Romeo and Juliet Apothecary Quotes

Well, Juliet, I will lie with thee to-night.
Let’s see for means: O mischief, thou art swift
To enter in the thoughts of desperate men!
I do remember an apothecary, –

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 5, Scene 1. Mistakingly informed by Balthasar that Juliet is dead, Romeo impulsively decides to return to Verona to kill himself with poison and join her in death. He feels that he has nothing left to live for. Romeo’s impulsive nature leads him to make hasty and rash decisions which can have tragic and fatal consequences.

Famine is in thy cheeks,
Need and oppression starveth in thine eyes,
Contempt and beggary hangs upon thy back;
The world is not thy friend nor the world’s law;
The world affords no law to make thee rich;
Then be not poor, but break it, and take this.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 5, Scene 1. Romeo persuades the Apothecary to ignore the law forbidding the sale of poisons and to sell some to him. He tells him that he lives in destitution and starvation, the law is not his friend, and Romeo’s money can help lift him out of poverty. Words personified in this passage are "need and oppression" (said to be starving) and "world" and "law" (described as no friend of the Apothecary).

There is thy gold, worse poison to men’s souls,
Doing more murders in this loathsome world,
Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell.
I sell thee poison; thou hast sold me none.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 5, Scene 1. As Romeo pays the poor Apothecary for the poison, he says that money and greed are a worse poison to men and their souls. Romeo sees money as a kind of evil that causes more murders that any amount of poison sold. Comparing gold to poison is an example of a metaphor.

Here’s to my love!
O true apothecary!
Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.

– William Shakespeare

Romeo and Juliet, Act 5, Scene 3. Romeo’s final words are a declaration of his love for Juliet, whom he wrongly thinks is dead. His decision to speed to an Apothecary and acquire poison, then rush to the Capulet tomb to drink it is reckless and hasty. Had he stopped to think and waited a while longer, he would have learned that Juliet was not dead, but in a sleep from which she awakens after he kills himself. Appearance vs Reality, a theme found throughout the play, leads to Romeo’s impulsive decision to take his own life because he mistakingly thought he could not be with the person he loved.
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