The Alchemist - Ben Jonson (nice books to read txt) 📗

hath carried him aside
  From the due path.

  SUB. Why, this doth qualify!

  TRI. The brethren had no purpose, verily,
  To give you the least grievance; but are ready
  To lend their willing hands to any project
  The spirit and you direct.

  SUB. This qualifies more!

  TRI. And for the orphans' goods, let them be valued,
  Or what is needful else to the holy work,
  It shall be numbered; here, by me, the saints,
  Throw down their purse before you.

  SUB. This qualifies most!
  Why, thus it should be, now you understand.
  Have I discours'd so unto you of our stone,
  And of the good that it shall bring your cause?
  Shew'd you (beside the main of hiring forces
  Abroad, drawing the Hollanders, your friends,
  From the Indies, to serve you, with all their fleet)
  That even the med'cinal use shall make you a faction,
  And party in the realm? As, put the case,
  That some great man in state, he have the gout,
  Why, you but send three drops of your elixir,
  You help him straight: there you have made a friend.
  Another has the palsy or the dropsy,
  He takes of your incombustible stuff,
  He's young again: there you have made a friend,
  A lady that is past the feat of body,
  Though not of mind, and hath her face decay'd
  Beyond all cure of paintings, you restore,
  With the oil of talc: there you have made a friend;
  And all her friends. A lord that is a leper,
  A knight that has the bone-ache, or a squire
  That hath both these, you make them smooth and sound,
  With a bare fricace of your med'cine: still
  You increase your friends.

  TRI. Ay, it is very pregnant.

  SUB. And then the turning of this lawyer's pewter
  To plate at Christmas.—

  ANA. Christ-tide, I pray you.

  SUB. Yet, Ananias!

  ANA. I have done.

  SUB. Or changing
  His parcel gilt to massy gold. You cannot
  But raise you friends. Withal, to be of power
  To pay an army in the field, to buy
  The king of France out of his realms, or Spain
  Out of his Indies. What can you not do
  Against lords spiritual or temporal,
  That shall oppone you?

  TRI. Verily, 'tis true.
  We may be temporal lords ourselves, I take it.

  SUB. You may be any thing, and leave off to make
  Long-winded exercises; or suck up
  Your "ha!" and "hum!" in a tune. I not deny,
  But such as are not graced in a state,
  May, for their ends, be adverse in religion,
  And get a tune to call the flock together:
  For, to say sooth, a tune does much with women,
  And other phlegmatic people; it is your bell.

  ANA. Bells are profane; a tune may be religious.

  SUB. No warning with you! then farewell my patience.
  'Slight, it shall down: I will not be thus tortured.

  TRI. I pray you, sir.

  SUB. All shall perish. I have spoken it.

  TRI. Let me find grace, sir, in your eyes; the man
  He stands corrected: neither did his zeal,
  But as your self, allow a tune somewhere.
  Which now, being tow'rd the stone, we shall not need.

  SUB. No, nor your holy vizard, to win widows
  To give you legacies; or make zealous wives
  To rob their husbands for the common cause:
  Nor take the start of bonds broke but one day,
  And say, they were forfeited by providence.
  Nor shall you need o'er night to eat huge meals,
  To celebrate your next day's fast the better;
  The whilst the brethren and the sisters humbled,
  Abate the stiffness of the flesh. Nor cast
  Before your hungry hearers scrupulous bones;
  As whether a Christian may hawk or hunt,
  Or whether matrons of the holy assembly
  May lay their hair out, or wear doublets,
  Or have that idol starch about their linen.

  ANA. It is indeed an idol.

  TRI. Mind him not, sir.
  I do command thee, spirit of zeal, but trouble,
  To peace within him! Pray you, sir, go on.

