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Athens. The palace of THESEUS.
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[Enter THESEUS, HIPPOLYTA, PHILOSTRATE, and Attendants]
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Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
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Draws on apace; four happy days bring in
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Another moon: but, O, methinks, how slow
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This old moon wanes! she lingers my desires,
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Like to a step-dame or a dowager
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Long withering out a young man revenue.
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Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
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Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
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And then the moon, like to a silver bow
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New-bent in heaven, shall behold the night
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Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments;
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Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth;
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Turn melancholy forth to funerals;
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The pale companion is not for our pomp.
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Hippolyta, I woo'd thee with my sword,
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And won thy love, doing thee injuries;
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But I will wed thee in another key,
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With pomp, with triumph and with revelling.
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[Enter EGEUS, HERMIA, LYSANDER, and DEMETRIUS]
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Happy be Theseus, our renowned duke!
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Thanks, good Egeus: what's the news with thee?
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Full of vexation come I, with complaint
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Against my child, my daughter Hermia.
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Stand forth, Demetrius. My noble lord,
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This man hath my consent to marry her.
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Stand forth, Lysander: and my gracious duke,
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This man hath bewitch'd the bosom of my child;
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Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes,
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And interchanged love-tokens with my child:
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Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung,
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With feigning voice verses of feigning love,
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And stolen the impression of her fantasy
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With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gawds, conceits,
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Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats, messengers
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Of strong prevailment in unharden'd youth:
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With cunning hast thou filch'd my daughter's heart,
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Turn'd her obedience, which is due to me,
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To stubborn harshness: and, my gracious duke,
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Be it so she; will not here before your grace
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Consent to marry with Demetrius,
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I beg the ancient privilege of Athens,
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As she is mine, I may dispose of her:
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Which shall be either to this gentleman
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Or to her death, according to our law
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Immediately provided in that case.
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What say you, Hermia? be advised fair maid:
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To you your father should be as a god;
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One that composed your beauties, yea, and one
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To whom you are but as a form in wax
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By him imprinted and within his power
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To leave the figure or disfigure it.
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Demetrius is a worthy gentleman.
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But in this kind, wanting your father's voice,
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The other must be held the worthier.
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I would my father look'd but with my eyes.
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Rather your eyes must with his judgment look.
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I do entreat your grace to pardon me.
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I know not by what power I am made bold,
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Nor how it may concern my modesty,
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In such a presence here to plead my thoughts;
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But I beseech your grace that I may know
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The worst that may befall me in this case,
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If I refuse to wed Demetrius.
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Either to die the death or to abjure
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For ever the society of men.
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Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires;
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Know of your youth, examine well your blood,
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Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
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You can endure the livery of a nun,
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For aye to be in shady cloister mew'd,
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To live a barren sister all your life,
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Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
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Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood,
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To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;
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But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd,
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Than that which withering on the virgin thorn
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Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.
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So will I grow, so live, so die, my lord,
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Ere I will my virgin patent up
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Unto his lordship, whose unwished yoke
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My soul consents not to give sovereignty.
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Take time to pause; and, by the nest new moon—
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The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,
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For everlasting bond of fellowship—
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Upon that day either prepare to die
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For disobedience to your father's will,
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Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;
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Or on Diana's altar to protest
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For aye austerity and single life.
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Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yield
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Thy crazed title to my certain right.
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You have her father's love, Demetrius;
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Let me have Hermia's: do you marry him.
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Scornful Lysander! true, he hath my love,
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And what is mine my love shall render him.
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And she is mine, and all my right of her
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I do estate unto Demetrius.
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I am, my lord, as well derived as he,
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As well possess'd; my love is more than his;
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My fortunes every way as fairly rank'd,
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If not with vantage, as Demetrius';
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And, which is more than all these boasts can be,
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I am beloved of beauteous Hermia:
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Why should not I then prosecute my right?
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Demetrius, I'll avouch it to his head,
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Made love to Nedar's daughter, Helena,
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And won her soul; and she, sweet lady, dotes,
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Devoutly dotes, dotes in idolatry,
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Upon this spotted and inconstant man.
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I must confess that I have heard so much,
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And with Demetrius thought to have spoke thereof;
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But, being over-full of self-affairs,
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My mind did lose it. But, Demetrius, come;
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And come, Egeus; you shall go with me,
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I have some private schooling for you both.
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For you, fair Hermia, look you arm yourself
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To fit your fancies to your father's will;
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Or else the law of Athens yields you up—
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Which by no means we may extenuate—
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To death, or to a vow of single life.
