Hor monologue (Act 4) — The Poetaster

Was this the treason, this the dangerous plot, Thy clamorous tongue so bellow'd through the court? Hadst thou no other project to encrease Thy grace with Caesar, but this wolfish train, To prey upon the life of innocent mirth And harmless pleasures, bred of noble wit? Away! I loath thy presence; such as thou, They are the moths and scarabs of a state, The bane of empires, and the dregs of courts; Who, to endear themselves to an employment, Care not whose fame they blast, whose life they endanger; And, under a disguised and cobweb mask Of love unto their sovereign, vomit forth Their own prodigious malice; and pretending To be the props and columns of their safety, The guards unto his person and his peace. Disturb it most, with their false, lapwing-cries.