Is hurt with mere intention on their follies.
Why will I view them then, my sense might ask me?
Or is't a rarity, or some new object,
That strains my strict observance to this point?
O, would it were! therein I could afford
My spirit should draw a little near to theirs,
To gaze on novelties; so vice were one.
Tut, she is stale, rank, foul; and were it not
That those that woo her greet her with lock'd eyes,
In spight of all th' impostures, paintings, drugs,
Which her bawd, Custom, dawbs her cheeks withal,
She would betray her loath'd and leprous face,
And fright the enamour'd dotards from themselves:
But such is the perverseness of our nature,
That if we once but fancy levity,
How antic and ridiculous soe'er
It suit with us, yet will our muffled thought
Choose rather not to see it, than avoid it:
And if we can but banish our own sense,
We act our mimic tricks with that free license,
That lust, that pleasure, that security;
As if we practised in a paste-board case,
And no one saw the motion, but the motion.
Well, check thy passion, lest it grow too loud:
While fools are pitied, they wax fat, and proud.


ACT II

SCENE I. -- THE COURT.