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O, that our fathers would applaud our loves,
To seal our happiness with their consents!
O heavenly Julia!

SILVIA.

Pro. Enough; I read your fortune in your eye: Was this the idol that you worship so?

Valentine. Even she; and is she not a heavenly saint? Pro, No, but she's an earthly paragon.

Val. Call her divine.

Pro. I will not flatter her.

Val. O, flatter me; for love delights in praises.

Pro. When I was sick, you gave me bitter pills ;

And I must minister the like to you.

Val. Then speak the truth by her; if not divine,
Yet let her be a principality,

Sovereign to all the creatures on the earth.
Pro. Except my mistress.

Val. Sweet, except not any,

Except thou wilt except against my love.

Pro. Have I not reason to prefer mine own? Val. And I will help thee to prefer her too; She shall be dignified with this high honor,To bear my lady's train; lest the base earth Should from her vesture chance to steal a kiss, And, of so great a favor growing proud, Disdain to root the summer-smelling flower, And make rough winter everlastingly.

Pro. Why, Valentine what braggardism is this? Val. Pardon me, Proteus: all I can is nothing To her whose worth makes other worthies nothing; She is alone.

Pro. Then let her alone.

Val. Not for the world: why man, she is mine own;

And I as rich in having such a jewel,

As twenty seas, if all their sands were pearl,

The water nectar and the rocks pure gold.

SONG.

Who is Silvia ? what is she?

That all our swains commend her?
Holy, fair and wise is she;

The heavens such grace did lend her,
That she might admir'd be.

Is she kind, as she is fair?

For beauty lives with kindness:

Love doth to her eyes repair

To help him of his blindness; And, being helped, inhabits there.

Then to Silvia let us sing

That Silvia is excelling ;
She excels each mortal thing
Upon the dull earth dwelling:
To her let us garlands bring.

OLIVIA.

Duke. If music be the food of love, play on,

Give me excess of it; that surfeiting,

The appetite may sicken, and so die.—
That strain again;—it had a dying fall:
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets
Stealing and giving odor.-Enough, no more,
'Tis not so sweet now as it was before.

O spirit of love, how quick and fresh art thou!
That notwithstanding thy capacity,
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there
Of what validity and pitch soever,
But falls into abatement and low price,

Even in a minute! so full of shapes is fancy,

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Duke. Why, so I do the noblest that I have: O, when mine eyes did see Olivia first, Methought she purged the air of pestilence; That instant was I turned into a hart;

And my desires, like fell and cruel hounds,

E'er since pursue me.-How now? what news from her?

Enter VALEntine.

Val. So please my lord, I might not be admitted,

But from her handmaid to return this answer.

The element itself, till seven years heat
Shall not behold her face at ample view;
But like a cloistress, she will veiled walk,
And water once a day her chamber round
With eye-offending brine; all this to season
A brother's dead love, which she would keep fresh,
And lasting in her sad remembrance.

Duke. O, she, that hath a heart of that fine frame,
To pay this debt of love but to a brother,
How will she love, when the rich golden shaft

Hath kill'd the flock of all affections else
That live in her! when liver, brain, and heart,
Those sovereign thrones are all supplied and fill'd
(Her sweet perfections) with one self king!
Away before me to sweet beds of flowers;
Love-thoughts lie rich, when canopied with bowers.

SONG.

Clo. O mistress mine, where are you roaming?

O, stay and hear; your true love's coming,"

That can sing both high and low:

Trip it no further, pretty sweeting;

Journey's end in lover's meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know.
What is love? 'tis not hereafter;
Present mirth hath present laughter;
What's to come is still unsure;
In delay there lies no plenty;
Then come kiss me, sweet-and-twenty;
Youth's a stuff will not endure.

SONG.

Clo. Come away, come away, death,
And in sad cypress let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath;

I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew
O, prepare it;

My part of death, no one so true
Did share it.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
On my black coffin let there be strown;
Not a friend, not a friend, greet

My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown:
A thousand thousand sighs to save.

Lay me, O, where

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Fair Portia's counterfeit? What demi-god
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine,

Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips

Parted with sugar breath; so sweet a bar

Should sunder such sweet friends: Here in her hairs

The painter plays the spider; and hath woven
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men,
Faster than gnats in cobwebs: But her eyes,—
How could he see to do them? having made one
Methinks it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnish'd: Yet look, how far
The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow
In underprizing it, so far this shadow
Doth limp behind the substance.

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Romeo. What lady's that which doth enrich the hand Of yonder knight?

Serv. I know not, sir.

Romeo. O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright,

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night

Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear:
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows,
The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand,
And, touching hers, make happy my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!
For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

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