Act 3

Scene V

The same. A garden.

	Enter Launcelot* and Jessica.*
Launcelot	Yes, truly; for, look you, the sins of the father are to be laid upon the children: therefore, I promise ye, I fear you. I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of the matter: therefore be of good cheer, for truly I think you are damned. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good; and that is but a kind of bastard hope neither.
Jessica	And what hope is that, I pray thee?
Launcelot	Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not, that you are not the Jew’s daughter.
Jessica	That were a kind of bastard hope, indeed: so the sins of my mother should be visited upon me.
Launcelot	Truly then I fear you are damned both by father and mother: thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into Charybdis, your mother: well, you are gone both ways.
Jessica	I shall be saved by my husband; he hath made me a Christian.
Launcelot	Truly, the more to blame he: we were Christians enow before; e’en as many as could well live, one by another. This making Christians will raise the price of hogs: if we grow all to be pork-eaters, we shall not shortly have a rasher on the coals for money.
	Enter Lorenzo.
Jessica	I’ll tell my husband, Launcelot, what you say: here he comes.
Lorenzo	I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Launcelot, if you thus get my wife into corners.
Jessica	Nay, you need not fear us, Lorenzo: Launcelot and I are out. He tells me flatly, there is no mercy for me in heaven, because I am a Jew’s daughter: and he says, you are no good member of the commonwealth, for in converting Jews to Christians, you raise the price of pork.
Lorenzo	I shall answer that better to the commonwealth than you can the getting up of the negro’s belly: the Moor is with child by you, Launcelot.
Launcelot	It is much that the Moor should be more than reason: but if she be less than an honest woman, she is indeed more than I took her for.
Lorenzo	How every fool can play upon the word! I think the best grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow commendable in none only but parrots. Go in, sirrah; bid them prepare for dinner.
Launcelot	That is done, sir; they have all stomachs.
Lorenzo	Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you! then bid them prepare dinner.
Launcelot	That is done too, sir; only “cover” is the word.
Lorenzo	Will you cover then, sir?
Launcelot	Not so, sir, neither; I know my duty.
Lorenzo	Yet more quarrelling with occasion! Wilt thou show the whole wealth of thy wit in an instant? I pray thee, understand a plain man in his plain meaning: go to thy fellows; bid them cover the table, serve in the meat, and we will come in to dinner.
Launcelot	For the table, sir, it shall be served in; for the meat, sir, it shall be covered; for your coming in to dinner, sir, why, let it be as humours and conceits shall govern. Exit.
Lorenzo	O dear discretion, how his words are suited! The fool hath planted in his memory An army of good words; and I do know A many fools, that stand in better place, Garnish’d like him, that for a tricksy word Defy the matter. How cheerest thou, Jessica? And now, good sweet, say thy opinion, How dost thou like the Lord Bassanio’s wife?
Jessica	Past all expressing. It is very meet The Lord Bassanio live an upright life; For, having such a blessing in his lady, He finds the joys of heaven here on earth; And if on earth he do not mean it, then In reason he should never come to heaven Why, if two gods should play some heavenly match And on the wager lay two earthly women, And Portia one, there must be something else Pawn’d with the other, for the poor rude world Hath not her fellow.
Lorenzo	Even such a husband Hast thou of me as she is for a wife.
Jessica	Nay, but ask my opinion too of that.
Lorenzo	I will anon: first, let us go to dinner.
Jessica	Nay, let me praise you while I have a stomach.
Lorenzo	No, pray thee, let it serve for table-talk; Then, howso’er thou speak’st, ’mong other things I shall digest it.
Jessica	Well, I’ll set you forth. Exeunt.