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All Site ContentMidsummer Night's DreamAct 1Scene 1
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"hailed down oaths"
Metaphor
Act 1,
Scene 1
Lines 226-251

An explanation of Helena’s comparison between Demetrius’ oaths and hailstones in Act 1, Scene 1 of myShakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream.

Helena

How happy some o'er other some can be!
Through Athens I am thought as fair as she,
But what of that? Demetrius thinks not so;
He will not know what all but he do know.
And, as he errs, doting on Hermia's eyes,
So I, admiring of his qualities.
Things base and vile, holding no quantity,
Love can transpose to form and dignity.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind,
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
Nor hath Love's mind of any judgement taste;
Wings and no eyes figure unheedy haste.
And therefore is Love said to be a child
Because in choice he is so oft beguiled.
As waggish boys in game themselves forswear,
So the boy Love is perjured everywhere.
For ere Demetrius looked on Hermia's eyne
He hailed down oaths that he was only mine,
And when this hail some heat from Hermia felt,
So he dissolved, and showers of oaths did melt.
I will go tell him of fair Hermia's flight.
Then to the wood will he tomorrow night
Pursue her. And for this intelligence
If I have thanks it is a dear expense.
But herein mean I to enrich my pain,
To have his sight thither and back again.
[Exit Helena]

Demetrius’s oaths of love toward Helena seemed as solid as hailstones until he met Hermia. Then the radiance of her beauty melted them away.