William Shakespeare

“ It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this—-That
in the course of justice, none of us
Should see salvation: we do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy. I have spoke thus much,
To mitigate the justice of thy plea;
Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence 'gainst the merchant there.
Shy
., My deeds upon my head! I crave the law,
The penalty and forfeit of my bond. ”

“ Venice, "the famous city in the sea," rising like enchantment from the waves of the Adriatic, appeals to the imagination through a history replete with dramatic incident; wherein power and revolution—conquest and conspiracy—mystery and romance—dazzling splendour and judicial murder alternate in every page. Thirteen hundred years witnessed the growth, maturity, and fall of this once celebrated city; commencing in the fifth century, when thousands of terrified fugitives sought refuge in its numerous islands from the dreaded presence of Attila ”

“ Father, I am glad you are come: give me your present to one master Bassanio, who, indeed, gives rare new liveries; if I serve not him, I will run as far as Heaven has any ground.—O rare fortune! here comes the man;—to him, father; for I am a Jew if I serve the Jew any longer. ”

“ That's certain, if the devil may be her judge.
Shy. My own flesh and blood to rebel!
Salar. But tell us, do you hear whether Antonio have had any loss at sea or no?
Shy. There I have another bad match: a bankrupt, a prodigal, who dare scarce show his head on the Rialto; a beggar, that used to come so smug upon the mart.—Let him look to his bond: he was wont to call me usurer;—let him look to his bond: he was wont to lend money for a Christian courtesy;—let him look to his bond. ”

“ Well, my conscience, hanging about the neck of my heart, says very wisely to me, my honest friend, Launcelot, being an honest man's son, or rather an honest woman's son;—for, indeed, my father did something smack, something grow to, he had a kind of taste;—well, my conscience says, Launcelot, budge not; budge, says the fiend; budge not, says my conscience. Conscience, say I, you counsel well; fiend, say I, you counsel well; to be ruled by my conscience I should stay with the Jew, my master, who (Heaven bless the mark!) is a kind of devil ”

“ The man is, notwithstanding, sufficient;—three thousand ducats;—I think I may take his bond.
Bas. Be assured you may.
Shy. I will be assured I may; and that I may be assured I will bethink me: May I speak with Antonio?
Bas. If it please you to dine with us.
Shy. Yes, to smell pork; to eat of the habitation which your prophet, the Nazarite, conjured the devil into! [23] I will buy with you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so following; but I will not eat with you, drink with you, nor pray with you.—What news on the Rialto?—Who is he comes here? ”

“ Of merchant-marring rocks?
Sal
. Not one, my lord.
Besides, it should appear, that if he had
The present money to discharge the Jew,
He would not take it: Never did I know
A creature that did bear the shape of man,
So keen and greedy to confound a man.
He plies the duke at morning, and at night;
And doth impeach the freedom of the state
If they deny him justice: twenty merchants,
The duke himself, and the magnificoes
Of greatest port, have all persuaded with him;
But none can drive him from the envious plea
Of forfeiture, of justice, and his bond. ”

“ It is a good divine that follows his own instructions: I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching. But this reasoning is not in the fashion to choose me a husband:—O me, the word choose! I may neither choose whom I would, nor refuse whom I dislike, so is the will of a living daughter curb'd by the will of a dead father:—Is it not hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none? ”

“ I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes? hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer as a Christian is? ”

“ I acquainted him with the cause in controversy between the Jew and Antonio, the merchant: we turned o'er many books together; he is furnished with my opinion; which, better'd with his own learning (the greatness whereof I cannot enough commend) , comes with him, at my importunity, to fill up your grace's request in my stead. I beseech you, let his lack of years be no impediment to let him lack a reverend estimation; for I never knew so young a body with so old a head. ”

“ This is signior Antonio.
[Exit BASSANIO.
Shy. (aside.)
How like a fawning publican he looks!
I hate him, for he is a Christian:
But more, for that, in low simplicity,
He lends out money gratis, and brings down
The rate of usance here with us in Venice. (E)
If I can catch him once upon the hip,
[24]
I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him.
He hates our sacred nation: and he rails
Even there where merchants most do congregate,
On me, my bargains, and my well-won thrift.
Which he calls interest: Cursed be my tribe
If I forgive him! ”

“ SCENE I.—VENICE. (A) EXTERIOR OF SHYLOCK'S HOUSE.
Enter LAUNCELOT GOBBO.
Lau. Certainly my conscience will serve me to run from this Jew, my master: The fiend is at mine elbow, and tempts me; saying to me,—Gobbo, Launcelot Gobbo, good Launcelot, or good Gobbo, or good Launcelot Gobbo, use your legs, take the start, run away:—My conscience says,—No: take heed, honest Launcelot; take heed, honest Gobbo: or (as aforesaid) honest Launcelot Gobbo; do not run: scorn running with thy heels. Well the most courageous fiend bids me pack. Via! says the fiend; Away! says the fiend, for the heavens ”

“ Why, this bond is forfeit;
And lawfully by this the Jew may claim
A pound of flesh, to be by him cut off
Nearest the merchant's heart:—Be merciful;
Take thrice thy money; bid me tear the bond.
Shy
. When it is paid according to the tenour.
It doth appear you are a worthy judge;
You know the law, your exposition
Hath been most sound: I charge you by the law,
Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar,
Proceed to judgment: by my soul I swear,
There is no power in the tongue of man
To alter me: I stay here on my bond.
Ant
. Most heartily I do beseech the court
To give the judgment. ”

