Page 396 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

I pray you have in mind where we must meet.

BASSANIO
I will not fail you.

GRATIANO
You look not well, Signor Antonio.
You have too much respect upon the world;
They lose it that do buy it with much care. [75]

Believe me, you are marvellously changed.

ANTONIO
I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano,
A stage where every man must play a part,
And mine a sad one.

GRATIANO
Let me play the fool,

With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come, [80]
And let my liver rather heat with wine
Than my heart cool with mortifying groans.
Why should a man whose blood is warm within,

Sit like his grandsire, cut in alabaster?
Sleep when he wakes? and creep into the jaundice [85]
By being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio,
(I love thee, and ’tis my love that speaks):

There are a sort of men whose visages
Do cream and mantle like a standing pond,
And do a wilful stillness entertain, [90]
With purpose to be dressed in an opinion

Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit,
As who should say, ‘I am Sir Oracle,
And when I ope my lips, let no dog bark’.
O my Antonio, I do know of these [95]

That therefore only are reputed wise
For saying nothing, when I am very sure
If they should speak, would almost damn those ears,
Which hearing them would call their brothers fools.