This section really highlights the relationship between Romeo and Friar Lawrence and shows what an influence the Friar has on Romeo.
Its seems that Friar Lawrence believes that he has the power to alter the course of history as he believes he can end the ongoing vendetta between Romeo and Juliet’s families. This kind of egotistical attitude leads to the many irresponsible actions taken by Friar Lawrence, for example going ahead with the wedding of Romeo and Juliet proved to be one of the worst decisions made by the Friar. The Friar becomes quite paradox because he now starts trying to get Romeo to slow down and be sensible “Therefore love moderately-long love doth so: Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow”. “So smile the heaven, upon this holy act, that after-hours with sorrow chide us not!” The Friar now seems to be thinking that maybe he is doing the wrong thing and uniting them in marriage for the wrong reasons but nevertheless he continues with the wedding ceremony which eventually leads to the banishment of Romeo “Hence from Verona art thou banished” (Act 3 Scene 3) and eventually this leads to the death of Romeo and Juliet as the Friar comes up with a new idea which was for Romeo to live in Mantua “Where thou shalt live till we can find a time to blaze your marriage, reconcile your friends, Beg pardon of the Prince” the Friar now believes that in time this whole thing will just blow over and everybody will forget about it, another bad idea from Friar Lawrence as this leads to even more confusion and more trouble for the Friar as Juliet needs assistance from him so he again dreams up another plan, for Juliet to take a sleeping remedy that will make her look as if she were dead, but at this point you can tell that the Friar is now more interested in saving himself from this bad situation than he is with saving Juliet and it seems that he enjoys being involved in the events portraying and selfish uncaring side of his diverse personality. Its ironic that if Friar Lawrence hadn’t created all of this mess in the first place he wouldn’t have to sort these problems out.
Every action the Friar seems to take towards giving Romeo and Juliet the least amount of grief possible seems to backfire on him every time as a note which was supposed to be passed on to Romeo in Mantua was not delivered therefore Romeo had found Juliet in a deep sleep and killed himself thinking she was dead, on finding out that his note wasn’t delivered he hurried back to where Juliet lay in her deep sleep but found it was too late as Romeo had already committed the ultimate sin by killing himself to be with Juliet in death but it was all in vain as Juliet arose from her sleep to find a poisoned Romeo next to her bed and Friar Lawrence trying to prevent her from doing the same thing as Romeo had just done and to escape with him but she refuses to leave so the Friar leaves her alone but he surprisingly reveals the truth to the Prince but he is excused with “We have still known thee for a holy man” (Act 5 Scene 3) so the Friars real punishment is the amount of guilt he will have to live with for the rest of his life.
The Friars egotistical attitude and lack of compassion is the cause of many of the events that took place that led to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, but he was in fact doing it for a reason.
The Friars main motive was in fact to stop the ongoing vendetta between Romeo and Juliet’s families by uniting Romeo and Juliet in marriage, and eventually he does unite the two families but through the deaths of Romeo and Juliet themselves which is not the way he intended it to be. Friar Lawrence believes he has the power to heal such a huge rift between the two families through just one marriage! The Friar should have known that it wouldn’t work to the effect that he wanted.
“For this alliance may so happy, to turn your households’ rancour to pure love”(Act 2 Scene 3). This phrase used by Friar Lawrence is proof of the Friar’s primary motive although he had other motives such as simply trying to help his friend and preserve the marriage to keep Romeo and Juliet happy but another reason why the Friar arranged the marriage ceremony and ‘tried’ to do the right thing could have been to boost his status, he wanted to portray himself in a favourable light which is another example of the Friars multiple personalities.
Friar Lawrence is supposed to be an honourable, trustworthy figure of great importance but he seems to have his priorities mixed up as there are times when he seems to care a lot more about himself than he does either Romeo or Juliet.
Him going ahead with the wedding ceremony shows that the Friar is trying to change the course of history, as he believes that he can unite the two families through the marriage of Romeo and Juliet, this shows that the Friar wants to be omnipotent as if he were God and this sometimes prevented the Friar from behaving the way he should have done within a such a situation.
The Friar was seen as a confidant to Romeo because he would be there, as a friend and almost a fatherly figure to him and Friar Lawrence would help Romeo in his time of need.
