Love for Love: A Comedy

TATT. I did, as I hope to be saved, madam; my intentions were good. But this is the most cruel thing, to marry one does not know how, nor why, nor wherefore. The devil take me i...

TATT. You say true, I beg your pardon. I’ll bring all off. It was impossible, madam, for me to imagine that a person of your ladyship’s wit and gallantry could have so long rece...

SIR SAMP. Not at all, madam,—odsbud, you wrong me,—I am not so old neither, to be a bare courtier, only a man of words. Odd, I have warm blood about me yet, and can serve a lady...

SIR SAMP. No doubt of it, sweet sir; but your filial piety, and my fatherly fondness would fit like two tallies. Here’s a rogue, brother Foresight, makes a bargain under hand an...

VAL. Read, read, sirrah, and refine your appetite; learn to live upon instruction; feast your mind and mortify your flesh; read, and take your nourishment in at your eyes; shut...

MRS. FRAIL. I shall get a fine reputation by coming to see fellows in a morning. Scandal, you devil, are you here too? Oh, Mr. Tattle, everything is safe with you, we know.

FORE. What, would you be gadding too? Sure, all females are mad to-day. It is of evil portent, and bodes mischief to the master of a family. I remember an old prophecy written b...

VAL. Why Tattle, you need not be much concerned at anything that he says: for to converse with Scandal, is to play at losing loadum; you must lose a good name to him before you...

TATT. Tell, madam? Alas, you don’t know me. I have much ado to tell your ladyship how long I have been in love with you—but encouraged by the impossibility of Valentine’s making...

BEN. Why, father came and found me squabbling with yon chitty-faced thing as he would have me marry, so he asked what was the matter. He asked in a surly sort of a way—it seems...

BEN. Mess, I love to speak my mind. Father has nothing to do with me. Nay, I can’t say that neither; he has something to do with me. But what does that signify? If so be that I...

SIR SAMP. Nor no more to be done, old boy; that’s plain—here ’tis, I have it in my hand, old Ptolomey, I’ll make the ungracious prodigal know who begat him; I will, old Nostroda...

MRS. FRAIL. Well, what if I took twenty—I warrant if you had been there, it had been only innocent recreation. Lord, where’s the comfort of this life if we can’t have the happin...

BEN. Mess, that’s true; marry! I had forgot. Dick’s dead, as you say. Well, and how? I have a many questions to ask you. Well, you ben’t married again, father, be you?

BEN. Come mistress, will you please to sit down? for an you stand a stern a that’n, we shall never grapple together. Come, I’ll haul a chair; there, an you please to sit, I’ll s...

VAL. Husht—interrupt me not—I’ll whisper prediction to thee, and thou shalt prophesy. I am Truth, and can teach thy tongue a new trick. I have told thee what’s past,—now I’ll te...

TATT. Frank, i’Gad, at least. What a pox does Mrs. Foresight mean by this civility? Is it to make a fool of me? Or does she leave us together out of good morality, and do as she...

MRS. FORE. Madam; you must say madam. By my soul, I shall fancy myself old indeed to have this great girl call me mother. Well, but Miss, what are you so overjoyed at?

SCAN. Poet! He shall turn soldier first, and rather depend upon the outside of his head than the lining. Why, what the devil, has not your poverty made you enemies enough? Must...

SCAN. Alas, Mr. Foresight, I’m afraid all is not right. You are a wise man, and a conscientious man, a searcher into obscurity and futurity, and if you commit an error, it is wi...

JERE. Ay, sir; she’s just going to the place of appointment. Ah, sir, if you are not very faithful and close in this business, you’ll certainly be the death of a person that has...

SCAN. Yes, faith, I believe some women are virtuous too; but ’tis as I believe some men are valiant, through fear. For why should a man court danger or a woman shun pleasure?

VAL. I was much obliged to you for your supply. It did me signal service in my necessity. But you delight in doing good. Scandal, drink to me, my friend Trapland’s health. An ho...

