You are here

All Site ContentRomeo and JulietAct 4Scene 5
Back to the Play
Friar Laurence, Lines 65-83
Performance Videos
Act 4,
Scene 5
Lines 65-83

Friar Laurence performs a speech from Act 4, Scene 5 of myShakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. 

myShakespeare | Romeo and Juliet 4.5 Performance: Friar Laurence, Lines 65-83

Friar Laurence

Peace, ho, for shame! Confusion's cure lives not
In these confusions. Heaven and yourself
Had part in this fair maid; now heaven hath all,
And all the better is it for the maid.
Your part in her you could not keep from death,
But heaven keeps his part in eternal life. 
The most you sought was her promotion,
For 'twas your heaven she should be advanced;
And weep ye now, seeing she is advanced
Above the clouds, as high as heaven itself?
O, in this love, you love your child so ill
That you run mad seeing that she is well.
She's not well married that lives married long;
But she's best married that dies married young.
Dry up your tears, and stick your rosemary
On this fair corpse; and, as the custom is, 
In all her best array bear her to church.
For though some nature bids us all lament,
Yet nature's tears are reason's merriment.