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The Same. A Garden. | |
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Enter LAUNCELOT and JESSICA. | |
| Laun. Yes, truly; for, look you, the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children; therefore, I promise you, I fear you. I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of the matter: therefore be of good cheer; for, truly, I think you are damned. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good, and that is but a kind of bastard hope neither. | |
| Jes. And what hope is that, I pray thee? | |
| Laun. Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not, that you are not the Jew’s daughter. | 5 |
| Jes. That were a kind of bastard hope, indeed: so the sins of my mother should be visited upon me. | |
| Laun. Truly then I fear you are damned both by father and mother: thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into Charybdis, your mother: well, you are gone both ways. | |
| Jes. I shall be saved by my husband; he hath made me a Christian. | |
| Laun. Truly the more to blame he: we were Christians enow before; e’en as many as could well live one by another. This making of Christians will raise the price of hogs: if we grow all to be pork-eaters, we shall not shortly have a rasher on the coals for money. | |
| Jes. I’ll tell my husband, Launcelot, what you say: here he comes. | 10 |
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Enter LORENZO. | |
| Lor. I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Launcelot, if you thus get my wife into corners. | |
| Jes. Nay, you need not fear us, Lorenzo: Launcelot and I are out. He tells me flatly, there is no mercy for me in heaven, because I am a Jew’s daughter: and he says you are no good member of the commonwealth, for, in converting Jews to Christians, you raise the price of pork. | |
| Lor. I shall answer that better to the commonwealth than you can the getting up of the negro’s belly: the Moor is with child by you, Launcelot. | |
| Laun. It is much that the Moor should be more than reason; but if she be less than an honest woman, she is indeed more than I took her for. | 15 |
| Lor. How every fool can play upon the word! I think the best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow commendable in none only but parrots. Go in, sirrah: bid them prepare for dinner. | |
| Laun. That is done, sir; they have all stomachs. | |
| Lor. Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you! then bid them prepare dinner. | |
| Laun. That is done too, sir; only, ‘cover’ is the word. | |
| Lor. Will you cover, then, sir? | 20 |
| Laun. Not so, sir, neither; I know my duty. | |
| Lor. Yet more quarrelling with occasion! Wilt thou show the whole wealth of thy wit in an instant? I pray thee, understand a plain man in his plain meaning: go to thy fellows; bid them cover the table, serve in the meat, and we will come in to dinner. | |
| Laun. For the table, sir, it shall be served in; for the meat, sir, it shall be covered; for your coming in to dinner, sir, why, let it be as humours and conceits shall govern. [Exit. | |
| Lor. O dear discretion, how his words are suited! | |
| The fool hath planted in his memory | 25 |
| An army of good words: and I do know | |
| A many fools, that stand in better place, | |
| Garnish’d like him, that for a tricksy word | |
| Defy the matter. How cheer’st thou, Jessica? | |
| And now, good sweet, say thy opinion; | 30 |
| How dost thou like the Lord Bassanio’s wife? | |
| Jes. Past all expressing. It is very meet, | |
| The Lord Bassanio live an upright life, | |
| For, having such a blessing in his lady, | |
| He finds the joys of heaven here on earth; | 35 |
| And if on earth he do not mean it, then | |
| In reason he should never come to heaven. | |
| Why, if two gods should play some heavenly match, | |
| And on the wager lay two earthly women, | |
| And Portia one, there must be something else | 40 |
| Pawn’d with the other, for the poor rude world | |
| Hath not her fellow. | |
| Lor. Even such a husband | |
| Hast thou of me as she is for a wife. | |
| Jes. Nay, but ask my opinion too of that. | 45 |
| Lor. I will anon; first, let us go to dinner. | |
| Jes. Nay, let me praise you while I have a stomach. | |
| Lor. No, pray thee, let it serve for table-talk; | |
| Then howsoe’er thou speak’st, ’mong other things | |
| I shall digest it. | 50 |
| Jes. Well, I’ll set you forth. [Exeunt. | |
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