The Merchant of Venice: the Trial Scene, Act IV Scene i

Stage two: Shylock refuses to give a reason

Shylock's answer is deliberate and, for a modern reader, shocking. He has sworn by the holy Sabbath to have the due and forfeit of his bond, and if the court denies it, let the danger light upon the city's charter and its freedom.

Then he refuses to explain himself.

You'll ask me why I rather choose to have

A weight of carrion flesh than to receive

Three thousand ducats. I'll not answer that,

But say it is my humour.

He gives examples: a man may pay ten thousand ducats to have a rat killed in his house; some men cannot bear a roast pig, some go mad at the sight of a cat, some cannot control themselves when a bagpipe plays. There is no firm reason for any of it. So he can give no reason for his suit either, beyond "a lodg'd hate and a certain loathing I bear Antonio".

Why he does this. In law he does not need a reason. A creditor enforcing a valid bond is not obliged to explain his motive, and by refusing to give one he is standing on his strict right. It is also, dramatically, the most frightening thing he could say, because a reason can be argued with and a humour cannot.

Stage three: the money is offered and refused

Bassanio offers six thousand ducats for the three thousand. Shylock's answer is one of the quotations MU actually sets.

If every ducat in six thousand ducats

Were in six parts, and every part a ducat,

I would not draw them, I would have my bond.

The Duke asks how he can hope for mercy, rendering none. Shylock's reply is the hardest argument in the scene, and candidates almost never use it.

What judgment shall I dread, doing no wrong?

You have among you many a purchas'd slave,

Which, like your asses and your dogs and mules,

You use in abject and in slavish parts,

Because you bought them.

If he asked them to free their slaves and marry them to their heirs, he says, they would answer "The slaves are ours." He answers the same way: the pound of flesh is dearly bought, it is his, and he will have it. And he adds the sentence that puts the court on trial: "If you deny me, fie upon your law! There is no force in the decrees of Venice."

Take this seriously in an essay. Shylock is pointing out that the Christians of Venice own human beings by purchase and see nothing wrong in it, and that his claim rests on exactly the same principle, namely that a thing bought is the buyer's. The play gives him this argument and nobody in the court answers it.

Stage four: Bellario's letter and the arrival of Balthazar

The Duke says he may dismiss the court unless Bellario, a learned doctor sent for to determine the matter, arrives. A messenger comes from Padua: Nerissa, dressed as a lawyer's clerk.

While the letter is being fetched, Gratiano and Shylock exchange insults over the whetting of Shylock's knife, and Shylock ends it with four words that state his whole position: "I stand here for law."

The letter. Bellario writes that he is very sick, but that a young doctor of Rome named Balthazar happened to be visiting him, that he acquainted him with the cause, that they turned over many books together, and that Balthazar comes furnished with Bellario's opinion bettered by his own learning. He asks that the young man's lack of years be no impediment.

What the letter does. It gives Portia everything a stranger needs to be heard: an introduction from a known authority, a stated qualification, and an explanation of why the expected expert has not come. It is also, in fact, false in every particular except the opinion, and the court never tests it.

Stage five: mercy, and the refusal of it

Portia enters as Balthazar. Her first questions are procedural and exact: which is the merchant and which the Jew, is your name Shylock, do you confess the bond. Antonio confesses it. She then states the position in law before saying anything else, and the statement is entirely in Shylock's favour.

Of a strange nature is the suit you follow,

Yet in such rule that the Venetian law

Cannot impugn you as you do proceed.

Then: "Then must the Jew be merciful." Shylock's four-word answer is the hinge of the scene: "On what compulsion must I? Tell me that."

The speech that follows is the most famous in the play. It begins by answering his question directly: none. Mercy is not strained, that is, not forced or constrained; it drops as the gentle rain from heaven; it blesses him that gives and him that takes; it is mightiest in the mightiest, and becomes a monarch better than his crown. Earthly power shows likest God's when mercy seasons justice.

Its conclusion is the part that matters for the argument, and it is a religious one: in the course of justice, none of us would see salvation, so we pray for mercy and that prayer teaches us to show it.

Shylock answers in one line and a half. "My deeds upon my head! I crave the law, the penalty and forfeit of my bond." The full treatment of what this exchange is worth as argument is in the chapter on mercy and equity.

Stage six: the money again, and the refusal to bend the law

Bassanio offers to pay twice, then ten times, and asks Portia to do what many candidates think a court should do.

Wrest once the law to your authority.

To do a great right, do a little wrong.

Portia refuses, and her reason is the most lawyerly thing in the play.

It must not be, there is no power in Venice

Can alter a decree established;

'Twill be recorded for a precedent,

And many an error by the same example

Will rush into the state.

