Shakespeare on our bodies, wills, reason, lusts of the blood, and
subtlety.
IAGO:
Virtue! a fig! 'tis in ourselves that we are thus
or thus. Our bodies are our gardens, to
the which
our wills are gardeners: so that if we
will plant
nettles, or sow lettuce, set hyssop and
weed up
thyme, supply it with one gender of
herbs, or
distract it with many, either to have it
sterile
with idleness, or manured with industry,
why, the
power and corrigible authority of this
lies in our
wills. If the balance of our lives had
not one
scale of reason to poise another of
sensuality, the
blood and baseness of our natures would
conduct us
to most preposterous conclusions: but we
have
reason to cool our raging motions, our
carnal
stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I
take this that
you call love to be a sect or scion.
RODERIGO:
It cannot be.
IAGO:
It is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of
the will. Come, be a man. Drown thyself!
drown
cats and blind puppies. I have professed
me thy
friend and I confess me knit to thy
deserving with
cables of perdurable toughness; I could
never
better stead thee than now. Put money in
thy
purse; follow thou the wars; defeat thy
favour with
an usurped beard; I say, put money in
thy purse….
….if
sanctimony and a frail vow betwixt
an erring barbarian and a supersubtle
Venetian not
too hard for my wits and all the tribe
of hell….
From Othello: I, iii
