Key Passage Analysis for Romeo and Julietact I

Key Passage Analysis for Romeo and JulietAct I

Act I, Scene 1

Rebellious subjects, enemies to peace,
Profaners of this neighbour-stained steel,--
Will they not hear? What, ho! you men, you beasts,
That quench the fire of your pernicious rage
5With purple fountains issuing from your veins,
On pain of torture, from those bloody hands
Throw your mistemper'd weapons to the ground,
And hear the sentence of your moved prince.
Three civil brawls, bred of an airy word,
10By thee, old Capulet, and Montague,
Have thrice disturb'd the quiet of our streets,
And made Verona's ancient citizens
Cast by their grave beseeming ornaments,
To wield old partisans, in hands as old,
15Canker'd with peace, to part your canker'd hate:
If ever you disturb our streets again,
Your lives shall pay the forfeit of the peace.
For this time, all the rest depart away:
You Capulet; shall go along with me:
20And, Montague, come you this afternoon,
To know our further pleasure in this case,
To old Freetown, our common judgment-place.
Once more, on pain of death, all men depart.

Act I, Scene 4

O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
5Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep;
Her wagon-spokes made of long spiders' legs,
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
The traces of the smallest spider's web,
10The collars of the moonshine's watery beams,
Her whip of cricket's bone, the lash of film,
Her wagoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not so big as a round little worm
Prick'd from the lazy finger of a maid;
15Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut
Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub,

Time outo' mind the fairies' coachmakers.
And in this state she gallops night by night

Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love;
20O'er courtiers' knees, that dream on court'sies straight,

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O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees,
O'er ladies ' lips, who straight on kisses dream,

Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are:
25Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail
Tickling a parson's nose as a' lies asleep,
Then dreams, he of another benefice:
30Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
35And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab
That plats the manes of horses in the night,
And bakes the elflocks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which once untangled, much misfortune bodes:
40This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them and learns them first to bear,
Making them women of good carriage:
This is she--

Act I, Scene 4

Act I, Scene 5

O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope's ear;
Beauty too rich for use, for earth too dear!
5So shows a snowy dove trooping with crows,
As yonder lady o'er her fellows shows.

The measure done, I'll watch her place of stand,
And, touching hers, make blessed my rude hand.
Did my heart love till now? forswear it, sight!

10For I ne'er saw true beauty till this night.

Act I, Scene 5

(1) If I profane with my unworthiest hand
This holy shrine, the gentle fine is this:
My lips, two blushing pilgrims, ready stand
To smooth that rough touch with a tender kiss.

(2)5Good pilgrim, you do wrong your hand too much,
Which mannerly devotion shows in this;
For saints have hands that pilgrims' hands do touch,
And palm to palm is holy palmers' kiss.

(1) Have not saints lips, and holy palmers too?

(2)10Aye, pilgrim, lips that they must use in prayer.

(1) O, then, dear saint, let lips do what hands do;
They pray, grant thou, lest faith turn to despair.

(2) Saints do not move, though grant for prayers' sake.

(1) Then move not, while my prayer's effect I take.
15Thus from my lips, by yours, my sin is purged.

(2) Then have my lips the sin that they have took.

(1) Sin from thy lips? O trespass sweetly urged!
Give me my sin again.