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Lysander

Ay me! For aught that I could ever read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth,
But either it was different in blood —

Hermia

O cross! Too high to be enthralled to low.

Lysander

Or else misgrafted in respect of years —

Hermia

O spite! Too old to be engaged to young.

Lysander

Or merit stood upon the choice of friends —

Hermia

O hell! To choose love by another's eyes.

Lysander

Or if there were a sympathy in choice,
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it,
Making it momentary as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream,
Brief as the lightning in the collied night
That in a spleen unfolds both heaven and earth,
And ere a man hath power to say "Behold!"
The jaws of darkness do devour it up.
So quick bright things come to confusion.

Lysander

How now, my love? Why is your cheek so pale?
How chance the roses there do fade so fast?

Hermia

Belike for want of rain, which I could well
Beteem them from the tempest of my eyes.

Theseus

Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires,
Know of your youth, examine well your blood;
Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun,
For aye to be in shady cloister mewed,
To live a barren sister all your life,
Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.
Thrice blessed they that master so their blood,
To undergo such maiden pilgrimage;
But earthlier happy is the rose distilled
Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn,
Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness.

Theseus

Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires,
Know of your youth, examine well your blood;
Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice,
You can endure the livery of a nun,
For aye to be in shady cloister mewed,
To live a barren sister all your life,
Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.

Theseus

What say you, Hermia? Be advised, fair maid,
To you your father should be as a god,
One that composed your beauties, yea, and one
To whom you are but as a form in wax,
By him imprinted and within his power
To leave the figure, or disfigure it.

Egeus

Thou, thou, Lysander, thou hast given her rhymes,
And interchanged love tokens with my child.
Thou hast by moonlight at her window sung
With feigning voice verses of feigning love,
And stol’n the impression of her fantasy
With bracelets of thy hair, rings, gauds, conceits,
Knacks, trifles, nosegays, sweetmeats — messengers
Of strong prevailment in unhardened youth.
With cunning hast thou filched my daughter's heart,
Turned her obedience, which is due to me,
To stubborn harshness. And, my gracious duke,

Theseus 

                                  Go, Philostrate,
Stir up the Athenian youth to merriments,
Awake the pert and nimble spirit of mirth,
Turn melancholy forth to funerals —
The pale companion is not for our pomp. 
[Exit Philostrate] 
Hippolyta, I wooed thee with my sword,
And won thy love doing thee injuries.
But I will wed thee in another key,
With pomp, with triumph, and with reveling. 
[Ancient Athens. Enter Duke Theseus, ruler of Athens; Hippolyta, his soon to be wife; Philostrate, a nobleman; and various attendants]

Theseus

Now, fair Hippolyta, our nuptial hour
Draws on apace. Four happy days bring in
Another moon — but, Oh, methinks how slow
This old moon wanes! She lingers my desires,
Like to a stepdame or a dowager
Long withering out a young man’s revenue.

Hippolyta

Four days will quickly steep themselves in night;
Four nights will quickly dream away the time;
And then the moon, like to a silver bow
New bent in heaven, shall behold the night
Of our solemnities. 

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