William Shakespeare: The Merchant of Venice

ACT 3. SCENE 5. The same. A garden.

[Enter LAUNCELOT and JESSICA.]

LAUNCELOT.
Yes, truly; for, look you, the sins of the father are to
be laid upon the children; therefore, I promise you, I fear you.
I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of
the matter; therefore be of good cheer, for truly I think you are
damn'd. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good, and
that is but a kind of bastard hope neither.

JESSICA.
And what hope is that, I pray thee?

LAUNCELOT.
Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not,
that you are not the Jew's daughter.

JESSICA.
That were a kind of bastard hope indeed; so the sins of my
mother should be visited upon me.

LAUNCELOT.
Truly then I fear you are damn'd both by father and
mother; thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into
Charybdis, your mother; well, you are gone both ways.

JESSICA.
I shall be saved by my husband; he hath made me a Christian.

LAUNCELOT.
Truly, the more to blame he; we were Christians enow
before, e'en as many as could well live one by another. This
making of Christians will raise the price of hogs; if we grow all
to be pork-eaters, we shall not shortly have a rasher on the
coals for money.

JESSICA.
I'll tell my husband, Launcelot, what you say; here he comes.

[Enter LORENZO.]

LORENZO.
I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Launcelot, if you
thus get my wife into corners.

JESSICA.
Nay, you need nor fear us, Lorenzo; Launcelot and I are
out; he tells me flatly there's no mercy for me in heaven,
because I am a Jew's daughter; and he says you are no good member
of the commonwealth, for in converting Jews to Christians you
raise the price of pork.