MARGARET
    I cannot tell.  Perhaps he has not been told. 
    Perhaps he might have seen them if he would. 
    I have known him more quick-sighted.  Let that pass. 
    All things seem chang’d, I think.  I had a friend,
    (I can’t but weep to think him alter’d too,)
    These things are best forgotten; but I knew
    A man, a young man, young, and full of honor,
    That would have pick’d a quarrel for a straw,
    And fought it out to the extremity,
    E’en with the dearest friend he had alive,
    On but a bare surmise, a possibility,
    That Margaret had suffer’d an affront. 
    Some are too tame, that were too splenetic once.

    SANDFORD
    ’Twere best he should be told of these affronts.

    MARGARET
    I am the daughter of his father’s friend,
    Sir Walter’s orphan-ward. 
    I am not his servant maid, that I should wait
    The opportunity of a gracious hearing,
    Enquire the times and seasons when to put
    My peevish prayer up at young Woodvil’s feet,
    And sue to him for slow redress, who was
    Himself a suitor late to Margaret. 
    I am somewhat proud:  and Woodvil taught me pride. 
    I was his favourite once, his playfellow in infancy,
    And joyful mistress of his youth. 
    None once so pleasant in his eyes as Margaret. 
    His conscience, his religion, Margaret was,
    His dear heart’s confessor, a heart within that heart,
    And all dear things summ’d up in her alone. 
    As Margaret smil’d or frown’d John liv’d or died: 
    His dress, speech, gesture, studies, friendships, all
    Being fashion’d to her liking. 
    His flatteries taught me first this self-esteem,
    His flatteries and caresses, while he loved. 
    The world esteem’d her happy, who had won
    His heart, who won all hearts;
    And ladies envied me the love of Woodvil.

    SANDFORD
    He doth affect the courtier’s life too much,
    Whose art is to forget,
    And that has wrought this seeming change in him,
    That was by nature noble. 
    ’Tis these court-plagues, that swarm about our house,
    Have done the mischief, making his fancy giddy
    With images of state, preferment, place,
    Tainting his generous spirits with ambition.

    MARGARET
    I know not how it is;
    A cold protector is John grown to me. 
    The mistress, and presumptive wife, of Woodvil
    Can never stoop so low to supplicate
    A man, her equal, to redress those wrongs,
    Which he was bound first to prevent;
    But which his own neglects have sanction’d rather,
    Both sanction’d and provok’d:  a mark’d neglect,
    And strangeness fast’ning bitter on his love,
    His love which long has been upon the wane. 
    For me, I am determined what to do: 
    To leave this house this night, and lukewarm John,
    And trust for food to the earth and Providence.