[_Exit_.
XANTIPPE. Alas, alas, and well-away!
I may curse the time that I was born,
Never woman had such fortune, I dare say;
Alas, two of my children be forlorn.
My fair daughter Dalilah is dead of the pox:
My dear son Ismael hanged up in chains.
Alas, the wind waveth his yellow locks,[248]
It slayeth my heart, and breaketh my brains.
Why should God punish and plague me so sore?
To see my children die so shamefully!
I will never eat bread in this world more,
With this knife will I slay myself by and by.
[_She would stick herself with a knife_.
_Enter_ BARNABAS.
BARNABAS. Beware what ye do; fye, mother, fye!
Will ye spill yourself for your own offence,
And seem for ever to exclude God's mercy?
God doth punish you for your negligence:
Wherefore take his correction with patience,
And thank him heartily, that of his goodness
He bringeth you in knowledge of your trespass.
For when my brother and sister were of young age,
You saw they were given to idleness and play,
Would apply no learning, but live in outrage.
And men complained on them every day.
Ye winked at their faults, and tiddled them alway;
By maintenance they grew to mischief and ill,
So at last God's justice did[249] them both spill.
In that God preserved me, small thank to you:
If God had not given me special grace,
To avoid evil and do good, this is true,
I had lived and died in as wretched case,
As they did, for I had both suffrance and space;
But it is an old proverb, you have heard it, I think:
That God will have see, shall not wink.
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