LOVE AND INTRIGUE

A monologue from the play by Friedrich Schiller

NOTE: This anonymous translation was first published in 1909 by George Bell and Sons, London. It is now a public domain work and may be performed without royalties.

LADY MILFORD: Pray spare me. I would gladly give a jewel in exchange for every hour's respite from such company! I always have my rooms tapestried with these creatures! --Narrow-minded, miserable beings, who are quite shocked if by chance a candid and heart-felt word should escape one's lips!--and stand aghast as though they saw an apparition--Slaves, moved by a single puppet wire, which I can govern as easily as the threads of my embroidery!--What can I have in common with such insipid wretches, whose souls, like their watches, are regulated by machinery? What pleasure can I have in the society of people whose answers to my questions I know beforehand? How can I hold communion with men, who dare not venture on an opinion of their own, lest it should differ from mine! Away with them--I care not to ride a horse that has not spirit enough to champ the bit!