SCAENA QUARTA.
MEMORIA, ANAMNESTES.
MEM. Ah, you leaden-heeled rascal!
ANA. Here 'tis, sir; I have it, I have it.
MEM. Is this all the haste you make?
ANA. An't like your worship, your cloghead Oblivio went before me, and foiled the trail of your footsteps, that I could hardly undertake the quest of your purse, forsooth.
MEM. You might have been here long ere this. Come hither, sirrah, come hither: what, must you go round about? Goodly, goodly, you are full of circumstances.
ANA. In truth, sir, I was here before, and missing you, went back into the city, sought you in every alehouse, inn, tavern, dicing-house, tennis-court, stews, and such like places, likely to find your worship in.
MEM. Ha, villain! am I a man likely to be found in such places, ha?
ANA. No, no, sir; but I was told by my Lady Lingua's page that your worship was seeking me; therefore I inquired for you in those places, where I knew you would ask for me, an it please your worship.
MEM. I remember another quarrel, sirrah; but—well, well, I have no leisure.
SCAENA QUINTA.
COMMUNIS SENSUS, LINGUA, PHANTASTES, MEMORY, ANAMNESTES.
COM. SEN. Lingua, the Senses, by our appointment, anon are to present their objects before us. Seeing, therefore, they be not in readiness, we license you in the meanwhile, either in your own person or by your advocate, to speak what you can for yourself.
LIN. My lord, if I should bring before your honour all my friends, ready to importune you in my behalf, I should have so many rhetoricians, logicians, lawyers, and (which is more) so many women, to attend me, that this grove would hardly contain the company; wherefore, to avoid the tediousness, I will lay the whole cause upon the tip of mine own tongue.
COM. SEN. Be as brief as the necessity of our short time requires.
LIN. My lord, though the imbecillitas of my feeble sex might draw me back from this tribunal, with the habenis, to wit timoris and the Catenis pudoris, notwithstanding being so fairly led on with the gracious [Greek: epiecheia] of your justissime [Greek: dikaiosynaes]. Especially so aspremente spurd' con gli sproni di necessita mia pugente, I will without the help of orators commit the totam salutem of my action to the volutabilitati [Greek: ton gynaicheion logon], which avec vostre bonne plaisir, I will finish with more than Laconicâ brevitate.
COM. SEN. What's this? here's a gallimaufry of speech indeed.
MEM. I remember about the year 1602 many used this skew kind of language which, in my opinion, is not much unlike the man Platony,[251] the son of Lagus, king of Egypt, brought for a spectacle, half-white, half-black.
COM. SEN. I am persuaded these same language-makers have the very quality of cold in their wit, that freezeth all heterogeneal languages together, congealing English tin, Grecian gold, Roman latten[252] all in a lump.
PHA. Or rather, in my imagination, like your fantastical gull's apparel, wearing a Spanish felt, a French doublet, a Granado stocking, a Dutch slop, an Italian cloak, with a Welsh freeze jerkin.
COM. SEN. Well, leave your toying: we cannot pluck the least feather from the soft wing of time. Therefore, Lingua, go on, but in a less formal manner. You know an ingenious oration must neither swell above the banks with insolent words, nor creep too shallow in the ford with vulgar terms; but run equally, smooth and cheerful, through the clean current of a pure style.
LIN. My lord, this one thing is sufficient to confirm my worth to be equal or better than the Senses, whose best operations are nothing till I polish them with perfection; for their knowledge is only of things present, quickly sublimed with the deft[253] file of time: whereas the tongue is able to recount things past, and often pronounce things to come, by this means re-edifying such excellences as time and age do easily depopulate.
COM. SEN. But what profitable service do you undertake for our dread queen Psyche?
LIN. O, how I am ravished to think how infinitely she hath graced me with her most acceptable service! But above all (which you, Master Register, well remember), when her highness, taking my mouth for her instrument, with the bow of my tongue struck so heavenly a touch upon my teeth, that she charmed the very tigers asleep, the listening bears and lions to couch at her feet, while the hills leaped, and the woods danced to the sweet harmony of her most angelical accents.
MEM. I remember it very well. Orpheus played upon the harp, while she sung, about some four years after the contention betwixt Apollo and Pan, and a little before the excoriation of Marsyas.
ANA. By the same token the river Alpheus, at that time pursuing his beloved Arethusa, dischannelled himself of his former course, to be partaker of their admirable consort[254], and the music being ended, thrust himself headlong into earth, the next way to follow his amorous chace. If you go to Arcadia, you shall see his coming up again.
COM. SEN. Forward, Lingua, with your reason.
