A Midsummer Night’s Dream Demetrius Lines

Act 1 Scene 1After (Theseus)Take time to pause; and, by the next new moon– The sealing-day betwixt my love and me,For everlasting bond of fellowship–Upon that day either prepare to dieFor disobedience to your father’s will,Or else to wed Demetrius, as he would;Or on Diana’s altar to protestFor aye austerity and single life. Relent, sweet Hermia: and, Lysander, yieldThy crazed title to my certain right.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Oberon)Having once this juice,I’ll watch Titania when she is asleep,And drop the liquor of it in her eyes.The next thing then she waking looks upon,Be it on lion, bear, or wolf, or bull,On meddling monkey, or on busy ape,She shall pursue it with the soul of love:But who comes here? I am invisible;And I will overhear their conference. (Enter)I love thee not, therefore pursue me not.Where is Lysander and fair Hermia?The one I’ll slay, the other slayeth me.Thou told’st me they were stolen unto this wood;And here am I, and wode within this wood,Because I cannot meet my Hermia.Hence, get thee gone, and follow me no more.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Helena)You draw me, you hard-hearted adamant;But yet you draw not iron, for my heartIs true as steel: leave you your power to draw,And I shall have no power to follow you. Do I entice you? do I speak you fair?Or, rather, do I not in plainest truthTell you, I do not, nor I cannot love you?
Act 2 Scene 1After (Helena)And even for that do I love you the more.I am your spaniel; and, Demetrius,The more you beat me, I will fawn on you:Use me but as your spaniel, spurn me, strike me, Neglect me, lose me; only give me leave,Unworthy as I am, to follow you.What worser place can I beg in your love,–And yet a place of high respect with me,–Than to be used as you use your dog? Tempt not too much the hatred of my spirit;For I am sick when I do look on thee.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Helena)And I am sick when I look not on you. You do impeach your modesty too much,To leave the city and commit yourselfInto the hands of one that loves you not.
Act 2 Scene 1After (Helena)Your virtue is my privilege: for thatIt is not night when I do see your face,Therefore I think I am not in the night. I will not stay thy questions; let me go:Or, if thou follow me, do not believeBut I shall do thee mischief in the wood.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Helena)Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius. I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus.
Act 2 Scene 2After (Helena)O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so. Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.(Exit)
Act 3 Scene 2After (Puck)This is the woman, but not this the man. O, why rebuke you him that loves you so?Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Now I but chide; but I should use thee worse,For thou, I fear, hast given me cause to curse,If thou hast slain Lysander in his sleep,Being o’er shoes in blood, plunge in the deep,And kill me too. So should the murder’d look, and so should I,Pierced through the heart with your stern cruelty.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)What’s this to my Lysander? where is he?Ah, good Demetrius, wilt thou give him me? I had rather give his carcass to my hounds.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Out, dog! out, cur! thou drivest me past the boundsOf maiden’s patience. Hast thou slain him, then?Henceforth be never number’d among men! You spend your passion on a misprised mood:I am not guilty of Lysander’s blood;Nor is he dead, for aught that I can tell.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)I pray thee, tell me then that he is well. An if I could, what should I get therefore?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)A privilege never to see me more.And from thy hated presence part I so:See me no more, whether he be dead or no.(She exits) There is no following her in this fierce vein:Here therefore for a while I will remain. (Lie down and go to sleep)
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Demetrius loves her, and he loves not you. (Waking up)O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!To what, my love, shall I compare thine eyne?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Helena)Never did mockers waste more idle breath. Lysander, keep thy Hermia; I will none:If e’er I loved her, all that love is gone.My heart to her but as guest-wise sojourn’d,And now to Helen is it home return’d,There to remain.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Helen, it is not so. Disparage not the faith thou dost not know,Lest, to thy peril, thou aby it dear.Look, where thy love comes; yonder is thy dear.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Hermia)Sweet, do not scorn her so. If she cannot entreat, I can compel.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Thou canst compel no more than she entreat. I say I love thee more than he can do.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Demetrius, I will keep my word with thee. I’ll not trust your word.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Be not afraid; she shall not harm thee, Helena. No, sir, she shall not, though you take her part.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Get you gone, you dwarf. You are too officiousIn her behalf that scorns your services.
