[From “Fatal Jealousy,” a Tragedy, Author unknown, 1673.]
No Truth Absolute: after seeing a Masque of Gipseys.
1st Spectator. By this we see that all the world’s a cheat,
Whose truths and falsehoods lie so intermixt,
And are so like each other, that ’tis hard
To find the difference. Who would not think these people
A real pack of such as we call Gipseys?
2d Spect. Things perfectly alike are but the same;
And these were Gipseys, if we did not know
How to consider them the contrary:
So in terrestrial things there is not one
But takes its form and nature from our fancy,
Not its own being, and is but what we think it.
1st Spect. But Truth is still itself?
2d Spect. No, not at all, as Truth appears to us;
For oftentimes
That is a truth to me, that’s false to you;
So ’twould not be, if it was truly true.
How clouded Man
Doubts first, and from one doubt doth soon proceed
A thousand more, in solving of the first!
Like ’nighted travellers we lose our way,
Then every ignis fatuus makes us stray,
By the false lights of reason led about,
Till we arrive where we at first set out:
Nor shall we e’er truth’s perfect highway see,
Till dawns the day-break of eternity.
Apprehension
O Apprehension!—
So terrible the consequence appears.
It makes my brain turn round, and night seem darker
The moon begins to drown herself in clouds,
Leaving a duskish horror everywhere.
My sickly fancy makes the garden seem
Like those benighted groves in Pluto’s kingdoms.
Injured Husband.
Wife (dying.) Oh, oh, I fain would live a little longer,
If but to ask forgiveness of Gerardo!
My soul will scarce reach heav’n without his pardon.
Gerardo (entering). Who’s that would go to heav’n,
Take it, whate’er thou art; and may’st thou be
Happy in death, whate’er thou didst design.
Gerardo; his wife murdered.
Ger. It is in vain to look ’em,[434] if they hide;
The garden’s large; besides, perhaps they’re gone.
We’ll to the body.
Servant. You are by it now, my Lord.
Ger. This accident amazes me so much,
I go I know not where.