William Shakespeare: The Complete Works 2nd Edition

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3.2 Enter Bassanio, Portia, Nerissa, Graziano, and all their trains. ⌈The curtains are drawn aside revealing the three caskets⌉

PORTIA (to Bassanio)

I pray you tarry. Pause a day or two

Before you hazard, for in choosing wrong

I lose your company. Therefore forbear a while.

There’s something tells me—but it is not love—

I would not lose you; and you know yourself

Hate counsels not in such a quality.

But lest you should not understand me well—

And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought—

I would detain you here some month or two

Before you venture for me. I could teach you

How to choose right, but then I am forsworn.

So will I never be; so may you miss me.

But if you do, you’ll make me wish a sin,

That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes,

They have o‘erlooked me and divided me. 15

One half of me is yours, the other half yours—

Mine own, I would say, but if mine, then yours,

And so all yours. O, these naughty times

Puts bars between the owners and their rights;

And so, though yours, not yours. Prove it so,

Let fortune go to hell for it, not I.

I speak too long, but ’tis to piece the time,

To eke it, and to draw it out in length

To stay you from election.

BASSANIO Let me choose,

For as I am, I live upon the rack. 25

PORTIA

Upon the rack, Bassanio? Then confess

What treason there is mingled with your love.

BASSANIO

None but that ugly treason of mistrust

Which makes me fear th‘enjoying of my love.

There may as well be amity and life

’Tween snow and fire as treason and my love.

PORTIA

Ay, but I fear you speak upon the rack,

Where men enforced do speak anything.

BASSANIO

Promise me life and I’ll confess the truth.

PORTIA

Well then, confess and live.

BASSANIO ’Confess and love’ 35

Had been the very sum of my confession.

O happy torment, when my torturer

Doth teach me answers for deliverance!

But let me to my fortune and the caskets.

PORTIA

Away then. I am locked in one of them.

If you do love me, you will find me out.

Nerissa and the rest, stand all aloof.

Let music sound while he doth make his choice.

Then if he lose he makes a swanlike end,

Fading in music. That the comparison

May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream

And wat‘ry deathbed for him. He may win,

And what is music then? Then music is

Even as the flourish when true subjects bow

To a new-crowned monarch. Such it is

As are those dulcet sounds in break of day

That creep into the dreaming bridegroom’s ear

And summon him to marriage. Now he goes,

With no less presence but with much more love

Than young Alcides when he did redeem

The virgin tribute paid by howling Troy

To the sea-monster. I stand for sacrifice.

The rest aloof are the Dardanian wives,

With blearèd visages come forth to view

The issue of th’exploit. Go, Hercules.

Live thou, I live. With much much more dismay

I view the fight than thou that mak’st the fray.

⌈Here music.⌉ A song the whilst Bassanio comments on the caskets to himself

⌈ONE FROM PORTIA’S TRAIN⌉

Tell me where is fancy bred,

Or in the heart, or in the head?

How begot, how nourished?

⌈ALL⌉ Reply, reply.

⌈ONE FROM PORTIA’S TRAIN⌉

It is engendered in the eyes,

With gazing fed; and fancy dies

In the cradle where it lies.

Let us all ring fancy’s knell.

I’ll begin it: ding, dong, bell.

ALL Ding, dong, bell.

BASSANIO (aside)

So may the outward shows be least themselves.

The world is still deceived with ornament.

In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt

But, being seasoned with a gracious voice,

Obscures the show of evil? In religion,

What damned error but some sober brow

Will bless it and approve it with a text,

Hiding the grossness with fair ornament? 80

There is no vice so simple but assumes

Some mark of virtue on his outward parts.

How many cowards whose hearts are all as false

As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins

The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars,

Who, inward searched, have livers white as milk?

And these assume but valour’s excrement

To render them redoubted. Look on beauty

And you shall see ‘tis purchased by the weight,

Which therein works a miracle in nature, 90

Making them lightest that wear most of it.

So are those crisped, snaky, golden locks

Which makes such wanton gambols with the wind

Upon supposed fairness, often known

To be the dowry of a second head,

The skull that bred them in the sepulchre.

Thus ornament is but the guilèd shore

To a most dangerous sea, the beauteous scarf

Veiling an Indian beauty; in a word,

The seeming truth which cunning times put on

To entrap the wisest. (Aloud) Therefore, thou gaudy

gold,

Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee.

