Cand. To answer generously, as you have done,
I should not by your arguments be won:
I know, I urge your ruin by consent;
Yet love too well, that ruin to prevent.
Phil. Like water given to those whom fevers fry, You kill but him, who must without it die.
Cand. Secure me, I may love without a crime; Then, for our flight, appoint both place and time.
Phil. The ensuing hour my plighted vows shall be; The time's not long; or only long to me.
Cand. Then, let us go where we shall ne'er be seen By my hard mother.
Phil. Or my cruel queen.
[Exeunt PHIL. and CAND.
Queen above. O, Philocles, unkind to call me cruel!
So false Aeneas did from Dido fly;
But never branded her with cruelty.
How I despise myself for loving so!
Ast. At once you hate yourself, and love him too.
Queen. No, his ingratitude has cured my wound: A painful cure indeed!