For such a wish! he was not born to shame:
Upon his brow shame is asham’d to sit;
For ‘tis a throne where honour may be crown’d
Sole monarch of the universal earth.
O, what a beast was I to chide at him!
NURSE.
Will you speak well of him that kill’d your cousin?
JULIET.
Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband?
Ah, poor my lord, what tongue shall smooth thy name,
When I, thy three-hours’ wife, have mangled it?—
But wherefore, villain, didst thou kill my cousin?
That villain cousin would have kill’d my husband:
Back, foolish tears, back to your native spring;
Your tributary drops belong to woe,
Which you, mistaking, offer up to joy.
My husband lives, that Tybalt would have slain;
And Tybalt’s dead, that would have slain my husband:
All this is comfort; wherefore weep I, then?
Some word there was, worser than Tybalt’s death,
That murder’d me: I would forget it fain;
But O, it presses to my memory
Like damned guilty deeds to sinners’ minds:
‘Tybalt is dead, and Romeo banished.’
That ‘banished,’ that one word ‘banished,’
Hath slain ten thousand Tybalts. Tybalt’s death
Was woe enough, if it had ended there:
Or, if sour woe delights in fellowship,
And needly will be rank’d with other griefs,—
Why follow’d not, when she said Tybalt’s dead,
Thy father, or thy mother, nay, or both,
Which modern lamentation might have mov’d?
But with a rearward following Tybalt’s death,
‘Romeo is banished’—to speak that word
Is father, mother, Tybalt, Romeo, Juliet,
All slain, all dead: ‘Romeo is banished,’—
There is no end, no limit, measure, bound,
In that word’s death; no words can that woe sound.—
Where is my father and my mother, nurse?
NURSE.
Weeping and wailing over Tybalt’s corse:
Will you go to them? I will bring you thither.
JULIET.
Wash they his wounds with tears: mine shall be spent,
When theirs are dry, for Romeo’s banishment.
Take up those cords. Poor ropes, you are beguil’d,
Both you and I; for Romeo is exil’d:
He made you for a highway to my bed;
But I, a maid, die maiden-widowed.
Come, cords; come, nurse; I’ll to my wedding-bed;
And death, not Romeo, take my maidenhead!
NURSE.
Hie to your chamber. I’ll find Romeo
To comfort you: I wot well where he is.
Hark ye, your Romeo will be here at night:
I’ll to him; he is hid at Lawrence’ cell.
JULIET.
O, find him! give this ring to my true knight,
And bid him come to take his last farewell.
[Exeunt.]
SCENE III
Friar Lawrence’s cell.
[Enter Friar Lawrence.]
FRIAR.
Romeo, come forth; come forth, thou fearful man.
Affliction is enanmour’d of thy parts,
And thou art wedded to calamity.
[Enter Romeo.]
ROMEO.
Father, what news? what is the prince’s doom
What sorrow craves acquaintance at my hand,
That I yet know not?
FRIAR.
Too familiar
Is my dear son with such sour company:
I bring thee tidings of the prince’s doom.
ROMEO.
What less than doomsday is the prince’s doom?
FRIAR.
A gentler judgment vanish’d from his lips,—
Not body’s death, but body’s banishment.
ROMEO.
Ha, banishment? be merciful, say death;
For exile hath more terror in his look,
Much more than death; do not say banishment.
FRIAR.
Hence from Verona art thou banished:
Be patient, for the world is broad and wide.
ROMEO.
There is no world without Verona walls,
But purgatory, torture, hell itself.
Hence-banished is banish’d from the world,
And world’s exile is death,—then banished
Is death misterm’d: calling death banishment,
Thou cutt’st my head off with a golden axe,
And smil’st upon the stroke that murders me.
FRIAR.
O deadly sin! O rude unthankfulness!
Thy fault our law calls death; but the kind prince,
Taking thy part, hath brush’d aside the law,
And turn’d that black word death to banishment:
This is dear mercy, and thou see’st it not.
ROMEO.
‘Tis torture, and not mercy: heaven is here,
Where Juliet lives; and every cat, and dog,
And little mouse, every unworthy thing,
Live here in heaven, and may look on her;
But Romeo may not.—More validity,
More honourable state, more courtship lives
In carrion flies than Romeo: they may seize
On the white wonder of dear Juliet’s hand,
And steal immortal blessing from her lips;
Who, even in pure and vestal modesty,
Still blush, as thinking