Alith. You do not understand me.
Lucy. I wish you may yourself.
Alith. I was engaged to marry, you see, another man, whom my justice will not suffer me to deceive or injure.
Lucy. Can there be a greater cheat or wrong done to a man than to give him your person without your heart? I should make a conscience of it.
Alith. I'll retrieve it for him after I am married a while.
Lucy. The woman that marries to love better, will be as much mistaken as the wencher that marries to live better. No, madam, marrying to increase love is like gaming to become rich; alas! you only lose what little stock you had before.
Alith. I find by your rhetoric you have been bribed to betray me.
Lucy. Only by his merit, that has bribed your heart, you see, against your word and rigid honour. But what a devil is this honour! 'tis sure a disease in the head, like the megrim or falling-sickness, that always hurries people away to do themselves mischief. Men lose their lives by it; women, what's dearer to 'em, their love, the life of life.
Alith. Come, pray talk you no more of honour, nor Master Harcourt; I wish the other would come to secure my fidelity to him and his right in me.