LIN. How oft hath her excellency employed me as ambassador in her most urgent affairs to foreign kings and emperors—I may say to the gods themselves? How many bloodless battles have my persuasions attained, when the Senses' forces have been vanquished? how many rebels have I reclaimed, when her sacred authority was little regarded? Her laws (without exprobation be it spoken) had been altogether unpublished, her will unperformed, her illustrious deeds unrenowned, had not the silver sound of my trumpet filled the whole circuit of the universe with her deserved fame. Her cities would dissolve, traffic would decay, friendships be broken, were not my speech the knot, mercury, and mastic, to bind, defend, and glue them together. What should I say more? I can never speak enough of the unspeakable praise of speech, wherein I can find no other imperfection at all, but that the most exquisite power and excellency of speech cannot sufficiently express the exquisite power and excellency of speaking.
COM. SEN. Lingua, your service and dignity we confess to be great; nevertheless these reasons prove you not to have the nature of a Sense.
LIN. By your ladyship's favour, I can soon prove that a Sense is a faculty, by which our queen sitting in her privy chamber hath intelligence of exterior occurrences. That I am of this nature, I prove thus. The object which I challenge is—
Enter APPETITUS in haste.
APP. Stay, stay, my lord; defer, I beseech you, defer the judgment.
COM. SEN. Who's this that boldly interrupts us thus?
APP. My name is Appetitus, common servant to the pentarchy of the Senses who, understanding that your honour was handling this action of Lingua's, sent me hither thus hastily, most humbly requesting the Bench to consider these articles they allege against her, before you proceed to judgment.
COM. SEN. Hum, here's good stuff; Master Register, read them. Appetitus, you may depart, and bid your mistress make convenient speed.
APP. At your lordship's pleasure. [Exit APPETITUS.
MEM. I remember that I forgot my spectacles; I left them in the 349th page of Hall's "Chronicles," where he tells a great wonder of a multitude of mice, which had almost destroyed the country, but that there resorted a great mighty flight of owls, that destroyed them. Anamnestes, read these articles distinctly.
ANA. Art. 1. Imprimis, We accuse Lingua of high treason and sacrilege against the most honourable commonwealth of letters; for, under pretence of profiting the people with translations, she hath most vilely prostituted the hard mysteries of unknown languages to the profane ears of the vulgar.
PHA. This is as much as to make a new hell in the upper world; for in hell they say Alexander is no better than a cobbler, and now by these translations every cobbler is as familiar with Alexander as he that wrote his life.
ANA. Art. 2. Item, that she hath wrongfully imprisoned a lady called
Veritas.
Art. 3. Item, That she's a witch, and exerciseth her tongue in exorcisms.
Art. 4. Item, That she's a common whore, and lets every one lie with her.
Art. 5. Item, that she rails on men in authority, depraving their honours with bitter jests and taunts; and that she's a backbiter, setting strife betwixt bosom friends.
Art. 6. Item, that she lends wives weapons to fight against their husbands.
Art. 7. Item, that she maintains a train of prating pettifoggers, prowling sumners[255], smooth-tongued bawds, artless[256] empirics, hungry parasites, newscarriers, janglers[257], and such like idle companions, that delude the commonalty.
Art. 8. Item, that she made rhetoric wanton, logic to babble, astronomy to lie.
Art. 9. Item that she's an incontinent tell-tale.
Art. 10. Item (which is the last and worst), that she's a woman in every respect, and for these causes not to be admitted to the dignity of a Sense. That these articles be true, we pawn our honours, and subscribe our names.
1. VISUS. 4. OLFACTUS. 3. GUSTUS. 2. AUDITUS. 5. TACTUS.
COM. SEN. Lingua, these be shrewd allegations, and, as I think, unanswerable. I will defer the judgment of your cause, till I have finished the contention of the Senses.
LIN. Your lordship must be obeyed. But as for them, most ungrateful and perfidious wretches—
COM. SEN. Good words become you better; you may depart, if you will, till we send for you. Anamnestes, run, remember Visus; 'tis time he were ready.
ANA. I go. [Exit ANAMNESTES et redit.] He stays here, expecting your lordship's pleasure.
SCAENA SEXTA.
A page carrying a scutcheon argent, charged with an eagle displayed proper: then VISUS, with a fan of peacock's feathers: next LUMEN, with a crown of bays and a shield with a bright sun in it, apparelled in tissue: then a page bearing a shield before COELUM, clad in azure taffeta, dimpled with stars, a crown of stars on his head, and a scarf resembling the zodiac overthwart the shoulders: next a page clad in green, with a terrestrial globe before TERRA, in a green velvet gown stuck with branches and flowers, a crown of turrets upon her head, in her hand a key: then a herald, leading in his hand COLOUR, clad in changeable silk, with a rainbow out of a cloud on her head: last, a boy. VISUS marshalleth his show about the stage, and presents it before the Bench.
