APOTHECARY.

Who calls so loud?


ROMEO.

Come hither, man. I see that thou art poor.

Hold, there is forty ducats. Let me have

A dram of poison, such soon-speeding gear

As will disperse itself through all the veins,

That the life-weary taker may fall dead,

And that the trunk may be discharg’d of breath

As violently as hasty powder fir’d

Doth hurry from the fatal cannon’s womb.


APOTHECARY.

Such mortal drugs I have, but Mantua’s law

Is death to any he that utters them.


ROMEO.

Art thou so bare and full of wretchedness,

And fear’st to die? Famine is in thy cheeks,

Need and oppression starveth in thine eyes,

Contempt and beggary hangs upon thy back.

The world is not thy friend, nor the world’s law;

The world affords no law to make thee rich;

Then be not poor, but break it and take this.


APOTHECARY.

My poverty, but not my will consents.


ROMEO.

I pay thy poverty, and not thy will.


APOTHECARY.

Put this in any liquid thing you will

And drink it off; and, if you had the strength

Of twenty men, it would despatch you straight.


ROMEO.

There is thy gold, worse poison to men’s souls,

Doing more murder in this loathsome world

Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell.

I sell thee poison, thou hast sold me none.

Farewell, buy food, and get thyself in flesh.

Come, cordial and not poison, go with me

To Juliet’s grave, for there must I use thee.


 [Exeunt.]
SCENE II. Friar Lawrence’s Cell.
 Enter Friar John.
FRIAR JOHN.

Holy Franciscan Friar! Brother, ho!


 Enter Friar Lawrence.
FRIAR LAWRENCE.

This same should be the voice of Friar John.

Welcome from Mantua. What says Romeo?

Or, if his mind be writ, give me his letter.


FRIAR JOHN.

Going to find a barefoot brother out,

One of our order, to associate me,

Here in this city visiting the sick,

And finding him, the searchers of the town,

Suspecting that we both were in a house