The Inside of a Church. | |
| |
Enter DON PEDRO, DON JOHN, LEONATO, FRIAR FRANCIS, CLAUDIO, BENEDICK, HERO, BEATRICE, &c. | |
| Leon. Come, Friar Francis, be brief: only to the plain form of marriage, and you shall recount their particular duties afterwards. | |
| Friar. You come hither, my lord, to marry this lady? | 4 |
| Claud. No. | |
| Leon. To be married to her, friar; you come to marry her. | |
| Friar. Lady, you come hither to be married to this count? | |
| Hero. I do. | 8 |
| Friar. If either of you know any inward impediment, why you should not be conjoined, I charge you, on your souls, to utter it. | |
| Claud. Know you any, Hero? | |
| Hero. None, my lord. | |
| Friar. Know you any, count? | 12 |
| Leon. I dare make his answer; none. | |
| Claud. O! what men dare do! what men may do! what men daily do, not knowing what they do! | |
| Bene. How now! Interjections? Why then, some be of laughing, as ah! ha! he! | |
| Claud. Stand thee by, friar. Father, by your leave: | 16 |
| Will you with free and unconstrained soul | |
| Give me this maid, your daughter? | |
| Leon. As freely, son, as God did give her me. | |
| Claud. And what have I to give you back whose worth | 20 |
| May counterpoise this rich and precious gift? | |
| D. Pedro. Nothing, unless you render her again. | |
| Claud. Sweet prince, you learn me noble thankfulness. | |
| There, Leonato, take her back again: | 24 |
| Give not this rotten orange to your friend; | |
| She’s but the sign and semblance of her honour. | |
| Behold! how like a maid she blushes here. | |
| O! what authority and show of truth | 28 |
| Can cunning sin cover itself withal. | |
| Comes not that blood as modest evidence | |
| To witness simple virtue? Would you not swear, | |
| All you that see her, that she were a maid, | 32 |
| By these exterior shows? But she is none: | |
| She knows the heat of a luxurious bed; | |
| Her blush is guiltiness, not modesty. | |
| Leon. What do you mean, my lord? | 36 |
| Claud. Not to be married, | |
| Not to knit my soul to an approved wanton. | |
| Leon. Dear my lord, if you, in your own proof, | |
| Have vanquish’d the resistance of her youth, | 40 |
| And made defeat of her virginity,— | |
| Claud. I know what you would say: if I have known her, | |
| You’ll say she did embrace me as a husband, | |
| And so extenuate the ’forehand sin: | 44 |
| No, Leonato, | |
| I never tempted her with word too large; | |
| But, as a brother to his sister, show’d | |
| Bashful sincerity and comely love. | 48 |
| Hero. And seem’d I ever otherwise to you? | |
| Claud. Out on thee! Seeming! I will write against it: | |
| You seem to me as Dian in her orb, | |
| As chaste as is the bud ere it be blown; | 52 |
| But you are more intemperate in your blood | |
| Than Venus, or those pamper’d animals | |
| That rage in savage sensuality. | |
| Hero. Is my lord well, that he doth speak so wide? | 56 |
| Leon. Sweet prince, why speak not you? | |
| D. Pedro. What should I speak? | |
| I stand dishonour’d, that have gone about | |
| To link my dear friend to a common stale. | 60 |
| Leon. Are these things spoken, or do I but dream? | |
| D. John. Sir, they are spoken, and these things are true. | |
| Bene. This looks not like a nuptial. | |
| Hero. True! O God! | 64 |
| Claud. Leonato, stand I here? | |
| Is this the prince? Is this the prince’s brother? | |
| Is this face Hero’s? Are our eyes our own? | |
| Leon. All this is so; but what of this, my lord? | 68 |
| Claud. Let me but move one question to your daughter; | |
| And by that fatherly and kindly power | |
| That you have in her, bid her answer truly. | |
| Leon. I charge thee do so, as thou art my child. | 72 |
| Hero. O, God defend me! how am I beset! | |
| What kind of catechizing call you this? | |
| Claud. To make you answer truly to your name. | |
| Hero. Is it not Hero? Who can blot that name | 76 |
| With any just reproach? | |
| Claud. Marry, that can Hero: | |
| Hero itself can blot out Hero’s virtue. | |
| What man was he talk’d with you yesternight | 80 |
