Section 126 Shylock Meditating Revenge1
If it will feed2 nothing else (S. 27, N. 8), it will3 feed my revenge. He has disgraced4 me, and hindered5 me of half a million! laughed6 at my losses, mocked7 at my gains, scorned my nation, thwarted8 my bargains, cooled9 my friends, heated10 my enemies! And11 what’s his reason? I am a Jew! Has12 not a Jew eyes? Has not a Jew hands, organs, senses, affections,13 passions? Is (S. 2, N. 1) he not fed with14 the same food, hurt with the same weapon, subject15 to the same diseases, healed16 by the same means, warmed17 and cooled by the same summer and winter, as a Christian is? If18 you stab us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? and19 if you wrong us, shall we not revenge? If we are like20 you in the rest (S. 27, N. 8), we will resemble you in that21! If a Jew wrong a Christian, what22 is his humility? Revenge23. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what24 should his sufferance be by Christian example? Why25, revenge! The villany you teach (S. 42, N. 4) me I26 will execute; and27 it shall go hard but28 I will better the instruction.—William Shakespeare, “The Merchant of Venice.”
Notes
1 Shylock auf Rache sinnend.
2 feed = satisfy.
3 Insert the adv. doch after the subject.
4 disgraced = insulted, beschimpft.
5 einen um etwas bringen.
6 Supply ‘has’ to begin this clause; at, über, with acc.
7 to mock at a thing, etwas verspotten, v. tr.; ‘my gains’ may be rendered by meinen Profit.
8 crossed (durchkreu´zen) my enterprises.
9 cooled = made indifferent.
10 heated = incited (auf´reizen).
11 And for what (aus welchem) reason?
12 As a rule the English ‘not a’ or ‘not an’ is best rendered by the indef. numeral kein. Say ‘Has a Jew no eyes’?
13 feelings.
14 von.
15 Say ‘is he not subject to’, etc.; to be subject to a thing, einer Sache unterworfen sein.
16 This verb requires again the passive voice, and copula and subject must be supplied; by, durch.
17 Say ‘not warmed’, the auxiliary need not be repeated here.
18 Begin with the principal sentence in this and the two following passages. ‘You’, here ihr.
19 Say ’and we shall not revenge ourselves, if you wrong us (Unrecht zufügen)’.
20 to be like, gleichen, with dat.; in the rest, in allem übrigen.
21 in that, darin.
22 what is = in what (wherein) consists.
23 In der Rache.
24 in what (wherein) shall according to the Christian example consist his sufferance (Dulden, n., or Duldung, f.)?
25 Nun, doch wohl in der Rache!
26 ich will sie anwenden.
27 and — hard, und es müßte seltsam zugehen.
28 but — instruction = if I should not even (noch, after ‘not’) excel (‘should excel’ Imperf. of the Subj. of übertreffen; App. § 33) my teachers.