Scene V.

Love for Love

by William Congreve

FORESIGHT, and SIR SAMPSON LEGEND with a paper.

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
Nor no more to be done, old boy; that's
plain--here 'tis, I have it in my hand, old Ptolomey, I'll make the
ungracious prodigal know who begat him; I will, old Nostrodamus.
What, I warrant my son thought nothing belonged to a father but
forgiveness and affection; no authority, no correction, no arbitrary
power; nothing to be done, but for him to offend and me to pardon. I
warrant you, if he danced till doomsday he thought I was to pay the
piper. Well, but here it is under black and white, signatum,
sigillatum, and deliberatum; that as soon as my son Benjamin is
arrived, he's to make over to him his right of inheritance. Where's
my daughter that is to be?--Hah! old Merlin! body o' me, I'm so glad
I'm revenged on this undutiful rogue.

FORESIGHT
Odso, let me see; let me see the paper. Ay, faith
and troth, here 'tis, if it will but hold. I wish things were done,
and the conveyance made. When was this signed, what hour? Odso, you
should have consulted me for the time. Well, but we'll make haste
-

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
Haste, ay, ay; haste enough. My son Ben
will be in town to-night. I have ordered my lawyer to draw up
writings of settlement and jointure--all shall be done to-night. No
matter for the time; prithee, brother Foresight, leave superstition.
Pox o' the time; there's no time but the time present, there's no
more to be said of what's past, and all that is to come will happen.
If the sun shine by day, and the stars by night, why, we shall know
one another's faces without the help of a candle, and that's all the
stars are good for.

FORESIGHT
How, how? Sir Sampson, that all? Give me leave
to contradict you, and tell you you are ignorant.

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
I tell you I am wise; and sapiens
dominabitur astris; there's Latin for you to prove it, and an
argument to confound your Ephemeris.--Ignorant! I tell you, I have
travelled old Fircu, and know the globe. I have seen the antipodes,
where the sun rises at midnight, and sets at noon-day.

FORESIGHT
But I tell you, I have travelled, and travelled in
the celestial spheres, know the signs and the planets, and their
houses. Can judge of motions direct and retrograde, of sextiles,
quadrates, trines and oppositions, fiery-trigons and
aquatical-trigons. Know whether life shall be long or short, happy
or unhappy, whether diseases are curable or incurable. If journeys
shall be prosperous, undertakings successful, or goods stolen
recovered; I know -

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
I know the length of the Emperor of
China's foot; have kissed the Great Mogul's slippers, and rid
a-hunting upon an elephant with a Cham of Tartary. Body o' me, I
have made a cuckold of a king, and the present majesty of Bantam is
the issue of these loins.

FORESIGHT
I know when travellers lie or speak truth, when
they don't know it themselves.

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
I have known an astrologer made a cuckold
in the twinkling of a star; and seen a conjurer that could not keep
the devil out of his wife's circle.

FORESIGHT
What, does he twit me with my wife too? I must be
better informed of this. [Aside.] Do you mean my wife, Sir Sampson?
Though you made a cuckold of the king of Bantam, yet by the body of
the sun -

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
By the horns of the moon, you would say,
brother Capricorn.

FORESIGHT
Capricorn in your teeth, thou modern Mandeville;
Ferdinand Mendez Pinto was but a type of thee, thou liar of the first
magnitude. Take back your paper of inheritance; send your son to sea
again. I'll wed my daughter to an Egyptian mummy, e'er she shall
incorporate with a contemner of sciences, and a defamer of virtue.

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
Body o' me, I have gone too far; I must
not provoke honest Albumazar: --an Egyptian mummy is an illustrious
creature, my trusty hieroglyphic; and may have significations of
futurity about him; odsbud, I would my son were an Egyptian mummy for
thy sake. What, thou art not angry for a jest, my good Haly? I
reverence the sun, moon and stars with all my heart. What, I'll make
thee a present of a mummy: now I think on't, body o' me, I have a
shoulder of an Egyptian king that I purloined from one of the
pyramids, powdered with hieroglyphics, thou shalt have it brought
home to thy house, and make an entertainment for all the philomaths,
and students in physic and astrology in and about London.

FORESIGHT
But what do you know of my wife, Sir Sampson?

SIR SAMPSON LEGEND
Thy wife is a constellation of virtues;
she's the moon, and thou art the man in the moon. Nay, she is more
illustrious than the moon; for she has her chastity without her
inconstancy: 'sbud I was but in jest.