rre not, quinch not, make no noyse: for if
thou dost it will be worse for thee. Quoth _Esdras_, what euer thou bee
at whose mercie I lye, spare me, and I wil giue thee as much gold as
thou wilt aske. Put me to anie paines my life reserued, and I willingly
will sustaine them: cut off my armes and legs, and leaue me as a lazer
to some loathsome spittle, where I may but liue a yeare to pray and
repent me. For thy brothers death the despayre of minde that hath euer
since haunted mee, the guiltie gnawing worme of conscience I feele
may bee sufficient penaunce. Thou canst not send me to such a hell, as
alreadie there is in my hart. To dispatch me presently is no reuenge,
it wil soone be forgotten: let me dye a lingring death, it will be
remembred a great deale longer. A lingring death maye auaile my soule,
but it is the illest of ills that can befortune my bodie. For my soules
health I beg my bodies torment: bee not thou a diuell to torment my
soule, and send me to eternall damnation. Thy ouer-hanging sword
hides heauen from my sight, I dare not looke vp, least I embrace my
deaths-wound vnawares: I cannot pray to God, and plead to thee both
at once. Ay mee, alreadie I see my life buried in the wrinckles of thy
browes: say but I shall liue, though thou meanest to kill me. Nothing
confounds like to suddaine terror, it thrusts euerie sense out of
office. Poyson wrapt vp in sugred pills is but halfe a poyson: the feare
of deaths lookes are more terrible than his stroake. The whilest I viewe
death, my faith is deaded: where a mans feare is, there his heart is.
Feare neuer engenders hope: how can I hope that heauens father will saue
mee from the hell euerlasting, when he giues me ouer to the hell of thy
furie.

_Heraclide_, now thinke I on thy teares sowen in the dust (thy teares,
that my bloudie minde made barraine). In reuenge of thee, God hardens
this mans heart against mee: yet I did not slaughter thee, though
hundreds else my hand hath brought to the shambles. Gentle sir, learne
of mee what it is to clog your conscience with murder, to haue your
dreames, your sleepes, your solitarie walkes troubled and disquieted
with murther. Your shaddowe by daye will affright you, you will not see
a weapon vnsheathd, but immediately you will imagine it is predestinate
for your destruction.

This murder is a house diuided within it selfe: it subornes a mans
owne soule to informe against him: his soule (being his accuser) brings
foorth his