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Updated: June 1, 2025
Or Shylock's? Or Benedick's? Or Macbeth's? Or that of Cassius? Or that of Falconbridge? But we might go on for ever. Take a single example Shylock. Is he so eager for money as to be indifferent to revenge? Or so eager for revenge as to be indifferent to money? Or so bent on both together as to be indifferent to the honour of his nation and the law of Moses?
All his propensities are mingled with each other, so that, in trying to apportion to each its proper part, we find the same difficulty which constantly meets us in real life. A superficial critic may say, that hatred is Shylock's ruling passion. But how many passions have amalgamated to form that hatred? It is partly the result of wounded pride: Antonio has called him dog.
Not only is it, as Johnson says, 'wildly improbable, it confuses Portia's character: it is an irritating absurdity. 'But more, for that in low simplicity He lends out money gratis. We have no proof that Antonio did this. He may have done it. He was the kind of person who might like popularity. If he was really guilty of 'low simplicity, I sympathise with Shylock's hatred of him.
One of them was as precious as Shylock's turquoise, and Gomara states that some Genoese merchants who examined it in Seville offered forty thousand golden ducats for it.
Shylock's master passion is not revenge, which is a savage, but avarice, which is a sordid motive. His hatred is inspired more by defeated hope of gain and positive losses and threatened ventures, than by the personal insults and contumely he has received.
The skins were thick, the heads of the pins pressed painfully into her fingers, but she groaned and worked away until the border was arranged for stitching, and could be tried on to show the effect. "Perfectly splendid!" was the verdict of the beholders. And so the matter of Shylock's gown was settled; but his beard still remained to be provided, and was by no means an easy problem to solve.
All his propensities are mingled with each other; so that, in trying to apportion to each its proper part, we find the same difficulty which constantly meets us in real life. A superficial critic may say, that hatred is Shylock's ruling passion. But how many passions have amalgamated to form that hatred? It is partly the result of wounded pride: Antonio has called him dog.
The importance of the arduous task Portia had engaged in gave this tender lady courage, and she boldly proceeded in the duty she had undertaken to perform: and first of all she addressed herself to Shylock; and allowing that he had a right by the Venetian law to have the forfeit expressed in the bond, she spoke so sweetly of the noble quality of mercy as would have softened any heart but the unfeeling Shylock's; saying, that it dropped as the gentle rain from heaven upon the place beneath; and how mercy was a double blessing, it blessed him that gave, and him that received it: and how it became monarchs better than their crowns, being an attribute of God himself; and that earthly power came nearest to God's in proportion as mercy tempered justice; and she bid Shylock remember that as we all pray for mercy, that same prayer should teach us to show mercy.
"No woman knows anything about seafaring, but Portia is right. The ship is headed for the Azores, which is the first tack needed in a windward sail for London under the present conditions." The reply was greeted with cheers, and when they subsided the cry for Shylock's subscription began again, but he declined.
It was a very short one, but it made every one laugh greatly, thanks to Shylock's excellent acting, and the chorus of boys, who greatly enjoyed chasing him across the stage, crying, "The law, his ducats, and his daughter!"
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