quotes, notes, timelines & more

Home » Quotes » Othello » Most gracious duke, To my unfolding lend your prosperous ear

Most gracious duke, To my unfolding lend your prosperous ear

Desdemona
Most gracious duke,
To my unfolding lend your prosperous ear
And let me find a charter in your voice
T' assist my simpleness.
Duke
What would you, Desdemona?
Desdemona
That I love the Moor to live with him
My downright violence and storm of fortunes
May trumpet to the world. My heart's subdued
Even to the very quality of my lord.
I saw Othello's visage in his mind,
And to his honors and his valiant parts
Did I my soul and fortunes consecrate.
So that, dear lords, if I be left behind,
A moth of peace, and he go to the war,
The rites for why I love him are bereft me
And I a heavy interim shall support
By his dear absence. Let me go with him.
Othello
Let her have your voice.
Vouch with me, heaven, I therefore beg it not
To please the palate of my appetite,
Nor to comply with heat (the young affects
In me defunct) and proper satisfaction,
But to be free and bounteous to her mind.
And heaven defend your good souls that you think
I will your serious and great business scant
For she is with me. No, when light-winged toys
Of feathered Cupid seel with wanton dullness
My speculative and officed instruments,
That my disports corrupt and taint my business,
Let housewives make a skillet of my helm,
And all indign and base adversities
Make head against my estimation.

Source:
Act 1
Scene 3
Line 278

Source Type:

Spoken by:
, ,