Romeo.Is she a Capulet?
O dear account! my life is my foe’s debt.
Benvolio.
Away, be gone; the sport is at the best.
Romeo.
Ay, so I fear; the more is my unrest.
Capulet.
Nay, gentlemen, prepare not to be gone;
We have a trifling foolish banquet towards.—
Is it e’en so? why then, I thank you all;
I thank you, honest gentlemen; goodnight.—
More torches here!—Come on then, let’s to bed.
Ah, sirrah [to 2 Capulet], by my fay, it waxes late;
I’ll to my rest.
[Exeunt all but Juliet and Nurse.]
Juliet.
Come hither, nurse. What is yond gentleman?
Nurse.
The son and heir of old Tiberio.
Juliet.
What’s he that now is going out of door?
Nurse.
Marry, that, I think, be young Petruchio.
Juliet.
What’s he that follows there, that would not dance?
Nurse.
I know not.
Juliet.
Go ask his name: if he be married,
My grave is like to be my wedding-bed.
Nurse.
His name is Romeo, and a Montague;
The only son of your great enemy.
Juliet.
My only love sprung from my only hate!
Too early seen unknown, and known too late!
Prodigious birth of love it is to me,
That I must love a loathed enemy.
Nurse.
What’s this? What’s this?
Juliet.
A rhyme I learn’d even now
Of one I danc’d withal.
[One calls within, ‘Juliet.’]
Nurse.
Anon, anon!
Come, let’s away; the strangers all are gone.
[Exeunt.]
[Enter Chorus.]
Chorus.
Now old desire doth in his deathbed lie,
And young affection gapes to be his heir;
That fair for which love groan’d for, and would die,
With tender Juliet match’d, is now not fair.
Now Romeo is belov’d, and loves again,
Alike bewitched by the charm of looks;
But to his foe suppos’d he must complain,
And she steal love’s sweet bait from fearful hooks:
Being held a foe, he may not have access
To breathe such vows as lovers us’d to swear;
And she as much in love, her means much less
To meet her new beloved anywhere:
But passion lends them power, time means, to meet,
Tempering extremities with extreme sweet.
[Exit.]
ACT II.
SCENE I. An open place adjoining Capulet’s Garden.
[Enter Romeo.]
Romeo.
Can I go forward when my heart is here?
Turn back, dull earth, and find thy centre out.
[He climbs the wall and leaps down within it.]
[Enter Benvolio and Mercutio.]
Benvolio.
Romeo! my cousin Romeo!
Mercutio.
He is wise;
And, on my life, hath stol’n him home to bed.
Benvolio.
He ran this way, and leap’d this orchard wall:
Call, good Mercutio.
Mercutio.
Nay, I’ll conjure too.—
Romeo! humours! madman! passion! lover!
Appear thou in the likeness of a sigh:
Speak but one rhyme, and I am satisfied;
Cry but ‘Ah me!’ pronounce but Love and dove;
Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,
One nickname for her purblind son and heir,
Young auburn Cupid, he that shot so trim
When King Cophetua lov’d the beggar-maid!—
He heareth not, he stirreth not, he moveth not;
The ape is dead, and I must conjure him.—
I conjure thee by Rosaline’s bright eyes,
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip,
By her fine foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh,
And the demesnes that there adjacent lie,
That in thy likeness thou appear to us!
Benvolio.
