SEM. Tush, sir, be merry, let pass away the mare:[33]
How say you, have I not hied me lightly?
Here is your chair and lute to make you merry.
CAL. Merry, quotha? nay, that will not be;
But I must needs sit for very feebleness.
Give me my lute, and thou shalt see
How I shall sing mine unhappiness.
This lute is out of tune now, as I guess;
Alas! in tune how should I set it,
When all harmony to me discordeth each whit,
As he, to whose will reason is unruly?
For I feel sharp needles within my breast;
Peace, war, truth, hatred, and injury:
Hope and suspect, and all in one chest.
SEM. Behold, Nero, in the love of Poppaea[34] oppressed,
Rome how he brent; old and young wept:
But she took no thought, nor never the less slept.
CAL. Greater is my fire, and less pity showed me.
SEM. I will not mock; this fool is a lover. [_Aside_.
CAL. What say'st thou?
SEM. I say, how can that fire be,
That tormenteth but one living man, greater
Than that fire that brenneth a whole city here,
And all the people therein?
CAL. Marry, for that fire is greatest,
That brenneth very sore, and lasteth longest;
And greater is the fire that brenneth one soul,
Than that which brenneth an hundred bodies.
SEM. His saying in this none can control. [_Aside_.
CAL. None but such as list to make lies!