| |
Duke.—Once more, Cesario, | |
| Get thee to yon same sovereign cruelty: | |
| The parts that fortune hath bestow’d upon her, | |
| Tell her, I hold as giddily as fortune; | |
| But ’tis that miracle and queen of gems, | 5 |
| That nature pranks her in, attracts my soul. | |
| Viola.—But if she cannot love you, sir? | |
| Duke.—I cannot be so answer’d. | |
| Vio.—Sooth, but you must. | |
| Say, that some lady, as perhaps there is, | 10 |
| Hath for your love as great a pang of heart | |
| As you have for Olivia: you cannot love her; | |
| You tell her so; must she not, then, be answer’d? | |
| Duke.—There is no woman’s sides | |
| Can bide the beating of so strong a passion | 15 |
| As love doth give my heart: no woman’s heart | |
| So big, to hold so much; they lack retention. | |
| Alas! their love may be call’d appetite,— | |
| No motion of the liver, but the palate,— | |
| That suffer forfeit, cloyment, and revolt; | 20 |
| But mine is all as hungry as the sea, | |
| And can digest as much: make no compare | |
| Between that love a woman can bear me, | |
| And that I owe Olivia. | |
| Vio.—Ay, but I know,— | 25 |
| Duke.—What dost thou know? | |
| Vio.—Too well what love women to men may owe: | |
| In faith, they are as true of heart as we. | |
| My father had a daughter lov’d a man, | |
| As it might be, perhaps, were I a woman, | 30 |
| I should your lordship. | |
| Duke.—And what’s her history? | |
| Vio.—A blank, my lord. She never told her love, | |
| But let concealment, like a worm i’ the bud, | |
| Feed on her damask cheek; she pin’d in thought; | 35 |
| And with a green and yellow melancholy, | |
| She sat like patience on a monument, | |
| Smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed? | |
| We men may say more, swear more; but indeed | |
| Our shows are more than will; for still we prove | 40 |
| Much in our vows, but little in our love. | |
| Duke.—But died thy sister of her love, my boy? | |
| Vio.—I am all the daughters of my father’s house, | |
| And all the brothers too. | |
| |