VISUS, LUMEN, COELUM, PHANTASTES, COMMUNIS SENSUS, MEMORY.
VIS. Lo, here the objects that delight the sight!
The goodliest objects that man's heart can wish!
For all things, that the orb first movable
Wraps in the circuit of his large-stretch'd arms,
Are subject to the power of Visus' eyes.
That you may know what profit light doth bring,
Note Lumen's words, that speaks next following.
LUM. Light, the fair grandchild to the glorious sun,
Opening the casements of the rosy morn,
Makes the abashed heavens soon to shun
The ugly darkness it embrac'd beforn;[258]
And, at his first appearance, puts to flight
The utmost relics of the hell-born night.
This heavenly shield, soon as it is display'd,
Dismays the vices that abhor the light;
To wanderers by sea and land gives aid;
Conquers dismay, recomforteth affright;
Rouseth dull idleness, and starts soft sleep,
And all the world to daily labour keep.
This a true looking-glass impartial,
Where beauty's self herself doth beautify
With native hue, not artificial,
Discovering falsehood, opening verity:
The day's bright eye colours distinction,
Just judge of measure and proportion.
The only means by which each mortal eye
Sends messengers to the wide firmament,
That to the longing soul brings presently
High contemplation and deep wonderment;
By which aspirement she her wings displays,
And herself thither, whence she came, upraise.
PHA. What blue thing's that, that's dappled so with stars.
VIS. He represents the heaven.
PHA. In my conceit
'Twere pretty, if he thundered when he speaks.
VIS. Then none could understand him.
COEL. Tropic, colures, the equinoctial,
The zodiac, poles, and line ecliptical,
The nadir, zenith, and anomalies,
The azimuth and ephimerides,
Stars, orbs, and planets, with their motions,
The oriental regradations,
Eccentrics, epicyctes, and—and—and—
PHA. How now, Visus, is your heaven at a stay,
Or is it his motus trepidationis that makes him stammer?
I pray you, Memory, set him a-gate[259] again.
MEM. I remember, when Jupiter made Amphitryo cuckold, and lay with his wife Alcmena, Coelum was in this taking for three days space, and stood still just like him at a nonplus.
COM. SEN. Leave jesting; you'll put the fresh actor out of countenance.
COEL. Eccentrics, epicyctes, and aspects
In sextile, trine and quadrate, which effects
Wonders on earth: also the oblique part
Of signs, that make the day both long and short,
The constellations, rising cosmical,
Setting of stars, chronic, and heliacal,
In the horizon or meridional,
And all the skill in deep astronomy,
Is to the soul derived by the eye.
PHA. Visus, you have made Coelum a heavenly speech, past earthly capacity; it had been as good for him he had thundered. But I pray you, who taught him to speak and use no action? methinks it had been excellent to have turned round about in his speech.
VIS. He hath so many motions, he knows not which to begin withal.
PHA. Nay, rather it seems he's of Copernicus' opinion, and that makes him stand still.
[TERRA comes to the midst of the stage, stands still
a while, saith nothing, and steps back.
COM. SEN. Let's hear what Terra can say—just nothing?
VIS. And't like your lordship, 'twere an indecorum Terra should speak.
MEM. You are deceived; for I remember, when Phaeton ruled the sun (I shall never forget him, he was a very pretty youth), the Earth opened her mouth wide, and spoke a very good speech to Jupiter.
ANA. By the same token Nilus hid his head then, he could never find it since.
PHA. You know, Memory, that was an extreme hot day, and 'tis likely Terra sweat much, and so took cold presently after, that ever since she hath lost her voice.
HER. A canton ermine added to the field
Is a sure sign the man that bore these arms
Was to his prince as a defensive shield,
Saving him from the force of present harms[260].
PHA. I know this fellow of old, 'tis a herald: many a centaur, chimaera[261], barnacle[262], crocodile, hippopotame, and such like toys hath he stolen out of the shop of my Invention, to shape new coats for his upstart gentlemen. Either Africa must breed more monsters,[263] or you make fewer gentlemen, Master Herald, for you have spent all my devices already. But since you are here, let me ask you a question in your own profession: how comes it to pass that the victorious arms of England, quartered with the conquered coat of France, are not placed on the dexter side, but give the flower-de-luce the better hand?
HER. Because that the three lions are one coat made of two French dukedoms, Normandy and Aquitain.
