Act V, Scene 2

LEONATO’S garden.

[Enter BENEDICK and MARGARET, meeting]

• Benedick. Pray thee, sweet Mistress Margaret, deserve well at
  my hands by helping me to the speech of Beatrice.

• Margaret. Will you then write me a sonnet in praise of my beauty?

• Benedick. In so high a style, Margaret, that no man living
  shall come over it; for, in most comely truth, thou 2415
  deservest it.

• Margaret. To have no man come over me! why, shall I always
  keep below stairs?

• Benedick. Thy wit is as quick as the greyhound's mouth; it catches.

• Margaret. And yours as blunt as the fencer's foils, which hit, 2420
  but hurt not.

• Benedick. A most manly wit, Margaret; it will not hurt a
  woman: and so, I pray thee, call Beatrice: I give
  thee the bucklers.

• Margaret. Give us the swords; we have bucklers of our own. 2425

• Benedick. If you use them, Margaret, you must put in the
  pikes with a vice; and they are dangerous weapons for maids.

• Margaret. Well, I will call Beatrice to you, who I think hath legs.

• Benedick. And therefore will come.
  [Exit MARGARET] 2430
  [Sings]
  The god of love,
  That sits above,
  And knows me, and knows me,
  How pitiful I deserve,— 2435
  I mean in singing; but in loving, Leander the good
  swimmer, Troilus the first employer of panders, and
  a whole bookful of these quondam carpet-mangers,
  whose names yet run smoothly in the even road of a
  blank verse, why, they were never so truly turned 2440
  over and over as my poor self in love. Marry, I
  cannot show it in rhyme; I have tried: I can find
  out no rhyme to 'lady' but 'baby,' an innocent
  rhyme; for 'scorn,' 'horn,' a hard rhyme; for,
  'school,' 'fool,' a babbling rhyme; very ominous 2445
  endings: no, I was not born under a rhyming planet,
  nor I cannot woo in festival terms.
  [Enter BEATRICE]
  Sweet Beatrice, wouldst thou come when I called thee?

• Beatrice. Yea, signior, and depart when you bid me. 2450

• Benedick. O, stay but till then!

• Beatrice. 'Then' is spoken; fare you well now: and yet, ere
  I go, let me go with that I came; which is, with
  knowing what hath passed between you and Claudio.

• Benedick. Only foul words; and thereupon I will kiss thee. 2455

• Beatrice. Foul words is but foul wind, and foul wind is but
  foul breath, and foul breath is noisome; therefore I
  will depart unkissed.

• Benedick. Thou hast frighted the word out of his right sense,
  so forcible is thy wit. But I must tell thee 2460
  plainly, Claudio undergoes my challenge; and either
  I must shortly hear from him, or I will subscribe
  him a coward. And, I pray thee now, tell me for
  which of my bad parts didst thou first fall in love with me?

• Beatrice. For them all together; which maintained so politic 2465
  a state of evil that they will not admit any good
  part to intermingle with them. But for which of my
  good parts did you first suffer love for me?

• Benedick. Suffer love! a good epithet! I do suffer love
  indeed, for I love thee against my will. 2470

• Beatrice. In spite of your heart, I think; alas, poor heart!
  If you spite it for my sake, I will spite it for
  yours; for I will never love that which my friend hates.

• Benedick. Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably.

• Beatrice. It appears not in this confession: there's not one 2475
  wise man among twenty that will praise himself.

• Benedick. An old, an old instance, Beatrice, that lived in
  the lime of good neighbours. If a man do not erect
  in this age his own tomb ere he dies, he shall live
  no longer in monument than the bell rings and the 2480
  widow weeps.

• Beatrice. And how long is that, think you?

• Benedick. Question: why, an hour in clamour and a quarter in
  rheum: therefore is it most expedient for the
  wise, if Don Worm, his conscience, find no 2485
  impediment to the contrary, to be the trumpet of his
  own virtues, as I am to myself. So much for
  praising myself, who, I myself will bear witness, is
  praiseworthy: and now tell me, how doth your cousin?

• Beatrice. Very ill. 2490

• Benedick. And how do you?

• Beatrice. Very ill too.

• Benedick. Serve God, love me and mend. There will I leave
  you too, for here comes one in haste.

[Enter URSULA]

• Ursula. Madam, you must come to your uncle. Yonder's old
  coil at home: it is proved my Lady Hero hath been
  falsely accused, the prince and Claudio mightily
  abused; and Don John is the author of all, who is
  fed and gone. Will you come presently? 2500

• Beatrice. Will you go hear this news, signior?

• Benedick. I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be
  buried in thy eyes; and moreover I will go with
  thee to thy uncle's.

[Exeunt]