William Shakespeare - Ultimate Collection: Complete Plays & Poetry in One Volume. William Shakespeare

merchandise.

       ANTONIO.

       Believe me, no; I thank my fortune for it,

       My ventures are not in one bottom trusted,

       Nor to one place; nor is my whole estate

       Upon the fortune of this present year;

       Therefore my merchandise makes me not sad.

       SALARINO.

       Why, then you are in love.

       ANTONIO.

       Fie, fie!

       SALARINO.

       Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad

       Because you are not merry; and ‘twere as easy

       For you to laugh and leap and say you are merry,

       Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,

       Nature hath fram’d strange fellows in her time:

       Some that will evermore peep through their eyes,

       And laugh like parrots at a bagpiper;

       And other of such vinegar aspect

       That they’ll not show their teeth in way of smile

       Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.

       [Enter BASSANIO, LORENZO, and GRATIANO.]

       SALANIO.

       Here comes Bassanio, your most noble kinsman,

       Gratiano, and Lorenzo. Fare ye well;

       We leave you now with better company.

       SALARINO.

       I would have stay’d till I had made you merry,

       If worthier friends had not prevented me.

       ANTONIO.

       Your worth is very dear in my regard.

       I take it your own business calls on you,

       And you embrace th’ occasion to depart.

       SALARINO.

       Good morrow, my good lords.

       BASSANIO.

       Good signiors both, when shall we laugh? Say when.

       You grow exceeding strange; must it be so?

       SALARINO.

       We’ll make our leisures to attend on yours.

       [Exeunt SALARINO and SALANIO.]

       LORENZO.

       My Lord Bassanio, since you have found Antonio,

       We two will leave you; but at dinner-time,

       I pray you, have in mind where we must meet.

       BASSANIO.

       I will not fail you.

       GRATIANO.

       You look not well, Signior Antonio;

       You have too much respect upon the world;

       They lose it that do buy it with much care.

       Believe me, you are marvellously chang’d.

       ANTONIO.

       I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano;

       A stage, where every man must play a part,

       And mine a sad one.

       GRATIANO.

       Let me play the fool;

       With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come;

       And let my liver rather heat with wine

       Than my heart cool with mortifying groans.

       Why should a man whose blood is warm within

       Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster,

       Sleep when he wakes, and creep into the jaundice

       By being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio—

       I love thee, and ‘tis my love that speaks—

       There are a sort of men whose visages

       Do cream and mantle like a standing pond,

       And do a wilful stillness entertain,

       With purpose to be dress’d in an opinion

       Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit;

       As who should say ‘I am Sir Oracle,

       And when I ope my lips let no dog bark.’

       O my Antonio, I do know of these

       That therefore only are reputed wise

       For saying nothing; when, I am very sure,

       If they should speak, would almost damn those ears

       Which, hearing them, would call their brothers fools.

       I’ll tell thee more of this another time.

       But fish not with this melancholy bait,

       For this fool gudgeon, this opinion.

       Come, good Lorenzo. Fare ye well awhile;

       I’ll end my exhortation after dinner.

       LORENZO.

       Well, we will leave you then till dinner-time.

       I must be one of these same dumb wise men,

       For Gratiano never lets me speak.

       GRATIANO.

       Well, keep me company but two years moe,

       Thou shalt not know the sound of thine own tongue.

       ANTONIO.

       Fare you well; I’ll grow a talker for this gear.

       GRATIANO.

       Thanks, i’ faith, for silence is only commendable

       In a neat’s tongue dried, and a maid not vendible.

       [Exeunt GRATIANO and LORENZO.]

       ANTONIO.

       Is that anything now?

       BASSANIO. Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in, two bushels of chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them they are not worth the search.

       ANTONIO.

       Well; tell me now what lady is the same

       To whom you swore a secret pilgrimage,

       That you to-day promis’d to tell me of?

       BASSANIO.

       ‘Tis not unknown to you, Antonio,

       How much I have disabled mine estate

       By something showing a more swelling port

       Than my faint means would grant continuance;

       Nor do I now make moan to be abridg’d

       From such a noble rate; but my chief care

       Is to come fairly off from the great debts

       Wherein my time, something too prodigal,

       Hath left me gag’d. To you, Antonio,

       I owe the most, in money and in love;

       And from your love I have a warranty

       To unburden all my plots and purposes

       How to get clear of all the debts I owe.

       ANTONIO.

       I pray you, good Bassanio, let me know it;

       And if it stand, as you yourself still do,

       Within the eye of honour, be assur’d

       My purse, my person, my extremest means,

       Lie all unlock’d to your occasions.

       BASSANIO.