Othello by William Shakespeare (phonics reading books TXT) 📖

high renown,
And thou art but of low degree:
'Tis pride that pulls the country down;
Then take thine auld cloak about thee."

Some wine, ho!

CASSIO.
Why, this is a more exquisite song than the other.

IAGO.
Will you hear it again?

CASSIO.
No; for I hold him to be unworthy of his place that does
those things. - Well, - God's above all, and there be souls must
be saved, and there be souls must not be saved.

IAGO.
It's true, good lieutenant.

CASSIO.
For mine own part, - no offence to the general, nor any
man of quality, - I hope to be saved.

IAGO.
And so do I too, lieutenant.

CASSIO.
Ay, but, by your leave, not before me; the lieutenant is to
be saved before the ancient. Let's have no more of this;
let's to our affairs. - Forgive us our sins! - Gentlemen, let's
look to our business. Do not think, gentlemen, I am drunk: this
is my ancient; this is my right hand, and this is my left: - I am
not drunk now; I can stand well enough, and I speak well enough.

ALL.
Excellent well.

CASSIO.
Why, very well then: you must not think, then, that I am drunk.

[Exit.]

MONTANO.
To the platform, masters; come, let's set the watch.

IAGO.
You see this fellow that is gone before; -
He is a soldier fit to stand by Caesar
And give direction: and do but see his vice;
'Tis to his virtue a just equinox,
The one as long as the other: 'tis pity of him.
I fear the trust Othello puts him in,
On some odd time of his infirmity,
Will shake this island.

MONTANO.
But is he often thus?

IAGO.
'Tis evermore the prologue to his sleep:
He'll watch the horologe a double set
If drink rock not his cradle.

MONTANO.
It were well
The general were put in mind of it.
Perhaps he sees it not, or his good nature
Prizes the virtue that appears in Cassio,
And looks not on his evils: is not this true?

[Enter Roderigo.]

IAGO.
[Aside to him.] How now, Roderigo!
I pray you, after the lieutenant; go.

[Exit Roderigo.]

MONTANO.
And 'tis great pity that the noble Moor
Should hazard such a place as his own second
With one of an ingraft infirmity:
It were an honest action to say
So to the Moor.

IAGO.
Not I, for this fair island;
I do love Cassio well; and would do much
To cure him of this evil. - But, hark! What noise?

[Cry within, - "Help! help!"]

[Re-enter Cassio, driving in Roderigo.]

CASSIO.
You rogue! you rascal!

MONTANO.
What's the matter, lieutenant?

CASSIO.
A knave teach me my duty! I'll beat the knave into
a twiggen bottle.

RODERIGO.
Beat me!

CASSIO.
Dost thou prate, rogue? [Striking Roderigo.]

MONTANO.
Nay, good lieutenant; I pray you, sir, hold your hand.

CASSIO.
Let me go, sir, or I'll knock you o'er the mazard.

MONTANO.
Come, come, you're drunk.

CASSIO.
Drunk!

[They fight.]

IAGO.
[Aside to Roderigo.] Away, I say! go out and cry a mutiny.

[Exit Roderigo.]

Nay, good lieutenant, - alas,, gentlemen: -
Help, ho! - Lieutenant, - sir, - Montano, - sir: -
Help, masters! - Here's a goodly watch indeed!

[Bell rings.]

Who's that that rings the bell? - Diablo, ho!
The town will rise: God's will, lieutenant, hold;
You will be sham'd forever.

[Re-enter Othello and Attendants.]

OTHELLO.
What is the matter here?

MONTANO.
Zounds, I bleed still; I am hurt to the death.

OTHELLO.
Hold, for your lives!

IAGO.
Hold, ho! lieutenant, - sir, - Montano, - gentlemen, -
Have you forgot all sense of place and duty?
Hold! the general speaks to you; hold, hold, for shame!

OTHELLO.
Why, how now, ho! from whence ariseth this?
Are we turn'd Turks, and to ourselves do that
Which Heaven hath forbid the Ottomites?
For Christian shame, put by this barbarous brawl:
He that stirs next to carve for his own rage
Holds his soul light; he dies upon his motion. -
Silence that dreadful bell; it frights the isle
From her propriety. - What is the matter, masters? -
Honest Iago, that look'st dead with grieving,
Speak, who began this? on thy love, I charge thee.

IAGO.
I do not know: - friends all but now, even now,
In quarter, and in terms like bride and groom
Devesting them for bed; and then, but now -
As if some planet had unwitted men, -
Swords out, and tilting one at other's breast
In opposition bloody. I cannot speak
Any beginning to this peevish odds;
And would in action glorious I had lost
Those legs that brought me to a part of it!

OTHELLO.
How comes it, Michael, you are thus forgot?

CASSIO.
I pray you, pardon me; I cannot speak.

OTHELLO.
Worthy Montano, you were wont be civil;
The gravity and stillness of your youth
The world hath noted, and your name is great
In mouths of wisest censure: what's the matter,
That you unlace your reputation thus,
And spend your rich opinion for the name
Of a night-brawler? give me answer to it.