  SUB. Nor shall you need to libel 'gainst the prelates,
  And shorten so your ears against the hearing
  Of the next wire-drawn grace. Nor of necessity
  Rail against plays, to please the alderman
  Whose daily custard you devour; nor lie
  With zealous rage till you are hoarse. Not one
  Of these so singular arts. Nor call yourselves
  By names of Tribulation, Persecution,
  Restraint, Long-patience, and such-like, affected
  By the whole family or wood of you,
  Only for glory, and to catch the ear
  Of the disciple.

  TRI. Truly, sir, they are
  Ways that the godly brethren have invented,
  For propagation of the glorious cause,
  As very notable means, and whereby also
  Themselves grow soon, and profitably, famous.

  SUB. O, but the stone, all's idle to it! nothing!
  The art of angels' nature's miracle,
  The divine secret that doth fly in clouds
  From east to west: and whose tradition
  Is not from men, but spirits.

  ANA. I hate traditions;
  I do not trust them—

  TRI. Peace!

  ANA. They are popish all.
  I will not peace: I will not—

  TRI. Ananias!

  ANA. Please the profane, to grieve the godly; I may not.

  SUB. Well, Ananias, thou shalt overcome.

  TRI. It is an ignorant zeal that haunts him, sir;
  But truly, else, a very faithful brother,
  A botcher, and a man, by revelation,
  That hath a competent knowledge of the truth.

  SUB. Has he a competent sum there in the bag
  To buy the goods within? I am made guardian,
  And must, for charity, and conscience sake,
  Now see the most be made for my poor orphan;
  Though I desire the brethren too good gainers:
  There they are within. When you have view'd and bought 'em,
  And ta'en the inventory of what they are,
  They are ready for projection; there's no more
  To do: cast on the med'cine, so much silver
  As there is tin there, so much gold as brass,
  I'll give't you in by weight.

  TRI. But how long time,
  Sir, must the saints expect yet?

  SUB. Let me see,
  How's the moon now? Eight, nine, ten days hence,
  He will be silver potate; then three days
  Before he citronise: Some fifteen days,
  The magisterium will be perfected.

  ANA. About the second day of the third week,
  In the ninth month?

  SUB. Yes, my good Ananias.

  TRI. What will the orphan's goods arise to, think you?

  SUB. Some hundred marks, as much as fill'd three cars,
  Unladed now: you'll make six millions of them.—
  But I must have more coals laid in.

  TRI. How?

  SUB. Another load,
  And then we have finish'd. We must now increase
  Our fire to ignis ardens; we are past
  Fimus equinus, balnei, cineris,
  And all those lenter heats. If the holy purse
  Should with this draught fall low, and that the saints
  Do need a present sum, I have a trick
  To melt the pewter, you shall buy now, instantly,
  And with a tincture make you as good Dutch dollars
  As any are in Holland.

  TRI. Can you so?

  SUB. Ay, and shall 'bide the third examination.

  ANA. It will be joyful tidings to the brethren.

  SUB. But you must carry it secret.

  TRI. Ay; but stay,
  This act of coining, is it lawful?

  ANA. Lawful!
  We know no magistrate; or, if we did,
  This is foreign coin.

  SUB. It is no coining, sir.
  It is but casting.

  TRI. Ha! you distinguish well:
  Casting of money may be lawful.

  ANA. 'Tis, sir.

  TRI. Truly, I take it so.

  SUB. There is no scruple,
  Sir, to be made of it; believe Ananias:
  This case of conscience he is studied in.

  TRI. I'll make a question of it to the brethren.

  ANA. The brethren shall approve it lawful, doubt not.
  Where shall it be done?

  [KNOCKING WITHOUT.]

  SUB. For that we'll talk anon.
  There's some to speak with me. Go in, I pray you,
  And view the parcels. That's the inventory.
  I'll come to you straight.
  [EXEUNT TRIB. AND ANA.]
  Who is it?—Face! appear.
  [ENTER FACE IN HIS UNIFORM.]
  How now! good prize?

  FACE. Good pox! yond' costive cheater
  Never came on.