(To the silver casket) Nor none of thee, thou pale and

common drudge

Tween man and man. But thou, thou meagre lead,

Which rather threaten’st than dost promise aught,

Thy paleness moves me more than eloquence, 106

And here choose I. Joy be the consequence!

PORTIA (aside)

How all the other passions fleet to air,

As doubtful thoughts, and rash-embraced despair,

And shudd’ring fear, and green-eyed jealousy. 110

O love, be moderate! Allay thy ecstasy.

In measure rain thy joy; scant this excess.

I feel too much thy blessing: make it less,

For fear I surfeit.

Bassanio opens the leaden casket

BASSANIO What find I here?

Fair Portia’s counterfeit. What demi-god 115

Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?

Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,

Seem they in motion? Here are severed lips

Parted with sugar breath. So sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends. Here in her hairs

The painter plays the spider, and hath woven

A golden mesh t’untrap the hearts of men

Faster than gnats in cobwebs. But her eyes—

How could he see to do them? Having made one,

Methinks it should have power to steal both his

And leave itself unfurnished. Yet look how far

The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow

In underprizing it, so far this shadow

Doth limp behind the substance. Here’s the scroll,

The continent and summary of my fortune.

‘You that choose not by the view

Chance as fair and choose as true.

Since this fortune falls to you,

Be content, and seek no new.

If you be well pleased with this,

And hold your fortune for your bliss,

Turn you where your lady is,

And claim her with a loving kiss.’

A gentle scroll. Fair lady, by your leave,

I come by note to give and to receive,

Like one of two contending in a prize,

That thinks he hath done well in people’s eyes,

Hearing applause and universal shout,

Giddy in spirit, still gazing in a doubt

Whether those peals of praise be his or no.

So, thrice-fair lady, stand I even so,

As doubtful whether what I see be true

Until confirmed, signed, ratified by you.

PORTIA

You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,

Such as I am. Though for myself alone

I would not be ambitious in my wish

To wish myself much better, yet for you

I would be trebled twenty times myself,

A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more

rich,

That only to stand high in your account

I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,

Exceed account. But the full sum of me

Is sum of something which, to term in gross,

Is an unlessoned girl, unschooled, unpractised,

Happy in this, she is not yet so old

But she may learn; happier than this,

She is not bred so dull but she can learn;

Happiest of all is that her gentle spirit

Commits itself to yours to be directed

As from her lord, her governor, her king.

Myself and what is mine to you and yours

Is now converted. But now I was the lord

Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,

Queen o’er myself; and even now, but now,

This house, these servants, and this same myself 170

Are yours, my lord’s. I give them with this ring,

Which when you part from, lose, or give away,

Let it presage the ruin of your love,

And be my vantage to exclaim on you.

BASSANIO

Madam, you have bereft me of all words.

Only my blood speaks to you in my veins,

And there is such confusion in my powers

As after some oration fairly spoke

By a beloved prince there doth appear

Among the buzzing pleased multitude, 180

Where every something being blent together

Turns to a wild of nothing save of joy,

Expressed and not expressed. But when this ring

Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence.

O, then be bold to say Bassanio’s dead.

NERISSA

My lord and lady, it is now our time

That have stood by and seen our wishes prosper

To cry ’Good joy, good joy, my lord and ladyl’

GRAZIANO

My lord Bassanio, and my gentle lady,

I wish you all the joy that you can wish,

For I am sure you can wish none from me.

And when your honours mean to solemnize

The bargain of your faith, I do beseech you

Even at that time I may be married too.

BASSANIO

With all my heart, so thou canst get a wife.

GRAZIANO

I thank your lordship, you have got me one.

My eyes, my lord, can look as swift as yours.

You saw the mistress, I beheld the maid.

You loved, I loved; for intermission

No more pertains to me, my lord, than you.

Your fortune stood upon the caskets there,

And so did mine too, as the matter falls;

For wooing here until I sweat again,

And swearing till my very roof was dry

With oaths of love, at last—if promise last—

I got a promise of this fair one here

To have her love, provided that your fortune

Achieved her mistress.

PORTIA Is this true, Nerissa?

NERISSA

Madam, it is, so you stand pleased withal.

BASSANIO

And do you, Graziano, mean good faith? 210

GRAZIANO Yes, faith, my lord.

BASSANIO

Our feast shall be much honoured in your marriage.

