BEATRICE How now, cousin Hero?
FRIAR Have comfort, lady.
LEONATO Dost thou look up?
FRIAR Yea, wherefore should she not?
LEONATO
Wherefore? Why, doth not every earthly thing
Cry shame upon her? Could she here deny
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The story that is printed in her blood?
Do not live, Hero, do not ope thine eyes;
For did I think thou wouldst not quickly die,
Thought I thy spirits were stronger than thy shames,
Myself would on the rearward of reproaches
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Strike at thy life. Griev’d I, I had but one?
Chid I for that at frugal Nature’s frame?
O, one too much by thee! Why had I one?
Why ever wast thou lovely in my eyes?
Why had I not with charitable hand
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Took up a beggar’s issue at my gates,
Who smirched thus, and mir’d with infamy,
I might have said, ‘No part of it is mine;
This shame derives itself from unknown loins’?
But mine, and mine I lov’d, and mine I prais’d,
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And mine that I was proud on – mine so much
That I myself was to myself not mine,
Valuing of her – why, she, O, she is fall’n
Into a pit of ink, that the wide sea
Hath drops too few to wash her clean again,
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And salt too little which may season give
To her foul-tainted flesh!
BENEDICK Sir, sir, be patient.
For my part I am so attir’d in wonder,
I know not what to say.
BEATRICE O, on my soul my cousin is belied!
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BENEDICK Lady, were you her bedfellow last night?
BEATRICE No, truly, not; although until last night,
I have this twelvemonth been her bedfellow.
LEONATO
Confirm’d, confirm’d! O, that is stronger made
Which was before barr’d up with ribs of iron.
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Would the two princes lie, and Claudio lie,
Who lov’d her so, that, speaking of her foulness,
Wash’d it with tears? Hence from her, let her die!
FRIAR Hear me a little;
For I have only been silent so long,
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And given way unto this course of fortune,
By noting of the lady. I have mark’d
A thousand blushing apparitions
To start into her face, a thousand innocent shames
In angel whiteness beat away those blushes,
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And in her eye there hath appear’d a fire
To burn the errors that these princes hold
Against her maiden truth. Call me a fool;
Trust not my reading nor my observations,
Which with experimental seal doth warrant
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The tenor of my book; trust not my age,
My reverence, calling, nor divinity,
If this sweet lady lie not guiltless here
Under some biting error.
LEONATO Friar, it cannot be.
Thou seest that all the grace that she hath left
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Is that she will not add to her damnation
A sin of perjury: she not denies it.
Why seek’st thou then to cover with excuse
That which appears in proper nakedness?
FRIAR Lady, what man is he you are accus’d of?
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HERO They know that do accuse me; I know none.
If I know more of any man alive
Than that which maiden modesty doth warrant,
Let all my sins lack mercy! O my father,
Prove you that any man with me convers’d
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At hours unmeet, or that I yesternight
Maintain’d the change of words with any creature,
Refuse me, hate me, torture me to death!
FRIAR
There is some strange misprision in the princes.
BENEDICK Two of them have the very bent of honour;
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And if their wisdoms be misled in this,
The practice of it lives in John the bastard,
Whose spirits toil in frame of villainies.
LEONATO I know not. If they speak but truth of her,
These hands shall tear her: if they wrong her honour,
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The proudest of them shall well hear of it.
Time hath not yet so dried this blood of mine,
Nor age so eat up my invention,
Nor fortune made such havoc of my means,
Nor my bad life reft me so much of friends,
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But they shall find, awak’d in such a kind,
Both strength of limb and policy of mind,
Ability in means and choice of friends,
To quit me of them throughly.
FRIAR Pause awhile,
And let my counsel sway you in this case.
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Your daughter here the princes left for dead,
Let her awhile be secretly kept in,
And publish it that she is dead indeed;
Maintain a mourning ostentation,
And on your family’s old monument
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Hang mournful epitaphs, and do all rites
That appertain unto a burial.
LEONATO
What shall become of this? What will this do?
FRIAR Marry, this well carried shall on her behalf
Change slander to remorse; that is some good:
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But not for that dream I on this strange course,
But on this travail look for greater birth.
She dying, as it must be so maintain’d,
Upon the instant that she was accus’d,
Shall be lamented, pitied, and excus’d
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Of every hearer; for it so falls out
That what we have we prize not to the worth
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lack’d and lost,
Why then we rack the value, then we find
The virtue that possession would not show us
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Whiles it was ours: so will it fare with Claudio.
