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SCENE V

Another room in Philario's house.
Enter POSTHUMUS.

Post.
Is there no way for men to be but women

Must be half-workers? We are all bastards;

And that most venerable man which I

Did call my father, was I know not where

When I was stamp'd; some coiner with his tools

Made me a counterfeit: yet my mother seem'd

The Dian of that time: so doth my wife

The nonpareil of this. O, vengeance, vengeance!

Me of my lawful pleasure she restrain'd

And pray'd me oft forbearance; did it with (11)

A pudency so rosy the sweet view on't

Might well have warm'd old Saturn; that I thought her

As chaste as unsunn'd snow. O, all the devils I

This yellow Iachimo, in an hour,--was't not?--

Or less,--at first?--perchance he spoke not, but,

Like all a full-acorn'd boar, a German one,

Cried 'O!' and mounted; found no opposition

But what he look'd for should oppose and she

Should from encounter guard. Could I find out (20)

The woman's part in me! For there's no motion

That tends to vice in man, but I affirm

It is the woman's part: be it lying, note it,

The woman's; flattering, hers; deceiving, hers;

Lust and rank thoughts, hers, hers; revenges, hers;

Ambitions, covetings, change of prides, disdain,

Nice longing, slanders, mutability,

All faults that may be named, nay that hell knows,

Why, hers, in part or all; but rather, all;

For even to vice

They are not constant, but are changing still (31)

One vice, but of a minute old, for one

Not half so old as that. I'll write against them,

Detest them, curse them: yet 'tis greater skill

In a true hate, to pray they have their will:

The very devils cannot plague them better. [Exit.

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