Internet Shakespeare Editions

Author: William Shakespeare
Editor: Roger Apfelbaum
Not Peer Reviewed

Romeo and Juliet (Quarto 1, 1597)

The most excellent Tragedie,

Enter Romeo alone.

Ro: Shall I goe forward and my heart is here?
Turne backe dull earth and finde thy Center out.
750Enter Benuolio Mercutio.
Ben: Romeo, my cosen Romeo.
Mer: Doest thou heare he is wise,
Vpon my life he hath stolne him home to bed.
Ben: He came this way, and leapt this Orchard wall.
755Call good Mercutio.
Mer: Call, nay Ile coniure too.
Romeo, madman, humors, passion, liuer, appeare thou in
likenes of a sigh: speek but one rime & I am satisfied, cry
760but ay me. Pronounce but Loue and Doue, speake to
my gossip Venus one faire word, one nickname for her
purblinde sonne and heire young Abraham:Cupid hee
that shot so trim when young King Cophetua loued the
begger wench. Hee heares me not. I coniure thee by
Rosalindes bright eye, high forehead, and scarlet lip, her
prettie foote, straight leg, and quiuering thigh, and the
770demaines that there adiacent lie , that in thy likenesse
thou appeare to vs.
Ben:If he doe heare thee thou wilt anger him.
Mer: Tut this cannot anger him, marrie if one shuld
raise a spirit in his Mistris circle of some strange fashion,
775making it there to stand till she had laid it, and coniurde
it downe, that were some spite. My inuocation is faire
and honest, and in his Mistris name I coniure onely but
to raise vp him.
780Ben: Well he hath hid himselfe amongst those trees,
To be conforted with the humerous night,
Blinde in his loue, and best befits the darke.
Mer: