If I refuse to wed Demetrius.
THESEUS
Either to die the death, or to abjure
For ever the society of men.
Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires.
Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
Whether, if you yield not to your father’s choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun,
For aye to be in shady cloister mewed,
To live a barren sister all your life,
Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
Thrice blessed they that master so their blood
To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;
But earthlier happy is the rose distilled
Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn,
Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness.
HERMIA
So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
Ere I will yield my virgin patent up
Unto his lordship whose unwishèd yoke
My soul consents not to give sovereignty.
THESEUS
Take time to pause, and by the next new moon—
The sealing day betwixt my love and me
For everlasting bond of fetlowship—
Upon that day either prepare to die
For disobedience to your father’s will,
Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would,
Or on Diana’s altar to protest
For aye austerity and single life.
DEMETRIUS
Relent, sweet Hermia; and, Lysander, yield
Thy crazed title to my certain right.
LYSANDER
You have her father’s love, Demetrius;
Let me have Hermia’s. Do you marry him.
EGEUS
Scornful Lysander! True, he hath my love;
And what is mine my love shall render him,
And she is mine, and all my right of her
I do estate unto Demetrius.
LYSANDER ⌈to Theseus⌉
I am, my lord, as well derived as he,
As well possessed. My love is more than his,
My fortunes every way as fairly ranked,
If not with vantage, as Demetrius;
And—which is more than all these boasts can be—
I am beloved of beauteous Hermia.
Why should not I then prosecute my right?
Demetrius—I’ll avouch it to his head-
Made love to Nedar’s daughter, Helena,
And won her soul, and she, sweet lady, dotes,
Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry
Upon this spotted and inconstant man.
THESEUS
I must confess that I have heard so much,
And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;
But, being over-full of self affairs,
My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;
And come, Egeus. You shall go with me.
I have some private schooling for you both.
For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
To fit your fancies to your father’s will,
Or else the law of Athens yields you up—
Which by no means we may extenuate—
To death or to a vow of single life.
Come, my Hippolyta; what cheer, my love?—
Demetrius and Egeus, go along.
I must employ you in some business
Against our nuptial, and confer with you
Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
EGEUS
With duty and desire we follow you.
Exeunt all but Lysander and Hermia
LYSANDER
How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pate ?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
HERMIA
Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.
LYSANDER
Ay me, for aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth,
But either it was different in btood—
HERMIA
O cross!—too high to be enthralled to low.
LYSANDER
Or else misgrafted in respect of years—
HERMIA
O spite!—too old to be engaged to young.
LYSANDER
Or merit stood upon the choice of friends—
HERMIA
O hell!—to choose love by another’s eyes.
LYSANDER
Or if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
Making it momentany as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream,
Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
And, ere a man hath power to say ‘Behold!’
The jaws of darkness do devour it up.
So quick bright things come to confusion.
HERMIA
If then true lovers have been ever crossed,
It stands as an edict in destiny.
Then let us teach our trial patience,
Because it is a customary cross,
As due to love as thoughts, and dreams, and sighs,
Wishes, and tears, poor fancy’s followers.
LYSANDER
A good persuasion. Therefore hear me, Hermia.
I have a widow aunt, a dowager
Of great revenue, and she hath no child,
And she respects me as her only son.
From Athens is her house remote seven leagues.
There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee,
And to that place the sharp Athenian law
Cannot pursue us. If thou lov’st me then,
Steal forth thy father’s house tomorrow night,
And in the wood, a league without the town,
Where I did meet thee once with Helena
To do observance to a morn of May,
There will I stay for thee.
HERMIA My good Lysander,
I swear to thee by Cupid’s strongest bow,
By his best arrow with the golden head,
By the simplicity of Venus’ doves,
By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,
And by that fire which burned the Carthage queen
When the false Trojan under sail was seen;
By all the vows that ever men have broke—
In number more than ever women spoke—
In that same place thou hast appointed me
Tomorrow truly will I meet with thee.
LYSANDER
Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena.
Enter Helena
HERMIA
God speed, fair Helena. Whither away?
HELENA
Call you me fair? That ’fair’ again unsay.
Demetrius loves your fair—O happy fair!
