Thy husband is thy Lord, thy life, thy keeper,
Thy head, thy sovereign:
One that cares for thee,
And for thy maintenance.
Commits his body
To painful labour, both by sea and land:
To watch the night in storms, the day in cold,
Whilst thou liest warm at home, secure and safe,
And craves no other tribute at thy hands,
But love, faire looks, and true obedience;
Too little payment for so great a debt.
Such duty as the subject owes the Prince,
Even such a woman oweth to her husband:
And when she is forward, peevish, sullen, sour,
And not obedient to his honest will,
What is she but a foul contending Rebel,
And graceless Traitor to her loving Lord?
I am ashamed that women are so simple,
To offer war, where they should kneel for peace:
Or seek for rule, supremacy, and sway,
When they are bound to serve, love, and obey.
Why are our bodies soft, and weak, and smooth,
Unapt to toil and trouble in the world,
But that our soft conditions, and our hearts,
Should well agree with our external parts?
Come, come, you forward and unable worms,
My mind hath bin as big as one of yours,
My heart as great, my reason happily more,
To bandy word for word, and frown for frown;
But now I see our Lances are but straws:
Our strength as weak, our weakness past compare,
That seeming to be most, which we indeed least are.
Then vale your stomachs, for it is no boot,
And place your hands below your husband's foot:
In token of which duty, if he please,
My hand is ready, may it do him ease.
William Shakespeare
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