[PHA.][264] But I pray you, Visus, what joy is that, that follows him?
VIS. 'Tis Colour, an object of mine, subject to his commandment.
PHA. Why speaks he not?
VIS. He is so bashful, he dares not speak for blushing:
What thing is that? tell me without delay.
BOY. That's nothing of itself, yet every way
As like a man as a thing like may be:
And yet so unlike as clean contrary,
For in one point it every way doth miss,
The right side of it a man's left side is;
'Tis lighter than a feather, and withal
It fills no place nor room, it is so small.
COM. SEN. How now, Visus, have you brought a boy with a riddle to pose us all?
PHA. Pose us all, and I here? That were a jest indeed. My lord, if he have a Sphinx, I have an Oedipus, assure yourself; let's hear it once again.
BOY. What thing is that, sir, &c.
PHA. This such a knotty enigma? Why, my lord, I think 'tis a woman, for first a woman is nothing of herself, and, again, she is likest a man of anything.
COM. SEN. But wherein is she unlike?
PHA. In everything: in peevishness, in folly. 'St, boy?
HEU. In pride, deceit, prating, lying, cogging, coyness, spite, hate, sir.
PHA. And in many more such vices. Now, he may well say, the left side a man's right side is, for a cross wife is always contrary to her husband, ever contradicting what he wisheth for, like to the verse in Martial, Velle tuum.
MEM. Velle tuum nolo, Dindyme, nolle volo.
PHA. Lighter than a feather—doth any man make question of that?
MEM. They need not, for I remember I saw a cardinal weigh them once, and the woman was found three grains lighter.
COM. SEN. 'Tis strange, for I have seen gentlewomen wear feathers oftentimes. Can they carry heavier things than themselves?
MEM. O, sir, I remember, 'tis their only delight to do so.
COM. SEN. But how apply you the last verse? it fills no place, sir.
PHA. By my faith, that spoils all the former, for these farthingales take up all the room now-a-days; 'tis not a woman, questionless. Shall I be put down with a riddle? Sirrah Heuresis, search the corners of your conceit, and find it me quickly.
HEU. Eh, [Greek: heureka, heureka] I have it: 'tis a man's face in a looking-glass.
PHA. My lord, 'tis so indeed. Sirrah let's see it, for do you see my right eye here?
COM. SEN. What of your eye?
PHA. O lord, sir, this kind of frown is excellent, especially when 'tis sweetened with such a pleasing smile.
COM. SEN. Phantastes!
PHA. O sir, my left eye is my right in the glass, do you see? By these lips, my garters hang so neatly, my gloves and shoes become my hands and feet so well. Heuresis, tie my shoe-strings with a new knot—this point was scarce well-trussed, so, 'tis excellent. Looking-glasses were a passing invention. I protest the fittest books for ladies to study on—
MEM. Take heed you fall not in love with yourself. Phantastes, as I remember—Anamnestes, who was't that died of the looking disease?
ANA. Forsooth, Narcissus: by the same token he was turned to a daffodil, and as he died for love of himself, so, if you remember, there was an old ill-favoured, precious-nosed, babber-lipped, beetle-browed, blear-eyed, slouch-eared slave that, looking himself by chance in a glass, died for pure hate.
PHA. By the lip of my —— I could live and die with this face.
COM. SEN. Fie, fie, Phantastes, so effeminate! for shame, leave off. Visus, your objects I must needs say, are admirable, if the house and instrument be answerable. Let's hear therefore in brief your description.
VIS. Under the forehead of Mount Cephalou,[265]
That overpeers the coast of Microcosm,
All in the shadow of two pleasant groves,
Stand by two mansion-houses, both as round
As the clear heavens: both twins, as like each other
As star to star, which by the vulgar sort,
For their resplendent composition,
Are named the bright eyes of Mount Cephalon:
With four fair rooms those lodgings are contrived,
Four goodly rooms in form most spherical,
Closing each other like the heavenly orbs:
The first whereof, of nature's substance wrought,
As a strange moat the other to defend,
Is trained movable by art divine,
Stirring the whole compacture of the rest:
The second chamber is most curiously
Compos'd of burnish'd and transparent horn.
PHA. That's a matter of nothing. I have known many have such bed-chambers.
MEM. It may be so, for I remember, being once in the town's library, I read such a thing in their great book of monuments, called "Cornucopia," or rather their "Copiacornu."
VIS. The third's a lesser room of purest glass;
The fourth's smallest, but passeth all the former
In worth of matter: built most sumptuously,
With walls transparent of pure crystalline.