When he shall hear she died upon his words,
Th’idea of her life shall sweetly creep
Into his study of imagination,
And every lovely organ of her life
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Shall come apparell’d in more precious habit,
More moving-delicate and full of life,
Into the eye and prospect of his soul
Than when she liv’d indeed: then shall he mourn –
If ever love had interest in his liver –
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And wish he had not so accused her:
No, though he thought his accusation true.
Let this be so, and doubt not but success
Will fashion the event in better shape
Than I can lay it down in likelihood.
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But if all aim but this be levell’d false,
The supposition of the lady’s death
Will quench the wonder of her infamy:
And if it sort not well, you may conceal her,
As best befits her wounded reputation.
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In some reclusive and religious life,
Out of all eyes, tongues, minds, and injuries.
BENEDICK Signior Leonato, let the friar advise you;
And though you know my inwardness and love
Is very much unto the Prince and Claudio,
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Yet, by mine honour, I will deal in this
As secretly and justly as your soul
Should with your body.
LEONATO Being that I flow in grief,
The smallest twine may lead me.
FRIAR ’Tis well consented. Presently away;
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For to strange sores strangely they strain the cure.
Come, lady, die to live; this wedding-day
Perhaps is but prolong’d; have patience and endure.
Exeunt all but Benedick and Beatrice.
BENEDICK Lady Beatrice, have you wept all this while?
BEATRICE Yea, and I will weep a while longer.
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BENEDICK I will not desire that.
BEATRICE You have no reason, I do it freely.
BENEDICK Surely I do believe your fair cousin is
wronged.
BEATRICE Ah, how much might the man deserve of me
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that would right her!
BENEDICK Is there any way to show such friendship?
BEATRICE A very even way, but no such friend.
BENEDICK May a man do it?
BEATRICE It is a man’s office, but not yours.
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BENEDICK I do love nothing in the world so well as you
– is not that strange?
BEATRICE As strange as the thing I know not. It were as
possible for me to say I loved nothing so well as you,
but believe me not; and yet I lie not; I confess nothing,
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nor I deny nothing. I am sorry for my cousin.
BENEDICK By my sword, Beatrice, thou lovest me.
BEATRICE Do not swear and eat it.
BENEDICK I will swear by it that you love me, and I will
make him eat it that says I love not you.
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BEATRICE Will you not eat your word?
BENEDICK With no sauce that can be devised to it. I
protest I love thee.
BEATRICE Why then, God forgive me!
BENEDICK What offence, sweet Beatrice?
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BEATRICE You have stayed me in a happy hour, I was
about to protest I loved you.
BENEDICK And do it with all thy heart.
BEATRICE I love you with so much of my heart that none
is left to protest.
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BENEDICK Come, bid me do anything for thee.
BEATRICE Kill Claudio!
BENEDICK Ha, not for the wide world!
BEATRICE You kill me to deny it. Farewell.
BENEDICK Tarry, sweet Beatrice.
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BEATRICE I am gone, though I am here; there is no love
in you; nay I pray you let me go.
BENEDICK Beatrice –
BEATRICE In faith, I will go.
BENEDICK We’ll be friends first.
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BEATRICE You dare easier be friends with me than fight
with mine enemy.
BENEDICK Is Claudio thine enemy?
BEATRICE Is a not approved in the height a villain, that
hath slandered, scorned, dishonoured my kinswoman?
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O that I were a man! What, bear her in hand until
they come to take hands, and then with public
accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancour
– O God that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the
market-place.
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BENEDICK Hear me, Beatrice –
BEATRICE Talk with a man out at a window! A proper
saying!
BENEDICK Nay, but Beatrice –
BEATRICE Sweet Hero! She is wronged, she is
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slandered, she is undone.
BENEDICK Beat –
BEATRICE Princes and counties! Surely a princely
testimony, a goodly count, Count Comfect, a sweet
gallant surely! O that I were a man for his sake, or that
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I had any friend would be a man for my sake! But
manhood is melted into curtsies, valour into
compliment, and men are only turned into tongue,
and trim ones too: he is now as valiant as Hercules that
only tells a lie and swears it. I cannot be a man with
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wishing, therefore I will die a woman with grieving.
BENEDICK Tarry, good Beatrice. By this hand I love
thee.
BEATRICE Use it for my love some other way than
swearing by it.
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BENEDICK Think you in your soul the Count Claudio
hath wronged Hero?
BEATRICE Yea, as sure as I have a thought, or a soul.
BENEDICK Enough! I am engaged, I will challenge him.
I will kiss your hand, and so I leave you. By this hand,
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CLAUDIO shall render me a dear account. As you hear of
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 408