Madam, what you wou’d seem to doubt,
Shall be to all the world made out, 290
How I’ve been drubb’d, and with what spirit
And magnanimity I bear it;
And if you doubt it to be true,
I’ll stake myself down against you: 
And if I fail in love or troth, 295
Be you the winner, and take both.

Quoth she, I’ve beard old cunning stagers
Say, fools for arguments use wagers;
And though I prais’d your valour, yet
I did not mean to baulk your wit; 300
Which, if you have, you must needs know
What I have told you before now,
And you b’ experiment have prov’d,
I cannot love where I’m belov’d.

Quoth Hudibras, ’tis a caprich 305
Beyond th’ infliction of a witch;
So cheats to play with those still aim
That do not understand the game. 
Love in your heart as icily burns
As fire in antique Roman urns, 310
To warm the dead, and vainly light
Those only that see nothing by’t. 
Have you not power to entertain,
And render love for love again;
As no man can draw in his breath 315
At once, and force out air beneath? 
Or do you love yourself so much,
To bear all rivals else a grutch? 
What fate can lay a greater curse
Than you upon yourself would force? 320
For wedlock without love, some say,
Is but a lock without a key. 
It is a kind of rape to marry
One that neglects, or cares not for ye: 
For what does make it ravishment, 325
But b’ing against the mind’s consent? 
A rape that is the more inhuman
For being acted by a woman. 
Why are you fair, but to entice us
To love you, that you may despise us? 330
But though you cannot Love, you say,
Out of your own fanatick way,
Why should you not at least allow
Those that love you to do so too? 
For, as you fly me, and pursue 330
Love more averse, so I do you;
And am by your own doctrine taught
To practise what you call a fau’t.

Quoth she, If what you say is true,
You must fly me as I do you; 340
But ’tis not what we do, but say,
In love and preaching, that must sway.

Quoth he, To bid me not to love,
Is to forbid my pulse to move,
My beard to grow, my ears to prick up, 345
Or (when I’m in a fit) to hickup: 
Command me to piss out the moon,
And ’twill as easily be done: 
Love’s power’s too great to be withstood
By feeble human flesh and blood. 350
’Twas he that brought upon his knees
The hect’ring, kill-cow Hercules;
Transform’d his leager-lion’s skin
T’ a petticoat, and made him spin;