This the soul's mirror and the body's guide,
Love's cabinet, bright beacons of the realm,
Casements of light, quiver of Cupid's shafts,
Wherein I sit, and immediately receive
The species of things corporeal,
Keeping continual watch and sentinel;
Lest foreign hurt invade our Microcosm,
And warning give (if pleasant things approach),
To entertain them. From this costly room
Leadeth, my lord, an entry to your house,
Through which I hourly to yourself convey
Matters of wisdom by experience bred:
Art's first invention, pleasant vision,
Deep contemplation, that attires the soul
In gorgeous robes of flowing literature:
Then, if that Visus have deserved best,
Let his victorious brow with crown be blest.
COM. SEN. Anamnestes, see who's to come next.
ANA. Presently, my lord.
PHA. Visus, I wonder that amongst all your objects, you presented us not with Plato's idea, or the sight of Nineveh,[266] Babylon, London, or some Stourbridge-fair monsters; they would have done passing well. Those motions, in my imagination, are very delightful.
VIS. I was loth to trouble your honours with such toys, neither could I provide them in so short a time.
COM. SEN. We will consider your worth; meanwhile, we dismiss you.
[VISUS leads his show about the stage, and so goeth out with it.
SCAENA ULTIMA.
AUDITUS, &c.
AUD. Hark, hark, hark, hark! peace, peace, O, peace! O sweet, admirable, swanlike, heavenly! hark, O most mellifluous strain! O, what a pleasant close was there! O fall[267] most delicate!
COM. SEN. How now, Phantastes! is Auditus mad?
PHA. Let him alone, his musical head is always full of old crotchets.
AUD. Did you mark the dainty driving of the last point, an excellent maintaining of the song; by the choice timpan of mine ear, I never heard a better! hist, 'st, 'st, hark! why, there's a cadence able to ravish the dullest stoic.
COM. SEN. I know not what to think on him.
AUD. There how sweetly the plain-song was dissolved into descant, and how easily they came off with the last rest. Hark, hark, the bitter'st[268] sweetest achromatic.
COM. SEN. Auditus!
AUD. Thanks, good Apollo, for this timely grace,
Never couldst thou in fitter hour indulge it:
O more than most musical harmony!
O most admirable concert! have you no ears?
Do you not hear this music?
PHA. It may be good; but, in my opinion, they rest too long in the beginning.
AUD. Are you then deaf? do you not yet perceive
The wondrous sound the heavenly orbs do make
With their continual motion? hark, hark,
O honey-sweet!
COM. SEN. What tune do they play?
AUD. Why such a tune as never was, nor ever shall be heard.
Mark now, now mark: now, now!
PHA. List, list, list.
AUD. Hark! O sweet, sweet, sweet.
PHA. List! how my heart envies my happy ears.
Hist, by the gold-strung harp of Apollo,
I hear the celestial music of the spheres,
As plainly as ever Pythagoras did.
O most excellent diapason! good, good.
It plays Fortune my foe,[269] as distinctly as may be.
COM. SEN. As the fool thinketh, so the bell clinketh. I protest I hear no more than a post.
PHA. What, the Lavolta![270] eh? nay, if the heavens fiddle, Fancy must needs dance.
COM. SEN. Prythee, sit still, thou must dance nothing but the passing measures[271]. Memory, do you hear this harmony of the spheres?
MEM. Not now, my lord; but I remember about some four thousand years ago, when the sky was first made, we heard very perfectly.
ANA. By the same token, the first tune the planets played, I remember Venus the treble ran sweet division upon Saturn the bass. The first tune they played was Sellenger's round[272], in memory whereof ever since it hath been called "the beginning of the world."
COM. SEN. How comes it we cannot hear it now?
MEM. Our ears are so well acquainted with the sound, that we never mark it. As I remember, the Egyptian Catadupes[273] never heard the roaring of the fall of Nilus, because the noise was so familiar unto them.
COM. SEN. Have you no other objects to judge by than these, Auditus?
AUD. This is the rarest and most exquisite:
Most spherical, divine, angelical;
But since your duller ears cannot perceive it,
May it please your lordship to withdraw yourself
Unto this neighbouring grove: there shall you see
How the sweet treble of the chirping birds,
And the soft stirring of the moved leaves,
Running delightful descant to the sound
Of the base murmuring of the bubbling brook[274],
Becomes a concert of good instruments;
While twenty babbling echoes round about,
Out of the stony concave of their mouths,
Restore the vanished music of each close,
And fill your ears full with redoubled pleasure.
COM. SEN. I will walk with you very willingly, for I grow weary of sitting. Come, Master Register and Master Phantastes.
[Exeunt OMNES.