Scene III.

The Way of the World

by William Congreve

FAINALL, MRS. MARWOOD.

FAINALL
Excellent creature! Well, sure, if I should live to
be rid of my wife, I should be a miserable man.

MRS. MARWOOD
Ay?

FAINALL
For having only that one hope, the accomplishment of
it of consequence must put an end to all my hopes, and what a wretch
is he who must survive his hopes! Nothing remains when that day
comes but to sit down and weep like Alexander when he wanted other
worlds to conquer.

MRS. MARWOOD
Will you not follow 'em?

FAINALL
Faith, I think not,

MRS. MARWOOD
Pray let us; I have a reason.

FAINALL
You are not jealous?

MRS. MARWOOD
Of whom?

FAINALL
Of Mirabell.

MRS. MARWOOD
If I am, is it inconsistent with my love to you
that I am tender of your honour?

FAINALL
You would intimate then, as if there were a
fellow-feeling between my wife and him?

MRS. MARWOOD
I think she does not hate him to that degree
she would be thought.

FAINALL
But he, I fear, is too insensible.

MRS. MARWOOD
It may be you are deceived.

FAINALL
It may be so. I do not now begin to apprehend
it.

MRS. MARWOOD
What?

FAINALL
That I have been deceived, madam, and you are
false.

MRS. MARWOOD
That I am false? What mean you?

FAINALL
To let you know I see through all your little
arts.--Come, you both love him, and both have equally dissembled your
aversion. Your mutual jealousies of one another have made you clash
till you have both struck fire. I have seen the warm confession
red'ning on your cheeks, and sparkling from your eyes.

MRS. MARWOOD
You do me wrong.

FAINALL
I do not. 'Twas for my ease to oversee and wilfully
neglect the gross advances made him by my wife, that by permitting
her to be engaged, I might continue unsuspected in my pleasures, and
take you oftener to my arms in full security. But could you think,
because the nodding husband would not wake, that e'er the watchful
lover slept?

MRS. MARWOOD
And wherewithal can you reproach me?

FAINALL
With infidelity, with loving another, with love of
Mirabell.

MRS. MARWOOD
'Tis false. I challenge you to show an
instance that can confirm your groundless accusation. I hate him.

FAINALL
And wherefore do you hate him? He is insensible,
and your resentment follows his neglect. An instance? The injuries
you have done him are a proof: your interposing in his love. What
cause had you to make discoveries of his pretended passion? To
undeceive the credulous aunt, and be the officious obstacle of his
match with Millamant?

MRS. MARWOOD
My obligations to my lady urged me: I had
professed a friendship to her, and could not see her easy nature so
abused by that dissembler.

FAINALL
What, was it conscience then? Professed a
friendship! Oh, the pious friendships of the female sex!

MRS. MARWOOD
More tender, more sincere, and more enduring,
than all the vain and empty vows of men, whether professing love to
us or mutual faith to one another.

FAINALL
Ha, ha, ha! you are my wife's friend too.

MRS. MARWOOD
Shame and ingratitude! Do you reproach me?
You, you upbraid me? Have I been false to her, through strict
fidelity to you, and sacrificed my friendship to keep my love
inviolate? And have you the baseness to charge me with the guilt,
unmindful of the merit? To you it should be meritorious that I have
been vicious. And do you reflect that guilt upon me which should lie
buried in your bosom?

FAINALL
You misinterpret my reproof. I meant but to remind
you of the slight account you once could make of strictest ties when
set in competition with your love to me.

MRS. MARWOOD
'Tis false, you urged it with deliberate
malice. 'Twas spoke in scorn, and I never will forgive it.

FAINALL
Your guilt, not your resentment, begets your rage.
If yet you loved, you could forgive a jealousy: but you are stung to
find you are discovered.

MRS. MARWOOD
It shall be all discovered. You too shall be
discovered; be sure you shall. I can but be exposed. If I do it
myself I shall prevent your baseness.

FAINALL
Why, what will you do?

MRS. MARWOOD
Disclose it to your wife; own what has past
between us.

FAINALL
Frenzy!

MRS. MARWOOD
By all my wrongs I'll do't. I'll publish to
the world the injuries you have done me, both in my fame and fortune:
with both I trusted you, you bankrupt in honour, as indigent of
wealth.

FAINALL
Your fame I have preserved. Your fortune has been
bestowed as the prodigality of your love would have it, in pleasures
which we both have shared. Yet, had not you been false I had e'er
this repaid it. 'Tis true--had you permitted Mirabell with Millamant
to have stolen their marriage, my lady had been incensed beyond all
means of reconcilement: Millamant had forfeited the moiety of her
fortune, which then would have descended to my wife. And wherefore
did I marry but to make lawful prize of a rich widow's wealth, and
squander it on love and you?

MRS. MARWOOD
Deceit and frivolous pretence!

FAINALL
Death, am I not married? What's pretence? Am I not
imprisoned, fettered? Have I not a wife? Nay, a wife that was a
widow, a young widow, a handsome widow, and would be again a widow,
but that I have a heart of proof, and something of a constitution to
bustle through the ways of wedlock and this world. Will you yet be
reconciled to truth and me?

MRS. MARWOOD
Impossible. Truth and you are inconsistent.--I
hate you, and shall for ever.

FAINALL
For loving you?

MRS. MARWOOD
I loathe the name of love after such usage; and
next to the guilt with which you would asperse me, I scorn you most.
Farewell.

FAINALL
Nay, we must not part thus.

MRS. MARWOOD
Let me go.

FAINALL
Come, I'm sorry.

MRS. MARWOOD
I care not. Let me go. Break my hands,
do--I'd leave 'em to get loose.

FAINALL
I would not hurt you for the world. Have I no other
hold to keep you here?

MRS. MARWOOD
Well, I have deserved it all.

FAINALL
You know I love you.

MRS. MARWOOD
Poor dissembling! Oh, that--well, it is not
yet -

FAINALL
What? What is it not? What is it not yet? It is
not yet too late -

MRS. MARWOOD
No, it is not yet too late--I have that
comfort.

FAINALL
It is, to love another.

MRS. MARWOOD
But not to loathe, detest, abhor mankind,
myself, and the whole treacherous world.

FAINALL
Nay, this is extravagance. Come, I ask your pardon.
No tears--I was to blame, I could not love you and be easy in my
doubts. Pray forbear--I believe you; I'm convinced I've done you
wrong; and any way, every way will make amends: I'll hate my wife
yet more, damn her, I'll part with her, rob her of all she's worth,
and we'll retire somewhere, anywhere, to another world; I'll marry
thee--be pacified.--'Sdeath, they come: hide your face, your tears.
You have a mask: wear it a moment. This way, this way: be
persuaded.