GRAZIANO (to Nerissa)

We’ll play with them the first boy for a thousand

ducats.

NERISSA What, and stake down?

GRAZIANO

No, we shall ne’er win at that sport and stake down.

Enter Lorenzo, Jessica, and Salerio, a messenger from Venice

But who comes here? Lorenzo and his infidel!

What, and my old Venetian friend Salerio!

BASSANIO

Lorenzo and Salerio, welcome hither,

If that the youth of my new int’rest here

Have power to bid you welcome. (To Portia) By your

leave,

I bid my very friends and countrymen,

Sweet Portia, welcome.

PORTIA

So do I, my lord. They are entirely welcome.

LORENZO

I thank your honour. For my part, my lord,

My purpose was not to have seen you here,

But meeting with Salerio by the way

He did entreat me past all saying nay

To come with him along.

SALERIO I did, my lord,

And I have reason for it. Signor Antonio

Commends him to you.

He gives Bassanio a letter

BASSANIO Ere I ope his letter

I pray you tell me how my good friend doth.

SALERIO

Not sick, my lord, unless it be in mind;

Nor well, unless in mind. His letter there

Will show you his estate.

Bassanio opens the letter and reads

GRAZIANO

Nerissa, (indicating Jessica) cheer yon stranger. Bid her

welcome. 235

Your hand, Salerio. What’s the news from Venice?

How doth that royal merchant good Antonio?

I know he will be glad of our success.

We are the Jasons; we have won the fleece.

SALERIO

I would you had won the fleece that he hath lost.

PORTIA

There are some shrewd contents in yon same paper

That steals the colour from Bassanio’s cheek.

Some dear friend dead, else nothing in the world

Could turn so much the constitution

Of any constant man. What, worse and worse?

With leave, Bassanio, I am half yourself,

And I must freely have the half of anything

That this same paper brings you.

BASSANIO O sweet Portia,

Here are a few of the unpleasant’st words

That ever blotted paper. Gentle lady,

When I did first impart my love to you

I freely told you all the wealth I had

Ran in my veins: I was a gentleman;

And then I told you true; and yet, dear lady,

Rating myself at nothing, you shall see

How much I was a braggart. When I told you

My state was nothing, I should then have told you

That I was worse than nothing, for indeed

I have engaged myself to a dear friend,

Engaged my friend to his mere enemy,

To feed my means. Here is a letter, lady,

The paper as the body of my friend,

And every word in it a gaping wound

Issuing life-blood. But is it true, Salerio?

Hath all his ventures failed? What, not one hit?

From Tripolis, from Mexico, and England,

From Lisbon, Barbary, and India,

And not one vessel scape the dreadful touch

Of merchant-marring rocks?

SALERIO Not one, my lord.

Besides, it should appear that if he had

The present money to discharge the Jew

He would not take it. Never did I know

A creature that did bear the shape of man

So keen and greedy to confound a man.

He plies the Duke at morning and at night,

And doth impeach the freedom of the state

If they deny him justice. Twenty merchants,

The Duke himself, and the magnificoes

Of greatest port, have all persuaded with him,

But none can drive him from the envious plea 280

Of forfeiture, of justice, and his bond.

JESSICA

When I was with him I have heard him swear

To Tubal and to Cush, his countrymen,

That he would rather have Antonio’s flesh

Than twenty times the value of the sum

That he did owe him; and I know, my lord,

If law, authority, and power deny not,

It will go hard with poor Antonio.

PORTIA (to Bassanio)

Is it your dear friend that is thus in trouble?

BASSANIO

The dearest friend to me, the kindest man,

The best-conditioned and unwearied spirit

In doing courtesies, and one in whom

The ancient Roman honour more appears

Than any that draws breath in Italy.

PORTIA What sum owes he the Jew?

BASSANIO

For me, three thousand ducats.

PORTIA What, no more?

Pay him six thousand and deface the bond.

Double six thousand, and then treble that,

Before a friend of this description

Shall lose a hair thorough Bassanio’s fault.

First go with me to church and call me wife,

And then away to Venice to your friend;

For never shall you lie by Portia’s side

With an unquiet soul. You shall have gold

To pay the petty debt twenty times over.

When it is paid, bring your true friend along.

My maid Nerissa and myself meantime

Will live as maids and widows. Come, away,

For you shall hence upon your wedding day.

Bid your friends welcome, show a merry cheer. 310

Since you are dear bought, I will love you dear.