  SUB. How then?

  FACE. I have walk'd the round
  Till now, and no such thing.

  SUB. And have you quit him?

  FACE. Quit him! an hell would quit him too, he were happy.
  'Slight! would you have me stalk like a mill-jade,
  All day, for one that will not yield us grains?
  I know him of old.

  SUB. O, but to have gull'd him,
  Had been a mastery.

  FACE. Let him go, black boy!
  And turn thee, that some fresh news may possess thee.
  A noble count, a don of Spain, my dear
  Delicious compeer, and my party-bawd,
  Who is come hither private for his conscience,
  And brought munition with him, six great slops,
  Bigger than three Dutch hoys, beside round trunks,
  Furnished with pistolets, and pieces of eight,
  Will straight be here, my rogue, to have thy bath,
  (That is the colour,) and to make his battery
  Upon our Dol, our castle, our cinque-port,
  Our Dover pier, our what thou wilt. Where is she?
  She must prepare perfumes, delicate linen,
  The bath in chief, a banquet, and her wit,
  For she must milk his epididimis.
  Where is the doxy?

  SUB. I'll send her to thee:
  And but despatch my brace of little John Leydens,
  And come again my self.

  FACE. Are they within then?

  SUB. Numbering the sum.

  FACE. How much?

  SUB. A hundred marks, boy.

  [EXIT.]

  FACE. Why, this is a lucky day. Ten pounds of Mammon!
  Three of my clerk! A portague of my grocer!
  This of the brethren! beside reversions,
  And states to come in the widow, and my count!
  My share to-day will not be bought for forty—

  [ENTER DOL.]

  DOL. What?

  FACE. Pounds, dainty Dorothy! art thou so near?

  DOL. Yes; say, lord general, how fares our camp?

  FACE. As with the few that had entrench'd themselves
  Safe, by their discipline, against a world, Dol,
  And laugh'd within those trenches, and grew fat
  With thinking on the booties, Dol, brought in
  Daily by their small parties. This dear hour,
  A doughty don is taken with my Dol;
  And thou mayst make his ransom what thou wilt,
  My Dousabel; he shall be brought here fetter'd
  With thy fair looks, before he sees thee; and thrown
  In a down-bed, as dark as any dungeon;
  Where thou shalt keep him waking with thy drum;
  Thy drum, my Dol, thy drum; till he be tame
  As the poor black-birds were in the great frost,
  Or bees are with a bason; and so hive him
  In the swan-skin coverlid, and cambric sheets,
  Till he work honey and wax, my little God's-gift.

  DOL. What is he, general?

  FACE. An adalantado,
  A grandee, girl. Was not my Dapper here yet?

  DOL. No.

  FACE. Nor my Drugger?

  DOL. Neither.

  FACE. A pox on 'em,
  They are so long a furnishing! such stinkards
  Would not be seen upon these festival days.—
  [RE-ENTER SUBTLE.]
  How now! have you done?

  SUB. Done. They are gone: the sum
  Is here in bank, my Face. I would we knew
  Another chapman now would buy 'em outright.

  FACE. 'Slid, Nab shall do't against he have the widow,
  To furnish household.

  SUB. Excellent, well thought on:
  Pray God he come!

  FACE. I pray he keep away
  Till our new business be o'erpast.

  SUB. But, Face,
  How cam'st thou by this secret don?

  FACE. A spirit
  Brought me th' intelligence in a paper here,
  As I was conjuring yonder in my circle
  For Surly; I have my flies abroad. Your bath
  Is famous, Subtle, by my means. Sweet Dol,
  You must go tune your virginal, no losing
  O' the least time: and, do you hear? good action.
  Firk, like a flounder; kiss, like a scallop, close;
  And tickle him with thy mother tongue. His great
  Verdugoship has not a jot of language;
  So much the easier to be cozen'd, my Dolly.
  He will come