Your eyes are lodestars, and your tongue’s sweet air
More tuneable than lark to shepherd’s ear
When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
Sickness is catching. O, were favour so!
Your words I catch, fair Hermia; ere I go,
My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,
My tongue should catch your tongue’s sweet melody.
Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
The rest I’d give to be to you translated.
O, teach me how you look, and with what art
You sway the motion of Demetrius’ heart.
HERMIA
I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.
HELENA
O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!
HERMIA
I give him curses, yet he gives me love.
HELENA
O that my prayers could such affection move
!
HERMIA
The more I hate, the more he follows me.
HELENA
The more I love, the more he hateth me.
HERMIA
His folly, Helen, is no fault of mine.
HELENA
None but your beauty; would that fault were mine!
HERMIA
Take comfort. He no more shall see my face.
Lysander and myself will fly this place.
Before the time I did Lysander see
Seemed Athens as a paradise to me.
O then, what graces in my love do dwell,
That he hath turned a heaven unto a hell?
LYSANDER
Helen, to you our minds we will unfold.
Tomorrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
Her silver visage in the wat’ry glass,
Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass—
A time that lovers’ sleights doth still conceal—
Through Athens’ gates have we devised to steal.
HERMIA
And in the wood where often you and I
Upon faint primrose beds were wont to lie,
Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,
There my Lysander and myself shall meet,
And thence from Athens turn away our eyes
To seek new friends and stranger companies.
Farewell, sweet playfellow. Pray thou for us,
And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius.—
Keep word, Lysander. We must starve our sight
From lovers’ food till morrow deep midnight.
LYSANDER
I will, my Hermia. Exit Hermia
Helena, adieu.
As you on him, Demetrius dote on you. Exit
HELENA
How happy some o’er other some can be!
Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.
But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so.
He will not know what all but he do know.
And as he errs, doting on Hermia’s eyes,
So I, admiring of his qualities.
Things base and vile, holding no quantity,
Love can transpose to form and dignity.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
Nor hath love’s mind of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste.
And therefore is love said to be a child
Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.
As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,
So the boy Love is perjured everywhere.
For ere Demetrius looked on Hermia’s eyne
He hailed down oaths that he was only mine,
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.
I will go tell him of fair Hermia’s flight.
Then to the wood will he tomorrow night
Pursue her, and for this intelligence
If I have thanks it is a dear expense.
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again. Exit
1.2 Enter Quince the carpenter, and Snug the joiner, and Bottom the weaver, and Flute the bellows-mender, and Snout the tinker, and Starveling the tailor
QUINCE Is all our company here?
BOTTOM You were best to call them generally, man by man, according to the scrip.
QUINCE Here is the scroll of every man’s name which is thought fit through all Athens to play in our interlude before the Duke and the Duchess on his wedding day at night.
BOTTOM First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats on; then read the names of the actors; and so grow to a point. 10
QUINCE Marry, our play is The Most Lamentable Comedy and Most Cruel Death of Pyramus and Thisbe.
BOTTOM A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.
QUINCE Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver?
BOTTOM Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.
QUINCE You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.
BOTTOM What is Pyramus? A lover or a tyrant?
QUINCE A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.
BOTTOM That will ask some tears in the true performing of it. If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes. I will move stones. I will condole, in some measure. To the rest.—Yet my chief humour is for a tyrant. I could play ’erc’les rarely, or a part to tear a cat in, to make all split.
The raging rocks
And shivering shocks
Shall break the locks
Of prison gates,
And Phibus’ car
Shall shine from far
And make and mar
The foolish Fates.
This was lofty. Now name the rest of the players.—This is ’erc’les’ vein, a tyrant’s vein. A lover is more condoling.
QUINCE Francis Flute, the bellows-mender?
FLUTE Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE Flute, you must take Thisbe on you.
FLUTE What is Thisbe? A wand’ring knight?
QUINCE It is the lady that Pyramus must love.
FLUTE Nay, faith, let not me play a woman. I have a beard coming.
QUINCE That’s all one. You shall play it in a mask, and you may speak as small as you will.
BOTTOM An I may hide my face, let me play Thisbe too.
