father’s heritage, If I commit into polluted hands, Red with the blood of offerings to false gods, The earth my father worked and worshipped in. It is my vineyard and it shall be mine, By God’s red hand the King should be ashamed; You too would be ashamed were you not shameless, To tempt a poor man’s soul with merchandise; You, smeared with spice, painted, and dripping perfume, A shameless woman, chaffering with a man, And he, the King, a dallier with God’s foes, Conspiring thus to cheat me of my vineyard. God puts a word into my mouth to say, He makes my mouth to spit upon you both. There is for you. And there is for the King. I spit upon you both and bid God curse you, Curse you to ruin and to rottenness. As here I curse you; him for making peace, Where no peace is, and you, you insolent woman, For being, like the King, a curse on Israel, A bringer down into the pit of hell.
MICAIAH. You shall avoid the presence when you curse. [_Exit with_ NABOTH.
JEZEBEL. You heard the curses of this frantic man? ASHOBAL _and_ PHARMAS. Madam, we did. We longed to silence him.
JEZEBEL. Rechab is captain of the guard today? PHARMAS. Yes, Madam.
ASHOBAL. Rechab, with the Jezreel troop, Mounts guard till night.
JEZEBEL. That will be well, Ashobal. You know the ivory room that the King made? You know that it was never planned nor used For anything, save as an inmost shrine For worshipping of God?
PHARMAS _and_ ASHOBAL. We know it, Madam.
JEZEBEL. Here is Micaiah back. Has Naboth gone?
MICAIAH. Yes, Madam, to the rabble of his friends Waiting his coming at the palace gate. Now they are taking him triumphantly Up to the feast, shouting, “He held his own Against the royal tyrants.” At the feast, When they have drunken, they will speak worse evil.
JEZEBEL. You all remember what he uttered here? How he misused the name of God, and cursed The King and me?
MICAIAH, ASHOBAL, _and_ PHARMAS (_together_). We do remember.
JEZEBEL. Wait, then, some minutes, till the feast be set, Then summon up the chapter of the priests, And Rechab with his troop of bodyguard. Then march with priests and soldiers to the banquet. Let the priests call for silence from the throng, And in the silence do you three stand forth, Bear witness against Naboth in these terms: “Thou didst blaspheme God and the King!” repeat The words he uttered, bear each other witness; And if a further witness be required, Say I, the Queen, will come to testify, Who heard the words, yet spared the speaker of them, So that the priests, whose cause it is, might judge. Then call upon the priests to utter judgment According to the laws of blasphemy.
MICAIAH, PHARMAS, _and_ ASHOBAL. We will obey your orders instantly. [_They go out._ JEZEBEL. Which brings the greater woe; to pass an evil, Or break your Being’s law to combat 

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