Page:Merchant of Venice (1923) Yale.djvu/51

The Merchant of Venice, II. vii

May not extend so far as to the lady:

And yet to be afeard of my deserving

Were but a weak disabling of myself.

As much as I deserve! Why, that's the lady:

I do in birth deserve her, and in fortunes,

In graces, and in qualities of breeding;

But more than these, in love I do deserve.

What if I stray'd no further, but chose here?

Let's see once more this saying grav'd in gold:

Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire.

Why, that's the lady: all the world desires her;

From the four corners of the earth they come,

To kiss this shrine, this mortal-breathing saint:

The Hyrcanian deserts and the vasty wilds

Of wide Arabia are as throughfares now

For princes to come view fair Portia:

The watery kingdom, whose ambitious head

Spits in the face of heaven, is no bar

To stop the foreign spirits, but they come,

As o'er a brook, to see fair Portia.

One of these three contains her heavenly picture.

Is 't like that lead contains her? 'Twere damnation

To think so base a thought: it were too gross

To rib her cerecloth in the obscure grave.

Or shall I think in silver she's immur'd,

Being ten times undervalu'd to tried gold?

O sinful thought! Never so rich a gem

Was set in worse than gold. They have in England

A coin that bears the figure of an angel

Stamped in gold, but that's insculp'd upon;

 30 disabling: disparagement

33 In natural and acquired advantages

36 grav'd: engraved

40 shrine: image

41 Hyrcanian: south of the Caspian Sea

42 throughfares: thoroughfares

51 rib: enclose

cerecloth: winding sheet

53 undervalu'd: inferior in value

56 angel: gold coin worth 10s.

57 insculp'd upon: engraved on the outside 