But let me hear the letter of your friend.

⌈BASSANIO⌉ (reads) ‘Sweet Bassanio, my ships have all miscarried, my creditors grow cruel, my estate is very low, my bond to the Jew is forfeit, and since in paying it, it is impossible I should live, all debts are cleared between you and I if I might but see you at my death. Notwithstanding, use your pleasure. If your love do not persuade you to come, let not my letter.’

PORTIA

O, love! Dispatch all business, and be gone.

BASSANIO

Since I have your good leave to go away

I will make haste, but till I come again

No bed shall e‘er be guilty of my stay

Nor rest be interposer ’twixt us twain. Exeunt

3.3 Enter Shylock the Jew, Solanio, Antonio, and the jailer

SHYLOCK

Jailer, look to him. Tell not me of mercy.

This is the fool that lent out money gratis.

Jailer, look to him.

ANTONIO Hear me yet, good Shylock.

SHYLOCK

I’ll have my bond. Speak not against my bond.

I have sworn an oath that I will have my bond.

Thou called’st me dog before thou hadst a cause,

But since I am a dog, beware my fangs.

The Duke shall grant me justice. I do wonder,

Thou naughty jailer, that thou art so fond

To come abroad with him at his request.

ANTONIO I pray thee hear me speak.

SHYLOCK

I’ll have my bond. I will not hear thee speak.

I’ll have my bond, and therefore speak no more.

I’ll not be made a soft and dull-eyed fool

To shake the head, relent, and sigh, and yield

To Christian intercessors. Follow not.

I’ll have no speaking. I will have my bond. Exit

SOLANIO

It is the most impenetrable cur

That ever kept with men.

ANTONIO Let him alone.

I’ll follow him no more with bootless prayers.

He seeks my life. His reason well I know:

I oft delivered from his forfeitures

Many that have at times made moan to me.

Therefore he hates me.

SOLANIO I am sure the Duke

Will never grant this forfeiture to hold.

ANTONIO

The Duke cannot deny the course of law,

For the commodity that strangers have

With us in Venice, if it be denied,

Will much impeach the justice of the state,

Since that the trade and profit of the city

Consisteth of all nations. Therefore go.

These griefs and losses have so bated me

That I shall hardly spare a pound of flesh

Tomorrow to my bloody creditor.

Well, jailer, on. Pray God Bassanio come

To see me pay his debt, and then I care not. Exeunt

3.4 Enter Portia, Nerissa, Lorenzo, Jessica, and Balthasar, a man of Portia’s

LORENZO (to Portia)

Madam, although I speak it in your presence,

You have a noble and a true conceit

Of godlike amity, which appears most strongly

In bearing thus the absence of your lord.

But if you knew to whom you show this honour,

How true a gentleman you send relief,

How dear a lover of my lord your husband,

I know you would be prouder of the work

Than customary bounty can enforce you.

PORTIA

I never did repent for doing good,

Nor shall not now; for in companions

That do converse and waste the time together,

Whose souls do bear an equal yoke of love,

There must be needs a like proportion

Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit,

Which makes me think that this Antonio,

Being the bosom lover of my lord,

Must needs be like my lord. If it be so,

How little is the cost I have bestowed

In purchasing the semblance of my soul

From out the state of hellish cruelty.

This comes too near the praising of myself,

Therefore no more of it. Hear other things:

Lorenzo, I commit into your hands

The husbandry and manage of my house

Until my lord’s return. For mine own part,

I have toward heaven breathed a secret vow

To live in prayer and contemplation,

Only attended by Nerissa here,

Until her husband and my lord’s return.

There is a monastery two miles off,

And there we will abide. I do desire you

Not to deny this imposition,

The which my love and some necessity

Now lays upon you.

LORENZO Madam, with all my heart,

I shall obey you in all fair commands.

PORTIA

My people do already know my mind,

And will acknowledge you and Jessica

In place of Lord Bassanio and myself.

So fare you well till we shall meet again.

LORENZO

Fair thoughts and happy hours attend on you!

JESSICA

I wish your ladyship all heart’s content.

PORTIA

I thank you for your wish, and am well pleased

To wish it back on you. Fare you well, Jessica.

