The Way of the World (Act 1 Scene 1)

Scene 1: A chocolate house

Mirabell and Fainall rising from cards. Betty waiting

MIRABELL
You are a fortunate man, Mr. Fainall

FAINALL
Have we done?

MIRABELL
What you please. I’ll play on to entertain you

FAINALL
No, I’ll give you your revenge another time, when you are not so indifferent; you are thinking of something else now, and play too negligently: the coldness of a losing gamester lessens the pleasure of the winner. I’d no more play with a man that slighted his ill fortune than I’d make love to a woman who undervalued the loss of her reputation

MIRABELL
You have a taste extremely delicate, and are for refining on your pleasures

FAINALL
Prithee, why so reserved? Something has put you out of humour

MIRABELL
Not at all: I happen to be grave to-day, and you are gay; that’s all

FAINALL
Confess, Millamant and you quarrelled last night, after I left you; my fair cousin has some humours that would tempt the patience of a Stoic. What, some coxcomb came in, and was well received by her, while you were by?

MIRABELL
Witwoud and Petulant, and what was worse, her aunt, your wife’s mother, my evil genius — or to sum up all in her own name, my old Lady Wishfort came in

FAINALL
Oh, there it is then: she has a lasting passion for you, and with reason. — What, then my wife was there?

MIRABELL
Yes, and Mrs. Marwood and three or four more, whom I never saw before; seeing me, they all put on their grave faces, whispered one another, then complained aloud of the vapours, and after fell into a profound silence

FAINALL
They had a mind to be rid of you

MIRABELL
For which reason I resolved not to stir. At last the good old lady broke through her painful taciturnity with an invective against long visits. I would not have understood her, but Millamant joining in the argument, I rose and with a constrained smile told her, I thought nothing was so easy as to know when a visit began to be troublesome; she reddened and I withdrew, without expecting her reply

FAINALL
You were to blame to resent what she spoke only in compliance with her aunt

MIRABELL
She is more mistress of herself than to be under the necessity of such a resignation

FAINALL
What? though half her fortune depends upon her marrying with my lady’s approbation?

MIRABELL
I was then in such a humour, that I should have been better pleased if she had been less discreet

FAINALL
Now I remember, I wonder not they were weary of you; last night was one of their cabal-nights: they have ’em three times a week and meet by turns at one another’s apartments, where they come together like the coroner’s inquest, to sit upon the murdered reputations of the week. You and I are excluded, and it was once proposed that all the male sex should be excepted; but somebody moved that to avoid scandal there might be one man of the community, upon which motion Witwoud and Petulant were enrolled members

MIRABELL
And who may have been the foundress of this sect? My Lady Wishfort, I warrant, who publishes her detestation of mankind, and full of the vigour of fifty-five, declares for a friend and ratafia; and let posterity shift for itself, she’ll breed no more

FAINALL
The discovery of your sham addresses to her, to conceal your love to her niece, has provoked this separation. Had you dissembled better, things might have continued in the state of nature

MIRABELL
I did as much as man could, with any reasonable conscience; I proceeded to the very last act of flattery with her, and was guilty of a song in her commendation. Nay, I got a friend to put her into a lampoon, and compliment her with the imputation of an affair with a young fellow, which I carried so far, that I told her the malicious town took notice that she was grown fat of a sudden; and when she lay in of a dropsy, persuaded her she was reported to be in labour. The devil’s in’t, if an old woman is to be flattered further, unless a man should endeavour downright personally to debauch her: and that my virtue forbade me. But for the discovery of this amour, I am indebted to your friend, or your wife’s friend, Mrs. Marwood

FAINALL
What should provoke her to be your enemy, unless she has made you advances which you have slighted? Women do not easily forgive omissions of that nature

MIRABELL
She was always civil to me, till of late. I confess I am not one of those coxcombs who are apt to interpret a woman’s good manners to her prejudice, and think that she who does not refuse ’em everything can refuse ’em nothing

FAINALL
You are a gallant man, Mirabell; and though you may have cruelty enough not to satisfy a lady’s longing, you have too much generosity not to be tender of her honour. Yet you speak with an indifference which seems to be affected, and confesses you are conscious of a negligence

MIRABELL
You pursue the argument with a distrust that seems to be unaffected, and confesses you are conscious of a concern for which the lady is more indebted to you than is your wife

FAINALL
Fie, fie, friend, if you grow censorious I must leave you: — I’ll look upon the gamesters in the next room

MIRABELL
Who are they?

FAINALL
Petulant and Witwoud. — Bring me some chocolate

MIRABELL
Betty, what says your clock?

BETTY
Turned of the last canonical hour, sir

MIRABELL
How pertinently the jade answers me! Ha! almost one a’ clock! (Looking on his watch) Oh, y’are come!