The Oxford Shakespeare: The Complete Works

by William Shakespeare

The wealthy curled darlings of our nation,

  Would ever have, t‘incur a general mock,

  Run from her guardage to the sooty bosom

  Of such a thing as thou—to fear, not to delight.

  Judge me the world if ’tis not gross in sense

  That thou hast practised on her with foul charms,

  Abused her delicate youth with drugs or minerals

  That weakens motion. I’ll have’t disputed on.

  ’Tis probable, and palpable to thinking.

  I therefore apprehend and do attach thee

  For an abuser of the world, a practiser

  Of arts inhibited and out of warrant.

  (To officers) Lay hold upon him. If he do resist,

  Subdue him at his peril.

  OTHELLO

  Hold your hands,

  Both you of my inclining and the rest.

  Were it my cue to fight, I should have known it

  Without a prompter. Whither will you that I go

  To answer this your charge?

  BRABANZIO

  To prison, till fit time

  Of law and course of direct session

  Call thee to answer.

  OTHELLO

  What if I do obey?

  How may the Duke be therewith satisfied,

  Whose messengers are here about my side

  Upon some present business of the state

  To bring me to him?

  OFFICER (to Brabanzio) ’Tis true, most worthy signor.

  The Duke’s in council, and your noble self,

  I am sure, is sent for.

  BRABANZIO

  How, the Duke in council?

  In this time of the night? Bring him away.

  Mine’s not an idle cause. The Duke himself,

  Or any of my brothers of the state,

  Cannot but feel this wrong as ’twere their own;

  For if such actions may have passage free,

  Bondslaves and pagans shall our statesmen be. Exeunt

  1.3 Enter the Duke and Senators set at a table, with lights and officers

  DUKE

  There is no composition in these news

  That gives them credit.

  FIRST SENATOR

  Indeed, they are disproportioned.

  My letters say a hundred and seven galleys.

  DUKE

  And mine a hundred-forty.

  SECOND SENATOR

  And mine two hundred.

  But though they jump not on a just account—

  As, in these cases, where the aim reports

  ’Tis oft with difference—yet do they all confirm

  A Turkish fleet, and bearing up to Cyprus.

  DUKE

  Nay, it is possible enough to judgement.

  I do not so secure me in the error,

  But the main article I do approve

  In fearful sense.

  SAILOR (within) What ho, what ho, what ho!

  Enter a Sailor

  OFFICER

  A messenger from the galleys.

  DUKE Now, what’s the business?

  SAILOR

  The Turkish preparation makes for Rhodes.

  So was I bid report here to the state

  By Signor Angelo.

  DUKE (to Senators) How say you by this change?

  FIRST SENATOR This cannot be,

  By no assay of reason—’tis a pageant

  To keep us in false gaze. When we consider

  The importancy of Cyprus to the Turk,

  And let ourselves again but understand

  That, as it more concerns the Turk than Rhodes,

  So may he with more facile question bear it,

  For that it stands not in such warlike brace,

  But altogether lacks th’abilities

  That Rhodes is dressed in—if we make thought of this,

  We must not think the Turk is so unskilful

  To leave that latest which concerns him first,

  Neglecting an attempt of ease and gain

  To wake and wage a danger profitless.

  DUKE

  Nay, in all confidence, he’s not for Rhodes.

  OFFICER Here is more news.

  Enter a Messenger

  MESSENGER

  The Ottomites, reverend and gracious,

  Steering with due course toward the Isle of Rhodes,

  Have there injointed them with an after fleet.

  FIRST SENATOR

  Ay, so I thought. How many, as you guess?

  MESSENGER

  Of thirty sail, and now they do restem

  Their backward course, bearing with frank appearance

  Their purposes toward Cyprus. Signor Montano,

  Your trusty and most valiant servitor,

  With his free duty recommends you thus,

  And prays you to believe him.

  DUKE

  ’Tis certain then for Cyprus.

  Marcus Luccicos, is not he in town?

  FIRST SENATOR He’s now in Florence.

  DUKE

  Write from us to him post-post-haste. Dispatch.

  Enter Brabanzio, Othello, Roderigo, Iago, Cassio, and officers

  FIRST SENATOR

  Here comes Brabanzio and the valiant Moor.

