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As Beatrice is, cannot be commendable.

But who dare tell her so? If I should speak,

She would mock me into air; O, she would laugh me

Out of myself, press me to death with wit.

Therefore let Benedick, like cover’d fire,

Consume away in sighs, waste inwardly.

It were a better death than die with mocks,

Which is as bad as die with tickling.

Urs.

Yet tell her of it, hear what she will say.

Hero.

No, rather I will go to Benedick,

And counsel him to fight against his passion,

And truly I’ll devise some honest slanders

To stain my cousin with. One doth not know

How much an ill word may empoison liking.

Urs.

O, do not do your cousin such a wrong.

She cannot be so much without true judgment—

Having so swift and excellent a wit

As she is priz’d to have—as to refuse

So rare a gentleman as Signior Benedick.

Hero.

He is the only man of Italy,

Always excepted my dear Claudio.

Urs.

I pray you be not angry with me, madam,

Speaking my fancy: Signior Benedick,

For shape, for bearing, argument, and valor,