Pioneers and all, had tasted her sweet body,

So I had nothing known. O, now for ever

Farewell the tranquil mind, farewell content,

Farewell the plumèd troops and the big wars

That makes ambition virtue! O, farewell,

Farewell the neighing steed and the shrill trump,

The spirit-stirring drum, th‘ear-piercing fife,

The royal banner, and all quality,

Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war!

And O, you mortal engines whose rude throats

Th’immortal Jove’s dread clamours counterfeit,

Farewell! Othello’s occupation’s gone.

IAGO Is’t possible, my lord?

OTHELLO ⌈taking Iago by the throat⌉

Villain, be sure thou prove my love a whore.

Be sure of it. Give me the ocular proof,

Or, by the worth of mine eternal soul,

Thou hadst been better have been born a dog

Than answer my waked wrath.

IAGO Is’t come to this?

OTHELLO

Make me to see’t, or at the least so prove it

That the probation bear no hinge nor loop

To hang a doubt on, or woe upon thy life.

IAGO My noble lord.

OTHELLO

If thou dost slander her and torture me,

Never pray more; abandon all remorse,

On horror’s head horrors accumulate,

Do deeds to make heaven weep, all earth amazed,

For nothing canst thou to damnation add

Greater than that.

IAGO O grace, O heaven forgive me!

Are you a man? Have you a soul or sense?

God buy you, take mine office. O wretched fool,

That lov’st to make thine honesty a vice!

O monstrous world, take note, take note, O world,

To be direct and honest is not safe!

I thank you for this profit, and from hence

I’ll love no friend, sith love breeds such offence.

OTHELLO Nay, stay. Thou shouldst be honest.

IAGO

I should be wise, for honesty’s a fool,

And loses that it works for.

OTHELLO By the world,

I think my wife be honest, and think she is not.

I think that thou art just, and think thou art not.

I’ll have some proof. My name, that was as fresh

As Dian’s visage, is now begrimed and black

As mine own face. If there be cords, or knives,

Poison, or fire, or suffocating streams,

I’ll not endure it. Would I were satisfied!

IAGO

I see, sir, you are eaten up with passion.

I do repent me that I put it to you.

You would be satisfied?

OTHELLO Would? Nay, and I will.

IAGO

And may. But how, how satisfied, my lord?

Would you, the supervisor, grossly gape on,

Behold her topped?

OTHELLO Death and damnation! O!

IAGO

It were a tedious difficulty, I think,

To bring them to that prospect. Damn them then

If ever mortal eyes do see them bolster

More than their own! What then, how then?

What shall I say? Where’s satisfaction?

It is impossible you should see this,

Were they as prime as goats, as hot as monkeys,

As salt as wolves in pride, and fools as gross

As ignorance made drunk. But yet I say,

If imputation, and strong circumstances

Which lead directly to the door of truth,

Will give you satisfaction, you might ha’t.

OTHELLO

Give me a living reason she’s disloyal.

IAGO I do not like the office,

But sith I am entered in this cause so far,

Pricked to’t by foolish honesty and love,

I will go on. I lay with Cassio lately,

And being troubled with a raging tooth,

I could not sleep. There are a kind of men

So loose of soul that in their sleeps

Will mutter their affairs. One of this kind is Cassio.

In sleep I heard him say ‘Sweet Desdemona,

Let us be wary, let us hide our loves’,

And then, sir, would he grip and wring my hand,

Cry ‘O, sweet creature!’, then kiss me hard,

As if he plucked up kisses by the roots,

That grew upon my lips, lay his leg o‘er my thigh,

And sigh, and kiss, and then cry ‘Cursèd fate,

That gave thee to the Moor!’

OTHELLO O, monstrous, monstrous!

IAGO Nay, this was but his dream.

OTHELLO

But this denoted a foregone conclusion.

IAGO

’Tis a shrewd doubt, though it be but a dream,

And this may help to thicken other proofs

That do demonstrate thinly.

OTHELLO I’ll tear her all to pieces.

IAGO

Nay, yet be wise; yet we see nothing done.

She may be honest yet. Tell me but this:

Have you not sometimes seen a handkerchief

Spotted with strawberries in your wife’s hand?

OTHELLO

I gave her such a one. ’Twas my first gift.

IAGO

I know not that, but such a handkerchief—

I am sure it was your wife’s—did I today

See Cassio wipe his beard with.

OTHELLO If it be that—

IAGO

If it be that, or any that was hers,

It speaks against her with the other proofs.

OTHELLO

O that the slave had forty thousand lives!

One is too poor, too weak for my revenge.

Now do I see ‘tis true. Look here, Iago.

All my fond love thus do I blow to heaven—’tis gone.

Arise, black vengeance, from the hollow hell.

Yield up, O love, thy crown and hearted throne

To tyrannous hate! Swell, bosom, with thy freight,