Page 414 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

Scene II IT

Enter Launcelot Gobbo, alone.

LAUNCELOT
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 [5] 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. ‘Fia!’ says the fiend; [10] ‘Away!’ says the
fiend. ‘For the heavens, rouse up a brave mind’, says the fiend, ‘and run’.
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, [15] 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, [20] ‘you

counsel well’. To be ruled by my conscience, I should stay with the Jew my
master who, God bless the mark, is a kind of devil; and to run away from the
Jew, I should be ruled by the fiend, who, saving your reverence, is the devil
himself. Certainly the [25] Jew is the very devil incarnation; and in my

conscience, my conscience is but a kind of hard conscience to offer to counsel
me to stay with the Jew. The fiend gives the more friendly counsel. I will run,
fiend; my heels are at your commandment; I will [30] run.

Enter Old Gobbo with a basket.

GOBBO
Master young man, you I pray you, which is the way to Master Jew’s?

LAUNCELOT

(aside) O heavens! this is my true-begotten father who, being more than
sand-blind, [35] high-gravel-blind, knows me not. I will try confusions with
him.

GOBBO