That love, you beg of me, I cannot give ;
For Sara owes that duty to her Lord.

He, that doth clip or counterfeit your stamp,
Shall die, my Lord: and shall your sacred self
Commit high treason 'gainst the King of heaven,
To stamp his image in forbidden metal,
Forgetting you allegiance and your oath?
In violating marriage' sacred law,

You break a greater honour than yourself.
To be a King, is of a younger house
Than To be married: your progenitor,
Sole-reigning Adam on the universe,
By God was honour'd, for a married man
But not by him anointed for a king.
It is a penalty to break your statutes,

Tho' not enacted with your Highness' hand;
How much more to infringe the holy act,

Made by the mouth of God, seal'd with his hand.
I know my sovereign, in my husband's love,
Who now doth loyal service in his wars,
Doth but to try the wife of Salisbury,

Whether she will hear a wanton's tale or no :
Lest being therein guilty by my stay,

From that, not from my liege, I turn away.

*

King. Whether is her beauty by her words divine? Or are her words sweet chaplains to her beauty? Like as the wind doth beautify a sail,

And as a sail becomes the unseen wind,

So do her words her beauties, beauties words.

Coun. He hath sworn me by the name of God 30 To break a vow made by the name of God. What if I swear by this right hand of mine To cut this right hand off? the better way Were to profane the idol, than confound it. Flattery.

-O Thou World, great nurse of flattery, Why dost thou tip men's tongues with golden words And poise their deeds with weight of heavy lead, That fair performance cannot follow promise? O that a man might hold the heart's close book And choke the lavish tongue, when it doth utter 40 The breath of falsehood, not character'd there !

Sin, worst in High Place.

An honourable grave is more esteemed,
Than the polluted closet of a king;
The greater man, the greater is the thing,
Be it good or bad, that he shall undertake.
An unreputed mote, flying in the sun,
Presents a greater substance than it is;
The freshest summer's day doth soonest taint
The loathed carrion, that it seems to kiss ;
Deep are the blows made with a mighty axe;
That sin does ten times aggravate itself,
That is committed in a holy place;
An evil deed done by authority

Is sin, and subornation; deck an ape

In tissue, and the beauty of the robe

Adds but the greater scorn unto the beast;
The poison sheweth worst in a golden cup;

Dark night seems darker by the lightning flash ;
Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.
And every Glory, that inclines to Sin,

The shame is treble by the opposite.

XX. (G.)

THE WARS OF CYRUS: A TRAGEDY.

AUTHOR UNKNOWN.

Dumb show exploded.

Chorus (to the Audience).

-Xenophon

Warrants what we record of Panthea.

It is writ in sad and tragic terms,

May move you tears; then you content our Muse,
That scorns to trouble you again with toys

Or needless antics, imitations,

Or shows, or new devises sprung o' late;
We have exiled them from our tragic stage,

As trash of their tradition, that can bring

Nor instance nor excuse: for what they do,*

* So I point it; instead of the line, as it stands in this unique copy

Nor instance nor excuse for what they do.

The sense I take to be, what the common playwrights do (or shew by action-the "inexplicable dumb show" of Shakspeare-), our Chorus relates. The following lines have else no coherence.