I’ll speak in a monstrous little voice: ‘Thisne, Thisne!’—
‘Ah Pyramus, my lover dear, thy Thisbe dear and lady
dear.’
QUINCE No, no, you must play Pyramus; and Flute, you Thisbe.
BOTTOM Well, proceed.
QUINCE Robin Starveling, the tailor?
STARVELING Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE Robin Starveling, you must play Thisbe’s mother.
Tom Snout, the tinker?
SNOUT Here, Peter Quince.
QUINCE You, Pyramus’ father; myself, Thisbe’s father.
Snug the joiner, you the lion’s part; and I hope here is a play fitted.
SNUG Have you the lion’s part written? Pray you, if it be, give it me; for I am slow of study.
QUINCE You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.
BOTTOM Let me play the lion too. I will roar that I will do any man’s heart good to hear me. I will roar that I will make the Duke say ‘Let him roar again; let him roar again’.
QUINCE An you should do it too terribly you would fright the Duchess and the ladies that they would shriek, and that were enough to hang us all.
ALL THE REST That would hang us, every mother’s son.
BOTTOM I grant you, friends, if you should fright the ladies out of their wits they would have no more discretion but to hang us, but I will aggravate my voice so that I will roar you as gently as any sucking dove. I will roar you an ’twere any nightingale.
QUINCE You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a sweet-faced man; a proper man as one shall see in a summer’s day; a most lovely, gentlemanlike man. Therefore you must needs play Pyramus.
BOTTOM Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best to play it in?
QUINCE Why, what you will.
BOTTOM I will discharge it in either your straw-colour beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your perfect yellow.
QUINCE Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and then you will play bare faced. But masters, here are your parts, and I am to entreat you, request you, and desire you to con them by tomorrow night, and meet me in the palace wood a mile without the town by moonlight. There will we rehearse; for if we meet in the city we shall be dogged with company, and our devices known. In the meantime I will draw a bill of properties such as our play wants. I pray you fail me not.
BOTTOM We will meet, and there we may rehe
arse most obscenely and courageously. Take pains; be perfect. Adieu.
QUINCE At the Duke’s oak we meet.
BOTTOM Enough. Hold, or cut bowstrings. Exeunt
2.1 Enter a Fairy at one door and Robin Goodfellow, a puck, at another
ROBIN
How now, spirit, whither wander you?
FAIRY
Over hill, over dale,
Thorough bush, thorough brier,
Over park, over pale,
Thorough flood, thorough fire:
I do wander everywhere
Swifter than the moonës sphere,
And I serve the Fairy Queen
To dew her orbs upon the green.
The cowslips tall her pensioners be.
In their gold coats spots you see;
Those be rubies, fairy favours;
In those freckles live their savours.
I must go seek some dewdrops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip’s ear.
Farewell, thou lob of spirits; I’ll be gone.
Our Queen and all her elves come here anon.
ROBIN
The King doth keep his revels here tonight.
Take heed the Queen come not within his sight,
For Oberon is passing fell and wroth 20
Because that she, as her attendant, hath
A lovely boy stol’n from an Indian king.
She never had so sweet a changeling;
And jealous Oberon would have the child
Knight of his train, to trace the forests wild.
But she perforce withholds the loved boy,
Crowns him with flowers, and makes him all her joy.
And now they never meet in grove, or green,
By fountain clear, or spangled starlight sheen,
But they do square, that all their elves for fear
Creep into acorn cups, and hide them there.
FAIRY
Either I mistake your shape and making quite
Or else you are that shrewd and knavish sprite
Called Robin Goodfellow. Are not you he
That frights the maidens of the villag‘ry,
Skim milk, and sometimes labour in the quern,
And bootless make the breathless housewife churn,
And sometime make the drink to bear no barm—
Mislead night wanderers, laughing at their harm?
Those that ‘hobgoblin’ call you, and ‘sweet puck’,
You do their work, and they shall have good luck.
Are not you he?
ROBIN Thou speak’st aright;
I am that merry wanderer of the night.
I jest to Oberon, and make him smile
When I a fat and bean-fed horse beguile,
The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works Page 137
