The nurse promises to bring Romeo to Juliet so she sets off for Friar Laurence’s cell where Romeo is in hiding. Upon arrival she sees a broken Romeo. Romeo is extremely close to friar Laurence and he seems to think of the friar as a father. It is ironic that we never really hear of Romeo’s real parents the Montagues but the friar is mentioned and his presence is always felt. Romeo never seeks his parents for advice and Juliet is very distant from hers. Romeo chooses to confide in the friar and reveals his deepest feelings to him. Romeo’s close relationship with the friar is the only thing that stops him from following his destiny at this stage of the play.
Romeo’s desperation is so high at the start of this scene that he is on the verge of killing himself. This action causes Friar Laurence to take control. He needs to calm Romeo down and bring him back to his senses. He has to use tactical methods to do this. He first of all shows his annoyance and shock. He says, ‘hold thy desperate hand!’ He immediately starts to work on Romeo through his use of language. The friar stops Romeo from killing himself, not only because he cares for Romeo, but it is also his moral duty as a priest.
Friar Laurence questions Romeo’s manhood and masculinity. The friar has to be clever and therefore deliberately shames Romeo for his weakness and his ‘womanish’ nature. The friar condemns Romeo for his actions and says, ‘thou hast amazed me’. This makes Romeo feel ashamed of himself and his actions. The friar says that he expected better form Romeo. To add more effect the argument is backed with effective use of alliteration and assonance. ‘Unseemly woman in a seeming man, and ill-beseeming beast in seeming both’ (act 3 scene 3 lines 112 and 113). The friar knows that this one argument will not be enough to bring Romeo back to his senses.
The friar then says that Romeo should be grateful for what he has. He has been presented with life and his cowardice is driving him to give it away without a second thought. The friar says that the things that Romeo has, Romeo ‘at once wouldst lose.’
The friar goes on to say that Romeo is being foolish in thinking that he should kill himself after he has just killed Tybalt. He says, ‘Hast thou slain Tybalt? Will thou slay thyself?’ He means to say that it is foolish of Romeo to kill himself after just saving himself from Tybalt, who would have killed Romeo. This gets Romeo thinking about his actions and this makes him feel foolish. The friar says that Romeo is a shame to his body, his love for Juliet and his mind. ‘Fie, fie, thou sham’st thy shape, thy love, thy wit.’ The friar points out that he ‘sham’st’ his body by saying, ‘thy noble shape is but a form of wax digressing from the valour of a man.’ This means that Romeo is different to his previous noble self. He is walking away from being a man, ‘digressing’. The friar says that Romeo ‘sham’st’ his love when he says that Romeo is ‘killing that love which thou has vowed to cherish’. He is saying that Romeo has brought shame to his love for Juliet as he is killing the bond between the two by committing suicide. He is breaking a promise that he made when Romeo and Juliet got married to cherish and love Juliet forever. By repeating his arguments again and again, the friar is adding emphasis to his case and is making it much more effective.
The arguments raised by the friar are definitely having and effect and so he adds a final note to bring Romeo to his senses. The friar says that Juliet is alive and well, why shouldn’t Romeo be happy? Romeo should also be happy as he is alive and Tybalt is dead who would have killed Romeo. (This argument is also repeated throughout the speech to add emphasis to Friar Laurence’s efforts to bring Romeo back to his senses). The Prince Escalus said that anyone who disturbed the peace by fighting would be sentenced to death. Romeo who not only disturbed the peace, but also killed someone, was not however, sentenced to death. He was instead only sentenced to banishment from the city of Verona. The friar points this out to Romeo and he asks why Romeo is not happy?
Finally the friar asks Romeo to throw away his ‘sullen’ state and be happy for he has both ‘fortune and ‘love’ on his side. The friar then asks Romeo to go to Juliet and comfort her. ‘Go get thee to thy love…and comfort her’. Now that Romeo is in the right state of mind, the friar lays out the plan that has to be carried out to salvage Romeo’s life and his marriage.
Friar Laurence’s plan is to get Romeo to a place called Mantua. There he was to live until he could get his friends back. Romeo was to ‘beg pardon from the Prince, and call thee back’. Romeo was to appeal to the Prince and ask for forgiveness. He was to wait until the misunderstanding could be undone and he could be welcomed home with thousand times more joy than that expressed when he was banished.
In my opinion, the friar acted cleverly and quickly to calm Romeo down and to get a plan into action. This speech is written with care, showing different ways in which circumstances can decide the way you act and the path your future will take. The tactics used to bring Romeo to the right state of mind were effective as it presented the facts and the possibilities in the play. It is also realistic. The ideas are not imaginative ones, but things that effect people’s lives even today.
