Page:Merchant of Venice (1923) Yale.djvu/92

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But life itself, my wife, and all the world,

Are not with me esteem'd above thy life:

I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all,

Here to this devil, to deliver you.

Por. Your wife would give you little thanks for that,

If she were by to hear you make the offer.

Gra. I have a wife, whom, I protest, I love:

I would she were in heaven, so she could

Entreat some power to change this currish Jew.

Ner. 'Tis well you offer it behind her back;

The wish would make else an unquiet house.

Shy. These be the Christian husbands! I have a daughter;

Would any of the stock of Barabbas

Had been her husband rather than a Christian!

We trifle time; I pray thee, pursue sentence.

Por. A pound of that same merchant's flesh is thine:

The court awards it, and the law doth give it.

Shy. Most rightful judge!

Por. And you must cut this flesh from off his breast:

The law allows it, and the court awards it.

Shy. Most learned judge! A sentence! come, prepare!

Por. Tarry a little: there is something else.

This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood;

The words expressly are 'a pound of flesh:'

Then take thy bond, take thou thy pound of flesh;

But, in the cutting it, if thou dost shed

One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods

Are, by the laws of Venice, confiscate

Unto the state of Venice.

Gra. O upright judge! Mark, Jew: O learned judge!

Shy. Is that the law?

 299 pursue: proceed with 