That shall he and I,
Not thou, make proof of. If I plead with him,
I crave of God but wrong’s requital. Go.
[Exit Hildegard.
And yet, God help me! Can I do it? God’s will
May no man thwart, or leave his righteousness
Baffled. I would not say, ‘My will be done,’
Were God’s will not for righteousness as mine,
If right be righteous, wrong be wrong, must be.
How else may God work wrong’s requital? I
Must be or none may be his minister.
And yet what righteousness is his to cast
Athwart my way toward right this wrong to me,
A sin against the soul and honour? Why
Must this vile word of yet cross all my thought
Always, a drifting doom or doubt that still
Strikes up and floats against my purpose? God,
Help me to know it! This weapon chosen of me,
This Almachildes, were his face not fair,
Were not his fame bright—were his aspect foul,
His name dishonourable, his line through life
A loathing and a spitting-stock for scorn,
Could I do this? Am I then even as they
Who queened it once in Rome’s abhorrent face
An empress each, and each by right of sin
Prostitute? All the life I have lived or loved
Hath been, if snows or seas or wellsprings be,
Pure as the spirit of love toward heaven is—chaste
As children’s eyes or mothers’. Though I sinned
As yet my soul hath sinned not, Albovine
Must bear, if God abhor unrighteousness,
The weight of penance heaviest laid on sin,
Shame. Not on me may shame be set, though hell
Take hold upon me dying. I would the deed
Were done, the wreak of wrath were wroken, and I
Dead.
Enter Albovine.
ALBOVINE.
Art thou sick at heart to see me?
ROSAMUND.
No.
ALBOVINE.
Thou art sweet and wise as ever God hath made
Woman. I would not turn thine heart from me
Or set thy spirit against the sense of mine
For more than Rome’s old empire.