Act 3 Scene 2After (Lysander)Now she holds me not;Now follow, if thou darest, to try whose right,Of thine or mine, is most in Helena. Follow! nay, I’ll go with thee, cheek by jole.(Exit)
Act 3 Scene 2After (Puck)Follow me, then,To plainer ground.(Lysander exits) (Enter)Lysander! speak again:Thou runaway, thou coward, art thou fled?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Puck as Lysander)Come, recreant; come, thou child;I’ll whip thee with a rod: he is defiledThat draws a sword on thee. Yea, art thou there?
Act 3 Scene 2After (Puck as Lysander)Ho, ho, ho! Coward, why comest thou not? Where art thou now?Faintness constraineth meTo measure out my length on this cold bed.By day’s approach look to be visited. (Lies down and sleep)
Act 4 Scene 1After (Lysander)My lord, I shall reply amazedly,Half sleep, half waking: but as yet, I swear,I cannot truly say how I came here;But, as I think,–for truly would I speak,And now do I bethink me, so it is,–I came with Hermia hither: our intent Was to be gone from Athens, where we might,Without the peril of the Athenian law. My lord, fair Helen told me of their stealth,Of this their purpose hither to this wood;And I in fury hither follow’d them,Fair Helena in fancy following me.But, my good lord, I wot not by what power,–But by some power it is,–my love to Hermia,Melted as the snow, seems to me nowAs the remembrance of an idle gaudWhich in my childhood I did dote upon;And all the faith, the virtue of my heart,The object and the pleasure of mine eye,Is only Helena.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)I wonder if the lion be to speak. No wonder, my lord: one lion may, when many asses do.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)Would you desire lime and hair to speak better? It is the wittiest partition that ever I hearddiscourse, my lord.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)Now is the mural down between the two neighbours. No remedy, my lord, when walls are so wilful to hearwithout warning.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)A very gentle beast, of a good conscience. The very best at a beast, my lord, that e’er I saw.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)True; and a goose for his discretion. Not so, my lord; for his valour cannot carry hisdiscretion; and the fox carries the goose.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Starveling as Moonshine)This lanthorn doth the horned moon present;– He should have worn the horns on his head.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)This is the greatest error of all the rest: the manshould be put into the lanthorn. How is it else theman i’ the moon? He dares not come there for the candle; for, yousee, it is already in snuff.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Starveling as Moonshine)All that I have to say, is, to tell you that thelanthorn is the moon; I, the man in the moon; thisthorn-bush, my thorn-bush; and this dog, my dog. Why, all these should be in the lanthorn; for allthese are in the moon. But, silence! here comes Thisbe.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Snug as Lion)[Roaring] Oh– Well roared, Lion.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Lysander)And so the lion vanished. And then came Pyramus.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Bottom as Pyramus)O wherefore, Nature, didst thou lions frame?Since lion vile hath here deflower’d my dear:Which is–no, no–which was the fairest dameThat lived, that loved, that liked, that look’dwith cheer.Come, tears, confound;Out, sword, and woundThe pap of Pyramus;Ay, that left pap,Where heart doth hop:(Stabs himself.)Thus die I, thus, thus, thus.Now am I dead,Now am I fled;My soul is in the sky:Tongue, lose thy light;Moon take thy flight:Exit Moonshine.Now die, die, die, die, die.(Dies.) No die, but an ace, for him; for he is but one.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Hippolyta)Methinks she should not use a long one for such aPyramus: I hope she will be brief. A mote will turn the balance, which Pyramus, whichThisbe, is the better; he for a man, God warrant us;she for a woman, God bless us.
Act 5 Scene 1After (Lysander)She hath spied him already with those sweet eyes. And thus she means, videlicet:–
Act 5 Scene 1After (Theseus)Moonshine and Lion are left to bury the dead. Ay, and Wall too.
July 29, 2019