243 ALAHAM: A TRAGEDY. BY FULKE GREVILLE, LORD BROOKE. ALAHAM, Second Son to the KING of ORMUs, deposes his Father: whose Eyes, and the Eyes of his elder Brother ZOPHI, (acting upon a maxim of Oriental Policy), he causes to be put out. They, blind, and fearing for their Lives, wander about. In this Extremity they are separately met by the King's Daughter CELICA, who conducts them to places of Refuge; hiding her Father amid the Vaults of a Temple, and guiding her Brother to take Sanctuary at the Altar. KING. CELICA. King. Cælica; thou only child, whom I repent Who nothing but mischance can have to friend. When our succession springs, then ripe to fall. Age there is also in a prince's state, Which is contempt, grown of misgovernment; Then mark! Blind, as a man: scorn'd, as a king; Life without joy, or light: what can it bring, O safety thou art then a hateful thing, When children's death assures the father's state. But headlong run down steep necessity. Cælica, then cease; importune me no more : Where they that yield can only drowned be. King. Occasion to my son hath turn'd her face; Calica. Yet live : Live for the state. King. Whose ruins glasses are, Wherein see errors of myself I must, And hold my life of danger, shame, and care. King. Nothing is left me but myself to lose. Cælica, by all thou ow'st the gods and me, If nature saw no cause of sudden ends, She, that but one way made to draw our breath, Calica. Yet, Sir, if weakness be not such a sand King. This sword, thy hands, may offer up my breath And plague my life's remissness in my death. Calica. Unto that duty if these hands be born, Now merely grace; since death doth but forgive Pain must displease that satisfies offence. King. Chance hath left death no more to spoil but sense. Calica. Then sword, do justice' office thorough me : I offer more than that he hates to thee. [Offers to kill herself. King. Ah! stay thy hand. My state no equal hath, And much more matchless my strange vices be: One kind of death becomes not thee and me. Kings' plagues by chance or destiny should fall; Headlong he perish must that ruins all. Calica. No cliff or rock is so precipitate, King. Cælica, and wilt thou Alaham exceed? Calica. Then be a king, no tyrant of thyself: and be what you will: what nature lent Is still in hers, and not our government. King. If disobedience, and obedience both, Still do me hurt; in what strange state am I? But hold thy course: it well becomes my blood, To do their parents mischief with their good. Calica. Yet, Sir, hark to the poor oppressed tears The just men's moan, that suffer by your fall; A prince's charge is to protect them all. And shall it nothing be that I am yours? The world without, my heart within, doth know, I never had unkind, unreverent powers. If thus you yield to Alaham's treachery, He ruins you: 'tis you, Sir, ruin me. King. Celica, call up the dead; awake the blind; Turn back the time; bid winds tell whence they come : As vainly strength speaks to a broken mind. Fly from me, Calica, hate all I do : Calica. Will you do that which Alaham cannot ? And not one king alone: since princes all All laws have lost authority in me. Calica. The laws of power chain'd to men's humors be. The good have conscience; the ill (like instruments) Are, in the hands of wise authority, Moved, divided, used, or laid down; Still, with desire, kept subject to a crown. Stir up all states, all spirits: hope and fear, King. Put down my son: for that must be the way: A father's shame; a prince's tyranny; The sceptre ever shall misjudged be. Calica. Let them fear rumour that do work amiss; Blood, torments, death, horrors of cruelty, Have time, and place. Look through these skins of fear, Let him not prey on all thy race, and thee: King. Danger is come, and must I now unarm, Passion! be thou my legacy and will; To thee I give my life, crown, reputation; My pomps to cloud; and (as forlorn with men) Though fear'd, sought, and a king, to live unknown. This living darkness, wherein I do go. Calica. My soul now joys. Doing breathes horror out. Absence must be our first step. Let us fly : A pause in rage makes Alaham to doubt; With love, or hate, to seek you every where. As dainty sparks, which till men dead do know, But hark! what's this? Malice doth never sleep : Sir, follow me: Misfortune's worst is come; Her strength is change: and change yields better doom. Choice now is past. Hard by there is a pile, Built under color of a sacrifice; If God do grant, it is a place to save ; If God denies, it is a ready grave. ZоPHI appears. Calica. What see I here? more spectacles of woe! And are my kindred only made to be Agents and patients in iniquity? Ah forlorn wretch! ruin's example right! Lost to thyself, not to thy enemy, Whose hand even while thou fliest thou fall'st into ; And with thy fall thy father dost undo. Save one I may: Nature would save them both; Is nature narrow to adversity? No, no. Our God left duty for a law; Despair, in bonds; fear, of itself in awe : Dost thou, that canst not see, hope to escape? Zophi. Make calm thy rage: pity a ghost distrest : My right, my liberty, I freely give: Give him, that never harm'd thee, leave to live. Calica. Nay, God, the world, thy parents it deny ; * Zophi is represented as a prince of weak understanding. |