Precedent means a decision that later courts follow. Her point is that a court which bends the law once, even for a good reason, has made a rule that will be used again in bad cases. Shylock, delighted, calls her "A Daniel come to judgment", after the young judge in the Book of Daniel who saves an innocent woman by cross-examination. It is the second time in the scene that a character praises a judge before hearing the judgment.

Stage seven: the judgment for Shylock

Portia asks to see the bond, offers Shylock thrice his money once more, and is refused on the ground of an oath in heaven. She then states the law as clearly as it can be stated.

Why, this bond is forfeit,

And lawfully by this the Jew may claim

A pound of flesh, to be by him cut off

Nearest the merchant's heart.

She invites him again to take three times the money and bid her tear the bond, and he refuses again. She gives judgment: Antonio must prepare his bosom for the knife, for the intent and purpose of the law has full relation to the penalty, which appears due upon the bond.

Then comes the exchange that ruins him, and it is Portia's trap although it looks like charity. She asks whether there is a surgeon standing by to stop Antonio's wounds, lest he bleed to death, at Shylock's charge.

SHYLOCK. Is it so nominated in the bond?

PORTIA. It is not so express'd, but what of that? 'Twere good you do so much for charity.

SHYLOCK. I cannot find it; 'tis not in the bond.

He has just told the court, in front of witnesses, that he will do nothing that is not written in the document. Everything that follows uses that against him.

Stage eight: the turn

Antonio makes his farewell to Bassanio, and Bassanio says he would sacrifice his wife and all the world to save him, which Portia answers drily: his wife would give him little thanks for the offer. Shylock says these are Christian husbands, and presses for sentence.

Portia awards the pound of flesh. Shylock cries "Most rightful judge!" She says he must cut this flesh from off Antonio's breast, the law allows it and the court awards it. He cries "Most learned judge! A sentence! Come, prepare."

Tarry a little, there is something else.

This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood.

The words expressly are "a pound of flesh".

If in the cutting he sheds one drop of Christian blood, his lands and goods are confiscate to the state of Venice. Shylock asks, "Is that the law?" and is told that as he urges justice he shall have more justice than he desires.

He tries to take the money instead. Portia stops him: he shall have nothing but the penalty. She adds a second impossibility: he must cut exactly a pound, neither more nor less, and if the scale turns by so much as the twentieth part of one poor scruple, or in the estimation of a hair, he dies and all his goods are confiscate. A scruple is a tiny apothecary's weight, so this is a demand for perfection that no knife can meet.

He asks only for his principal. It is offered by Bassanio. Portia refuses even that: he has refused it in open court, and shall have merely justice and his bond. Shylock gives up and turns to leave.

Stage nine: the alien statute

He is not allowed to leave.

Tarry, Jew.

The law hath yet another hold on you.

She recites a Venetian statute: if it is proved against an alien, a person who is not a citizen, that by direct or indirect attempts he has sought the life of any citizen, then the party against whom he contrived seizes half his goods, the other half goes to the state, and his life lies in the mercy of the Duke alone. She says it appears by manifest proceeding that Shylock has contrived, indirectly and directly too, against the very life of Antonio, and tells him to kneel and beg mercy of the Duke.

Read this carefully, because it is where most answers go wrong. Shylock has not committed any offence outside the courtroom. What is said to be his attempt on Antonio's life is the bringing of this very suit, on a bond a court has just declared valid. He is convicted, in effect, of asking a court for the remedy it told him he was entitled to.

Stage ten: the sentence, and what Antonio adds

The Duke pardons his life before he asks, "that thou shalt see the difference of our spirit". Half the wealth is Antonio's, the other half goes to the state, which humbleness may reduce to a fine. Portia corrects even that: the fine is for the state, not for Antonio.

Shylock's answer is four lines that many readers find the most painful in the play.

Nay, take my life and all, pardon not that.

You take my house when you do take the prop

That doth sustain my house; you take my life

When you do take the means whereby I live.

Antonio then states his own terms. He will not take the half awarded to him as owner: he asks the court to quit the fine on the state's half, and asks to hold the other half in use, that is, in trust, rendering it on Shylock's death to Lorenzo. And two conditions more.

1. That Shylock presently become a Christian.
2. That he record a deed of gift, in court, of all he dies possessed of, to Lorenzo and Jessica.

The Duke says he shall do this or the pardon is recanted. Portia asks whether he is contented. Shylock's last words in the play are three: "I am content." He then asks leave to go because he is not well, and to have the deed sent after him. Gratiano's parting joke is that in christening he shall have two godfathers, and that had Gratiano been judge he would have had ten more, to bring him to the gallows and not to the font.

The sequence of the reversal, in the order to write it

Learn this list. It is the answer to "critically examine the trial scene", and it is what most candidates cannot get in order.

