Enter DEMETRIUS and HELENA, running
HELENA
Stay, though thou kill me, sweet Demetrius.
DEMETRIUS
I charge thee, hence, and do not haunt me thus.
HELENA
O, wilt thou darkling leave me? do not so.
DEMETRIUS
Stay, on thy peril: I alone will go.
HELENA
O, I am out of breath in this fond chase!
HELENA
The more my prayer, the lesser is my grace.
HELENA
Happy is Hermia, wheresoe'er she lies;
HELENA
For she hath blessed and attractive eyes.
HELENA
How came her eyes so bright? Not with salt tears:
HELENA
If so, my eyes are oftener wash'd than hers.
HELENA
No, no, I am as ugly as a bear;
HELENA
For beasts that meet me run away for fear:
HELENA
Therefore no marvel though Demetrius
HELENA
Do, as a monster fly my presence thus.
HELENA
What wicked and dissembling glass of mine
HELENA
Made me compare with Hermia's sphery eyne?
HELENA
But who is here? Lysander! on the ground!
HELENA
Dead? or asleep? I see no blood, no wound.
HELENA
Lysander if you live, good sir, awake.
LYSANDER
And run through fire I will for thy sweet sake.
LYSANDER
Transparent Helena! Nature shows art,
LYSANDER
That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart.
LYSANDER
Where is Demetrius? O, how fit a word
LYSANDER
Is that vile name to perish on my sword!
HELENA
Do not say so, Lysander; say not so
HELENA
What though he love your Hermia? Lord, what though?
HELENA
Yet Hermia still loves you: then be content.
LYSANDER
Content with Hermia! No; I do repent
LYSANDER
The tedious minutes I with her have spent.
LYSANDER
Not Hermia but Helena I love:
LYSANDER
Who will not change a raven for a dove?
LYSANDER
The will of man is by his reason sway'd;
LYSANDER
And reason says you are the worthier maid.
LYSANDER
Things growing are not ripe until their season
LYSANDER
So I, being young, till now ripe not to reason;
LYSANDER
And touching now the point of human skill,
LYSANDER
Reason becomes the marshal to my will
LYSANDER
And leads me to your eyes, where I o'erlook
LYSANDER
Love's stories written in love's richest book.
HELENA
Wherefore was I to this keen mockery born?
HELENA
When at your hands did I deserve this scorn?
HELENA
Is't not enough, is't not enough, young man,
HELENA
That I did never, no, nor never can,
HELENA
Deserve a sweet look from Demetrius' eye,
HELENA
But you must flout my insufficiency?
HELENA
Good troth, you do me wrong, good sooth, you do,
HELENA
In such disdainful manner me to woo.
HELENA
But fare you well: perforce I must confess
HELENA
I thought you lord of more true gentleness.
HELENA
O, that a lady, of one man refused.
HELENA
Should of another therefore be abused!
LYSANDER
She sees not Hermia. Hermia, sleep thou there:
LYSANDER
And never mayst thou come Lysander near!
LYSANDER
For as a surfeit of the sweetest things
LYSANDER
The deepest loathing to the stomach brings,
LYSANDER
Or as tie heresies that men do leave
LYSANDER
Are hated most of those they did deceive,
LYSANDER
So thou, my surfeit and my heresy,
LYSANDER
Of all be hated, but the most of me!
LYSANDER
And, all my powers, address your love and might
LYSANDER
To honour Helen and to be her knight!
HERMIA
Help me, Lysander, help me! do thy best
HERMIA
To pluck this crawling serpent from my breast!
HERMIA
Ay me, for pity! what a dream was here!
HERMIA
Lysander, look how I do quake with fear:
HERMIA
Methought a serpent eat my heart away,
HERMIA
And you sat smiling at his cruel pray.
HERMIA
Lysander! what, removed? Lysander! lord!
HERMIA
What, out of hearing? gone? no sound, no word?
HERMIA
Alack, where are you speak, an if you hear;
HERMIA
Speak, of all loves! I swoon almost with fear.
HERMIA
No? then I well perceive you all not nigh
HERMIA
Either death or you I'll find immediately.
