And last neglected? how would'st thou insult,
When I must live uxorious to thy will
In perfect thraldom, how again betray me,
Bearing my words and doings to the lords
To gloss upon, and censuring, frown or smile?
This gaol I count the house of liberty

945

To thine, whose doors my feet shall never enter. DAL. Let me approach at least and touch thy hand.

SAMS. Not for thy life, lest fierce remembrance
wake

My sudden rage to tear thee joint by joint.
At distance I forgive thee, go with that,
Bewail thy falsehood, and the pious works
It hath brought forth to make thee memorable
Among illustrious women, faithful wives:
Cherish thy hasten'd widowhood with the gold
Of matrimonial treason: so farewell.

955

DAL. I see thou art implacable, more deaf 960
To prayers than winds and seas, yet winds to seas
Are reconcil'd at length, and sea to shore :
Thy anger unappeasable still rages,
✓ Eternal tempest never to be calm'd.

Why do I humble thus myself, and, suing
For peace, reap nothing but repulse and hate?

Bid go with evil omen and the brand

965

Of infamy upon my name denounc'd?

To mix with thy concernments I desist

Henceforth, nor too much disapprove my own. 970 Fame if not double-fac'd is double-mouth'd,

975

980

And with contráry blast proclaims most deeds;
On both his wings, one black, the other white,
Bears greatest names in his wild aery flight.
My name perhaps among the circumcis'd,
In Dan, in Judah, and the bordering tribes,
To all posterity may stand defam'd,
With malediction mention'd, and the blot
Of falsehood most unconjugal traduc'd.
But in my country where I most desire,
In Ecron, Gaza, Asdod, and in Gath,
I shall be nam'd among the famousest
Of women, sung at solemn festivals,
Living and dead recorded, who to save
Her country from a fierce destroyer, chose
Above the faith of wedlock-bands, my tomb
With odours visited and annual flowers;
Not less renown'd than in Mount Ephraim
Jael, who with inhospitable guile
Smote Sisera sleeping through the temples nail'd.
Nor shall I count it heinous to enjoy
The public marks of honour and reward
Conferr'd upon me, for the piety

985

Which to my country I was judg'd to have shown. At this who ever envies or repines,

995

I leave him to his lot, and like my own. [sting CHOR. She's gone, a manifest serpent by her Discover'd in the end, till now conceal'd. [me, SAMS. So let her go: God sent her to debase

And aggravate my folly, who committed
To such a viper his most sacred trust
Of secrecy, my safety, and my life.

1000

CHOR. Yet beauty, tho' injurious, hath strange

power,

After offence returning, to regain

Love once possess'd, nor can be easily

Repuls'd, without much inward passion felt

And secret sting of amorous remorse.

1005

[end;

SAMS. Love-quarrels oft in pleasing concord

↑ Not wedlock-treachery endang'ring life.

CHOR. It is not virtue, wisdom, valour, wit,
Strength, comeliness of shape, or amplest merit,
That woman's love can win or long inherit;
But what it is, hard is to say,

Harder to hit,

Which way soever men refer it,
Much like thy riddle, Samson, in one day

1015

Or seven, though one should musing sit.

If any of these or all, the Timnian bride
Had not so soon preferr'd

Thy paranymph, worthless to thee compar'd, 1020

Successor in thy bed,

Nor both so loosely disallied

Their nuptials, nor this last so treacherously
Had shorn the fatal harvest of thy head,
Is it for that such outward ornament

Was lavish'd on their sex, that inward gifts

1025

Were left for haste unfinish'd, judgment scant,
Capacity not rais'd to apprehend

Or value what is best

In choice, but oftest to affect the wrong?

1020

Or was too much of self-love mix'd,

Of constancy no root infix'd,

That either they love nothing, or not long?

Whate'er it be to wisest men and best

Seeming at first all heavenly under virgin veil, 1035

Soft, modest, meek, demure,

Once join'd, the contrary she proves, a thorn

To folly and shameful deeds which ruin ends.
What pilot so expert but needs must wreck,
Imbark'd with such a steers-mate at the helm?

Favour'd of heav'n who finds

One virtuous, rarely found,
That in domestic good combines :

Happy that house! his way to peace is smooth;
But virtue, which breaks through all opposition,

And all temptation can remove,

Most shines and most is acceptable above.

Therefore God's universal law

Gave to the man despotic power
Over his female in due awe,

Nor from that right to part an hour,

106.

Smile she or lour:

On his whole life, not sway'd

So shall he least confusion draw

By female usurpation, or dismay'd.

1060

But had we best retire? I see a storm. [rain. SAMS. Fair days have oft contracted wind and

CHOR. But this another kind of tempest brings.

SAMS. Be less abstruse, my riddling days are

[fear

past. CHOR. Look now for no inchanting voice, nor The bait of honied words; a rougher tongue 1066 Draws hitherward, I know him by his stride, The giant Harapha of Gath, his look

Haughty as is his pile high-built and proud. Comes he in peace? what wind hath blown him

I less conjecture than when first I saw

The sumptuous Dalila floating this way:
His habit carries peace, his brow defiance.

[hither

1072

SAMS. Or peace or not, alike to me he comes.

CHOR. His fraught we soon shall know, he now

arrives.

[chance,

HAR. I come not, Samson, to condole thy As these perhaps, yet wish it had not been,

1065 Look] Euripid. Med. 771.