Instant Monologues
Moliere Tartuffe Instant Monologue


TARTUFFE
by Moliére

INT: PARIS

TARTUFFE

Love for the beauty of eternal things

Cannot destroy our love for earthly beauty;

Our mortal senses well may be entranced

By perfect works that Heaven has fashioned here.

Its charms reflected shine in such as you,

And in yourself, its rarest miracles;

It has displayed such marvels in your face,

That eyes are dazed, and hearts are rapt away;

I could not look on you, the perfect creature,

Without admiring Nature's great Creator,

And feeling all my heart inflamed with love

For you, His fairest image of Himself.

At first I trembled lest this secret love

Might be the Evil Spirit's artful snare;

I even schooled my heart to flee your beauty,

Thinking it was a bar to my salvation.

But soon, enlightened, O all lovely one,

I saw how this my passion may be blameless,

How I may make it fit with modesty,

And thus completely yield my heart to it.

'Tis I must own, a great presumption in me

To dare make you the offer of my heart;

My love hopes all things from your perfect goodness,

And nothing from my own poor weak endeavor.

You are my hope, my stay, my peace of heart;

On you depends my torment or my bliss;

And by your doom of judgment, I shall be

Blest, if you will; or damned, by your decree.






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