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Come, my Hippolyta: what cheer, my love?
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Demetrius and Egeus, go along:
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I must employ you in some business
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Against our nuptial and confer with you
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Of something nearly that concerns yourselves.
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With duty and desire we follow you.
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[Exeunt all but LYSANDER and HERMIA]
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How now, my love! why is your cheek so pale?
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How chance the roses there do fade so fast?
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Belike for want of rain, which I could well
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Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.
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Ay me! for aught that I could ever read,
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Could ever hear by tale or history,
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The course of true love never did run smooth;
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But, either it was different in blood,—
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O cross! too high to be enthrall'd to low.
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Or else misgraffed in respect of years,—
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O spite! too old to be engaged to young.
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Or else it stood upon the choice of friends,—
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O hell! to choose love by another's eyes.
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Or, if there were a sympathy in choice,
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War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
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Making it momentany as a sound,
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Swift as a shadow, short as any dream;
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Brief as the lightning in the collied night,
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That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth,
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And ere a man hath power to say 'Behold!'
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The jaws of darkness do devour it up:
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So quick bright things come to confusion.
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If then true lovers have been ever cross'd,
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It stands as an edict in destiny:
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Then let us teach our trial patience,
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Because it is a customary cross,
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As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,
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Wishes and tears, poor fancy's followers.
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A good persuasion: therefore, hear me, Hermia.
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I have a widow aunt, a dowager
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Of great revenue, and she hath no child:
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From Athens is her house remote seven leagues;
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And she respects me as her only son.
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There, gentle Hermia, may I marry thee;
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And to that place the sharp Athenian law
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Cannot pursue us. If thou lovest me then,
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Steal forth thy father's house to-morrow night;
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And in the wood, a league without the town,
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Where I did meet thee once with Helena,
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To do observance to a morn of May,
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There will I stay for thee.
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I swear to thee, by Cupid's strongest bow,
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By his best arrow with the golden head,
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By the simplicity of Venus' doves,
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By that which knitteth souls and prospers loves,
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And by that fire which burn'd the Carthage queen,
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When the false Troyan under sail was seen,
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By all the vows that ever men have broke,
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In number more than ever women spoke,
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In that same place thou hast appointed me,
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To-morrow truly will I meet with thee.
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Keep promise, love. Look, here comes Helena.
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God speed fair Helena! whither away?
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Call you me fair? that fair again unsay.
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Demetrius loves your fair: O happy fair!
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Your eyes are lode-stars; and your tongue's sweet air
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More tuneable than lark to shepherd's ear,
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When wheat is green, when hawthorn buds appear.
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Sickness is catching: O, were favour so,
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Yours would I catch, fair Hermia, ere I go;
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My ear should catch your voice, my eye your eye,
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My tongue should catch your tongue's sweet melody.
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Were the world mine, Demetrius being bated,
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The rest I'd give to be to you translated.
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O, teach me how you look, and with what art
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You sway the motion of Demetrius' heart.
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I frown upon him, yet he loves me still.
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O that your frowns would teach my smiles such skill!
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I give him curses, yet he gives me love.
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O that my prayers could such affection move!
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The more I hate, the more he follows me.
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The more I love, the more he hateth me.
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His folly, Helena, is no fault of mine.
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None, but your beauty: would that fault were mine!
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Take comfort: he no more shall see my face;
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Lysander and myself will fly this place.
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Before the time I did Lysander see,
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Seem'd Athens as a paradise to me:
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O, then, what graces in my love do dwell,
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That he hath turn'd a heaven unto a hell!
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Helen, to you our minds we will unfold:
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To-morrow night, when Phoebe doth behold
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Her silver visage in the watery glass,
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Decking with liquid pearl the bladed grass,
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A time that lovers' flights doth still conceal,
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Through Athens' gates have we devised to steal.
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And in the wood, where often you and I
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Upon faint primrose-beds were wont to lie,
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Emptying our bosoms of their counsel sweet,
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There my Lysander and myself shall meet;
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And thence from Athens turn away our eyes,
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To seek new friends and stranger companies.
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Farewell, sweet playfellow: pray thou for us;
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And good luck grant thee thy Demetrius!
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Keep word, Lysander: we must starve our sight
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From lovers' food till morrow deep midnight.
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As you on him, Demetrius dote on you!
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How happy some o'er other some can be!
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Through Athens I am thought as fair as she.