| Out at your window, betwixt twelve and one? | |
| Now, if you are a maid, answer to this. | |
| Hero. I talk’d with no man at that hour, my lord. | |
| D. Pedro. Why, then are you no maiden. Leonato, | 84 |
| I am sorry you must hear: upon mine honour, | |
| Myself, my brother, and this grieved count, | |
| Did see her, hear her, at that hour last night, | |
| Talk with a ruffian at her chamber-window; | 88 |
| Who hath indeed, most like a liberal villain, | |
| Confess’d the vile encounters they have had | |
| A thousand times in secret. | |
| D. John. Fie, fie! they are not to be nam’d, my lord, | 92 |
| Not to be spoke of; | |
| There is not chastity enough in language | |
| Without offence to utter them. Thus, pretty lady, | |
| I am sorry for thy much misgovernment. | 96 |
| Claud. O Hero! what a Hero hadst thou been, | |
| If half thy outward graces had been plac’d | |
| About thy thoughts and counsels of thy heart! | |
| But fare thee well, most foul, most fair! farewell, | 100 |
| Thou pure impiety, and impious purity! | |
| For thee I’ll lock up all the gates of love, | |
| And on my eyelids shall conjecture hang, | |
| To turn all beauty into thoughts of harm, | 104 |
| And never shall it more be gracious. | |
| Leon. Hath no man’s dagger here a point for me? [HERO swoons. | |
| Beat. Why, how now, cousin! wherefore sink you down? | |
| D. John. Come, let us go. These things, come thus to light, | 108 |
| Smother her spirits up. [Exeunt DON PEDRO, DON JOHN and CLAUDIO. | |
| Bene. How doth the lady? | |
| Beat. Dead, I think! help, uncle! | |
| Hero! why, Hero! Uncle! Signior Benedick! | 112 |
| Friar! | |
| Leon. O Fate! take not away thy heavy hand: | |
| Death is the fairest cover for her shame | |
| That may be wish’d for. | 116 |
| Beat. How now, cousin Hero! | |
| Friar. Have comfort, lady. | |
| Leon. Dost thou look up? | |
| Friar. Yea; wherefore should she not? | 120 |
| Leon. Wherefore! Why, doth not every earthly thing | |
| Cry shame upon her? Could she here deny | |
| The story that is printed in her blood? | |
| Do not live, Hero; do not ope thine eyes; | 124 |
| For, did I think thou wouldst not quickly die, | |
| Thought I thy spirits were stronger than thy shames, | |
| Myself would, on the rearward of reproaches, | |
| Strike at thy life. Griev’d I, I had but one? | 128 |
| Chid I for that at frugal nature’s frame? | |
| O! one too much by thee. Why had I one? | |
| Why ever wast thou lovely in mine eyes? | |
| Why had I not with charitable hand | 132 |
| Took up a beggar’s issue at my gates, | |
| Who smirched thus, and mir’d with infamy, | |
| I might have said, ‘No part of it is mine; | |
| This shame derives itself from unknown loins?’ | 136 |
| But mine, and mine I lov’d, and mine I prais’d, | |
| And mine that I was proud on, mine so much | |
| That I myself was to myself not mine, | |
| Valuing of her; why, she—O! she is fallen | 140 |
| Into a pit of ink, that the wide sea | |
| Hath drops too few to wash her clean again, | |
| And salt too little which may season give | |
| To her foul-tainted flesh. | 144 |
| Bene. Sir, sir, be patient. | |
| For my part, I am so attir’d in wonder, | |
| I know not what to say. | |
| Beat. O! on my soul, my cousin is belied! | 148 |
| Bene. Lady, were you her bedfellow last night? | |
| Beat. No, truly, not; although, until last night, | |
| I have this twelvemonth been her bedfellow. | |
| Leon. Confirm’d, confirm’d! O! that is stronger made, | 152 |
| Which was before barr’d up with ribs of iron. | |
| Would the two princes lie? and Claudio lie, | |
| Who lov’d her so, that, speaking of her foulness, | |
| Wash’d it with tears? Hence from her! let her die. | 156 |
| Friar. Hear me a little; | |
| For I have only been silent so long, | |
| And given way unto this course of fortune, | |
| By noting of the lady: I have mark’d | 160 |
| A thousand blushing apparitions | |
| To start into her face; a thousand innocent shames | |
| In angel whiteness bear away those blushes; | |
| And in her eye there hath appear’d a fire, | 164 |