FORE. Ah, Sir Sampson, heav’n help your head. This is none of your lucky hour; _Nemo omnibus horis sapit_. What, is he gone, and in contempt of science? Ill stars and unconverti...

[_She gives him the glass_: SCANDAL _and she whisper_.] My passion for you is grown so violent, that I am no longer master of myself. I was interrupted in the morning, when you...

FORE. O Mr. Tattle, your servant, you are a close man; but methinks your love to my daughter was a secret I might have been trusted with. Or had you a mind to try if I could dis...

ANG. Ha! I saw him wink and smile. I fancy ’tis a trick—I’ll try.—I would disguise to all the world a failing which I must own to you: I fear my happiness depends upon the recov...

JERE. Counterfeit, madam! I’ll maintain him to be as absolutely and substantially mad as any freeholder in Bethlehem; nay, he’s as mad as any projector, fanatic, chymist, lover,...

SIR SAMP. How! What does my aunt say? Surprising, aunt? Not at all for a young couple to make a match in winter: not at all. It’s a plot to undermine cold weather, and destroy t...

SIR SAMP. Gads bobs, does he not know me? Is he mischievous? I’ll speak gently. Val, Val, dost thou not know me, boy? Not know thy own father, Val? I am thy own father, and this...

MISS. O Mr. Tattle, are you here? I’m glad I have found you; I have been looking up and down for you like anything, till I’m as tired as anything in the world.

BEN. Nay, I’ll give you leave to guess. I’ll undertake to make a voyage to Antegoa—no, hold; I mayn’t say so, neither. But I’ll sail as far as Leghorn and back again before you...

VAL. You see what disguises love makes us put on. Gods have been in counterfeited shapes for the same reason; and the divine part of me, my mind, has worn this mask of madness a...

SIR SAMP. What, is my son Valentine gone? What, is he sneaked off, and would not see his brother? There’s an unnatural whelp! There’s an ill-natured dog! What, were you here too...

JERE. Would you could, sir, for he has lost himself. Indeed, sir, I have a’most broke my heart about him—I can’t refrain tears when I think of him, sir: I’m as melancholy for hi...

SIR SAMP. Body o’ me, I don’t know any universal grievance, but a new tax, or the loss of the Canary fleet. Unless popery should be landed in the West, or the French fleet were...

MRS. FRAIL. O sister, had you come a minute sooner, you would have seen the resolution of a lover:—honest Tar and I are parted;—and with the same indifference that we met. O’ my...

SCAN. Not upon a kind occasion, madam. But when a lady comes tyrannically to insult a ruined lover, and make manifest the cruel triumphs of her beauty, the barbarity of it somet...

TATT. Scandal, you will not be so ungenerous. Oh, I shall lose my reputation of secrecy for ever. I shall never be received but upon public days, and my visits will never be adm...

VAL. No; he has sent me the hardest conditions in the world. You have heard of a booby brother of mine that was sent to sea three years ago? This brother, my father hears, is la...

VAL. Who’s that that’s out of his way? I am Truth, and can set him right. Harkee, friend, the straight road is the worst way you can go. He that follows his nose always, will ve...

SIR SAMP. See it, boy? Ay, ay; why, thou dost see it—’tis thy own hand, Vally. Why, let me see, I can read it as plain as can be. Look you here. [_Reads_.] _The condition of thi...

NURSE. Wee’st heart, I know not, they’re none of ’em come home yet. Poor child, I warrant she’s fond o’ seeing the town. Marry, pray heaven they ha’ given her any dinner. Good l...

SIR SAMP. Where is this old soothsayer, this uncle of mine elect? Aha, old Foresight, Uncle Foresight, wish me joy, Uncle Foresight, double joy, both as uncle and astrologer; he...

SIR SAMP. No, no; come, come, sit thee down, honest Val. How dost thou do? Let me feel thy pulse. Oh, pretty well now, Val. Body o’ me, I was sorry to see thee indisposed; but I...

