Before my liberty.
PALAMON.
I saw her first.
ARCITE.
That’s nothing.
PALAMON.
But it shall be.
ARCITE.
I saw her too.
PALAMON.
Yes, but you must not love her.
ARCITE.
I will not as you doe, to worship her,
As she is heavenly, and a blessed Goddes;
I love her as a woman, to enjoy her:
So both may love.
PALAMON.
You shall not love at all.
ARCITE.
Not love at all!
Who shall deny me?
PALAMON.
I, that first saw her; I, that tooke possession
First with mine eyes of all those beauties
In her reveald to mankinde: if thou lou’st her,
Or entertain’st a hope to blast my wishes,
Thou art a Traytour, Arcite, and a fellow
False as thy Title to her: friendship, blood,
And all the tyes betweene us I disclaime,
If thou once thinke upon her.
ARCITE.
Yes, I love her,
And if the lives of all my name lay on it,
I must doe so; I love her with my soule:
If that will lose ye, farewell, Palamon;
I say againe, I love, and in loving her maintaine
I am as worthy and as free a lover,
And have as just a title to her beauty
As any Palamon or any living
That is a mans Sonne.
PALAMON.
Have I cald thee friend?
ARCITE.
Yes, and have found me so; why are you mov’d thus?
Let me deale coldly with you: am not I
Part of your blood, part of your soule? you have told me
That I was Palamon, and you were Arcite.
PALAMON.
Yes.
ARCITE.
Am not I liable to those affections,
Those joyes, greifes, angers, feares, my friend shall suffer?
PALAMON.
Ye may be.
ARCITE.
Why, then, would you deale so cunningly,
So strangely, so vnlike a noble kinesman,
To love alone? speake truely: doe you thinke me
Vnworthy of her sight?
PALAMON.
No; but unjust,
If thou pursue that sight.
ARCITE.
Because an other
First sees the Enemy, shall I stand still
And let mine honour downe, and never charge?
PALAMON.
Yes, if he be but one.
ARCITE.
But say that one
Had rather combat me?
PALAMON.
Let that one say so,
And use thy freedome; els if thou pursuest her,
Be as that cursed man that hates his Country,
A branded villaine.
ARCITE.
You are mad.
PALAMON.
I must be,
Till thou art worthy, Arcite; it concernes me,
And in this madnes, if I hazard thee
And take thy life, I deale but truely.
ARCITE.
Fie, Sir,
You play the Childe extreamely: I will love her,
I must, I ought to doe so, and I dare;
And all this justly.
PALAMON.
O that now, that now
Thy false-selfe and thy friend had but this fortune,
To be one howre at liberty, and graspe
Our good Swords in our hands! I would quickly teach thee
What ‘twer to filch affection from another:
Thou art baser in it then a Cutpurse;
Put but thy head out of this window more,
And as I have a soule, Ile naile thy life too’t.
ARCITE.
Thou dar’st not, foole, thou canst not, thou art feeble.
Put my head out? Ile throw my Body out,
And leape the garden, when I see her next
[Enter Keeper.]
And pitch between her armes to anger thee.
PALAMON.
No more; the keeper’s comming; I shall live
To knocke thy braines out with my Shackles.
ARCITE.
Doe.
KEEPER.
By your leave, Gentlemen—
PALAMON.
Now, honest keeper?
KEEPER.
Lord Arcite, you must presently to’th Duke;
The cause I know not yet.
ARCITE.
I am ready, keeper.
KEEPER.
Prince Palamon, I must awhile bereave you
Of your faire Cosens Company. [Exeunt Arcite, and Keeper.]
PALAMON.
And me too,
Even when you please, of life. Why is he sent for?
It may be he shall marry her; he’s goodly,
And like enough the Duke hath taken notice
Both of his blood and body: But his falsehood!
Why should a friend be treacherous? If that
Get him a wife so noble, and so faire,
Let honest men ne’re love againe. Once more
I would but see this faire One. Blessed Garden,
And fruite, and flowers more blessed, that still blossom
As her bright eies shine on ye! would I were,
For all the fortune of my life hereafter,
Yon little Tree, yon blooming Apricocke;
How I would spread, and fling my wanton armes