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[ Enter] A NTONIO and D ELIO. Echo ( from the D UCHESS’S Grave) 1 | |
| DELIO. Yond ’s the cardinal’s window. This fortification | |
| Grew from the ruins of an ancient abbey; | |
| And to yond side o’ th’ river lies a wall, | 4 |
| Piece of a cloister, which in my opinion | |
| Gives the best echo that you ever heard, | |
| So hollow and so dismal, and withal | |
| So plain in the distinction of our words, | 8 |
| That many have suppos’d it is a spirit | |
| That answers. | |
| ANT. I do love these ancient ruins. | |
| We never tread upon them but we set | 12 |
| Our foot upon some reverend history; | |
| And, questionless, here in this open court, | |
| Which now lies naked to the injuries | |
| Of stormy weather, some men lie interr’d | 16 |
| Lov’d the church so well, and gave so largely to ’t, | |
| They thought it should have canopied their bones | |
| Till dooms-day. But all things have their end; | |
| Churches and cities, which have diseases like to men, | 20 |
| Must have like death that we have. | |
| ECHO. Like death that we have. | |
| DELIO. Now the echo hath caught you. | |
| ANT. It groan’d methought, and gave | 24 |
| A very deadly accent. | |
| ECHO. Deadly accent. | |
| DELIO. I told you ’twas a pretty one. You may make it | |
| A huntsman, or a falconer, a musician, | 28 |
| Or a thing of sorrow. | |
| ECHO. A thing of sorrow. | |
| ANT. Ay, sure, that suits it best. | |
| ECHO. That suits it best. | 32 |
| ANT. ’Tis very like my wife’s voice. | |
| ECHO. Ay, wife’s voice. | |
| DELIO. Come, let us walk further from ’t. | |
| I would not have you go to the cardinal’s to-night: | 36 |
| Do not. | |
| ECHO. Do not. | |
| DELIO. Wisdom doth not more moderate wasting sorrow | |
| Than time. Take time for ’t; be mindful of thy safety. | 40 |
| ECHO. Be mindful of thy safety. | |
| ANT. Necessity compels me. | |
| Make scrutiny through the passages | |
| Of your own life, you ’ll find it impossible | 44 |
| To fly your fate. | |
| ECHO. O, fly your fate! | |
| DELIO. Hark! the dead stones seem to have pity on you, | |
| And give you good counsel. | 48 |
| ANT. Echo, I will not talk with thee, | |
| For thou art a dead thing. | |
| ECHO. Thou art a dead thing. | |
| ANT. My duchess is asleep now, | 52 |
| And her little ones, I hope sweetly. O heaven, | |
| Shall I never see her more? | |
| ECHO. Never see her more. | |
| ANT. I mark’d not one repetition of the echo | 56 |
| But that; and on the sudden a clear light | |
| Presented me a face folded in sorrow. | |
| DELIO. Your fancy merely. | |
| ANT. Come, I ’ll be out of this ague, | 60 |
| For to live thus is not indeed to live; | |
| It is a mockery and abuse of life. | |
| I will not henceforth save myself by halves; | |
| Lose all, or nothing. | 64 |
| DELIO. Your own virtue save you! | |
| I ’ll fetch your eldest son, and second you. | |
| It may be that the sight of his own blood | |
| Spread in so sweet a figure may beget | 68 |
| The more compassion. However, fare you well. | |
| Though in our miseries Fortune have a part, | |
| Yet in our noble sufferings she hath none. | |
| Contempt of pain, that we may call our own. Exeunt. | 72 |