1. The bond is admitted by Antonio and declared valid by the court.
2. Three thousand, six thousand, and ten times the sum are offered and refused.
3. Mercy is asked for and refused, and no compulsion to be merciful is found.
4. The court refuses to bend the law, on the ground of precedent.
5. Judgment is given for Shylock: he may cut a pound of flesh nearest the heart.
6. Shylock refuses a surgeon because a surgeon is not in the bond.
7. The bond gives flesh, not blood. One drop of Christian blood forfeits everything.
8. It must also be exactly a pound, to the estimation of a hair, on pain of death.
9. He asks for the money; refused, because he refused it in open court.
10. He asks for the principal alone; refused.
11. The alien statute is produced: half to Antonio, half to the state, life at the Duke's mercy.
12. The Duke pardons his life; Antonio adds trusteeship for Lorenzo, forced conversion, and a deed of gift.

What beginners get wrong

They say Portia proves the bond invalid. She does the opposite. She holds it valid twice, in terms, and gives judgment on it. The bond is never set aside.

They say Shylock loses because he asks for too much. He loses because a term is read against him that he never thought about, and then because of a statute nobody mentioned until he tried to leave.

They forget that the money is refused three times before the turn. Every one of those refusals is used against him later, so they are not repetition, they are the record being built.

They stop at the blood. The blood point only defeats the claim. What destroys Shylock, his fortune and his religion, is the alien statute, and half the marks are there.

They think Antonio is merciful at the end. Read the conditions. He gives up ownership of one half and takes the income of the other, and he requires the man to change his religion and disinherit himself in favour of the daughter who robbed him. Whether that is mercy is a real question, and an essay should treat it as one.

A worked answer

Question. "Critically examine the trial scene." Here is the opening paragraph and the plan.

Opening paragraph. The trial in Act IV Scene i is not a scene in which a bad claim is exposed. The court holds the bond good, twice and in terms, and gives judgment on it, and Shylock is defeated only afterwards, by a construction of his own document that no party had considered and by a statute nobody had mentioned. This answer argues that the scene is a study in what strict reading can do in the hands of a court that has already decided who should win.

The plan of the rest. One paragraph on the bond being upheld and the money refused three times. One on the mercy speech and why it fails as argument. One on the surgeon exchange, in which Shylock commits himself to the rule that nothing counts unless written. One on the blood and the exact pound. One on the alien statute, produced after judgment by the judge, with no charge and no defence. One on the sentence and Antonio's conditions. A conclusion answering the question asked.

Why this plan scores. It follows the scene's own order, so every point is anchored to a moment the examiner can find, and it takes a position in the first paragraph instead of arriving at one in the last.

Quick revision

The Duke is on Antonio's side but rules he cannot deny the course of law.

Shylock refuses to give a reason: "it is my humour", the rat, the pig, the cat, the bagpipe.

His hardest argument: you own purchased slaves because you bought them, and I own this flesh because I bought it.

Bellario's letter introduces "Balthazar", a young doctor of Rome, in his place.

"On what compulsion must I?" answered by the quality of mercy speech.

Portia refuses to bend the law because it would be recorded for a precedent.

She gives judgment for Shylock, then: no jot of blood, and exactly a pound to a hair.

Then the alien statute: half to Antonio, half to the state, life at the Duke's mercy.

Antonio's conditions: half in use for Lorenzo, become a Christian, record a deed of gift.

Shylock's last line: "I am content."

Test yourself

1. Does Portia hold the bond valid or void? Valid. She says the Venetian law cannot impugn Shylock as he proceeds, she states that the bond is forfeit and he may lawfully claim a pound of flesh nearest the heart, and she awards it. The bond is never declared void at any point.

2. What exactly does the blood argument say? That the bond expressly grants a pound of flesh and grants no blood at all, so in cutting the flesh Shylock may not shed one drop of Christian blood, and if he does his lands and goods are confiscate to the state of Venice.

3. Why does the surgeon exchange matter? Because Shylock is made to say in open court that he will do nothing which is not nominated in the bond. Having insisted that the document is the whole of the matter, he cannot object when the document is read against him with the same strictness.

4. State the alien statute in your own words. If an alien is proved to have sought the life of a citizen of Venice by direct or indirect attempts, the intended victim takes half his goods, the state takes the other half, and his life is at the mercy of the Duke alone.

5. Why is the alien statute the more serious blow? The blood point only stops him recovering. The statute makes him a criminal, takes his whole estate, and puts his life in the Duke's hands, which is what allows Antonio to impose conversion and a deed of gift as the price of survival.

6. Who is Balthazar? The name Portia uses in disguise as the young doctor of laws from Rome. It is also the name of Portia's own servant in Act III Scene iv, whom she sends to Padua, and the play reuses it without explanation.