SECOND MURDERER.
’Tis no matter; let it go. There’s few or none will entertain it.
FIRST MURDERER.
What if it come to thee again?
SECOND MURDERER.
I’ll not meddle with it; it makes a man coward. A man cannot steal but it accuseth him; a man cannot swear but it checks him; a man cannot lie with his neighbour’s wife but it detects him. ’Tis a blushing shamefaced spirit that mutinies in a man’s bosom. It fills a man full of obstacles. It made me once restore a purse of gold that by chance I found. It beggars any man that keeps it. It is turned out of towns and cities for a dangerous thing; and every man that means to live well endeavours to trust to himself and live without it.
FIRST MURDERER.
Zounds, ’tis even now at my elbow, persuading me not to kill the Duke.
SECOND MURDERER.
Take the devil in thy mind, and believe him not. He would insinuate with thee but to make thee sigh.
FIRST MURDERER.
I am strong-framed; he cannot prevail with me.
SECOND MURDERER.
Spoke like a tall man that respects thy reputation. Come, shall we fall to work?
FIRST MURDERER.
Take him on the costard with the hilts of thy sword, and then throw him in the malmsey-butt in the next room.
SECOND MURDERER.
O excellent device—and make a sop of him.
FIRST MURDERER.
Soft, he wakes.