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| QUEEN: |
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| I wonder, doctor, |
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| Thou ask'st me such a question. Have I not been |
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| Thy pupil long? Hast thou not learn'd me how |
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| To make perfumes? distil? preserve? yea, so |
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| That our great king himself doth woo me oft |
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| For my confections? Having thus far proceeded,— |
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| Unless thou think'st me devilish—is't not meet |
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| That I did amplify my judgement in |
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| Other conclusions? I will try the forces |
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| Of these thy compounds on such creatures as |
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| We count not worth the hanging,—but none human— |
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| To try the vigour of them and apply |
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| Allayments to their act, and by them gather |
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| Their several virtues and effects. |
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| I do not like her. She doth think she has |
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| Strange ling'ring poisons. I do know her spirit, |
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| And will not trust one of her malice with |
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| A drug of such damn'd nature. Those she has |
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| Will stupefy and dull the sense a while, |
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| Which first, perchance, she'll prove on cats and dogs, |
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| Then afterward up higher; but there is |
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| No danger in what show of death it makes, |
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| More than the locking-up the spirits a time, |
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| To be more fresh, reviving. She is fool'd |
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| With a most false effect; and I the truer, |
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| So to be false with her. |
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| QUEEN: |
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| Weeps she still, say'st thou? Dost thou think in time |
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| She will not quench and let instructions enter |
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| Where folly now possesses? Do thou work. |
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| When thou shalt bring me word she loves my son, |
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| I'll tell thee on the instant thou art then |
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| As great as is thy master,—greater, for |
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| His fortunes all lie speechless and his name |
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| Is at last gasp. Return he cannot, nor |
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| Continue where he is. To shift his being |
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| Is to exchange one misery with another, |
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| And every day that comes comes to |
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| A day's work in him. What shalt thou expect, |
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| To be depender on a thing that leans, |
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| Who cannot be new built, nor has no friends |
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| So much as but to prop him? |
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| Thou tak'st up |
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| Thou know'st not what; but take it for thy labour. |
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| It is a thing I made, which hath the King |
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| Five times redeem'd from death. I do not know |
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| What is more cordial. Nay, I prithee, take it; |
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| It is an earnest of a further good |
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| That I mean to thee. Tell thy mistress how |
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| The case stands with her; do't as from thyself. |
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| Think what a chance thou changest on; but think |
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| Thou hast thy mistress still; to boot, my son, |
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| Who shall take notice of thee. I'll move the King |
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| To any shape of thy preferment such |
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| As thou'lt desire; and then myself, I chiefly, |
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| That set thee on to this desert, am bound |
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| To load thy merit richly. Call my women. |
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| Think on my words. |
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| A sly and constant knave, |
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| Not to be shak'd; the agent for his master |
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| And the remembrancer of her to hold |
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| The hand-fast to her lord. I have given him that |
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| Which, if he take, shall quite unpeople her |
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| Of liegers for her sweet, and which she after, |
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| Except she bend her humour, shall be assur'd |
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| To taste of too. |
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