Page:Merchant of Venice (1923) Yale.djvu/18

4

You have too much respect upon the world:

They lose it that do buy it with much care:

Believe me, you are marvellously chang'd.

Ant. I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano;

A stage where every man must play a part,

And mine a sad one.

Gra.Let me play the fool:

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come,

And let my liver rather heat with wine

Than my heart cool with mortifying groans.

Why should a man, whose blood is warm within,

Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster?

Sleep when he wakes, and creep into the jaundice

By being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio—

I love thee, and it is my love that speaks—

There are a sort of men whose visages

Do cream and mantle like a standing pond,

And do a wilful stillness entertain,

With purpose to be dress'd in an opinion

Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit;

As who should say, 'I am Sir Oracle,

And when I ope my lips let no dog bark!'

O, my Antonio, I do know of these,

That therefore only are reputed wise

For saying nothing; when, I am very sure,

If they should speak, would almost damn those ears

Which, hearing them, would call their brothers fools.

I'll tell thee more of this another time:

But fish not, with this melancholy bait,

For this fool-gudgeon, this opinion.

Come, good Lorenzo. Fare ye well awhile:

 74 respect world: concern about business

79 sad: serious

82 mortifying: self-denying

89 cream and mantle: grow a scum

standing: stagnant

91 opinion: reputation

92 conceit: thought

98 damn those ears; cf. n.

102 fool-gudgeon: an easily caught fish 