| To burn the errors that these princes hold | |
| Against her maiden truth. Call me a fool; | |
| Trust not my reading nor my observations, | |
| Which with experimental seal doth warrant | 168 |
| The tenour of my book; trust not my age, | |
| My reverence, calling, nor divinity, | |
| If this sweet lady lie not guiltless here | |
| Under some biting error. | 172 |
| Leon. Friar, it cannot be. | |
| Thou seest that all the grace that she hath left | |
| Is, that she will not add to her damnation | |
| A sin of perjury: she not denies it. | 176 |
| Why seek’st thou then to cover with excuse | |
| That which appears in proper nakedness? | |
| Friar. Lady, what man is he you are accus’d of? | |
| Hero. They know that do accuse me, I know none; | 180 |
| If I know more of any man alive | |
| Than that which maiden modesty doth warrant, | |
| Let all my sins lack mercy! O, my father! | |
| Prove you that any man with me convers’d | 184 |
| At hours unmeet, or that I yesternight | |
| Maintain’d the change of words with any creature, | |
| Refuse me, hate me, torture me to death. | |
| Friar. There is some strange misprision in the princes. | 188 |
| Bene. Two of them have the very bent of honour; | |
| And if their wisdoms be misled in this, | |
| The practice of it lives in John the bastard, | |
| Whose spirits toil in frame of villanies. | 192 |
| Leon. I know not. If they speak but truth of her, | |
| These hands shall tear her; if they wrong her honour, | |
| The proudest of them shall well hear of it. | |
| Time hath not yet so dried this blood of mine. | 196 |
| Nor age so eat up my invention, | |
| Nor fortune made such havoc of my means, | |
| Nor my bad life reft me so much of friends, | |
| But they shall find, awak’d in such a kind, | 200 |
| Both strength of limb and policy of mind, | |
| Ability in means and choice of friends, | |
| To quit me of them throughly. | |
| Friar. Pause awhile, | 204 |
| And let my counsel sway you in this case. | |
| Your daughter here the princes left for dead; | |
| Let her awhile be secretly kept in, | |
| And publish it that she is dead indeed: | 208 |
| Maintain a mourning ostentation; | |
| And on your family’s old monument | |
| Hang mournful epitaphs and do all rites | |
| That appertain unto a burial. | 212 |
| Leon. What shall become of this? What will this do? | |
| Friar. Marry, this well carried shall on her behalf | |
| Change slander to remorse; that is some good: | |
| But not for that dream I on this strange course, | 216 |
| But on this travail look for greater birth. | |
| She dying, as it must be so maintain’d, | |
| Upon the instant that she was accus’d, | |
| Shall be lamented, pitied and excus’d | 220 |
| Of every hearer; for it so falls out | |
| That what we have we prize not to the worth | |
| Whiles we enjoy it, but being lack’d and lost, | |
| Why, then we rack the value, then we find | 224 |
| The virtue that possession would not show us | |
| Whiles it was ours. So will it fare with Claudio: | |
| When he shall hear she died upon his words, | |
| The idea of her life shall sweetly creep | 228 |
| Into his study of imagination, | |
| And every lovely organ of her life | |
| Shall come apparell’d in more precious habit, | |
| More moving-delicate, and full of life | 232 |
| Into the eye and prospect of his soul, | |
| Than when she liv’d indeed: then shall he mourn,— | |
| If ever love had interest in his liver,— | |
| And wish he had not so accused her, | 236 |
| No, though he thought his accusation true. | |
| Let this be so, and doubt not but success | |
| Will fashion the event in better shape | |
| Than I can lay it down in likelihood. | 240 |
| But if all aim but this be levell’d false, | |
| The supposition of the lady’s death | |
| Will quench the wonder of her infamy: | |
| And if it sort not well, you may conceal her,— | 244 |
| As best befits her wounded reputation,— | |
| In some reclusive and religious life, | |
| Out of all eyes, tongues, minds, and injuries. | |
