ACT THE THIRD. SCENE-An Apartment of State in Woodvil Hall.-Cavaliers drinking. JOHN WOODVIL, LOVEL, GRAY, JOHN. More mirth, I beseech you, gentlemen- GRAY. More wine, say I, and mirth shall ensue in course. What! we have not yet above three half-pints a man to answer for. Brevity is the soul of drinking, as of wit. Despatch, I say. More wine. (fills) FIRST GENTLEMAN. I entreat you, let there be some order, some method, in our drinkings. I love to lose my reason with my eyes open, to commit the deed of drunkenness with forethought and de liberation. I love to feel the fumes of the liquor gathering here, like clouds. SECOND GENTLEMAN. And I am for plunging into madness at once. Damn order, and method, and steps, and degrees, that he speaks of. Let confusion have her legitimate work. LOVEL. I marvel why the poets, who, of all men, methinks, should possess the hottest livers, and most empyreal fancies, should affect to see such virtues in cold water. GRAY. Virtue in cold water! ha! ha! ha!— JOHN. Because your poet-born hath an internal wine, richer than lippara or canaries, yet uncrushed from any grapes of earth, unpressed in mortal wine-presses. THIRD GENTLEMAN. What may be the name of this wine? JOHN. It hath as many names as qualities. It is denominated indifferently, wit, conceit, invention, inspiration, but its most royal and comprehensive name is fancy. THIRD GENTLEMAN. And where keeps he this sovereign liquor? JOHN. Its cellars are in the brain, whence your true poet deriveth intoxication at will; while his animal spirits, catching a pride from the quality and neighbourhood of their noble relative, the brain, refuse to be sustained by wines and fermentations of earth. THIRD GENTLEMAN. But is your poet-born always tipsy with this liquor? JOHN. He hath his stoopings and reposes; but his proper element is the sky, and in the suburbs of the empyrean. THIRD GENTLEMAN. Is your wine-intellectual so exquisite? henceforth, I, a man of plain conceit, will, in all humility, content my mind with canaries. FOURTH GENTLEMAN. I am for a song or a catch. When will the catches come on, the sweet wicked catches? JOHN. They cannot be introduced with propriety before midnight. Every man must commit his twenty bumpers first. We are not yet well roused. Frank Lovel, the glass stands with you. LOVEL. Gentlemen, the Duke. (fil's) ALL. The Duke. (they drink) GRAY. Can any tell, why his Grace, being a Papist JOHN. Pshaw! we will have no questions of state now. What follows? GRAY. JOHN. That every man should sing, and be joyful, and ask no questions. SECOND GENTLEMAN. Damn politics, they spoil drinking. THIRD GENTLEMAN. For certain, 'tis a blessed monarchy. SECOND GENTLEMAN. The cursed fanatic days we have seen! The times have been when swearing was out of fashion. THIRD GENTLEMAN. And drinking. FIRST GENTLEMAN. And wenching. GRAY. The cursed yeas and forsooths, which we have heard uttered, when a man could not rap out an innocent oath, but strait the air was thought to be infected. LOVEL. "Twas a pleasant trick of the saint, which that trim puritan Swear-not-at-all Smooth-speech used, when his spouse chid him with an oath for committing with his servant maid, to cause his house to be fumigated with burnt brandy, and ends of scripture, to disperse the devil's breath, as he termed it. Ha ha! ha! ALL. GRAY. But 'twas pleasanter, when the other saint Resist-the-devil-and-he-will-flee-from-thee Pureman was overtaken in the act, to plead an illusio visus, and maintain his sanctity upon a supposed power in the adversary to counterfeit the shapes of things. |