ROMEO	What, shall I groan and tell thee?

BENVOLIO	Groan! why, no.
	But sadly tell me who.

ROMEO	Bid a sick man in sadness make his will:
	Ah, word ill urged to one that is so ill!
	In sadness, cousin, I do love a woman.

BENVOLIO	I aim'd so near, when I supposed you loved.

ROMEO	A right good mark-man! And she's fair I love.

BENVOLIO	A right fair mark, fair coz, is soonest hit.

ROMEO	Well, in that hit you miss: she'll not be hit
	With Cupid's arrow; she hath Dian's wit;
	And, in strong proof of chastity well arm'd,
	From love's weak childish bow she lives unharm'd.
	She will not stay the siege of loving terms,
	Nor bide the encounter of assailing eyes,
	Nor ope her lap to saint-seducing gold:
	O, she is rich in beauty, only poor,
	That when she dies with beauty dies her store.

BENVOLIO	Then she hath sworn that she will still live chaste?

ROMEO	She hath, and in that sparing makes huge waste,
	For beauty starved with her severity
	Cuts beauty off from all posterity.
	She is too fair, too wise, wisely too fair,
	To merit bliss by making me despair:
	She hath forsworn to love, and in that vow
	Do I live dead that live to tell it now.

BENVOLIO	Be ruled by me, forget to think of her.

ROMEO	O, teach me how I should forget to think.

BENVOLIO	By giving liberty unto thine eyes;
	Examine other beauties.

ROMEO	'Tis the way
	To call hers exquisite, in question more:
	These happy masks that kiss fair ladies' brows
	Being black put us in mind they hide the fair;
	He that is strucken blind cannot forget
	The precious treasure of his eyesight lost:
	Show me a mistress that is passing fair,
	What doth her beauty serve, but as a note
	Where I may read who pass'd that passing fair?
	Farewell: thou canst not teach me to forget.

BENVOLIO	I'll pay that doctrine, or else die in debt.

	[Exeunt]

	ROMEO AND JULIET

ACT I

SCENE II	A street.

	[Enter CAPULET, PARIS, and Servant]

CAPULET	But Montague is bound as well as I,
	In penalty alike; and 'tis not hard, I think,
	For men so old as we to keep the peace.

PARIS	Of honourable reckoning are you both;
	And pity 'tis you lived at odds so long.
	But now, my lord, what say you to my suit?

CAPULET	But saying o'er what I have said before:
	My child is yet a stranger in the world;
	She hath not seen the change of fourteen years,
	Let two more summers wither in their pride,
	Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride.

PARIS	Younger than she are happy mothers made.

CAPULET	And too soon marr'd are those so early made.
	The earth hath swallow'd all my hopes but she,
	She is the hopeful lady of my earth:
	But woo her, gentle Paris, get her heart,
	My will to her consent is but a part;
	An she agree, within her scope of choice
	Lies my consent and fair according voice.
	This night I hold an old accustom'd feast,
	Whereto I have invited many a guest,
	Such as I love; and you, among the store,
	One more, most welcome, makes my number more.
	At my poor house look to behold this night
	Earth-treading stars that make dark heaven light:
	Such comfort as do lusty young men feel
	When well-apparell'd April on the heel
	Of limping winter treads, even such delight
	Among fresh female buds shall you this night
	Inherit at my house; hear all, all see,
	And like her most whose merit most shall be: