"If Love the Virgin's Heart invade, / How, like a Moth, the simple Maid / Still plays about the Flame!"
— Gay, John (1685-1732)
Author
Work Title
Place of Publication
London
Publisher
Printed for John Watts
Date
1728
Metaphor
"If Love the Virgin's Heart invade, / How, like a Moth, the simple Maid / Still plays about the Flame!"
Metaphor in Context
MRS PEACHUM.
But if Polly should be in love, how should we help her, or how can she help herself? Poor Girl, I am in the utmost Concern about her.
AIR IV.
Why is your faithful Slave disdain'd? &c.
If Love the Virgin's Heart invade,
How, like a Moth, the simple Maid
Still plays about the Flame!
If soon she be not made a Wife,
Her Honour's sing'd, and then for Life,
She's--what I dare not name.
PEACHUM.
Look ye, Wife. A handsome Wench in our way of Business is as profitable as at the Bar of a Temple Coffee-House, who looks upon it as her livelihood to grant every Liberty but one. You see I would indulge the Girl as far as prudently we can. In any thing, but Marriage! After that, my Dear, how shall we be safe? Are we not then in her Husband's Power? For a Husband hath the absolute Power over all a Wife's Secrets but her own. If the Girl had the Discretion of a Court Lady, who can have a dozen young Fellows at her Ear without complying with one, I should not matter it; but Polly is Tinder, and a Spark will at once set her on a Flame. Married! If the Wench does not know her own Profit, sure she knows her own Pleasure better than to make herself a Property! My Daughter to me should be, like a Court Lady to a Minister of State, a Key to the whole Gang. Married! If the Affair is not already done, I'll terrify her from it, by the Example of our Neighbours.
(I.iv, pp. 5-6)
But if Polly should be in love, how should we help her, or how can she help herself? Poor Girl, I am in the utmost Concern about her.
AIR IV.
Why is your faithful Slave disdain'd? &c.
If Love the Virgin's Heart invade,
How, like a Moth, the simple Maid
Still plays about the Flame!
If soon she be not made a Wife,
Her Honour's sing'd, and then for Life,
She's--what I dare not name.
PEACHUM.
Look ye, Wife. A handsome Wench in our way of Business is as profitable as at the Bar of a Temple Coffee-House, who looks upon it as her livelihood to grant every Liberty but one. You see I would indulge the Girl as far as prudently we can. In any thing, but Marriage! After that, my Dear, how shall we be safe? Are we not then in her Husband's Power? For a Husband hath the absolute Power over all a Wife's Secrets but her own. If the Girl had the Discretion of a Court Lady, who can have a dozen young Fellows at her Ear without complying with one, I should not matter it; but Polly is Tinder, and a Spark will at once set her on a Flame. Married! If the Wench does not know her own Profit, sure she knows her own Pleasure better than to make herself a Property! My Daughter to me should be, like a Court Lady to a Minister of State, a Key to the whole Gang. Married! If the Affair is not already done, I'll terrify her from it, by the Example of our Neighbours.
(I.iv, pp. 5-6)
Categories
Provenance
C-H Lion
Citation
The Beggar's Opera. As it is Acted at the Theatre Royal in Lincoln's-Inn-Fields. Written by Mr. Gay (London: Printed for John Watts, 1728). <Link to ECCO>
Extremely popular and often reprinted, with ninety some entries in the ESTC. Reading Penguin edition, edited by Bryan Loughrey and T.O. Treadwell, which is based on the third, quarto, edition of 1729.
Extremely popular and often reprinted, with ninety some entries in the ESTC. Reading Penguin edition, edited by Bryan Loughrey and T.O. Treadwell, which is based on the third, quarto, edition of 1729.
Date of Entry
06/28/2013
