have prerogative of sex;
The she's even of the savage herd are safe;
And when they snarl or bite, have no return
But courtship from the male.

_Emp. _ Were she not she, and I not Muley-Moluch,
She's mistress of inevitable charms,
For all but me; nor am I so exempt,
But that--I know not what I was to say--
But I am too obnoxious to my friends,
And swayed by your advice.

_Seb. _ Sir, I advised not;
By heaven, I never counselled love, but pity.

_Emp. _ By heaven thou didst; deny it not, thou didst:
For what was all that prodigality
Of praise, but to inflame me?

_Seb. _ Sir--

_Emp. _ No more;
Thou hast convinced me that she's worth my love.

_Seb. _ Was ever man so ruined by himself? [_Aside. _

_Alm. _ Thy love! That odious mouth was never framed
To speak a word so soft:
Name death again, for that thou canst pronounce
With horrid grace, becoming of a tyrant.
Love is for human hearts, and not for thine,
Where the brute beast extinguishes the man.

_Emp. _ Such if I were, yet rugged lions love,
And grapple, and compel their savage dames. --
Mark my Sebastian, how that sullen frown, [_She frowns. _
Like flashing lightning, opens angry heaven,
And, while it kills, delights! --But yet, insult not
Too soon, proud beauty! I confess no love.

_Seb. _ No, sir; I said so, and I witness for you,
Not love, but noble pity, moved your mind:
Interest might urge you too to save her life;
For those, who wish her party lost, might murmur
At shedding royal blood.

_Emp. _ Right, thou instruct'st me;
Interest of state requires not death, but marriage,
To unite the jarring titles of our line.

_Seb. _ Let me be dumb for ever; all I plead, [_Aside. _
Like wildfire thrown against the winds, returns
With double force to burn me.

_Emp. _ Could I but bend, to make my beauteous foe
The partner of my throne, and of my bed--

_Alm. _ Still thou dissemblest; but, I read thy heart,
And know the power of my own charms; thou lov'st,
And I am pleased, for my revenge, thou dost.

_Emp. _ And thou hast cause.

_Alm. _ I have, for I have power to make thee wretched.
Be sure I will, and yet despair of freedom.

_Emp. _ Well then, I love;
And 'tis below my greatness to disown it;
Love thee implacably, yet hate thee too;
Would hunt thee barefoot, in the mid-day sun,
Through the parched desarts and the scorching sands,
To enjoy thy love, and, once enjoyed, to kill thee.

_Alm. _ 'Tis a false courage, when thou threaten'st me;
Thou canst not stir a hand to touch my life:
Do not I see thee tremble, while thou speak'st?
Lay by the lion's hide, vain conqueror,
And take the distaff; for thy soul's my slave.

_Emp. _ Confusion! How thou view'st my very heart!
I could as soon
Stop a spring-tide, blown in, with my bare hand,
As this impetuous love:--Yes, I will wed thee;
In spite of thee, and of myself, I will.

_Alm. _ For what? to people Africa with monsters,
Which that unnatural mixture must produce?
No, were we joined, even though it were in death,
Our bodies burning in one funeral pile,
The prodigy of Thebes would be renewed,
And my divided flame should break from thine.

_Emp. _ Serpent, I will engender poison with thee;
Join hate with hate, add venom to the birth:
Our offspring, like the seed of dragons' teeth,
Shall issue armed, and fight themselves to death.

_Alm. _ I'm calm again; thou canst not marry me.

_Emp. _ As gleams of sunshine soften storms to showers,
So, if you smile, the loudness of my rage
In gentle whispers shall return but this--
That nothing can divert my love but death.

_Alm. _ See how thou art deceived; I am a Christian:
'Tis true, unpractised in my new belief,
Wrongs I resent, nor pardon yet with ease;
Those fruits come late, and are of slow increase
In haughty hearts, like mine: Now, tell thyself
If this one word destroy not thy designs:
Thy law permits thee not to marry me.

_Emp. _ 'Tis but a specious tale, to blast my hopes,
And baffle my pretensions. --Speak, Sebastian,
And, as a king, speak true.

_Seb. _ Then, thus adjured,
On a king's word 'tis truth, but truth ill-timed;
For her dear life is now exposed anew,
Unless you wholly can put on divinity,
And graciously forgive.

_Alm. _ Now learn, by this,
The little value I have left for life,
And trouble me no more.

_Emp. _ I thank thee, woman;
Thou hast restored me to my native rage,
And I will seize my happiness by force.

_Seb. _ Know, Muley Moluch, when thou darest attempt--

_Emp. _ Beware! I would not be provoked to use
A conqueror's right, and therefore charge thy silence.
If thou wouldst merit to be thought my friend,
I leave thee to persuade her to compliance:
If not, there's a new gust in ravishment,
Which I have never tried.

_Bend. _ They must be watched; [_Aside. _
For something I observed creates a doubt. [_Exeunt Emp. and_ BEND.

_Seb. _ I've been too tame, have basely borne my wrongs,
And not exerted all the king within me:
I heard him, O sweet heavens! he threatened rape;
Nay, insolently urged me to persuade thee,
Even thee, thou idol of my soul and eyes,
For whom I suffer life, and drag this being.

_Alm. _ You turn my prison to a paradise;
But I have turned your empire to a prison:
In all your wars good fortune flew before you;
Sublime you sat in triumph on her wheel,
Till in my fatal cause your sword was drawn;
The weight of my misfortunes dragged you down.

_Seb. _ And is't not strange, that heaven should bless my arms
In common causes, and desert the best?
Now in your greatest, last extremity,
When I would aid you most, and most desire it,
I bring but sighs, the succours of a slave.

_Alm. _ Leave then the luggage of your fate behind;
To make your flight more easy leave Almeyda:
Nor think me left a base, ignoble prey,
Exposed to this inhuman tyrant's lust;
My virtue is a guard beyond my strength,
And death, my last defence, within my call.

_Seb.