Fred.  Torment farre worse then death.

Valen.  Ile follow thee:  Deare Fredericke, like thy face, be thy words faire.

Fre.  This monstrous dealing doubles my deaths care.

Valen.  What shall I call thee to allay this ire?

Fred.  Why, call me son and blush at thy desire.

Valen.  I never brought thee foorth.

Fred.  Art thou not wife Unto my father?

Val.  Thinke upon thy life: 
It lyes like mine, onely in gentle breath;
Or that thy father’s dead, and after death
’Tis in my choice to marry whom I will.

Fred.  Any but me.

Valen.  O doe not thinke so ill,
Rather thinke, thou art a stranger, not his sonne;
Then ’tis no incest tho the Act be done. 
Nature unto her selfe is too unkind
To buzze such scruples into Fredericks minde;
Twas a device of man to avoid selfe love,
Else every pleasure in one stocke should move,
Beautie in grace part never from the kinne.

Fred.  If thou persever as thou hast begun,
I shall forget I am my fathers sonne,
I shall forget thou art my fathers wife,
And where ’tis I must die abridge thy life.

Valen.  Why did’st not kill me, being thy prisoner then, But friendly didst deliver me again[212] Unto thy father, wert not thou didst love me?

Fred.  Beyond all sufferance, monster, thou dost move me. 
’Twas for my fathers sake, not for thine owne;
That, to thy lifes losse, thou hadst throughly knowne
But that relenting nature playde her part,
To save thy blood whose losse had slaine his heart: 
And it repents me not hee doth survive,
But that his fortune was so ill to wive. 
Come, kill, for for that you came; shun delayes
Lest living Ile tell this to thy dispraise,
Make him to hate thee, as he hath just cause,
And like a strumpet turne thee to the lawes.

Valen.  Good Fredericke.

Fred.  Tis resolv’d on, I haue said.

Valen.  Then fatall Ministers I craue your ayde.

    Enter Van. and Mont.

Come, Vandermas, Montano, wheres your corde? 
Quicklie dispatch, strangle this hatefull Lord. 
Or stay:  because I love him, he shall chuse
The easiest of three deaths that we may use,
The halter, poyson, or bloodshedding blade.

Fred.  Any of them.

Valen.  This Aconite’s well made, a cup of poyson
Stuft with despatching simples, give him this,
And he shall quickly leave all earthly blisse. 
There, take it, Fredericke, our last guift of grace;
Since thou must die, Ile have thee die apace.