Foolishness and Folly Quotes - A Midsummer Night's Dream | A Midsummer Night's Dream - Summary, Themes & Characters - Novels PDF Download

THESEUS

Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires,

Know of your youth, examine well your blood,

Whether (if you yield not to your father's choice)

You can endure the livery of a nun,

For aye to be shady cloister mewed,

To live a barren sister all your life,

Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon.

Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood

To undergo such maiden pilgrimage,

But earthlier happy is the rose distilled

Than that which withering on the virgin thorn,

Grows, lives, and dies, in single blessedness. (1.1.169-180)

Theseus explains to Hermia what her options are, but thinks that a vow of chastity would be a poor choice.  For Theseus, choosing love over practicality is foolishness.

HERMIA

By all the vows that ever men have broke

(In number more than ever women spoke),

In that same place thou hast appointed me,

To-morrow truly will I meet with thee. (1.1.178-181)

Shakespeare pokes a bit of fun here at love—men break vows faster than women can make them.  Not only does Hermia know this, she chooses to swear on it.  For Shakespeare, one thing that you can depend on in love is the foolishness it brings.

HELENA

But herein mean I to enrich my pain,

To have his sight thither and back again. (1.1.256-257)

Helena wants to see Demetrius, even if it is only to have him scorn her.  In love, Helena shows complete foolishness and lack of judgment regarding whom she gives her affection to.

QUINCE

Marry, our play is "The most lamentable comedy and most

cruel death of Pyramus and Thisbe."

BOTTOM

A very good piece of work, I assure you, and a merry. (1.2.11-15)

Bottom's misspeakings and misunderstandings are a running joke in the play, but sometimes from items like this, you get the sense that he is really oblivious. The Mechanicals are usually the butt of the joke, but they seem to be happily having their own fun here.  In some cases foolishness can be a source of enjoyment, at least when paired with ignorance.

DEMETRIUS

You do impeach your modesty too much

To leave the city and commit yourself

Into the hands of one that loves you not,

To trust the opportunity of night

And the ill counsel of a desert place

With the rich worth of your virginity. (2.1.221-226)

Once again, we see love causing characters to act foolishly.

PUCK

Through the forest have I gone,

But Athenian found I none

On whose eyes I might approve

This flower's force in stirring love.

Night and silence! Who is here? (2.2.72-76)

When Puck dumps the love juice in the wrong guy's eyes, we're reminded that even fairies are prone to foolish mistakes.

BOTTOM

I see their knavery.  This is to make an ass of 

me, to fright me, if they could. (3.1.122-123) 

Of course, when Bottom accuses his friends of trying to "make an ass" of him, it's funny to us because we know something that Bottom doesn't—he literally has been made into an ass.  (Also, his name, Bottom, becomes very fitting.) 

TITANIA

On the first view to say, to swear, I love thee.

BOTTOM

Methinks, mistress, you should have little 

reason for that. And yet, to say the truth, reason 

and love keep little company together nowadays. (3.1.143-146)

Here we see Shakespeare's usual little trick where the fool of the play is sometimes given to the wisest insights. Here, Bottom sums up Titania's silliness by pointing out that there's no reason for her to be in love with him.

PUCK

Captain of our fairy band,

Helena is here at hand,

And the youth mistook by me,

Pleading for a lover's fee.

Shall we their fond pageant see?

Lord, what fools these mortals be! (3.2.112-117)

Though the Athenian lovers are suffering, for an observer like Puck, the lovers' foolishness is source of entertainment.

HERMIA

"Puppet!" why so? Ay, that way goes the game.

Now I perceive that she hath made compare

Between our statures; she hath urg'd her height,

And with her personage, her tall personage,

Her height, forsooth, she hath prevail'd with him.

And are you grown so high in his esteem

Because I am so dwarfish and so low?

How low am I, thou painted maypole? Speak!

How low am I? I am not yet so low

But that my nails can reach unto thine eyes. (3.2.304-313)

Hermia believes Lysander has fallen out of love with her simply because she is short.  Here we see the folly of the female characters' behavior—without the excuse of enchantment that the males can claim.