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Without the stamp of merit! Let none presume
To wear an undeserved dignity.

O, that estates, degrees, and offices,

Were not deriv'd corruptly! and that clear honour
Were purchas'd by the merit of the wearer!
How many then should cover, that stand bare?
How many be commanded, that command?
How much low peasantry would then be glean'd
From the true seed of honour? and how much honour
Pick'd from the chaff and ruin of the times,

To be new varnish'd?

LOVE MESSENGER COMPARED TO AN APRIL DAY.

I have not seen

So likely an ambassador of love:

A day in April never came so sweet,

To show how costly summer was at hand,
As this fore-spurrer comes before his lord.

ACT III.

THE JEW'S REVENGE.

If it will feed nothing else, it will feed my revenge. He hath disgraced me, and hindered me of half a million; laughed at my losses, mocked at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine enemies; and what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a christian, what is his humility? revenge: if a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? why, revenge The villany, you teach me, I will execute: and it shall go hard, but I will better the instruction.

MUSIC.

Let music sound, while he doth make his choice;
Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end,
Fading in music: that the comparison

May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream
And wat❜ry death-bed 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 car,
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 bleared visages, come forth to view
The issue of the exploit.

THE DECEIT OF ORNAMENT OR APPEARANCES.

The world is still deceived with ornament; In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt, But, being season'd with a gracioust 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? 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 search'd, have livers white as milk? And these assume but valour's excrement, To render them redoubted. Look on beauty, And you shall see 'tis purchas'd by the weight; Which therein works a miracle in nature, Making them lightest that wear most of it: So are those crisped‡ snaky golden locks, * Dignity of mein. + Winning favour.

+ Curled

Which make 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 guiled* 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.

PORTIA'S PICTURE.

What find I here?

[Opening the leaden casket
Fair Portia's counterfeit? What demi-god
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,
Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd 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 to entrap 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 unfurnish'd.

SUCCESSFUL LOVER COMPARED TO A CONQUEROR.

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 not;
So thrice fair lady, stand I.

HIS THOUGHTS TO THE INARTICULATE JOYS OF A

CROWD.

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:
Where every something, being blent‡ together,
*Treacherous. + Likeness, portrait. + Blended

Turns to a wild of nothing save of joy,
Express'd, and not express'd.

IMPLACABLE REVENGE.

Shy. 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-ey'd fool,

To shake the head, relent, and sigh, and yield
To Christian intercessors.

THE BOASTING OF YOUTH

I'll hold thee any wager,

When we are both accouter'd 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 with all;-then I'll repent,
And wish, for all that, that I had not kill'd them:
And twenty of these puny lies I'll tell,

That men shall swear, I have discontinued school
Above a twelvemonth.

AFFECTATION IN WORDS.

O dear discretion, how his words are suited'
The fool hath planted in his memory
An army of good words: and I do know
As many fools, that stand in better place
Garnish'd like him, that for a tricksy word
Defy the matter.

THE JEW'S REASON FOR REVENGE.

You'll ask me why I rather chose to have
A weight of carrion flesh, than to receive
Three thousand ducats: I'll not answer that:
But, say, it is my humour:* Is it answer'd?
What if
my house be troubled with a rat

* Particular fancy.

And I be pleased to give ten thousand ducats
To have it baned? What, are you answer'd yet?
Some men there are, love not a gaping pig;
Some, that are mad, if they behold a cat;
And others, when the bag-pipe sings i'the nose,
Cannot contain their urine: For affection,*
Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood
Of what it likes, or loaths: Now, for your answer
As there is no firm reason to be render'd,
Why he cannot abide a gapingt pig;
Why he, a harmless necessary cat;
Why he, a swollen bag-pipe; but of force
Must yield to such inevitable shame,
As to offend, himself being offended;
So can I give no reason, nor I will not,

More than a lodg'd hate, and a certain loathing
I bear Antonio, that I follow thus

A losing suit against him. Are you answer'd?

MERCY.

The quality of mercy is not strain'd;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice bless'd;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown:
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptre'd sway.
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,

It is an attribute to God himself;

And earthly power doth then show likest God's, When mercy seasons justice.

FORTUNE.

For herein fortune shows herself more kind
Than is her custom: it is still her use,

To let the wretched man outlive his wealth,
To view with hollow eye, and wrinkled brow,

An

age

of poverty

* Prejudice.

5

+ Crying.

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