But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow,
That, to pay grief, must of poor patience borrow.
These sentences, to sugar or to gall,
Being strong on both sides, are equivocal.
But words are words: I never yet did hear
That the bruised heart was piercéd through the

ear.

I humbly beseech you, proceed to the affairs of

state.

Duke. The Turk with a most mighty preparation makes for Cyprus :-Othello, the fortitude of the place is best known to you: and though we have there a substitute of most allowed sufficiency, yet opinion, a sovereign mistress of effects, throws a more safer voice on you:-you must therefore be content to slubber the gloss of your new fortunes with this more stubborn and boisterous expedition.

Oth. The tyrant custom, most grave senators,
Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war
My thrice-driven bed of down. I do agnize
A natural and prompt alacrity

I find in hardness; and do undertake
These present wars against the Ottomites.
Most humbly therefore bending to your state,
I crave fit disposition for my wife;.
Due reference of place, and exhibition;
With such accommodation and besort
As levels with her breeding.

My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world. My heart's subdued
Even to the very quality of my lord:
I saw Othello's visage in his mind;
And to his honours and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I be left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
The rights for which I love him are bereft me,
And I a heavy interim shall support

By his dear absence. Let me go with him.
Oth. Your voices, lords :-'beseech you, let
her will

Have a free way.

Vouch with me, heaven, I therefore beg it not

To please the palate of my appetite;
Nor to comply with heat, the young affects,
In my distinct and proper satisfaction;

But to be free and bounteous to her mind.
And heaven defend your good souls, that you think
I will your serious and great business scant
For she is with me. No; when light-winged toys
Of feathered Cupid seel with wanton dulness
My speculative and active instruments,
That my disports corrupt and taint my business,
Let housewives make a skillet of my helm,
And all indign and base adversities
Make head against my estimation!

Duke. Be it as you shall privately determine, Either for her stay or going. The affair cries haste, And speed must answer it: you must hence tonight.

Des. To-night, my lord?
This night.

Duke.

Oth.

With all my heart.

Duke. At nine i' the morning here we 'll meet

again.

Othello, leave some officer behind,

And he shall our commission bring to you; With such things else of quality and respect As doth import you.

Oth.

Please your grace, my ancient:

A man he is of honesty and trust.

To his conveyance I assign my wife,

With what else needful your good grace shall think To be sent after me.

If virtue no delighted beauty lack, Your son-in-law is far more fair than black. 1st Sen. Adieu, brave Moor: use Desdemona

well.

Bra. Look to her, Moor; have a quick eye to see: She has deceived her father, and may thee.

[Exeunt DUKE, Senators, Officers, &c. Oth. My life upon her faith.-Honest Iago, My Desdemona must I leave to thee;

I pr'y thee let thy wife attend on her;

And bring them after in the best advantage.—
Come, Desdemona; I have but an hour
Of love, of worldly matters and direction,
To spend with thee: we must obey the time.
[Exeunt OTHELLO and DESDEMONA.

Rod. Iago. lago. What say'st thou, noble heart? Rod. What will I do, think'st thou? Iago. Why, go to bed and sleep. Rod. I will incontinently drown myself. Iago. Well, if thou dost, I shall never love thee after it. Why, thou silly gentleman!

Rod. It is silliness to live when to live is a

torment: and then have we a prescription to die, when death is our physician,

Iago. O villanous! I have looked upon the world for four times seven years; and since I could distinguish between a benefit and an injury, I never found a man that knew how to love himself. Ere I would say I would drown myself for the love of a Guinea-hen, I would change my humanity with a baboon.

Rod. What should I do? I confess it is my shame to be so fond; but it is not in virtue to amend it.

Iago. Virtue? a fig!-'tis in ourselves that we are thus or thus. Our bodies are our gardens, to the which our wills are gardeners: so that if we will plant nettles, or sow lettuce; set hyssop, and weed up thyme; supply it with one gender of herbs, or distract it with many; either to have it steril with idleness, or manured with industry,-why, the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous conclusions.-But we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts; whereof I take this that you call love, to be a sect or scion.

Rod. It cannot be.

Iago. It is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will. Come, be a man. Drown thyself! drown cats and blind puppies. I have professed me thy friend, and I confess me knit to thy deserving with cables of perdurable toughness. I could never better stead thee than now. Put money in thy purse: follow these wars; defeat thy favour with an usurped beard: I say, put money in thy purse. It cannot be that Desdemona should long continue her love to the Moor;-put money in thy purse;-nor he his to her: it was a violent commencement, and thou shalt see an answerable sequestration; -put but money in thy purse. These Moors are changeable in their wills;-fill thy purse with money-the food that to him now is as luscious as locusts, shall be to him shortly as bitter as coloquintida. She must change for youth when she is sated with his body, she will find the error of her choice. She must have change, she must: therefore put money in thy purse. If thou wilt needs damn thyself, do it a more delicate way than drowning. Make

all the money thou canst. If sanctimony and a frail vow, betwixt an erring barbarian and a supersubtle Venetian, be not too hard for my wits and all the tribe of hell, thou shalt enjoy her: therefore make money. A pox of drowning thyself! it is clean out of the way: seek thou rather to be hanged in compassing thy joy, than to be drowned and go without her.

