[To them] HEARTWELL.
BELL.Who? Heartwell? Ay, but he knows better things.How now, George, where hast thou been snarling odious truths, and entertaining company, like a physician, with discourse of their diseases and infirmities? What fine lady hast thou been putting out of conceit with herself, and persuading that the face she had been making all the morning was none of her own? For I know thou art as unmannerly and as unwelcome to a woman as a looking-glass after the smallpox.
HEART.I confess I have not been sneering fulsome lies and nauseous flattery; fawning upon a little tawdry whore, that will fawn upon me again, and entertain any puppy that comes, like a tumbler, with the same tricks over and over.For such, I guess, may have been your late employment.
BELL.Would thou hadst come a little sooner.Vainlove would have wrought thy conversion, and been a champion for the cause.
HEART.What! has he been here? That's one of love's April fools;is always upon some errand that's to no purpose; ever embarking in adventures, yet never comes to harbour.
SHARP.That's because he always sets out in foul weather, loves to buffet with the winds, meet the tide, and sail in the teeth of opposition.
HEART.What! Has he not dropt anchor at Araminta?
BELL.Truth on't is she fits his temper best, is a kind of floating island; sometimes seems in reach, then vanishes and keeps him busied in the search.
SHARP.She had need have a good share of sense to manage so capricious a lover.
BELL.Faith I don't know, he's of a temper the most easy to himself in the world; he takes as much always of an amour as he cares for, and quits it when it grows stale or unpleasant.
SHARP.An argument of very little passion, very good understanding, and very ill nature.
HEART.And proves that Vainlove plays the fool with discretion.
SHARP.You, Bellmour, are bound in gratitude to stickle for him;you with pleasure reap that fruit, which he takes pains to sow: he does the drudgery in the mine, and you stamp your image on the gold.
BELL.He's of another opinion, and says I do the drudgery in the mine.Well, we have each our share of sport, and each that which he likes best; 'tis his diversion to set, 'tis mine to cover the partridge.
HEART.And it should be mine to let 'em go again.
SHARP.Not till you had mouthed a little, George.I think that's all thou art fit for now.
HEART.Good Mr.Young-Fellow, you're mistaken; as able as yourself, and as nimble, too, though I mayn't have so much mercury in my limbs; 'tis true, indeed, I don't force appetite, but wait the natural call of my lust, and think it time enough to be lewd after I have had the temptation.
BELL.Time enough, ay, too soon, I should rather have expected, from a person of your gravity.
HEART.Yet it is oftentimes too late with some of you young, termagant, flashy sinners--you have all the guilt of the intention, and none of the pleasure of the practice--'tis true you are so eager in pursuit of the temptation, that you save the devil the trouble of leading you into it.Nor is it out of discretion that you don't swallow that very hook yourselves have baited, but you are cloyed with the preparative, and what you mean for a whet, turns the edge of your puny stomachs.Your love is like your courage, which you show for the first year or two upon all occasions; till in a little time, being disabled or disarmed, you abate of your vigour; and that daring blade which was so often drawn, is bound to the peace for ever after.
BELL.Thou art an old fornicator of a singular good principle indeed, and art for encouraging youth, that they may be as wicked as thou art at thy years.
