Othello | Page 9

and
corrigible authority of this lies in our wills. If the balance of our lives

had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and
baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous
conclusions: But we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal
stings, our unbitted lusts; whereof I take this, that you call love, to be a
sect or scion.
RODERIGO.
It cannot be.
IAGO.
It is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will.
Come, be a man: drown thyself! drown cats and blind puppies. I have
professed me thy friend, and I confess me knit to
thy deserving with
cables of perdurable toughness; I could
never better stead thee than
now. Put money in thy purse; follow thou the wars; defeat thy favour
with an usurped beard; I say, put money in thy purse. It cannot be that
Desdemona should long continue her love to the Moor,--put money in
thy purse,--nor he his to her: it was a violent commencement, and thou
shalt see an answerable sequestration;--put but money in thy
purse.--These Moors are changeable in their wills:--fill thy purse with
money: the food that to him now is as luscious as locusts shall be to
him shortly as acerb as the coloquintida. She must change for youth:
when she is sated with his body, she will find the error of her choice:
she must have change, she must: therefore put money in thy purse.--If
thou wilt needs damn thyself, do it a more delicate way than drowning.
Make all the money thou canst; if sanctimony and a frail vow betwixt
an erring barbarian and a supersubtle Venetian be not too hard for my
wits and all the tribe of hell, thou shalt enjoy her; therefore make
money. A pox of drowning thyself! it is clean out of the way: seek thou
rather to be hanged in compassing thy joy than to be drowned and go
without her.
RODERIGO.
Wilt thou be fast to my hopes, if I depend on the
issue?
IAGO.
Thou art sure of me:--go, make money:--I have told thee

often, and I re-tell thee again and again, I hate the Moor: my cause is
hearted; thine hath no less reason. Let us be
conjunctive in our
revenge against him: if thou canst cuckold him, thou dost thyself a

pleasure, me a sport. There are many events in the womb of time which
will be delivered. Traverse; go; provide thy money. We will have more
of this to-morrow. Adieu.
RODERIGO.
Where shall we meet i' the morning?
IAGO.
At my lodging.
RODERIGO.
I'll be with thee betimes.
IAGO.
Go to; farewell. Do you hear, Roderigo?
RODERIGO.
What say you?
IAGO.
No more of drowning, do you hear?
RODERIGO.
I am changed: I'll go sell all my land.
[Exit.]
IAGO.
Thus do I ever make my fool my purse;
For I mine own
gain'd knowledge should profane
If I would time expend with such a
snipe
But for my sport and profit. I hate the Moor;
And it is thought
abroad that 'twixt my sheets
He has done my office: I know not if't be
true;
But I, for mere suspicion in that kind,
Will do as if for surety.
He holds me well,
The better shall my purpose work on him.

Cassio's a proper man: let me see now;
To get his place, and to plume
up my will
In double knavery,--How, how?--Let's see:--
After some
time, to abuse Othello's ear
That he is too familiar with his wife:--

He hath a person, and a smooth dispose,
To be suspected; fram'd to
make women false.
The Moor is of a free and open nature,
That
thinks men honest that but seem to be so;
And will as tenderly be led
by the nose
As asses are.
I have't;--it is engender'd:--hell and night

Must bring this monstrous birth to the world's light.
[Exit.]

ACT II.
SCENE I. A seaport in Cyprus. A Platform.
[Enter Montano and two Gentlemen.]
MONTANO.
What from the cape can you discern at sea?
FIRST GENTLEMAN.
Nothing at all: it is a high-wrought flood;

I cannot, 'twixt the heaven and the main,
Descry a sail.
MONTANO.
Methinks the wind hath spoke aloud at land;
A fuller
blast ne'er shook our battlements:
If it hath ruffian'd so upon the sea,

What ribs of oak, when mountains melt on them,
Can hold the
mortise? What shall we hear of this?
SECOND GENTLEMAN.
A segregation of the Turkish fleet:
For
do but stand upon the foaming shore,
The chidden billow seems to
pelt the clouds;
The wind-shak'd surge, with high and monstrous
main,
Seems to cast water on the burning Bear,
And quench the
guards of the ever-fixed pole;
I never did like molestation view
On
the enchafed flood.
MONTANO.
If that the Turkish fleet
Be not enshelter'd and
embay'd, they are drown'd;
It is impossible to bear it out.
[Enter a third Gentleman.]
THIRD GENTLEMAN.
News, lads! our wars are done.
The
desperate tempest hath so bang'd the Turks
That their designment
halts; a noble ship of Venice
Hath seen a grievous wreck and
sufferance
On