  DUKE

  Valiant Othello, we must straight employ you

  Against the general enemy Ottoman.

  (To Brabanzio) I did not see you. Welcome, gentle

  signor.

  We lacked your counsel and your help tonight.

  BRABANZIO

  So did I yours. Good your grace, pardon me.

  Neither my place, nor aught I heard of business,

  Hath raised me from my bed, nor doth the general

  care

  Take hold on me; for my particular grief

  Is of so floodgate and o’erbearing nature

  That it engluts and swallows other sorrows,

  And it is still itself.

  DUKE

  Why, what’s the matter?

  BRABANZIO

  My daughter, O, my daughter!

  SENATORS

  Dead?

  BRABANZIO

  Ay, to me.

  She is abused, stol’n from me, and corrupted

  By spells and medicines bought of mountebanks.

  For nature so preposterously to err,

  Being not deficient, blind, or lame of sense,

  Sans witchcraft could not.

  DUKE

  Whoe’er he be that in this foul proceeding

  Hath thus beguiled your daughter of herself

  And you of her, the bloody book of law

  You shall yourself read in the bitter letter

  After your own sense, yea, though our proper son

  Stood in your action.

  BRABANZIO

  Humbly I thank your grace.

  Here is the man, this Moor, whom now it seems

  Your special mandate for the state affairs

  Hath hither brought.

  SENATORS We are very sorry for’t.

  DUKE (to Othello)

  What in your own part can you say to this?

  BRABANZIO Nothing but this is so.

  OTHELLO

  Most potent, grave, and reverend signors,

  My very noble and approved good masters,

  That I have ta’en away this old man’s daughter,

  It is most true, true I have married her.

  The very head and front of my offending

  Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech,

  And little blessed with the soft phrase of peace,

  For since these arms of mine had seven years’ pith

  Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used

  Their dearest action in the tented field,

  And little of this great world can I speak

  More than pertains to feats of broils and battle.

  And therefore little shall I grace my cause

  In speaking for myself. Ye
t, by your gracious patience,

  I will a round unvarnished tale deliver

  Of my whole course of love, what drugs, what charms,

  What conjuration and what mighty magic—

  For such proceeding I am charged withat—

  I won his daughter.

  BRABANZIO

  A maiden never bold,

  Of spirit so still and quiet that her motion

  Blushed at hersetf—and she in spite of nature,

  Of years, of country, credit, everything,

  To fall in love with what she feared to look on!

  It is a judgement maimed and most imperfect

  That will confess perfection so could err

  Against all rules of nature, and must be driven

  To find out practices of cunning hell

  Why this should be. I therefore vouch again

  That with some mixtures powerful o’er the blood,

  Or with some dram conjured to this effect,

  He wrought upon her.

  DUKE

  To vouch this is no proof

  Without more wider and more overt test

  Than these thin habits and poor likelihoods

  Of modern seeming do prefer against him.

  A SENATOR But Othello, speak.

  Did you by indirect and forced courses

  Subdue and poison this young maid’s affections,

  Or came it by request and such fair question

  As soul to soul affordeth?

  OTHELLO

  I do beseech you,

  Send for the lady to the Sagittary,

  And let her speak of me before her father.

  If you do find me foul in her report,

  The trust, the office I do hold of you

  Not only take away, but let your sentence

  Even fall upon my life.

  DUKE (to officers)

  Fetch Desdemona hither.

  OTHELLO

  Ensign, conduct them. You best know the place.

  Exit Iago with two or three officers

  And till she come, as truly as to heaven

  I do confess the vices of my blood,

  So justly to your grave ears I’ll present

  How I did thrive in this fair lady’s love

  And she in mine.

  DUKE

  Say it, Othello.

  OTHELLO

  Her father loved me, oft invited me,

  Still questioned me the story of my life

  From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes

  That I have passed.