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But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;
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He will not know what all but he do know:
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And as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes,
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So I, admiring of his qualities:
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Things base and vile, folding no quantity,
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Love can transpose to form and dignity:
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Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
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And therefore is wing'd Cupid painted blind:
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Nor hath Love's mind of any judgement taste;
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Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste:
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And therefore is Love said to be a child,
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Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.
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As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,
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So the boy Love is perjured every where:
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For ere Demetrius look'd on Hermia's eyne,
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He hail'd down oaths that he was only mine;
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And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
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So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.
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I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight:
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Then to the wood will he to-morrow night
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Pursue her; and for this intelligence
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If I have thanks, it is a dear expense:
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But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
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To have his sight thither and back again.
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Athens. QUINCE’S house.
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[Enter QUINCE, SNUG, BOTTOM, FLUTE, SNOUT, and STARVELING]
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Is all our company here?
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You were best to call them generally, man by man,
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according to the scrip.
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Here is the scroll of every man's name, which is
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thought fit, through all Athens, to play in our
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interlude before the duke and the duchess, on his
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First, good Peter Quince, say what the play treats
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on, then read the names of the actors, and so grow
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Marry, our play is, The most lamentable comedy, and
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most cruel death of Pyramus and Thisby.
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A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a
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merry. Now, good Peter Quince, call forth your
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actors by the scroll. Masters, spread yourselves.
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Answer as I call you. Nick Bottom, the weaver.
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Ready. Name what part I am for, and proceed.
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You, Nick Bottom, are set down for Pyramus.
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What is Pyramus? a lover, or a tyrant?
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A lover, that kills himself most gallant for love.
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That will ask some tears in the true performing of
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it: if I do it, let the audience look to their
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eyes; I will move storms, I will condole in some
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measure. To the rest: yet my chief humour is for a
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tyrant: I could play Ercles rarely, or a part to
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tear a cat in, to make all split.
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This was lofty! Now name the rest of the players.
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This is Ercles' vein, a tyrant's vein; a lover is
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Francis Flute, the bellows-mender.
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Flute, you must take Thisby on you.
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What is Thisby? a wandering knight?
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It is the lady that Pyramus must love.
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Nay, faith, let me not play a woman; I have a beard coming.
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That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and
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you may speak as small as you will.
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An I may hide my face, let me play Thisby too, I'll
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speak in a monstrous little voice. 'Thisne,
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Thisne;' 'Ah, Pyramus, lover dear! thy Thisby dear,
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No, no; you must play Pyramus: and, Flute, you Thisby.
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Robin Starveling, the tailor.
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Robin Starveling, you must play Thisby's mother.
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Tom Snout, the tinker.
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You, Pyramus' father: myself, Thisby's father:
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Snug, the joiner; you, the lion's part: and, I
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hope, here is a play fitted.
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Have you the lion's part written? pray you, if it
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be, give it me, for I am slow of study.
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You may do it extempore, for it is nothing but roaring.
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Let me play the lion too: I will roar, that I will
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do any man's heart good to hear me; I will roar,
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that I will make the duke say 'Let him roar again,
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An you should do it too terribly, you would fright
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the duchess and the ladies, that they would shriek;
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and that were enough to hang us all.
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That would hang us, every mother's son.
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I grant you, friends, if that you should fright the
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ladies out of their wits, they would have no more
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discretion but to hang us: but I will aggravate my
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voice so that I will roar you as gently as any
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sucking dove; I will roar you an 'twere any
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You can play no part but Pyramus; for Pyramus is a
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sweet-faced man; a proper man, as one shall see in a
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summer's day; a most lovely gentleman-like man:
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therefore you must needs play Pyramus.
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Well, I will undertake it. What beard were I best
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I will discharge it in either your straw-colour
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beard, your orange-tawny beard, your purple-in-grain
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beard, or your French-crown-colour beard, your
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Some of your French crowns have no hair at all, and
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then you will play bare-faced. But, masters, here
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are your parts: and I am to entreat you, request
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you and desire you, to con them by to-morrow night;
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and meet me in the palace wood, a mile without the
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town, by moonlight; there will we rehearse, for if
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we meet in the city, we shall be dogged with
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company, and our devices known. In the meantime I
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will draw a bill of properties, such as our play
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wants. I pray you, fail me not.
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We will meet; and there we may rehearse most
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obscenely and courageously. Take pains; be perfect: adieu.
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At the duke's oak we meet.
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Enough; hold or cut bow-strings.
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