Herc. And although it be no great part of injustice for him to be struck with the scabbard that has struck with the blade (for there is few of us but hath made some one cuckold or other)—— 393
Zuc. True, I ha’ done’t myself.
Herc. Yet——
Zuc. Yet I hope a man of wit may prevent his own mishap, or if he can prevent it——
Herc. Yet——
Zuc. Yet make it known yet, and so known that the
world may tremble with only thinking of it. Well, Fawn, whom shall I marry now? O Heaven! that God made for a man no other means of procreation and maintaining the world peopled but by women! O![254] that we could increase like roses, by being slipp’d one from another,[255]—or like flies, procreate with blowing, or any other way than by a woman,—by women, who have no reason in their love or mercy in their hate, no rule in their pity, no pity in their revenge, no judgment to speak, and yet no patience to hold their tongues;
Man’s opposite, the more held down, they swell; 410
Above them naught but will, beneath them naught but hell.
Herc. Or, that since Heaven hath given us no other means to allay our furious appetite, no other way of increasing our progeny,—since we must entreat and beg for assuagement of our passions, and entertainment of our affections,—why did not Heaven make us a nobler creature than women, to show unto?—some admirable deity, of an uncorruptible beauty, that might[256] be worth our knees, the expense of our heat, and the crinkling of our hams.[257] 420
Zuc. But that we must court, sonnet, flatter, bribe, kneel, sue to so feeble and imperfect, inconstant, idle, vain, hollow bubble, as woman is! O, my Fawn![258]
Herc. O, my lord, look who here comes!