“O let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven!
Keep me in temper, I would not be mad”[69:1]
From this time onward his self-control grows less and less; try as he will, he is unable to restrain his passion:
“O how this mother swells up toward my heart!
Hysterica passio, down, thou climbing sorrow,
Thy element’s below!”[69:2]
But the passionate nature is reasserting itself and will not be kept down. Sarcasm, tenderness, and anger alternate in his speeches; he responds to the least sign of love, but anything less draws from him the bitterest reproaches. He prays for patience and for the judgment of Heaven to be manifested in his favour. Now he begins to approach incoherence, and the abruptness which marks the matter as
well as the manner of his speech shews only too plainly the affection of his mind. His state of mind is truly described as one of “high rage.”
“No, I’ll not weep;
I have full cause of weeping; but this heart