Exeunt Lorenzo and Jessica

Now, Balthasar,

As I have ever found thee honest-true,

So let me find thee still. Take this same letter,

And use thou all th’endeavour of a man

In speed to Padua. See thou render this

Into my cousin’s hands, Doctor Bellario,

And look what notes and garments he doth give

thee,

Bring them, I pray thee, with imagined speed

Unto the traject, to the common ferry

Which trades to Venice. Waste no time in words,

But get thee gone. I shall be there before thee.

BALTHASAR

Madam, I go with all convenient speed. Exit

PORTIA

Come on, Nerissa. I have work in hand

That you yet know not of. We’ll see our husbands

Before they think of us.

NERISSA Shall they see us?

PORTIA

They shall, Nerissa, but in such a habit

That they shall think we are accomplishèd

With that we lack. I’ll hold thee any wager,

When we are both accoutered like young men

I’ll prove the prettier fellow of the two,

And wear my dagger with the braver grace,

And speak between the change of man and boy

With a reed voice, and turn two mincing steps

Into a manly stride, and speak of frays

Like a fine bragging youth, and tell quaint lies

How honourable ladies sought my love,

Which I denying, they fell sick and died.

I could not do withal. Then I’ll repent,

And wish for all that that I had not killed them;

And twenty of these puny lies I’ll tell,

That men shall swear I have discontinued school

Above a twelvemonth. I have within my mind

A thousand raw tricks of these bragging Jacks

Which I will practise.

NERISSA Why, shall we turn to men?

PORTIA Fie, what a question’s that

If thou wert near a lewd interpreter!

But come, I’ll tell thee all my whole device

When I am in my coach, which stays for us

At the park gate; and therefore haste away,

For we must measure twenty miles today. Exeunt

3.5 Enter Lancelot the clown, and Jessica

LANCELOT Yes, truly; for look you, the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children, therefore I promise you I fear you. I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of the matter, therefore be o’ good cheer, for truly I think you are damned. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good, and that is but a kind of bastard hope, neither.

JESSICA And what hope is that, I pray thee?

LANCELOT Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not, that you are not the Jew’s daughter.

JESSICA That were a kind of bastard hope indeed. So the sins of my mother should be visited upon me.

LANCELOT Truly then, I fear you are damned both by father and mother. Thus, when I shun Scylla your father, I fall into Charybdis your mother. Well, you are gone both ways.

JESSICA I shall be saved by my husband. He hath made me a Christian.

LANCELOT Truly, the more to blame he! We were Christians enough before, e’en as many as could well live one by another. This making of Christians will raise the price of hogs. If we grow all to be pork-eaters we shall not shortly have a rasher on the coals for money.

Enter Lorenzo

JESSICA I’ll tell my husband, Lancelot, what you say. Here he comes.

LORENZO I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Lancelot, if you thus get my wife into corners.

JESSICA Nay, you need not fear us, Lorenzo. Lancelot and I are out. He tells me flatly there’s no mercy for me in heaven because I am a Jew’s daughter, and he says you are no good member of the commonwealth, for in converting Jews to Christians you raise the price of pork.

LORENZO (to Lancelot) I shall answer that better to the commonwealth than you can the getting up of the Negro’s belly. The Moor is with child by you, Lancelot. LANCELOT It is much that the Moor should be more than reason, but if she be less than an honest woman, she is indeed more than I took her for.

LORENZO How every fool can play upon the word! I think the best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow commendable in none only but parrots. Go in, sirrah, bid them prepare for dinner.

LANCELOT That is done, sir. They have all stomachs.

LORENZO Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you Then bid them prepare dinner.

LANCELOT That is done too, sir; only ’cover’ is the word.

LORENZO Will you cover then, sir?

LANCELOT Not so, sir, neither. I know my duty.

LORENZO Yet more quarrelling with occasion! Wilt thou show the whole wealth of thy wit in an instant? I pray thee understand a plain man in his plain meaning. Go to thy fellows; bid them cover the table, serve in the meat, and we will come in to dinner.

LANCELOT For the table, sir, it shall be served in. For the meat, sir, it shall be covered. For your coming in to dinner, sir, why, let it be as humours and conceits shall govern. Exit

LORENZO

O dear discretion, how his words are suited!

The fool hath planted in his memory

An army of good words, and I do know

A many fools that stand in better place,

Garnished like him, that for a tricksy word

Defy the matter. How cheer’st thou, Jessica?

And now, good sweet, say thy opinion:

How dost thou like the Lord Bassanio’s wife?

JESSICA

Past all expressing. It is very meet

The Lord Bassanio live an upright life,