MONTANO.
Worthy Othello, I am hurt to danger:
Your officer, Iago, can inform you, -
While I spare speech, which something now offends me, -
Of all that I do know: nor know I aught
By me that's said or done amiss this night:
Unless self-charity be sometimes a vice,
And to defend ourselves it be a sin
When violence assails us.

OTHELLO.
Now, by heaven,
My blood begins my safer guides to rule;
And passion, having my best judgement collied,
Assays to lead the way. If I once stir,
Or do but lift this arm, the best of you
Shall sink in my rebuke. Give me to know
How this foul rout began, who set it on;
And he that is approv'd in this offense,
Though he had twinn'd with me, both at a birth,
Shall lose me. - What! in a town of war
Yet wild, the people's hearts brimful of fear,
To manage private and domestic quarrel,
In night, and on the court and guard of safety!
'Tis monstrous. - Iago, who began't?

MONTANO.
If partially affin'd, or leagu'd in office,
Thou dost deliver more or less than truth,
Thou art no soldier.

IAGO.
Touch me not so near:
I had rather have this tongue cut from my mouth
Than it should do offence to Michael Cassio;
Yet, I persuade myself, to speak the truth
Shall nothing wrong him. - Thus it is, general.
Montano and myself being in speech,
There comes a fellow crying out for help;
And Cassio following him with determin'd sword,
To execute upon him. Sir, this gentleman
Steps in to Cassio and entreats his pause:
Myself the crying fellow did pursue,
Lest by his clamour, - as it so fell out, -
The town might fall in fright: he, swift of foot,
Outran my purpose; and I return'd the rather
For that I heard the clink and fall of swords,
And Cassio high in oath; which till to-night
I ne'er might say before. When I came back, -
For this was brief, - I found them close together,
At blow and thrust; even as again they were
When you yourself did part them.
More of this matter cannot I report; -
But men are men; the best sometimes forget: -
Though Cassio did some little wrong to him, -
As men in rage strike those that wish them best, -
Yet surely Cassio, I believe, receiv'd
From him that fled some strange indignity,
Which patience could not pass.

OTHELLO.
I know, Iago,
Thy honesty and love doth mince this matter,
Making it light to Cassio. Cassio, I love thee;
But never more be officer of mine. -

[Re-enter Desdemona, attended.]

Look, if my gentle love be not rais'd up! -
I'll make thee an example.

DESDEMONA.
What's the matter?

OTHELLO.
All's well now, sweeting; come away to bed.
[To Montano, who is led off.]
Sir, for your hurts, myself will be your surgeon:
Lead him off.
Iago, look with care about the town,
And silence those whom this vile brawl distracted. -
Come, Desdemona: 'tis the soldiers' life
To have their balmy slumbers wak'd with strife.

[Exeunt all but Iago and Cassio.]

IAGO.
What, are you hurt, lieutenant?

CASSIO.
Ay, past all surgery.

IAGO.
Marry, heaven forbid!

CASSIO.
Reputation, reputation, reputation! O, I have lost my
reputation! I have lost the immortal part of myself, and what
remains is bestial. - My reputation, Iago, my reputation!

IAGO.
As I am an honest man, I thought you had received some
bodily wound; there is more sense in that than in reputation.
Reputation is an idle and most false imposition; oft got without
merit and lost without deserving: you have lost no reputation at
all, unless you repute yourself such a loser. What, man! there
are ways to recover the general again: you are but now cast in
his mood, a punishment more in policy than in malice; even so as
one would beat his offenceless dog to affright an imperious lion:
sue to him again, and he is yours.

CASSIO.
I will rather sue to be despised than to deceive so good a
commander with so slight, so drunken, and so indiscreet an
officer. Drunk? and speak parrot? and squabble? swagger?
swear? and discourse fustian with one's own shadow? - O thou
invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by,
let us call thee devil!

IAGO.
What was he that you followed with your sword? What had he done
to you?

CASSIO.
I know not.

IAGO.
Is't possible?

CASSIO.
I remember a mass of things, but nothing distinctly; a quarrel,
but nothing wherefore. - O God, that men should put an enemy in
their mouths to steal away their brains! that we should, with
joy, pleasance, revel, and applause, transform ourselves into
beasts!

IAGO.
Why, but you are now well enough: how came you thus recovered?

CASSIO.
It hath pleased the devil drunkenness to give place to the
devil wrath: one unperfectness shows me another, to make me
frankly despise myself.

IAGO.
Come, you are too severe a moraler: as the time, the place, and
the condition of this country stands, I could heartily wish
this had not befallen; but since it is as it is, mend it for
your own good.

CASSIO.
I will ask him for my place again; - he shall tell me I am a
drunkard! Had I as many mouths as Hydra, such an answer would
stop them all. To be now a sensible man, by and by a fool,
and presently a beast! O strange! - Every inordinate cup is
unbless'd, and the ingredient is a devil.

IAGO.
Come, come, good wine is a good familiar creature, if it be
well used: exclaim no more against it. And, good lieutenant,
I think you think I love you.

CASSIO.
I have well approved it, sir. - I drunk!

IAGO.
You, or any man living, may be drunk at a time, man. I'll tell
you what you shall do. Our general's wife is now the general; -
I may say so in this respect, for that he hath devoted and
given up himself to the contemplation, mark, and denotement
of her