Rod. Wilt thou be fast to my hopes, if I depend on the issue?

Iago. Thou art sure of me.-Go, make money. -I have told thee often, and I re-tell thee again and again, I hate the Moor. My cause is hearted; thine hath no less reason. Let us be conjunctive in our revenge against him: if thou canst cuckold him, thou dost thyself a pleasure, and me a sport. There are many events in the womb of time, which will be delivered. Traverse; go; provide thy money. We will have more of this to-morrow. Adieu.

Rod. Where shall we meet i' the morning?
Iago. At my lodging.

Rod. I'll be with thee betimes.

Iago. Go to; farewell. Do you hear, Roderigo?
Rod. What say you?

Iago. No more of drowning, do you hear.
Rod. I am changed. I'll sell all my land.
Iago. Go to; farewell: put money enough in
your purse.
[Exit RODERIGO.
Thus do I ever make my fool my purse:
For, mine own gained knowledge should profane,
If I would time expend with such a snipe,
But for my sport and profit.-I hate the Moor;
And it is thought abroad that 'twixt my sheets
He has done my office : I know not if't be true;
But I, for mere suspicion in that kind,
Will do as if for surety. He holds me well;
The better shall my purpose work on him.—
Cassio's a proper man. Let me see now:
To get his place, and to plume up my will:
A double knavery:-how; how? Let me see:-
After some time, to abuse Othello's ear
That he is too familiar with his wife :-
He hath a person and a smooth dispose
To be suspected; framed to make women false.
The Moor is of a free and open nature,
That thinks men honest that but seem to be so;
And will as tenderly be led by th' nose
As asses are.-

I have 't. It is engendered.—Hell and night Must bring this monstrous birth to the world's

Mon. But,good lieutenant, is your general wived? Cas. Most fortunately: he hath achieved a maid That paragons description and wild fame : One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens, And in the essential vesture of creation Does bear all excellency.-How now; who has put in?

Re-enter Second Gentleman.

2nd Gent. "Tis one Iago, ancient to the general. Cas. He has had most favourable and happyspeed: Tempests themselves,high seas and howling winds, The guttered rocks and congregated sands (Traitors ensteeped to clog the guiltless keel), As having sense of beauty, do omit Their mortal natures, letting go safely by The divine Desdemona.

Cas. She that I spake of, our great captain's captain,

Left in the conduct of the bold Iago;
Whose footing here anticipates our thoughts
A se'nnight's speed.-Great Jove, Othello guard,
And swell his sail with thine own powerful breath;
That he may bless this bay with his tall ship,
Make love's quick pants in Desdemona's arms,
Give renewed fire to our extincted spirits,
And bring all Cyprus comfort!-O, behold,
Enter DESDEMONA, EMILIA, IAGO, RODERIGO,
and Attendants.

The riches of the ship is come on shore!
Ye men of Cyprus, let her have your knees:-
Hail to thee, lady! and the grace of heaven,
Before, behind thee, and on every hand,

Enwheel thee round!

Des.

I thank you, valiant Cassio. What tidings can you tell me of my lord?

Cas. He is not yet arrived; nor know I aught But that he's well, and will be shortly here.

Des. O, but I fear-How lost you company? Cas. The great contention of the sea and skies Parted our fellowship. But hark! a sail.

[Cry within, "A sail, a sail!" Then guns heard. 2nd Gent. They give their greeting to the citadel: This likewise is a friend.

Des. Well praised! How if she be black and witty?

Iago. If she be black, and thereto have a wit, She'll find a white that shall her blackness fit. Des. Worse and worse.

Emil. How if fair and foolish?

Iago. She never yet was foolish that was fair: For even her folly helped her to an heir.

Des. These are old fond paradoxes, to make fools laugh i' the alehouse. What miserable praise hast thou for her that 's foul and foolish? Iago. There's none so foul, and foolish thereunto,

But does foul pranks, which fair and wise ones do.

Des. O heavy ignorance!-thou praisest the worst best. But what praise couldst thou bestow on a deserving woman indeed? one that, in the authority of her merit, did justly put on the vouch of very malice itself?

Iago. She that was ever fair, and never proud; Had tongue at will, and yet was never loud; Never lacked gold, and yet went never gay; Fled from her wish, and yet said,-" Now I may;"

She that, being angered, her revenge being nigh,
Bade her wrong stay, and her displeasure fly;
She that in wisdom never was so frail
To change the cod's head for the salmon's tail;