ne. I wouldn't believe it, sir, if you gave your word!
Orgon. I will make you believe it by-and-by.
Dorine. Yes. You're going to tell us a bald-faced lie.
Orgon. I am only saying what you will soon see.
Dorine. Nonsense!
Orgon. What I say, dear girl, will soon be.
Dorine. Go on. Don't believe him! It's too bizarre!
He's joking.
Orgon. I say . . .
Dorine. No, you've gone too far,
And no one believes you.
Orgon. Damn you, you shrew . . .
Dorine. Well, I believe you then; the worse for you.
What? Monsieur, can you pose as one who's sage,
Gravely stroking your breaded visage?
And still be fool enough to wish . . .
Orgon. Hear me!
I have given you too much liberty,
And it no longer gives me any pleasure.
Dorine. Monsieur, please. Keep your anger within measure.
Are you mocking us with your silly plot?
Your daughter is no match for a bigot;
He has other schemes to worry about.
And what would you gain if she wed this lout?
With your wealth, what benefit would it bring
To pick a bum . . .
Orgon. Ssh! Say he has nothing;
For that reason, you should revere him the more.
He is a holy man and nobly poor.
It raises him up to greater grandeur
That he has renounced all wealth by his pure
Detachment from the merely temporal
And his powerful love for the Eternal.
But my assistance may give him the means
To restore his lands and remove his liens.
He is a man of repute in the land of his birth,
And, even as he is, he's a man of worth.
Dorine. Yes, so he tells us, but his vanity
Does not sit so well with true piety.
A man pleased with a simple sanctity
Needn't vaunt his name and his dignity,
And the humility born of devotion
Suffers beneath such blatant ambition.
What good is his pride? . . . But perhaps I digress:
Let's speak of the man--not his nobleness.
Can you bestow, without feeling like a rat,
A girl like this on a man like that?
And shouldn't you think of propriety
And foresee the end with anxiety?
We know that some girls cannot remain chaste
If their husband's tush is not to their taste,
And that