Pri.
After so many hours, lives, speeches spent,
Thus once again says Nestor from the Greeks:
Deliver Helen, and all damage else
(As honour, loss of time, travel, expence,
Wounds, friends, and what else dear that is consum'd
In hot digestion of this cormorant war)
Shall be struck off. Hector, what say you to't?

Hect.
Though no man lesser fears the Greeks than I,
As far as touches my particular, yet
There is no lady of more softer bowels,
More spungy to suck in the sense of fear,
More ready to cry out, who knows what follows?
Than Hector is. The Wound of Peace is Surety,(18) ^note

The beacon of the wise; the tent that searches
To th' bottom of the worst. Let Helen go.
Since the first sword was drawn about this question,
Ev'ry tithe soul 'mongst many thousand dismes
Hath been as dear as Helen. I mean, of ours.
If we have lost so many tenths of ours
To guard a thing not ours, not worth to us
(Had it our name) the value of one ten;
What merit's in that reason which denies
The yielding of her up?

Troi.
Fie, fie, my brother:
Weigh you the worth and honour of a King
(So great as our dread father) in a scale
Of common ounces? will you with counters sum
The vast proportion of his infinite?
And buckle in a Waste most fathomless,
With spans and inches so diminutive
As fears and reasons? fie, for godly shame!

Hel.
No marvel, though you bite so sharp at reasons,
You are so empty of them. Should not our father
Bear the great sway of his affairs with reasons;
Because your speech hath none, that tells him so?

Troi.
You are for dreams and slumbers, brother Priest,
You fur your gloves with reasons. Here are your reasons.
You know, an enemy intends you harm;
You know, a sword imploy'd is perillous;
And reason flies the object of all harm.
Who marvels then, when Helenus beholds
A Grecian and his sword, if he do set
The very wings of reason to his heels,
And fly like chidden Mercury from Jove,
Or like a star dis-orb'd!—Nay, if we talk of reason,
Let's shut our gates, and sleep: manhood and honour
Should have hare-hearts, would they but fat their thoughts
With this cramm'd reason: reason and respect
Make livers pale, and lustyhood deject.

Hect.
Brother, she is not worth what she doth cost
The holding.

Troi.
What is aught, but as 'tis valu'd?

Hect.
But Value dwells not in particular will;
It holds its estimate and dignity
As well wherein 'tis precious of it self,
As in the prizer: 'tis mad idolatry,
To make the service greater than the God;
And the Will dotes, that is inclinable
To what infectiously it self affects,
Without some image of th' affected merit.

Troi.
I take to day a wife, and my election
Is led on in the conduct of my Will;
My Will enkindled by mine eyes and ears,
Two traded pilots 'twixt the dangerous shores
Of Will and Judgment; how may I avoid
(Although my Will distaste what is elected)
The wife I chuse? there can be no evasion
To blench from this, and to stand firm by honour.
We turn not back the silks upon the merchant,
When we have spoil'd them; nor th' remainder viands
We do not throw in unrespective place,
Because we now are full. It was thought meet,
Paris should do some vengeance on the Greeks:
Your breath of full consent bellied his sails;
The seas and winds (old wranglers) took a truce,
And did him service: he touch'd the Ports desir'd;
And for an old aunt, whom the Greeks held captive,
He brought a Grecian Queen, whose youth and freshness
Wrinkles Apollo's, and makes stale the morning.(19) ^note

Why keep we her? the Grecians keep our aunt:
Is she worth keeping? why, she is a pearl,
Whose price hath launch'd above a thousand ships,
And turn'd crown'd Kings to merchants—
If you'll avouch, 'twas wisdom Paris went,
(As you must needs, for you all cry'd, go, go:)
If you'll confess, he brought home noble prize,
(As you must needs, for you all clap'd your hands,
And cry'd, inestimable!) why d'you now
The issue of your proper wisdoms rate,
And do a deed that fortune never did,
Beggar that estimation which you priz'd
Richer than sea and land? O theft most base!
That we have stoln what we do fear to keep!
But thieves, unworthy of a thing so stol'n,
Who in their country did them that disgrace,
We fear to warrant in our native place!

Cas. [within.]
Cry, Trojans, cry!

Pri.
What noise? what shriek is this?

Troi.
'Tis our mad sister, I do know her voice.

Cas. [within.]
Cry, Trojans!

Hect.
It is Cassandra. Enter Cassandra, with her hair about her ears.

Cas.
Cry, Trojans, cry; lend me ten thousand eyes,
And I will fill them with prophetick tears.