SIR SAMP. I left ’em together here; what, are they gone? Ben’s a brisk boy: he has got her into a corner; father’s own son, faith, he’ll touzle her, and mouzle her. The rogue’s...

MISS. What, and must not I have e’er a husband, then? What, must I go to bed to nurse again, and be a child as long as she’s an old woman? Indeed but I won’t. For now my mind is...

SIR SAMP. Is Ben come? Odso, my son Ben come? Odd, I’m glad on’t. Where is he? I long to see him. Now, Mrs. Frail, you shall see my son Ben. Body o’ me, he’s the hopes of my fam...

BEN. Tar-barrel? Let your sweetheart there call me so, if he’ll take your part, your Tom Essence, and I’ll say something to him; gad, I’ll lace his musk-doublet for him, I’ll ma...

VAL. No, prithee stay: Tattle and you should never be asunder; you are light and shadow, and show one another; he is perfectly thy reverse both in humour and understanding; and...

SCAN. I hope you will be able to see Valentine in the morning. You had best take a little diacodion and cowslip-water, and lie upon your back: maybe you may dream.

VAL. Understood! She is harder to be understood than a piece of Egyptian antiquity or an Irish manuscript: you may pore till you spoil your eyes and not improve your knowledge.

JERE. Yes, sir; you need make no great doubt of that. He that was so near turning poet yesterday morning can’t be much to seek in playing the madman to-day.

JERE. O sir, there’s Trapland the scrivener, with two suspicious fellows like lawful pads, that would knock a man down with pocket-tipstaves. And there’s your father’s steward,...

SCAN. I’ll give an account of you and your proceedings. If indiscretion be a sign of love, you are the most a lover of anybody that I know: you fancy that parting with your esta...

SCAN. Here’s a dog now, a traitor in his wine: sirrah, refund the sack.—Jeremy, fetch him some warm water, or I’ll rip up his stomach, and go the shortest way to his conscience.

JERE. Good lack! What’s the matter now? Are any more of us to be mad? Why, sir, my master longs to see her, and is almost mad in good earnest with the joyful news of her being h...

SIR SAMP. Are we? A pox o’ your prognostication. Why, we are fools as we use to be. Oons, that you could not foresee that the moon would predominate, and my son be mad. Where’s...

FORE. Here, take your young mistress and lock her up presently, till farther orders from me. Not a word, Hussy; do what I bid you, no reply, away. And bid Robin make ready to gi...

VAL. By this, Scandal, you may see what it is to be great; secretaries of state, presidents of the council, and generals of an army lead just such a life as I do; have just such...

FORE. I say you lie, sir. It is impossible that anything should be as I would have it; for I was born, sir, when the crab was ascending, and all my affairs go backward.

ANG. Would anything but a madman complain of uncertainty? Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing, and the overtaking and possessing of a...

SCAN. Madam, I am very glad that I overheard a better reason which you gave to Mr. Tattle; for his impertinence forced you to acknowledge a kindness for Valentine, which you den...

NURSE. Miss, Miss, Miss Prue! Mercy on me, marry and amen. Why, what’s become of the child? Why Miss, Miss Foresight! Sure she has locked herself up in her chamber, and gone to...

OFF. By your leave, gentlemen: Mr. Trapland, if we must do our office, tell us. We have half a dozen gentlemen to arrest in Pall Mall and Covent Garden; and if we don’t make has...

TATT. There’s no occasion for a lie; I could never tell a lie to no purpose. But since we have done nothing, we must say nothing, I think. I hear her,—I’ll leave you together, a...

FORE. I’m so perplexed and vexed, I’m not fit to receive him; I shall scarce recover myself before the hour be past. Go nurse, tell Sir Sampson I’m ready to wait on him.

VAL. ’Tis as much as I expected. I did not come to see him, I came to see Angelica: but since she was gone abroad, it was easily turned another way, and at least looked well on...

VAL. What, is my bad genius here again! Oh no, ’tis the lawyer with an itching palm; and he’s come to be scratched. My nails are not long enough. Let me have a pair of red-hot t...