“ While the language of the Jew is characterized by an assumption of biblical phraseology, the appeal of Portia to the quality of mercy is invested with a heavenly eloquence elevating the poet to sublimity.
From the opening to the closing scene,—from the moment when we hear of the sadness, prophetic of evil, which depresses the spirit of Antonio, till we listen at the last to the "playful prattling of two lovers in a summer's evening," whose soft cadences are breathed through strains of music,—all is a rapid succession of hope, fear, terror, and gladness ”

“ The work of destruction was all but completed by the Turks, who engaged her in an expensive and ruinous warfare, during which she lost the Morea, the islands of Cyprus and Candia, and with them the ascendancy which she had long possessed in the Levant. From all these causes her decline proved as rapid as her rise had been, and though her position can hardly fail to give her a considerable coasting trade, all her maritime greatness has departed, and apparently the highest destiny to which she can now aspire, is that of being a valuable dependency to some superior power. ”

“ If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? and if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility? revenge: If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance be by Christian example? why, revenge. The villany you teach me I will execute: and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction.
Salar. Here comes another of the tribe; a third cannot be matched, unless the devil himself turn Jew. ”

“ Whether Bassanio had not once a love.
Repent not you that you shall lose your friend,
And he repents not that he pays your debt;
For, if the Jew do cut but deep enough,
I'll pay it instantly with all my heart.
Bas
. Antonio, I am married to a wife,
Which is as dear to me as life itself;
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.
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. ”

“ The saint is sculptured with the shield in his right hand, the lance in his left; a clear proof, says the French writer, of the unacquaintance of the Venetians with the use of arms; and symbolical that their great council never undertakes a war of its own accord, nor for any other object than to obtain a good and secure peace. The satirist has unintentionally given the republic the highest praise which could flow from his pen. Happy, indeed, would it have been for mankind, if Governments had never been actuated by any other policy. ”

“ Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff; you shall seek all day ere you find them; and when you have them they are not worth the search. ”

“ Alas, fifteen wives is nothing; eleven widows and nine maids, is a simple coming in for one man: and then, to 'scape drowning thrice; and to be in peril of my life with the edge of a feather-bed, [56] here are simple 'scapes! Well, if fortune be a woman she's a good wench for this gear.—I'll take my leave of the Jew in the twinkling of an eye. ”

“ At a very early period, Venice had begun to trade with Constantinople and the Levant, and though subjected to formidable competition from the Pisans and Genoese, succeeded in engrossing the far largest share of the traffic of the East. The Crusades now commenced, and giving lucrative employment to their shipping in the conveyance of troops, and the munitions of war, greatly increased both their wealth and power, and enabled them to make large additions to their territory. ”

“ Enter PORTIA and NERISSA.
Por. Inquire the Jew's house out, give him this deed, And let him sign it; we'll away to-night, And be a day before our husbands home: This deed will be well welcome to Lorenzo.
Enter GRATIANO.
Gra. Fair Sir, you are well overtaken: My lord Bassanio, upon more advice, [112] Hath sent you here this ring; and doth entreat Your company at dinner.
Por. That cannot be: This ring I do accept most thankfully, And so, I pray you, tell him: Furthermore, I pray you, show my youth old Shylock's house. ”

“ As thou hast done with me;—What, Jessica!—
And sleep and snore, and rend apparel out;—
Why, Jessica, I say!
Lau. Why, Jessica!
Shy. Who bids thee call? I do not bid thee call.
Lau. Your worship was wont to tell me I could do nothing without bidding.
Enter JESSICA.
Jes. Call you? What is your will?
Shy
. I am bid forth to supper,
[63]
Jessica;
There are my keys:—But wherefore should I go?
I am not bid for love: they flatter me:
But yet I'll go in hate, to feed upon
The prodigal Christian:
[64]
—Jessica, my girl,
Look to my house:—I am right loath to go ”

“ I see, Sir, you are liberal in offers:
You taught me first to beg; and now, methinks,
You teach me how a beggar should be answer'd. ”

“ That in a gondola were seen together
Lorenzo and his amorous Jessica;
Besides, Antonio certified the duke,
They were not with Bassanio in his ship.
Sal
. I never heard a passion so confus'd,
So strange, outrageous, and so variable,
As the dog Jew did utter in the streets;
"
My daughter!—O, my ducats!—O, my daughter!
Fled with a Christian!—O, my Christian ducats!—
Justice! the law! my ducats, and my daughter.!"
Let good Antonio look he keep his day,
Or he shall pay for this. ”

“ An oath, an oath, I have an oath in heaven:
Shall I lay perjury upon my soul?
No, not for Venice. ”

“ In Venice the tribunal for criminal cases was composed of forty judges, ordinarily presided over by one of three selected from the Council of the Doge, and draughted for the most part, if not wholly, from the members of the Senate. The Doge, who on all occasions was attended by his particular officers, had the right of sitting in the councils, or on the tribunal. The authority for the six senators in red (in this scene) is taken from the picture at Hampton Court Palace, where the Doge of Venice, in state, is receiving Sir Henry Wootton, ambassador from James the First. ”

“ The rate of usance here with us in Venice."
About the time that Shakespeare lived, Venice had commercial dealings with all the civilized nations of the world; and Cyprus, Candia, and the Morea were subject to her government. Merchants from all countries congregated in Venice, and received every possible encouragement from the authorities.
The Jews, under the sanction of government, were the money lenders, and were, consequently, much disliked, as well as feared, by their mercantile creditors. They indulged in usury to an enormous extent, and were immensely rich. ”

“ It must not be; there is no power in Venice
Can alter a decree established:
'Twill be recorded for a precedent;
And many an error, by the same example,
Will rush into the state; ”