To this before the Gods we gave our hands,
And nothing but our death can break the bands.
This binds thee, then, to further my defign:
As I am bound by vow to further thine :
Nor can'ft, nor dar'ft thou, traitor, on the plain
Appeach my honor, or thine own maintain,
Since thou art of my council, and the friend.
Whofe faith I truft, and on whofe care depend:
And wou'd'ft thou court my lady's love, which I
Much rather than release would choofe to die?
But thou falfe Arcite never shall obtain
Thy bad pretence; I told thee first my pain:
For firft my love began ere thine was born;
Thou as my council, and my brother fworn,
Art bound t'affift my eldership of right:
Or juftly to be deem'd a perjur'd knight.
Thus Palamon: but Arcite with difdain
In haughty language thus reply'd again ;
Forfworn thyself: the traitor's odious name
I first return, and then difprove thy claim.
If love be paffion, and that paffion nurst
With ftrong defires, I lov'd the lady first.
Can't thou pretend defire, whom zeal inflam'd
To worship, and a pow'r celeftial nam'd?
Thine was devotion to the bleft above,
I faw the woman and defir'd her love;
First own'd my paffion, and to thee commend
Th' important fecret, as my chofen friend,
Suppofe (which yet I grant not) thy defire.
A moment elder than my rival fire;
Can chance of feeing first thy title prove?
And know'st thou not, no law is made for love;
Law is to things which to free choice relate;
Love is not in our choice, but in our fate;
Laws are but pofitive; love's pow'r, we see,
Is Nature's fanétion, and her first decree.
Each day we break the bond of human laws
For love, and vindicate the common cause.
Laws for defence of civil rights are plac'd,
Love throws the fences down, and makes a general waste;
Maids, widows, wives, without diftinction fall;
The sweeping deluge, love, comes on, and covers all.
If then the laws of friendship I tranfgrefs,
Í keep the greater, while I break the lefs;
And both are mad alike, fince neither can poffefs.
Both hopeless to be ranfom'd, never more
To fee the fun, but as he paffes o'er.
Like Efop's hounds contending for the bone,
Each pleaded right, and wou'd be lord alone;
The fruitless fight continued all the day;
A cur came by, and snatch'd the prize away.
As courtiers therefore justle for a grant,
And when they break their friendship plead their want,
So thou, if fortune will thy fuit advance,
Love on, nor envy me my equal chance :
For I muft love, and am refolv'd to try
My fate, or failing in th' adventure die,
Great was their ftrife, which hourly was renew'd,
Till each with mortal hate his rival view'd:
Now friends no more, nor walking hand in hand;
But when they met, they made a furly stand;
And glar'd like angry lions as they pafs'd,
And wish'd that ev'ry look might be their laft.
It chanc'd at length, Pirithous came t'attend
This worthy Thefeus, his familiar friend;
Their love in early infancy began,
And rofe as childhood ripen'd into man,
Companions of the war; and lov'd fo well,
That when one dy'd, as ancient stories tell,
His fellow to redeem him went to hell.
But to pursue my tale; to welcome home
His warlike brother is Pirithous come:
Arcite of Thebes was known in arms long fince,
And honor'd by this young Theffalian prince.
Thefeus to gratify his friend and guest,
Who made our Arcite's freedom his request,
Reftor'd to liberty the captive knight,
But on thefe hard conditions I recite:
That if hereafter Arcite fhould be found
Within the compafs of Athenian ground,
By day or night, or on whate'er pretence,
His head fhou'd pay the forfeit of th' offence.
To this Pirithous for his friend agreed,
And on his promife was the prifoner freed.
Unpleas'd and penfive hence he takes his way,
At his own peril; for his life must pay.
Who now but Arcite mourns his bitter fate,
Finds his dear purchase, and repents too late?
What have I gain'd, he faid, in prifon pent,
If I but change my bonds for banishment?
