IAGO
You, or any man living, may be drunk at a time, man. I’ll tell you what you shall do. Our general’s wife is now the general;—I may say so in this respect, for that he hath devoted and given up himself to the contemplation, mark, and denotement of her parts and graces:—confess yourself freely to her; importune her help to put you in your place again: she is of so free, so kind, so apt, so blessed a disposition, she holds it a vice in her goodness not to do more than she is requested: this broken joint between you and her husband entreat her to splinter; and, my fortunes against any lay worth naming, this crack of your love shall grow stronger than it was before.
CASSIO
You advise me well.
IAGO
I protest, in the sincerity of love and honest kindness.
CASSIO
I think it freely; and betimes in the morning I will beseech the virtuous Desdemona to undertake for me; I am desperate of my fortunes if they check me here.
IAGO
You are in the right. Goodnight, lieutenant; I must to the watch.
CASSIO
Good night, honest Iago.
[Exit.]
IAGO
And what’s he, then, that says I play the villain?
When this advice is free I give and honest,
Probal to thinking, and, indeed, the course
To win the Moor again? For ‘tis most easy
The inclining Desdemona to subdue
In any honest suit: she’s fram’d as fruitful
As the free elements. And then for her
To win the Moor,—were’t to renounce his baptism,
All seals and symbols of redeemèd sin,—
His soul is so enfetter’d to her love
That she may make, unmake, do what she list,
Even as her appetite shall play the god
With his weak function. How am I, then, a villain
To counsel Cassio to this parallel course,
Directly to his good? Divinity of hell!
When devils will the blackest sins put on,
They do suggest at first with heavenly shows,
As I do now: for whiles this honest fool
Plies Desdemona to repair his fortune,
And she for him pleads strongly to the Moor,
I’ll pour this pestilence into his ear,—
That she repeals him for her body’s lust;
And by how much she strives to do him good,
She shall undo her credit with the Moor.
So will I turn her virtue into pitch;
And out of her own goodness make the net
That shall enmesh them all.
[Enter Roderigo.]
How now, Roderigo!
RODERIGO
I do follow here in the chase, not like a hound that hunts, but one that fills up the cry. My money is almost spent; I have been tonight exceedingly well cudgelled; and I think the issue will be—I shall have so much experience for my pains: and so, with no money at all and a little more wit, return again to Venice.
IAGO
How poor are they that have not patience!
What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
Thou know’st we work by wit, and not by witchcraft;
And wit depends on dilatory time.
Does’t not go well? Cassio hath beaten thee,
And thou, by that small hurt, hast cashier’d Cassio;
Though other things grow fair against the sun,
Yet fruits that blossom first will first be ripe:
Content thyself awhile.—By the mass, ‘tis morning;
Pleasure and action make the hours seem short.—
Retire thee; go where thou art billeted:
Away, I say; thou shalt know more hereafter;
Nay, get thee gone.
[Exit Roderigo.]
Two things are to be done,—
My wife must move for Cassio to her mistress;
I’ll set her on;
Myself the while to draw the Moor apart,
And bring him jump when he may Cassio find
Soliciting his wife. Ay, that’s the way;
Dull not device by coldness and delay.
[Exit.]
ACT III
SCENE I. Cyprus. Before the Castle.
[Enter Cassio and some Musicians.]
CASSIO
Masters, play here,—I will content your pains,
Something that’s brief; and bid “Good-morrow, general.”
[Music.]
[Enter Clown.]
CLOWN
Why, masters, have your instruments been in Naples, that they speak i’ the nose thus?
FIRST MUSICIAN
How, sir, how!
CLOWN
Are these, I pray you, wind instruments?
FIRST MUSICIAN
Ay, marry, are they, sir.
CLOWN
O, thereby hangs a tale.
FIRST MUSICIAN
Whereby hangs a tale, sir?
CLOWN
Marry, sir, by many a wind instrument that I know. But, masters, here’s money for you: and the general so likes your music, that he desires you, for love’s sake, to make no more noise with it.
FIRST MUSICIAN
Well, sir, we will not.
CLOWN
If you have any music that may not be heard, to’t again: but, as they say, to hear music the general does not greatly care.
FIRST MUSICIAN
We have none such, sir.
CLOWN
Then put up your pipes in your bag, for I’ll away: go, vanish into air, away!
[Exeunt Musicians.]
CASSIO
Dost thou hear, mine honest friend?
CLOWN
No, I hear not your honest friend; I hear you.
CASSIO
Pr’ythee, keep up thy quillets. There’s a poor piece of gold for thee: if the gentlewoman that attends the general’s wife be stirring, tell her there’s one Cassio entreats her a little favour of speech: wilt thou do this?