Why so disorder'd? Wherefore shakes thy frame?
Look on me; do I tremble? Am I pale?
When I let loose a sigh, I'll pardon thine.
Take my example, and be bravely wretched;
True grandeur rises from surmounted ills;
The wretched only can be truly great.
If not in kindness, yet in vengeance strike;
'Tis not Erixene, 'tis Perseus' wife.-

Thou'lt not resign me?

DEMETRIUS.

Not to Jove.

ERIXENE.

Then strike.

DEMETRIUS. [Gazing on her with astonishment.]

How can I strike? Stab at the face of heav'n?
How can I strike?-Yet how can I forbear?

I feel a thousand deaths, debating one.

A deity stands guard on every charm,
And strikes at me.

ERIXENE.

As will thy brother soon:
He's now in arms, and may be here this hour.
Nothing so cruel as too soft a soul;

This is strange tenderness, that breaks my heart;
Strange tenderness, that dooms to double death-
To Perseus.

DEMETRIUS.

True. But how to shun that horror?
By wounding thee, whom savage pards would spare?
My heart's inhabitant! my soul's ambition!

By wounding thee and bathing in thy blood;
That blood illustrious, through a radiant race
Of kings, and heroes, rolling down from gods?

ERIXENE.

Heroes and kings, and gods themselves, must yield

To dire necessity.

DEMETRIUS.

Since that absolves me,

Stand firm and fair.

ERIXENE

My bosom meets the point,

Than Perseus far more welcome to my breast.

DEMETRIUS.

Necessity, for gods themselves too strong,

Is weaker than thy charms.

ERIXENE.

[Drops the dagger.

O my Demetrius!

[Turns, and goes to the farther part of the stage.

And save me from a double suicide,

And one of tenfold death.-O Jove! O Jove!

[Falling on his knees.

[Suddenly starting up.

What can Jove? Why pray?

But I'm distracted.

What can I pray for?

ERIXENE.

For a heart.

DEMETRIUS.

Yes, one

That cannot feel. Mine bleeds at every vein.
Who never lov'd, ne'er suffer'd; he feels nothing,
Who nothing feels but for himself alone;
And when we feel for others, reason reels,
O'erloaded, from her path, and man runs mad.
As Love alone can exquisitely bless,
Love only feels that marvellous of pain;
Opens new veins of torture in the soul,
And wakes the nerve where agonies are born:
E'en Dymas, Perseus (hearts of adamant!)
Might weep these torments of their mortal foe.

To life from death, to transport from despair.

DEMETRIUS.

See, Perseus' wife! [Pointing at Erixene] Let Delia

tell the rest.

KING.

My grief-accustom'd heart can guess too well.

DEMETRIUS.

That sight turns all to guilt, but tears and death.

KING.

Death! Who shall quell false Perseus now in arms? Who pour my tempest on the Capitol?

How shall I sweeten life to thy sad spirit?

I'll quit my throne this hour, and thou shalt reign.

DEMETRIUS.

You recommend that death you would dissuade;
Ennobled thus by fame and empire lost,

As well as life!-Small sacrifice to Love.

[Going to stab himself, the King runs to prevent it;

but too late.

KING.

Ah, hold! nor strike thy dagger through my heart!

DEMETRIUS.

'Tis my first disobedience, and my last.

KING.

[Falls down.

There Philip fell! There Macedon expir'd!

I see the Roman eagle hovering o'er us,

And the shaft broke should bring her to the ground.

[Pointing at Demetrius.

DEMETRIUS.

Hear, good Antigonus! my last request:

Tell Perseus, if he'll sheath his impious sword
Drawn on his father, I'll forgive him all;

Though poor Erixene lies bleeding by :

Her blood cries Vengeance ;-but my father's Peace

[Dies.

KING.

As much his goodness wounds me as his death.
What then are both?-O Philip, once renown'd!
Where is the pride of Greece, the dread of Rome,
The theme of Athens, the wide world's example,
And the god Alexander's rival, now?

E'en at the foot of fortune's precipice,
Where the slave's sigh wafts pity to the prince,
And his omnipotence cries out for more.

ANTIGONUS.

As the swoln column of ascending smoke,
So solid swells thy grandeur, pigmy man!

KING.

My life's deep tragedy was plann'd with art,
From scene to scene advancing in distress,
Through a sad series, to this dire result;
As if the Thracian queen conducted all,
And wrote the moral in her children's blood;
Which seas might labour to wash out in vain.

Hear it, ye nations! distant ages! hear;
And learn the dread decrees of Jove to fear:
His dread decrees the strictest balance keep;
The father groans who made a mother weep;
But if no terror for yourselves can move,
Tremble, ye parents, for the child ye love;
For Your Demetrius: Mine is doom'd to bleed,
A guiltless victim, for his father's deed.