Eliz monologue (Act 2) — The Saint's Tragedy

But none to you: Hard-hearted! Am I not enough your slave? Can I obey you more when he is gone Than now I do? Wherein, pray, has he hindered This holiness of mine, for which you make me Old ere my womanhood? [Conrad offers to go.] Stay, Sir, and tell me Is this the outcome of your 'father's care'? Was it not enough to poison all my joys With foulest scruples?--show me nameless sins, Where I, unconscious babe, blessed God for all things, But you must thus intrigue away my knight And plunge me down this gulf of widowhood! And I not twenty yet--a girl--an orphan-- That cannot stand alone! Was I too happy? O God! what lawful bliss do I not buy And balance with the smart of some sharp penance? Hast thou no pity? None? Thou drivest me To fiendish doubts: Thou, Jesus' messenger?