Or,

if sour woe delights in fellowship, And needly will be rank'd with other griefs, Why follow'd not, when she said — Tybalt's dead, Thy father, or thy mother, nay, or both, Which modern lamentation 9 might have mov❜d? But, with a rear-ward following Tybalt's death, Romeo is banished, to speak that word, Is father, mother, Tybalt, Romeo, Juliet, All slain, all dead :- Romeo is banished, — There is no end, no limit, measure, bound, In that word's death; no words can that woe sound. Where is my father, and my mother, nurse?

Nurse. Weeping and wailing over Tybalt's corse: Will you go to them? I will bring you thither.

Jul. Wash they his wounds with tears? mine shall be spent,

When theirs are dry, for Romeo's banishment.
Take up those cords: Poor ropes, you are beguil'd,
Both you and I; for Romeo is exil'd:

He made you for a highway to my bed;

But I, a maid, die maiden-widowed.

Come, cords; come, nurse; I'll to my wedding bed; And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!

Nurse. Hie to your chamber: I'll find Romeo
To comfort you:
- I wot well where he is.
Hark ye, your Romeo will be here at night;
I'll to him; he is hid at Laurence' cell.

Jul. O find him! give this ring to my true knight, And bid him come to take his last farewell.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III.

Friar Laurence's Cell.

Enter Friar LAURENCE and ROMEO.

Fri. Romeo, come forth; come forth, thou fearful man ;

9 Which modern lamentation, &c.] i. e. trite, common.

Affliction is enamour'd of thy parts,

And thou art wedded to calamity.

Rom. Father, what news? what is the prince's doom?
What sorrow craves acquaintance at my hand,
That I yet know not?

Fri.

Too familiar

Is my

dear son with such sour company:

I bring thee tidings of the prince's doom.

Rom. What less than dooms-day is the prince's doom?
Fri. A gentler judgment vanish'd from his lips,
Not body's death, but body's banishment.

Rom. Ha! banishment? be merciful, say-death:
For exile hath more terror in his look,

Much more than death: do not say - banishment.
Fri. Hence from Verona art thou banished:
Be patient, for the world is broad and wide.

Rom. There is no world without Verona walls,
But purgatory, torture, hell itself.
Hence-banished is banish'd from the world,
And world's exíle is death; then banishment +
Is death mis-term'd: calling death - banishment,
Thou cut'st my head off with a golden axe,
And smil'st upon the stroke that murders me.

Fri. O deadly sin! O rude unthankfulness!
Thy fault our law calls death; but the kind prince,
Taking thy part, hath rush'd aside the law,
And turn'd that black word death to banishment :
This is dear mercy', and thou seest it not.

Rom. 'Tis torture, and not mercy: heaven is here,
Where Juliet lives; and every cat, and dog,
And little mouse, every unworthy thing,
Live here in heaven, and may look on her,
But Romeo not.
may
More validity,
More honourable state, more courtship lives

+ "then banished" - MALONE.

1 This is dear mercy,] The old copies read mere mercy, which, in ancient language, signifies absolute mercy.

In carrion flies, than Romeo 2: they may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliet's hand,
And steal immortal blessing from her lips;
Who, even in pure and vestal modesty,
Still blush, as thinking their own kisses sin;
But Romeo may not; he is banished:

Flies may do this, when I from this must fly;
They are free men, but I am banished.

And say'st thou yet, that exile is not death?
Hadst thou no poison mix'd, no sharp-ground knife,
No sudden mean of death, though ne'er so mean,
But-banished -to kill me; banished?
O friar, the damned use that word in hell;
Howlings attend it: How hast thou the heart,
Being a divine, a ghostly confessor,

A sin-absolver, and my friend profess'd,

To mangle me with that word-banishment?

Fri. Thou fond mad man, hear me but speak a word.
Rom. O, thou wilt speak again of banishment.

Fri. I'll give thee armour to keep off that word;
Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy,
To comfort thee, though thou art banished.

Rom. Yet banished?-Hang up philosophy!
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet,
Displant a town, reverse a prince's doom;
It helps not, it prevails not, talk no more.

Fri. O, then I see that madmen have no ears.
Rom. How should they, when that wise men have no
eyes?

Fri. Let me dispute with thee of thy estate.3

21

More validity,

More honourable state, more courtship lives

In carrion flies, than Romeo:] Validity seems here to mean worth or dignity. By courtship, the author seems to mean, the state of a lover; that dalliance, in which he who courts or wooes a lady is sometimes indulged.

Let me dispute with thee of thy estate.] i. e. talk over thy affairs.

Rom. Thou canst not speak of what thou dost not feel:

Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,
An hour but married, Tybalt murdered,
Doting like me, and like me banished,

Then might'st thou speak, then might'st thou tear thy
hair,

And fall upon the ground, as I do now,
Taking the measure of an unmade grave.

Fri. Arise; one knocks; good Romeo, hide thyself.
[Knocking within.
Rom. Not I; unless the breath of heart-sick groans,
Mist-like, infold me from the search of eyes. [Knocking.
Fri. Hark, how they knock! Who's there? -
Romeo, arise;
Thou wilt be taken : Stay a while:

:

stand up;

Run to my study:-By and by: - God's will!
What wilfulness is this?—I come, I come. [Knocking.
Who knocks so hard? whence come you? what's your
will?

Nurse [within.] Let me come in, and you shall know
my errand;

I come from lady Juliet.
Fri.

Fri.
Piteous predicament!

[Knocking.

Welcome then.

Enter Nurse.

Nurse. O holy friar, O, tell me, holy friar, Where is my lady's lord, where's Romeo?

Fri. There on the ground, with his own tears made

drunk.

Nurse. O, he is even in my mistress' case,

Just in her case!

O woeful sympathy!

Nurse.

Even so lies she,

Blubbering and weeping, weeping and blubbering :-
Stand up, stand up; stand, an you be a man:

For Juliet's sake, for her sake, rise and stand;
Why should you fall into so deep an O?

Rom. Nurse!

Nurse. Ah sir! ah sir! - Well, death's the end of all. Rom. Spak'st thou of Juliet? how is it with her? Doth she not think me an old murderer, Now I have stain'd the childhood of our joy With blood remov'd but little from her own? Where is she? and how doth she? and what says My conceal'd lady to our cancell❜d love?

Nurse. O, she says nothing, sir, but weeps and weeps; And now falls on her bed; and then starts up, And Tybalt calls; and then on Romeo cries, And then down falls again.

Rom.

As if that name,
Shot from the deadly level of a gun,
Did murder her; as, that name's cursed hand
Murder'd her kinsman.- O tell me, friar, tell me,
In what vile part of this anatomy

Doth my name lodge? tell me, that I may sack
The hateful mansion.
[Drawing his Sword.
Fri.
Hold thy desperate hand:
Art thou a man? thy form cries out, thou art;
Thy tears are womanish; thy wild acts denote
The unreasonable fury of a beast:
Unseemly woman, in a seeming man!
Or ill-beseeming beast, in seeming both!
Thou hast amaz'd me: by my holy order,
I thought thy disposition better temper❜d.
Hast thou slain Tybalt? wilt thou slay thyself?

And slay thy lady too that lives in thee,

By doing damned hate upon thyself?

Why rail'st thou on thy birth, the heaven, and earth?
Since birth, and heaven, and earth, all three do meet
In thee at once; which thou at once would'st lose.
Fye, fye! thou sham'st thy shape, thy love, thy wit;
Which, like an usurer, abound'st in all,
And usest none in that true use indeed