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  • Title: The Honest Whore, Part 1 (Quarto 1, 1604)
  • Editor: Joost Daalder
  • Contributing editor: Brett Greatley-Hirsch
  • Coordinating editor: Brett Greatley-Hirsch
  • General textual editor: Eleanor Lowe

    • ISBN: 978-1-55058-490-5

    Copyright Digital Renaissance Editions. This text may be freely used for educational, non-profit purposes; for all other uses contact the Editor.
    Authors: Thomas Dekker, Thomas Middleton
    Editor: Joost Daalder
    Peer Reviewed

    The Honest Whore, Part 1 (Quarto 1, 1604)

    THE HONEST WHORE.
    Should haue this golden hooke, and lasciuious baite,
    Throwne out to the full length, why let me tell you:
    1060I ha seene letters sent from that white hand,
    Tuning such musicke to Matheos eare.
    Bell. Mathaeo! thats true, but beleeue it, I
    No sooner had laid hold vpon your presence,
    But straight mine eye conueid you to my heart.
    1065Hipo. Oh, you cannot faine with me, why, I know Lady,
    This is the common passion of you all,
    To hooke in a kind gentleman, and then
    Abuse his coyne, conueying it to your louer,
    And in the end you shew him a french trick,
    1070And so you leaue him, that a coach may run
    Betweene his legs for bredth.
    Bell O by my soule!
    Not I: therein ile proue an honest whore,
    In being true to one, and to no more.
    1075Hipo. If any be disposde to trust your oath,
    Let him: ile not be he, I know you feine
    All that you speake, I: for a mingled harlot,
    Is true in nothing but in being false.
    What! shall I teach you how to loath your selfe?
    1080And mildly too: not without sense or reason.
    Bell. I am content, I would faine loath my selfe,
    If you not loue me.
    Hipo. Then if your gratious blood be not all wasted,
    I shall assay to doo't.
    1085Lend me your silence, and attention,- you haue no soule,
    That makes you wey so light: heauens treasure bought it,
    And halfe a crowne hath sold it: for your body
    Is like the common shoare, that still receiues
    All the townes filth. The sin of many men
    1090Is within you, and thus much I suppose,
    That if all your committers stood in ranke,
    Theide make a lane, (in which your shame might dwell)
    And with their spaces reach from hence to hell.
    Nay, shall I vrge it more, there has bene knowne,
    As
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