115: _as_] om. Ff. 119: _the_] _this_ Hanmer. 124: _something showing_] _shewing something_ Pope. 125: _continuance_] _continuance of_ Chedworth conj. 143: _the other forth_] _the other, forth_ Hanmer. _the first_ Seymour conj. _him forth_ Lloyd conj. 146: _wilful_] _witless_ Warburton. _wileful_ Becket conj. _wasteful_ Collier MS. _wilful youth_] _prodigal_ Lansdowne version. 155: _do me now_] Qq. _doe_ F1. _do to me_ F2 F3 F4. 160: _unto it_] _to serve you_ Mason conj. 163: _sometimes_] _sometime,_ Theobald. 164: _messages_] _messengers_ Mason conj. 171: _strond_] _strand_ Johnson. 172: _come_] _comes_ Q1. 175: _presages me such_] _which so presages_ Seymour conj. 178: _Neither_] _Nor_ Pope. ~~~~~ SCENE II. _Belmont._ _A room in_ PORTIA’S _house_. _Enter_ PORTIA _and_ NERISSA. _Por._ By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary of this great world. _Ner._ You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the same abundance as your good fortunes are: and yet, for aught I see, they are as sick that surfeit with too 5 much, as they that starve with nothing. It is no mean happiness, therefore, to be seated in the mean: superfluity comes sooner by white hairs; but competency lives longer. _Por._ Good sentences, and well pronounced. _Ner._ They would be better, if well followed. 10 _Por._ If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men’s cottages princes’ palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own instructions: I can easier teach twenty what were good to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching. 15 The brain may devise laws for the blood; but a hot temper leaps o’er a cold decree: such a hare is madness the youth, to skip o’er the meshes of good counsel the cripple. But this reasoning is not in the fashion to choose me a husband. O me, the word ‘choose’! I may neither choose whom I 20 would, nor refuse whom I dislike; so is the will of a living daughter curbed by the will of a dead father. Is it not hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none? _Ner._ Your father was ever virtuous; and holy men, at their death, have good inspirations: therefore, the lottery, 25 that he hath devised in these three chests of gold, silver, and lead,—whereof who chooses his meaning chooses you,— will, no doubt, never be chosen by any rightly, but one who shall rightly love. But what warmth is there in your affection towards any of these princely suitors that are 30 already come? _Por._ I pray thee, over-name them; and as thou namest them, I will describe them; and, according to my description, level at my affection. _Ner._ First, there is the Neapolitan prince. 35