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?

Jul. Shall I speak ill of him that is my husband? Ah, poor my lord, what tongue shall smooth 13 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 14.

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 15, 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,

13 To smooth is to flatter, to speak fair; it is here metaphorically used for to mitigate or assuage the asperity of censure with which Romeo's name would be now mentioned. See vol. ix. p. 275, note 9.

14 So in The Tempest:

I am a fool

To weep at what I'm glad of.'

15 i. e. is worse than the loss of ten thousand Tybalts.'

Thy father, or thy mother, nay, or both,

Which modern 16 lamentation might have mov'd?
But, with a rear-ward 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. Jul. 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 and I; you 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 Laurence' cell.

Jul. O find him! give this ring to my true knight, And bid him come to take his last farewell.

[Exeunt.

SCENE III. Friar Laurence's Cell.

Enter FRIAR LAURENCE and ROMEO.

Fri. Romeo, come forth; come forth, thou fearful

man;

Affliction is enamour'd of thy parts,

And thou art wedded to calamity.

16 Modern is trite, common. So in As You Like It:'Full of wise saws, and modern instances.'

Rom. Father, what news? what is the prince's doom?

What sorrow craves acquaintance at my hand,
That I yet know not?

Is

Fri.

my

Too familiar

dear son with such sour company: I bring thee tidings of the prince's doom.

Rom. What less than dooms-day is the prince's doom?

Fri. A gentler judgment vanish'd from his lips, Not body's death, but body's banishment.

Rom. Ha! banishment? be merciful, say-death: For exile hath more terror in his look,

Much more than death: do not say-banishment.
Fri. Hence from Verona art thou banished:
Be patient, for the world is broad and wide.
Rom. 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 banishment
Is death misterm'd: calling death-banishment,
Thou cut'st my head off with a golden axe,
And smil'st upon the stroke that murders me.

Fri. O deadly sin! O rude unthankfulness!
Thy fault our law calls death; but the kind prince,
Taking thy part, hath rush'd aside the law,
And turn'd that black word death to banishment:
This is dear mercy1, and thou seest it not.

Rom. 'Tis torture, and not mercy: heaven is here, Where Juliet lives; and every cat, and dog, And little mouse, every unworthy thing,

The quarto, 1597, reads 'This is mere mercy,' i. e. absolute

mercy.

2 From this and the foregoing speech of Romeo, Dryden has borrowed in his beautiful paraphrase of Chaucer's Palamon and Arcite :

'Heaven is not but where Emily abides,
And where she's absent all is hell besides.'

Live here in heaven, and may look on her,
But Romeo may not.-More validity3,
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 their own kisses sin;
But Romeo may not; he is banished:
Flies may do this, when I from this must fly:
They are free men, but I am banished.

And say'st thou yet, that exile is not death?
Hadst thou no poison mix'd, no sharp-ground knife,
No sudden mean of death, though ne'er so mean,
But-banished—to kill me; banished?

O friar, the damned use that word in hell;
Howlings attend it: How hast thou the heart,
Being a divine, a ghostly confessor,

A sin-absolver, and my friend profess'd,
To mangle me with that word-banishment?

3 Validity is again employed to signify worth, value, in the first scene of King Lear.

By courtship, courtesy, courtly behaviour is meant. See vol. iii. p. 136, note 32. As this is one of the words which have escaped the industry of Shakspeare's editors, it may be as well to elucidate its meaning fully. Bullokar defines' compliment to be ceremony, court-ship, fine behaviour.' See also Cotgrave in Curtisanie and Curialité; and Florio in Cortegianía. • Would I might never excell a Dutch skipper in courtship, if I did not put distate into my carriage of purpose, I knew I should not please them.'-Sir Giles Goosecap, a Comedy. Again, in the same play ::-' My lord, my want of courtship makes me fear I should be rude.'

• Whilst the young lord of Telamon, her husband,
Was packeted to France, to study courtship,
Under, forsooth, a colour of employment.'

Ford's Fancies Chaste and Noble. See also Gifford's Massinger, vol. ii. p. 505, where the true meaning of the word has not escaped the acute and able editor.

Fri. Thou fond mad man, hear me but speak a

word.

Rom. O, thou wilt speak again of banishment. Fri. I'll give thee armour to keep off that word; Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy,

To comfort thee, though thou art banished.
Rom. Yet banished?-Hang up philosophy!
Unless philosophy can make a Juliet,

Displant a town, reverse a prince's doom;
It helps not, it prevails not, talk no more.

Fri. O, then I see that madmen have no ears.
Rom. How should they, when that wise men have

Fri. Let me dispute with thee of thy estate 5.

Rom. Thou canst not speak of what thou dost not feel:

Wert thou as young as I, Juliet thy love,
An hour but married, Tybalt murdered,
Doting like me, and like me banished,

Then might'st thou speak, then might'st thou tear thy hair,

And fall upon the ground, as I do now,
Taking the measure of an unmade grave.

4 So in the poem of Romeus and Juliet, the Friar says:-
Virtue is always thrall to troubles and annoy,

But wisdom in adversity finds cause of quiet joy.'

See also Lyly's Euphues, 1580:- Thou sayest banishment is bitter to the freeborne. There be many meates which are sowre in the mouth and sharp in the maw; but if thou mingle them with sweet sawces, they yeeld both a pleasant taste and wholesome nourishment. I speake this to this end, that though thy exile seem grievous to thee, yet guiding thyself with the rules of philosophy it shall be more tolerable.'

5 The same phrase, and with the same meaning, occurs in The Winter's Tale :

can he speak? hear?

Know man from man? dispute his own estate?

i. e. is he able to talk over his own affairs, or the present state he is in?