Abdal. Your boldness to your services I give:
Now take it, as your full reward,—to live.
Almanz. To live!
If from thy hands alone my death can be,
I am immortal, and a god to thee.
If I would kill thee now, thy fate's so low,
That I must stoop ere I can give the blow:
But mine is fixed so far above thy crown,
That all thy men,
Piled on thy back, can never pull it down:
But, at my ease, thy destiny I send,
By ceasing from this hour to be thy friend.
Like heaven, I need but only to stand still.
And, not concurring to thy life, I kill.
Thou canst no title to my duty bring;
I'm not thy subject, and my soul's thy king.
Farewell. When I am gone,
There's not a star of thine dare stay with thee:
I'll whistle thy tame fortune after me;
And whirl fate with me wheresoe'er I fly,
As winds drive storms before them in the sky. [Exit.
Zul. Let not this insolent unpunished go;
Give your commands; your justice is too slow. [Zulema, Hamet, and others are going after him.
Abdal. Stay, and what part he pleases let him take:
I know my throne's too strong for him to shake.
But my fair mistress I too long forget;
The crown I promised is not offered yet.
Without her presence all my joys are vain,
Empire a curse, and life itself a pain. [Exeunt.
ACT IV. SCENE I.
Enter Boabdelin, Abenamar, and Guards.
Boab. Advise, or aid, but do not pity me:
No monarch born can fall to that degree.
Pity descends from kings to all below;
But can, no more than fountains, upward flow.
Witness, just heaven, my greatest grief has been,
I could not make your Almahide a queen.
Aben. I have too long the effects of fortune known,
Either to trust her smiles, or fear her frown.
Since in their first attempt you were not slain,
Your safety bodes you yet a second reign.
The people like a headlong torrent go,
And ev'ry dam they break, or overflow;
But, unopposed, they either lose their force,
Or wind, in volumes, to their former course.
Boab. In walls we meanly must our hopes inclose,
To wait our friends, and weary out our foes:
While Almahide
To lawless rebels is exposed a prey,
And forced the lustful victor to obey.
Aben. One of my blood, in rules of virtue bred!
Think better of her, and believe she's dead.