And banish'd from her fight, I fuffer more
In freedom, than I felt in bonds before;
Forc'd from her prefence, and condemn'd to live:
Unwelcome freedom, and unthank'd reprieve :
Heaven is not, but where Emily abides,
And where's fhe's abfent, all is hell befides.
Next to my day of birth, was that accurft,
Which bound my friendship to Pirithous first:
Had I not known that prince, I ftill had been
In bondage, and had still Emilia feen:
For tho' I never can her grace deserve,
'Tis recompence enough to fee and serve.
O Palamon, my kinsman and my friend,
How much more happy fates thy love attend!
Thine is th' adventure; thine the victory:
Well has thy fortune turn'd the dice for thee:
Thou on that angel's face may'ft feed thine eyes,
In prifon, no; but blifsful paradife!
Thou daily feeft that fun of beauty shine,
And lov'ft at least in love's extremeft line.
I mourn in abfence, love's eternal night;
And who can tell but fince thou haft her fight,
And art a comely, young, and valiant knight,
Fortune (a various pow'r) may cease to frown,
And by fome ways unknown thy wishes crown?
But I, the most forlorn of human kind,
Nor help can hope, nor remedy can find;
But doom'd to drag my loathfom life in care,
For my reward, muft end it in despair.
Fire, water, air, and earth, and force of fates
That governs all, and heav'n that all creates,
Nor art, nor nature's hand can ease my grief;
Nothing but death, the wretch's laft relief:
Then farewel youth, and all the joys that dwell,
With youth and life, and life itself farewel.
But why, alas! do mortal men in vain
Of fortune, fate, or Providence complain?
God gives us what he knows our wants require,
And better things than those which we defire:
Some pray for riches; riches they obtain;
But, watch'd by robbers, for their wealth are flain:
Some pray from prison to be freed; and come,
When guilty of their vows to fall at home;
Murder'd by those they trufted with their life,
A favor'd fervant, or a bofom wife.
Such dear-bought bleffings happen ev'ry day,
Because we know not for what things to pray.
Like drunken fots about the ftreet we roam :
Well knows the fot he has a certain home;
Yet knows not how to find th' uncertain place,
And blunders on, and ftaggers ev'ry pace.
Thus all feek happiness; but few can find,
For far the greater part of men are blind.
This is my cafe, who thought our utmost good
Was in one word of freedom understood:
The fatal bleffing came from prifon free,
I ftarve abroad, and lofe the fight of Emily.
Thus Arcite; but if Arcite thus deplore
His fuff'rings, Palamon yet fuffers more.
For when he knew his rival freed and gone,
He fwells with wrath; he makes outrageous moan:
He frets, he fumes, he ftares, he stamps the ground
The hollow tow'r with clamours rings around:
With briny tears he bathed his fetter'd feet,
And dropp'd all o'er with agony of fweat.
Alas! he cry'd! I wretch in prifon pine,
Too happy rival, while the fruit is thine:
Thou liv'ft at large, thou draw'ft thy native air,
Pleas'd with thy freedom, proud of my despair:
Thou mayft, fince thou haft youth and courage join'd,
A fweet behaviour and a folid mind,
Affemble ours, and all the Theban race,
To vindicate on Athens thy difgrace;
And after, by fome treaty made, poffefs
Fair Emily, the pledge of lafting peace.
So thine fhall be the beauteous prize, while I
Muft languish in despair, in prison die.
Thus all th' advantage of the ftrife is thine,
Thy portion double joys, and double forrows mine,
The rage of jealousy then fir'd his foul,
And his face kindled like a burning coal:
Now cold defpair, fucceeding in her stead,
To livid palenefs turns the glowing red.
His blood, fcarce liquid, creeps within his veins,
Like water which the freezing wind constrains.
Then thus he faid: Eternal Deities,
Who rule the world with abfolute decrees,
And write whatever time fhall bring to pass,
With pens of adamant, on plates of brass;
|