Much Ado About Nothing; Act IV, Scene i
Much Ado About Nothing. Act 4, Scene 1. Beatrice
This text is used in our interview with Rebecca Watson.
BENE.
248 Lady Beatrice, have you wept all this while?
BEAT.
249 Yea, and I will weep a while longer.
BENE.
250 I will not desire that.
BEAT.
251 You have no reason, I do it freely.
BENE.
252 Surely I do believe your fair cousin is wrong’d.
BEAT.
253 Ah, how much might the man deserve of me that would right her!
BENE.
254 Is there any way to show such friendship?
BEAT.
255 A very even way, but no such friend.
BENE.
256 May a man do it?
BEAT.
257 It is a man’s office, but not yours.
BENE.
258 I do love nothing in the world so well as you—is not that strange?
BEAT.
259 As strange as the thing I know not. It were as possible for me to say I
260 lov’d nothing so well as you, but believe me not; and yet I lie not: I
261 confess nothing, nor I deny nothing. I am sorry for my cousin.
BENE.
262 By my sword, Beatrice, thou lovest me.
BEAT.
263 Do not swear and eat it.
BENE.
264 I will swear by it that you love me, and I will make him eat it that says I love not you.
BEAT.
265 Will you not eat your word?
BENE.
266 With no sauce that can be devis’d to it. I protest I love thee.
BEAT.
267 Why then God forgive me!
BENE.
268 What offense, sweet Beatrice?
BEAT.
269 You have stay’d me in a happy hour, I was about to protest I lov’d you.
BENE.
270 And do it with all thy heart.
BEAT.
271 I love you with so much of my heart that none is left to protest.
BENE.
272 Come, bid me do any thing for thee.
BEAT.
273 Kill Claudio.
BENE.
274 Ha, not for the wide world.
BEAT.
275 You kill me to deny it. Farewell.
BENE.
276 Tarry, sweet Beatrice.
BEAT.
277 I am gone, though I am here; there is no love in you. Nay, I pray you let me go.
BENE.
278 Beatrice—
BEAT.
279 In faith, I will go.
BENE.
280 We’ll be friends first.
BEAT.
281 You dare easier be friends with me than fight with mine enemy.
BENE.
282 Is Claudio thine enemy?
BEAT.
283 Is ’a not approv’d in the height a villain, that hath slander’d, scorn’d,
284 dishonor’d my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What, bear her in
285 hand until they come to take hands, and then with public accusation,
286 uncover’d slander, unmitigated rancor—O God, that I were a man! I
287 would eat his heart in the market-place.
BENE.
288 Hear me, Beatrice—
BEAT.
289 Talk with a man out at a window! A proper saying!
BENE.
290 Nay, but, Beatrice—
BEAT.
291 Sweet Hero, she is wrong’d, she is sland’red, she is undone.
BENE.
292 Beat—
BEAT.
293 Princes and counties! Surely a princely testimony, a goodly count,
294 Count Comfect, a sweet gallant surely! O that I were a man for his sake!
295 Or that I had any friend would be a man for my sake! But manhood is
296 melted into cur’sies, valor into compliment, and men are only turn’d
297 into tongue, and trim ones too. He is now as valiant as Hercules that
298 only tells a lie, and swears it. I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore
299 I will die a woman with grieving.
BENE.
300 Tarry, good Beatrice. By this hand, I love thee.
BEAT.
301 Use it for my love some other way than swearing by it.
BENE.
302 Think you in your soul the Count Claudio hath wrong’d Hero?
BEAT.
303 Yea, as sure as I have a thought or a soul.
BENE.
304 Enough, I am engag’d, I will challenge him. I will kiss your hand, and
305 so I leave you. By this hand, Claudio shall render me a dear account.
306 As you hear of me, so think of me. Go comfort your cousin. I must say
307 she is dead; and so farewell.
Exeunt.
What does the quote ‘I love nothing in the world so well as you’ mean?