| Bene. Signior Leonato, let the friar advise you: | 248 |
| And though you know my inwardness and love | |
| Is very much unto the prince and Claudio, | |
| Yet, by mine honour, I will deal in this | |
| As secretly and justly as your soul | 252 |
| Should with your body. | |
| Leon. Being that I flow in grief, | |
| The smallest twine may lead me. | |
| Friar. ’Tis well consented: presently away; | 256 |
| For to strange sores strangely they strain the cure. | |
| Come, lady, die to live: this wedding day | |
| Perhaps is but prolong’d: have patience and endure. [Exeunt FRIAR, HERO, and LEONATO. | |
| Bene. Lady Beatrice, have you wept all this while? | 260 |
| Beat. Yea, and I will weep a while longer. | |
| Bene. I will not desire that. | |
| Beat. You have no reason; I do it freely. | |
| Bene. Surely I do believe your fair cousin is wronged. | 264 |
| Beat. Ah! how much might the man deserve of me that would right her. | |
| Bene. Is there any way to show such friendship? | |
| Beat. A very even way, but no such friend. | |
| Bene. May a man do it? | 268 |
| Beat. It is a man’s office, but not yours. | |
| Bene. I do love nothing in the world so well as you: is not that strange? | |
| Beat. As strange as the thing I know not. It were as possible for me to say I loved nothing so well as you; but believe me not, and yet I lie not; I confess nothing, nor I deny nothing. I am sorry for my cousin. | |
| Bene. By my sword, Beatrice, thou lovest me. | 272 |
| Beat. Do not swear by it, and eat it. | |
| Bene. I will swear by it that you love me; and I will make him eat it that says I love not you. | |
| Beat. Will you not eat your word? | |
| Bene. With no sauce that can be devised to it. I protest I love thee. | 276 |
| Beat. Why then, God forgive me! | |
| Bene. What offence, sweet Beatrice? | |
| Beat. You have stayed me in a happy hour: | |
| I was about to protest I loved you. | 280 |
| Bene. And do it with all thy heart. | |
| Beat. I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest. | |
| Bene. Come, bid me do anything for thee. | |
| Beat. Kill Claudio. | 284 |
| Bene. Ha! not for the wide world. | |
| Beat. You kill me to deny it. Farewell. | |
| Bene. Tarry, sweet Beatrice. | |
| Beat. I am gone, though I am here: there is no love in you: nay, I pray you, let me go. | 288 |
| Bene. Beatrice,— | |
| Beat. In faith, I will go. | |
| Bene. We’ll be friends first. | |
| Beat. You dare easier be friends with me than fight with mine enemy. | 292 |
| Bene. Is Claudio thine enemy? | |
| Beat. Is he not approved in the height a villain, that hath slandered, scorned, dishonoured my kinswoman? O! that I were a man. What! bear her in hand until they come to take hands, and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancour,—O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market-place. | |
| Bene. Hear me, Beatrice,— | |
| Beat. Talk with a man out at a window! a proper saying! | 296 |
| Bene. Nay, but Beatrice,— | |
| Beat. Sweet Hero! she is wronged, she is slandered, she is undone. | |
| Bene. Beat— | |
| Beat. Princes and counties! Surely, a princely testimony, a goodly Count Comfect; a sweet gallant, surely! O! that I were a man for his sake, or that I had any friend would be a man for my sake! But manhood is melted into curtsies, valour into compliment, and men are only turned into tongue, and trim ones too: he is now as valiant as Hercules, that only tells a lie and swears it. I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore I will die a woman with grieving. | 300 |
| Bene. Tarry, good Beatrice. By this hand, I love thee. | |
| Beat. Use it for my love some other way than swearing by it. | |
| Bene. Think you in your soul the Count Claudio hath wronged Hero? | |
| Beat. Yea, as sure as I have a thought or a soul. | 304 |
| Bene. Enough! I am engaged, I will challenge him. I will kiss your hand, and so leave you. By this hand, Claudio shall render me a dear account. As you hear of me, so think of me. Go, comfort your cousin: I must say she is dead; and so, farewell. [Exeunt. | |
