Romeo and Juliet

Act 2, Scene 1

Modern spelling. Stage directions omitted.

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ROMEO

Can I go forward when my heart is here?
Turn back, dull earth, and find centre out.

BENVOLIO

Romeo! My cousin Romeo! Romeo!

MERCUTIO

He is wise,
And on my life stol’n him home to bed.

BENVOLIO

He ran this way, and leap’d this orchard wall:
Call, good Mercutio.

MERCUTIO

Nay, I’ll conjure too.
Romeo! Humours! Madman! Passion! Lover!
Appear in the likeness of a sigh,
Speak but one rhyme, and I am satisfied;
Cry but ‘Ah me!’ Pronounce but Love and dove;
Speak to my gossip Venus one fair word,
One nickname for her purblind son and heir,
Young Abraham Cupid, he that shot so trim
When King Cophetua lov’d the beggar-maid.
He heareth not, he stirreth not, he moveth not;
The ape is dead, and I must conjure him.
I conjure by Rosaline’s bright eyes,
By her high forehead and her scarlet lip,
By her fine foot, straight leg, and quivering thigh,
And the demesnes that there adjacent lie,
That in likeness appear to us.

BENVOLIO

An if he hear , wilt anger him.

MERCUTIO

This cannot anger him. ’Twould anger him
To raise a spirit in his mistress’ circle,
Of some strange nature, letting it there stand
Till she had laid it, and conjur’d it down;
That were some spite. My invocation
Is fair and honest, and, in his mistress’ name,
I conjure only but to raise up him.

BENVOLIO

Come, he hid himself among these trees
To be consorted with the humorous night.
Blind is his love, and best befits the dark.

MERCUTIO

If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.
Now will he sit under a medlar tree,
And wish his mistress were that kind of fruit
As maids call medlars when they laugh alone.
O Romeo, that she were, O that she were
An open-arse and a poperin pear!
Romeo, good night. I’ll to my truckle-bed.
This field-bed is too cold for me to sleep.
Come, shall we go?

BENVOLIO

Go then; for in vain
To seek him here that means not to be found.

All of Romeo and Juliet

Opening and close

Prologue,

Act 1

Act 1, Scene 1Act 1, Scene 2Act 1, Scene 3Act 1, Scene 4Act 1, Scene 5,

Act 2

Act 2Act 2, Scene 1Act 2, Scene 2Act 2, Scene 3Act 2, Scene 4Act 2, Scene 5Act 2, Scene 6,

Act 3

Act 3, Scene 1Act 3, Scene 2Act 3, Scene 3Act 3, Scene 4Act 3, Scene 5,

Act 4

Act 4, Scene 1Act 4, Scene 2Act 4, Scene 3Act 4, Scene 4Act 4, Scene 5,

Act 5

Act 5, Scene 1Act 5, Scene 2Act 5, Scene 3

Open Romeo and Juliet in the 1623 First Folio. See its words in the cloud.

Compare a quarto passage.

Modern spelling for reading. The edition is public domain in the United States. Edition source.