  I ran it through even from my boyish days

  To th’ very moment that he bade me tell it,

  Wherein I spoke of most disastrous chances,

  Of moving accidents by flood and field,

  Of hair-breadth scapes i‘th’ imminent deadly breach,

  Of being taken by the insolent foe

  And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence,

  And portance in my traveller’s history,

  Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,

  Rough quarries, rocks, and hills whose heads touch

  heaven,

  It was my hint to speak. Such was my process,

  And of the cannibals that each other eat,

  The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads

  Do grow beneath their shoulders. These things to hear

  Would Desdemona seriously incline,

  But still the house affairs would draw her thence,

  Which ever as she could with haste dispatch

  She’d come again, and with a greedy ear

  Devour up my discourse; which I observing,

  Took once a pliant hour, and found good means

  To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart

  That I would all my pilgrimage dilate,

  Whereof by parcels she had something heard,

  But not intentively. I did consent,

  And often did beguile her of her tears

  When I did speak of some distressful stroke

  That my youth suffered. My story being done,

  She gave me for my pains a world of kisses.

  She swore in faith ’twas strange, ‘twas passing strange,

  ’Twas pitiful, ’twas wondrous pitiful.

  She wished she had not heard it, yet she wished

  That heaven had made her such a man. She thanked

  me,

  And bade me, if I had a friend that loved her,

  I should but teach him how to tell my story,

  And that would woo her. Upon this hint I spake.

  She loved me for the dangers I had passed,

  And I loved her that she did pity them.

  This only is the witchcraft I have used.

  Enter Desdemona, Iago, and attendants

  Here comes the lady. Let her witness it.

  DUKE

  I think this tale would win my daughter, too.—

  Good Brabanzio,

  Take up this mangled matter at the best.

  Men do their broken weapons rather use

  Than their bare hands.

  BRABANZIO

  I pray you hear her speak.

  If she confess that she was half the wooer,

  Destruction on my head if my bad blame

  Light on the man! Come hither, gentle mistress.

  Do you perceive in all this noble company

  Where most you owe obedience?

  DESDEMONA

  My noble father,

  I do perceive here a divided duty.

  To you I am bound for life and education.

  My life and education both do learn me

  How to respect you. You are the lord of duty,

  I am hitherto your daughter. But here’s my husband,

  And so much duty as my mother showed

  To you, preferring you before her father,

  So much I challenge that I may profess

  Due to the Moor my lord.

  BRABANZIO

  God b‘wi’you, I ha’ done.

  Please it your grace, on to the state affairs.

  I had rather to adopt a child than get it.

  Come hither, Moor.

  I here do give thee that with all my heart

  Which, but thou hast already, with all my heart

  I would keep from thee. (To Desdemona) For your sake,

  jewel,

  I am glad at soul I have no other child,

  For thy escape would teach me tyranny,

  To hang clogs on ’em. I have done, my lord.

  DUKE

  Let me speak like yourself, and lay a sentence

  Which, as a grece or step, may help these lovers

  Into your favour.

  When remedies are past, the griefs are ended

  By seeing the worst which late on hopes depended.

  To mourn a mischief that is past and gone

  Is the next way to draw new mischief on.

  What cannot be preserved when fortune takes,

  Patience her injury a mockery makes.

  The robbed that smiles steals something from the thief;

  He robs himself that spends a bootless grief.

  BRABANZIO

  So let the Turk of Cyprus us beguile,

  We lose it not so long as we can smile.

  He bears the sentence well that nothing bears

  But the free comfort which from thence he hears,

  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 pierced through the ear.

  I humbly beseech you proceed to th’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 suff
iciency, yet opinion, a more 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.

  OTHELLO

  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

  This 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.

  DUKE Why, at her father’s!

  BRABANZIO I will not have it so.

  OTHELLO Nor I.

  DESDEMONA Nor would I there reside,

  To put my father in impatient thoughts

  By being in his eye. Most gracious Duke,

  To my unfolding lend your prosperous ear,

  And let me find a charter in your voice

  T’assist my simpleness.

  DUKE

  What would you, Desdemona?

  DESDEMONA

  That I did love the Moor to live with him,

  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 rites for why I love him are bereft me,

  And I a heavy interim shall support

  By his dear absence. Let me go with him.

  OTHELLO (to the Duke) Let her have your voice.

  Vouch with me heaven, I therefor beg it not

  To please the palate of my appetite,

  Nor to comply with heat—the young affects

  In me defunct—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

  When she is with me. No, when light-winged toys

  Of feathered Cupid seel with wanton dullness

  My speculative and officed 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. Th’affair cries haste,

  And speed must answer it.

  A SENATOR (to Othello)

  You must away tonight.