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The Illustrated Works of Shakespeare
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Illustrated Works of Shakespeare, The (1990)(Animated Pixels)[!][CDTV-PC].iso
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17
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01_02
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1991-04-10
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149 lines
Belmont. A Room in Portia's House.
Enter PORTIA with her waiting-woman, NERISSA.
Portia By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary of this great
world.
Nerissa You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the same
abundance as your good fortunes are; and yet, for aught I
see, they are as sick that surfeit with too much as they
that starve with nothing. It is no mean happiness,
therefore, to be seated in the mean: superfluity comes
sooner by white hairs, but competency lives longer.
Portia Good sentences, and well pronounced.
Nerissa They would be better if well followed.
Portia If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do,
chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes'
palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own
instructions. I can easier teach twenty what were good to be
done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.
The brain may devise laws for the blood, but a hot temper
leaps o'er a cold decree - such a hare is Madness, the
youth, to skip o'er the meshes of good Counsel, the cripple.
But this reasoning is not in the fashion to choose me a
husband. O me, the word 'choose'! I may neither choose who I
would nor refuse who I dislike; so is the will of a living
daughter curbed by the will of a dead father. Is it not
hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none?
Nerissa Your father was ever virtuous, and holy men at their death
have good inspirations. Therefore the lottery that he hath
devised in these three chests of gold, silver, and lead,
whereof who chooses his meaning chooses you, will, no doubt,
never be chosen by any rightly but one who you shall rightly
love. But what warmth is there in your affection towards any
of these princely suitors that are already come?
Portia I pray thee overname them, and, as thou namest them, I will
describe them; and according to my description, level at my
affection.
Nerissa First there is the Neapolitan prince.
Portia Ay, that's a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of
his horse, and he makes it a great appropriation to his own
good parts that he can shoe him himself. I am much afeard my
lady his mother played false with a smith.
Nerissa Then is there the County Palatine.
Portia He doth nothing but frown, as who should say "And you will
not have me, choose". He hears merry tales and smiles not: I
fear he will prove the weeping philosopher when he grows
old, being so full of unmannerly sadness in his youth. I had
rather be married to a death's-head with a bone in his mouth
than to either of these. God defend me from these two!
Nerissa How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?
Portia God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man. In truth
I know it is a sin to be a mocker, but he - why, he hath a
horse better than the Neapolitan's, a better bad habit of
frowning than the Count Palatine; he is every man in no man.
If a throstle sing, he falls straight a-capering; he will
fence with his own shadow. If I should marry him, I should
marry twenty husbands. If he would despise me, I would
forgive him, for if he love me to madness, I shall never
requite him.
Nerissa What say you then to Falconbridge, the young baron of
England?
Portia You know I say nothing to him, for he understands not me,
nor I him: he hath neither Latin, French, nor Italian, and
you will come into the court and swear that I have a poor
pennyworth in the English. He is a proper man's picture, but
alas, who can converse with a dumb-show? How oddly he is
suited! I think he bought his doublet in Italy, his round
hose in France, his bonnet in Germany, and his behaviour
everywhere.
Nerissa What think you of the Scottish lord, his neighbour?
Portia That he hath a neighbourly charity in him, for he borrowed a
box of the ear of the Englishman, and swore he would pay him
again when he was able. I think the Frenchman became his
surety, and sealed under for another.
Nerissa How like you the young German, the Duke of Saxony's nephew?
Portia Very vilely in the morning when he is sober, and most vilely
in the afternoon when he is drunk. When he is best he is a
little worse than a man, and when he is worst he is little
better than a beast. An the worst fall that ever fell, I
hope I shall make shift to go without him.
Nerissa If he should offer to choose, and choose the right casket,
you should refuse to perform your father's will if you
should refuse to accept him.
Portia Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee set a deep
glass of Rhenish wine on the contrary casket; for if the
devil be within and that temptation without, I know he will
choose it. I will do anything, Nerissa, ere I will be
married to a sponge.
Nerissa You need not fear, lady, the having any of these lords. They
have acquainted me with their determinations, which is,
indeed, to return to their home, and to trouble you with no
more suit unless you may be won by some other sort than your
father's imposition depending on the caskets.
Portia If I live to be as old as Sibylla, I will die as chaste as
Diana, unless I be obtained by the manner of my father's
will. I am glad this parcel of wooers are so reasonable, for
there is not one among them but I dote on his very absence,
and I pray God grant them a fair departure.
Nerissa Do you not remember, lady, in your father's time, a
Venetian, a scholar and a soldier, that came hither in
company of the Marquis of Montferrat?
Portia Yes, yes; it was Bassanio - as I think so was he called.
Nerissa True, madam. He, of all the men that ever my foolish eyes
looked upon, was the best deserving a fair lady.
Portia I remember him well; and I remember him worthy of thy
praise.
Enter a SERVINGMAN.
How now, what news?
Servingman The four strangers seek for you, madam, to take their leave;
and there is a forerunner come from a fifth, the Prince of
Morocco, who brings word the prince his master will be here
tonight.
Portia If I could bid the fifth welcome with so good heart as I can
bid the other four farewell, I should be glad of his
approach. If he have the condition of a saint and the
complexion of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than
wive me. Come Nerissa. Sirrah, go before. Whiles we shut the
gate upon one wooer, another knocks at the door.
[Exeunt.