Romeo and Juliet

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 conjured 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.
[Before the real action of the play begins, a single actor (referred to as a chorus) comes to the front of the stage to deliver this introductory prologue to the play]

Chorus

Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes,
A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life,
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Doth, with their death, bury their parents' strife.
The fearful passage of their death-marked love
And the continuance of their parents' rage —  
Which, but their children's end, nought could remove —
Is now the two hours' traffic of our stage;
The which, if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

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