Mrs. Mar. Your merry note may be changed sooner than you think.
Milla. D’ye say so? Then I’m resolved I’ll have a song to keep up my spirits.
SCENE XII
[To them] Mincing.
Minc. The gentlemen stay but to comb, madam; and will wait on you.
Milla. Desire Mrs.—that is in the next room to sing the song I would have learnt yesterday. You shall hear it, madam —Not that there’s any great matter in it—but ’tis agreeable to my humour.
SONG
Set by Mr. John Eccles.
I
When ’tis not with ambition joined;
A sickly flame, which if not fed expires;
And feeding, wastes in self-consuming fires.
II
Or am’rous youth, that gives the joy;
But ’tis the glory to have pierced a swain,
For whom inferior beauties sighed in vain.
III
When I insult a rival’s eyes:
If there’s delight in love, ’tis when I see
That heart which others bleed for, bleed for me.
SCENE XIII
[To them] Petulant, Witwoud.
Milla. Is your animosity composed, gentlemen?
Wit. Raillery, raillery, madam, we have no animosity—we hit off a little wit now and then, but no animosity—The falling out of wits is like the falling out of lovers—We agree in the main, like treble and base. Ha, Petulant!
Pet. Ay, in the main—but when I have a humour to contradict—
Wit. Ay, when he has a humour to contradict, then I contradict too. What, I know my cue. Then we contradict one another like two battledores; for contradictions beget one another like Jews.
Pet. If he says black’s black—if I have a humour to say ’tis blue—let that pass—all’s one for that. If I have a humour to prove it, it must be granted.
Wit. Not positively must—but it may—it may.
Pet. Yes, it positively must, upon proof positive.
Wit. Ay, upon proof positive it must; but upon proof presumptive it only may. That’s a logical distinction now, madam.
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