Part 3 (1/2)

WOMEN.

ARAMINTA, in love with Vainlove--Mrs. Bracegirdle BELINDA, her cousin, an affected lady, in love with Bellmour--Mrs.

Mountfort LAEt.i.tIA, wife to Fondlewife--Mrs. Barry SYLVIA, Vainlove's forsaken mistress--Mrs. Bowman LUCY, her maid--Mrs. Leigh BETTY.

BOY and FOOTMEN.

SCENE: London.

ACT I.

SCENE I.

SCENE: _The Street_.

BELLMOUR _and_ VAINLOVE _meeting_.

BELL. Vainlove, and abroad so early! Good-morrow; I thought a contemplative lover could no more have parted with his bed in a morning than he could have slept in't.

VAIN. Bellmour, good-morrow. Why, truth on't is, these early sallies are not usual to me; but business, as you see, sir--[_Showing Letters_.]

And business must be followed, or be lost.

BELL. Business! And so must time, my friend, be close pursued, or lost.

Business is the rub of life, perverts our aim, casts off the bias, and leaves us wide and short of the intended mark.

VAIN. Pleasure, I guess you mean.

BELL. Ay; what else has meaning?

VAIN. Oh, the wise will tell you--

BELL. More than they believe--or understand.

VAIN. How, how, Ned! A wise man say more than he understands?

BELL. Ay, ay! Wisdom's nothing but a pretending to know and believe more than we really do. You read of but one wise man, and all that he knew was, that he knew nothing. Come, come, leave business to idlers and wisdom to fools; they have need of 'em. Wit be my faculty, and pleasure my occupation; and let Father Time shake his gla.s.s. Let low and earthly souls grovel till they have worked themselves six foot deep into a grave.

Business is not my element--I roll in a higher orb, and dwell--

VAIN. In castles i' th' air of thy own building. That's thy element, Ned. Well, as high a flier as you are, I have a lure may make you stoop.

[_Flings a Letter_.]

BELL. I, marry, sir, I have a hawk's eye at a woman's hand. There's more elegancy in the false spelling of this superscription [_takes up the Letter_] than in all Cicero. Let me see.--How now!--Dear _perfidious Vainlove_. [_Reads_.]

VAIN. Hold, hold, 'slife, that's the wrong.

BELL. Nay, let's see the name--Sylvia!--how canst thou be ungrateful to that creature? She's extremely pretty, and loves thee entirely--I have heard her breathe such raptures about thee--