TOUCHSTONE So-so is good, very good, very excellent good. And yet it is not, it is but so-so. Art thou wise?

WILLIAM Ay, sir, I have a pretty wit.

TOUCHSTONE Why, thou sayst well. I do now remember a saying: ‘The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.’ The heathen philosopher, when he had a desire to eat a grape, would open his lips when he put it into his mouth, meaning thereby that grapes were made to eat, and lips to open. You do love this maid?

WILLIAM I do, sir.

TOUCHSTONE Give me your hand. Art thou learned?

WILLIAM No, sir.

TOUCHSTONE Then learn this of me: to have is to have. For it is a figure in rhetoric that drink, being poured out of a cup into a glass, by filling the one doth empty the other. For all your writers do consent that ipse is he. Now you are not ipse, for I am he.

WILLIAM Which he, sir?

TOUCHSTONE He, sir, that must marry this woman. Therefore, you clown, abandon—which is in the vulgar, leave—the society—which in the boorish is company—of this femate—which in the common is woman; which together is, abandon the society of this female, or, clown, thou perishest; or, to thy better understanding, diest; or, to wit, I kill thee, make thee away, translate thy life into death, thy liberty into bondage. I will deal in poison with thee, or in bastinado, or in steel. I will bandy with thee in faction, I will o’errun thee with policy. I will kill thee a hundred and fifty ways. Therefore tremble, and depart.

AUDREY Do, good William.

WILLIAM God rest you merry, sir.

Exit

Enter Corin

CORIN Our master and mistress seeks you. Come, away, away.

TOUCHSTONE Trip, Audrey, trip, Audrey. (To Corin) I attend, I attend.

Exeunt

5.2 Enter Orlando and Oliver

ORLANDO Is’t possible that on so little acquaintance you should like her? That but seeing, you should love her? And loving, woo? And wooing, she should grant? And will you persevere to enjoy her?

OLIVER Neither call the giddiness of it in question, the poverty of her, the small acquaintance, my sudden wooing, nor her sudden consenting; but say with me, ‘I love Aliena’; say with her, that she loves me; consent with both that we may enjoy each other. It shall be to your good, for my father’s house and all the revenue that was old Sir Rowland’s will I estate upon you, and here live and die a shepherd.

Enter Rosalind as Ganymede

ORLANDO You have my consent. Let your wedding be tomorrow. Thither will I invite the Duke and all’s contented followers. Go you, and prepare Aliena; for look you, here comes my Rosalind.

ROSALIND God save you, brother.

OLIVER And you, fair sister. Exit

ROSALIND O, my dear Orlando, how it grieves me to see thee wear thy heart in a scarf.

ORLANDO It is my arm.

ROSALIND I thought thy heart had been wounded with the claws of a lion.

ORLANDO Wounded it is, but with the eyes of a lady.

ROSALIND Did your brother tell you how I counterfeited to swoon when he showed me your handkerchief?

ORLANDO Ay, and greater wonders than that.

ROSALIND O, I know where you are. Nay, ‘tis true. There was never anything so sudden but the fight of two rams, and Caesar’s thrasonical brag of ‘I came, saw, and overcame’, for your brother and my sister no sooner met but they looked; no sooner looked but they loved; no sooner loved but they sighed; no sooner sighed but they asked one another the reason; no sooner knew the reason but they sought the remedy; and in these degrees have they made a pair of stairs to marriage, which they will climb incontinent, or else be incontinent before marriage. They are in the very wrath of love, and they will together. Clubs cannot part them.

ORLANDO They shall be married tomorrow, and I will bid the Duke to the nuptial. But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes. By so much the more shall I tomorrow be at the height of heart-heaviness by how much I shall think my brother happy in having what he wishes for.

ROSALIND Why, then, tomorrow I cannot serve your turn for Rosalind?

ORLANDO I can live no longer by thinking.

ROSALIND I will weary you then no longer with idle talking. Know of me then—for now I speak to some purpose—that I know you are a gentleman of good conceit. I speak not this that you should bear a good opinion of my knowledge, insomuch I say I know you are; neither do I labour for a greater esteem than may in some little measure draw a belief from you to do yourself good, and not to grace me. Believe then, if you please, that I can do strange things. I have since I was three year old conversed with a magician, most profound in his art, and yet not damnable. If you do love Rosalind so near the heart as your gesture cries it out, when your brother marries Aliena shall you marry her. I know into what straits of fortune she is driven, and it is not impossible to me, if it appear not inconvenient to you, to set her before your eyes tomorrow, human as she is, and without any danger.

ORLANDO Speakest thou in sober meanings?

ROSALIND By my life, I do, which I tender dearly, though I say I am a magician. Therefore put you in your best array, bid your friends: for if you will be married tomorrow, you shall; and to Rosalind if you will.

Enter Silvius and Phoebe

Look, here comes a lover of mine and a lover of hers.

PHOEBE (to Rosalind)

Youth, you have done me much ungentleness,

To show the letter that I writ to you.

ROSALIND

I care not if I have. It is my study

To seem despiteful and ungentle to you.

You are there followed by a faithful shepherd.

Look upon him; love him. He worships you.

PHOEBE (to Silvius)

Good shepherd, tell this youth what ’tis to love.

SILVIUS

It is to be all made of sighs and tears,

And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE And I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO And I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND And I for no woman.

SILVIUS

It is to be all made of faith and service,

And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE And I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO And I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND And I for no woman.

SILVIUS

It is to be all made of fantasy,

All made of passion, and all made of wishes,

All adoration, duty, and observance,

All humbleness, all patience and impatience,

All purity, all trial, all obedience,

And so am I for Phoebe.

PHOEBE And so am I for Ganymede.

ORLANDO And so am I for Rosalind.

ROSALIND And so am I for no woman.

PHOEBE (to Rosalind)

If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

SILVIUS (to Phoebe)

If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

ORLANDO

If this be so, why blame you me to love you?

ROSALIND Why do you speak too, ‘Why blame you me to love you?’

ORLANDO

To her that is not here nor doth not hear.

ROSALIND Pray you, no more of this, ’tis like the howling of Irish wolves against the moon. (To Silvius) I will help you if I can. (To Phoebe) I would love you if I could.—Tomorrow meet me all together. (To Phoebe) I will marry you if ever I marry woman, and I’ll be married tomorrow. (To Orlando) I will satisfy you if ever I satisfy man, and you shall be married tomorrow. (To Silvius) I will content you if what pleases you contents you, and you shall be married tomorrow. (To Orlando) As you love Rosalind, meet. (To Silvius) As you love Phoebe, meet. And as I love no woman, I’ll meet. So fare you well. I have left you commands.