Hect.
Peace, sister, peace.

Cas.
Virgins and boys, mid-age and wrinkled old,
Soft infancy, that nothing can but cry,
Add to my clamour! let us pay betimes
A moiety of that mass of moan to come:
Cry, Trojans, cry; practice your eyes with tears.
Troy must not be, nor goodly Ilion stand:
Our fire-brand brother, Paris, burns us all.
Cry, Trojans, cry! a Helen and a wo;
Cry, cry, Troy burns, or else let Helen go. [Exit.

Hect.
Now, youthful Troilus, do not these high strains
Of Divination in our sister work
Some touches of remorse? Or is your blood
So madly hot, that no discourse of reason,

Nor fear of bad success in a bad cause,
Can qualifie the same?

Troi.
Why, brother Hector,
We may not think the justness of each act
Such and no other than event doth form it;
Nor once deject the courage of our minds,
Because Cassandra's mad; her brain-sick raptures
Cannot distaste the goodness of a quarrel,
Which hath our several honours all engag'd
To make it gracious. For my private part,
I am no more touch'd than all Priam's sons;
And, Jove forbid! there should be done amongst us
Such things, as might offend the weakest spleen
To fight for and maintain.

Par.
Else might the world convince of levity
As well my undertakings, as your counsels:
But I attest the Gods, your full consent
Gave wings to my propension, and cut off
All fears attending on so dire a project.
For what, alas, can these my single arms?
What propugnation is in one man's valour,
To stand the push and enmity of those
This quarrel would excite? yet I protest,
Were I alone to pass the difficulties,
And had as ample Power, as I have Will,
Paris should ne'er retract what he hath done,
Nor faint in the pursuit.

Pri.
Paris, you speak
Like one besotted on your sweet delights;
You have the honey still, but these the gall;
So, to be valiant, is no praise at all.

Par.
Sir, I propose not merely to my self
The pleasures such a Beauty brings with it:
But I would have the soil of her fair Rape
Wip'd off, in honourable keeping her.
What treason were it to the ransack'd Queen,
Disgrace to your great worths, and shame to me,
Now to deliver her possession up,
On terms of base compulsion? can it be,
That so degenerate a strain, as this,

Should once set footing in your generous bosoms?
There's not the meanest spirit on our Party,
Without a heart to dare, or sword to draw,
When Helen is defended: none so noble,
Whose life were ill bestow'd, or death unfam'd,
When Helen is the subject. Then, I say,
Well may we fight for her, whom, we know well,
The world's large spaces cannot parallel.

Hect.
Paris and Troilus, you have Both said well:(20) ^note


But on the cause and question now in hand
Have gloz'd but superficially; not much
Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought(21) ^note

The reasons, you alledge, do more conduce
To the hot passion of distemper'd blood,
Than to make up a free determination
'Twixt right and wrong: for pleasure and revenge
Have ears more deaf than adders, to the voice
Of any true decision. Nature craves,

All dues be render'd to their owners; now
What nearer debt in all humanity,
Than wife is to the husband? If this law

Of Nature be corrupted through affection,
And that great minds, of partial indulgence
To their benummed wills, resist the same;
There is a law in each well-order'd Nation,
To curb those raging appetites that are
Most disobedient and refractory.
If Helen then be wife to Sparta's King,
(As, it is known, she is) these moral laws
Of Nature, and of Nation, speak aloud
To have her back return'd. Thus to persist
In doing wrong, extenuates not wrong,
But makes it much more heavy. Hector's opinion
Is this in way of truth; yet ne'ertheless,
My sprightly brethren, I propend to you
In resolution to keep Helen still;
For 'tis a cause that hath no mean dependance
Upon our joint and several Dignities.

Troi.
Why, there you touch'd the life of our design:
Were it not Glory that we more affected
Than the performance of our heaving spleens,
I would not wish a drop of Trojan blood
Spent more in her defence. But, worthy Hector,
She is a theam of Honour and Renown,
A spur to valiant and magnanimous deeds,
Whose present courage may beat down our foes,
And Fame, in time to come, canonize us.
For, I presume, brave Hector would not lose
So rich advantage of a promis'd Glory,
As smiles upon the forehead of this Action,
For the wide World's revenue.

Hect.
I am yours,
You valiant Off-spring of great Priamus;
I have a roisting Challenge sent amongst
The dull and factious Nobles of the Greeks,
Will strike amazement to their drowsie spirits.
I was advertiz'd, their great General slept,
Whilst Emulation in the Army crept.
This, I presume, will wake him. [Exeunt.

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