Friar Lawrence may have taken such actions towards keeping Romeo and Juliet together for many reasons but this could be more evidence of the Friars split personality because he could have arranged the marriage in an attempt to bring the Capulet and Montague families together so that he would be the hero and have a higher sense of superiority, or he could have simply just wanted Romeo and Juliet to live happily ever after and genuinely just want to unite the two families and end the ongoing dispute. I believe that the Friar gave Juliet that sleeping potion in an attempt to extricate himself from the situation showing how selfish he can be. Giving Juliet a sleeping potion was way out of the Friars character as it is such an extreme plan of action, which was totally irrelevant. The only time Juliet was hesitant to follow the Friar’s advice was just before she took the sleeping potion “No, no; this shall forbid it: lie thou there. What if it be a poison, which the Friar subtly hath minister’d to have me dead”. Juliet is becoming paranoid. Telling Romeo to go to Mantua could have been a way for Friar Lawrence to gain some extra time and think of what to do next because it didn’t seem like a genuine idea at all. The most legitimate explanation I could ever make for why the friar behaved the way he did would be the fact that he wants to be all powerful, as if he were a God, yet he wants to be seen in a more respectable light for being the good Samaritan that ended the vendetta between the Montague and Capulet families.
Even though Friar Lawrence was the character mainly responsible for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet there are many other characters implicated in their deaths. Characters such as the Nurse and the parents of both Romeo and Juliet had a part in the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. The Nurse is shouted at when she tries to defend Juliet “Peace you mumbling fool” (Act 3 Scene 5) and with that she betrays Juliet by defecting from Juliet’s side and joining Lord Capulet in trying to recommend Paris as “a lovely gentleman”. Juliet’s final words to the Nurse had great meaning because she was able to let her anger out on the Nurse “Ancient damnation! O most wicked fiend!” (Act 3 Scene 5) even made a threat to kill herself if the Friars plan doesn’t work “I’ll to the friar, to know his remedy: If all else fail, myself have the power to die” this evidence really show how much of an important part the nurse had in the death of Juliet even though she may not have such complete control over the events as Friar Lawrence may have done she still proved Juliet’s death by betraying Juliet when she needed her the most, so now the comfort of Juliet at least having one friend is now gone as she has been betrayed by her closest friend.
Another character that plays a vital part in the deaths of Romeo and Juliet is Lord Capulet because he tries to force Juliet into marrying Paris even though she is not in love with him so for her to prolong her relationship with Romeo she would have to do it at the expense of her family as Lord Capulet would disown Juliet for being with Romeo “And you be not, hang, beg, starve, die in the streets” this now makes Juliet’s life a living hell as she now feels there is no pity for her “Is there no pity sitting in the clouds, that sees into the bottom of my grief?” she feels that she should be in Tybalt’s position “Or, if you do not, make the bridal bed in that dim monument where Tybalt lies” (Act 3 Scene 5). In my opinion Lord Capulet was the second most responsible character for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet as he made Juliet seem like an outsider as if she was not a member of his family making her choose between her love for Romeo and her parents. This evidence combined with the previous evidence made it inevitable that Juliet would commit suicide if Friar Lawrence’s plan were to fall through.
Romeo and Juliet themselves are obviously to blame as they killed themselves, Romeo killed himself because he thought Juliet was dead only for her to re-awaken and find Romeo dead at her bedside so she kills herself to join as life is no longer worth living because the nurse and her parents have deserted her and Romeo is now dead.
Why they shouldn’t take full responsibility for their own deaths is because although Romeo did poison himself, Friar Lawrence’s plan to keep Juliet in an unconscious state backfired as the note that was supposed to inform Romeo of such news failed to reach him, if Friar Lawrence had thought the plan through correctly he would have been able to inform Romeo in advance to prevent such misunderstandings to occur. Juliet then woke up to the corpse of the man she loves so she decides not to flee Verona with the friar but to stab herself so that she and Romeo can be together in death. This is why the deaths of Romeo and Juliet lie heavily on the shoulders of Friar Lawrence as he had almost total control over the events that took place to end up in such a tragedy.
In conclusion Friar Lawrence is responsible for setting in motion a series of events that lead to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. The wedding ceremony set up by the friar in order to unite Romeo and Juliet as well as their families lead to the Prince banishing Romeo, this lead to the friar advising Romeo to go to Mantua for a while and let everything calm down a little and he can “beg pardon of the Prince”, and hope that it all blows over, then in the absence of Romeo, Juliet confided in Friar Lawrence so he gave her a sleeping potion to make her seem dead even though she was only in a deep sleep, he then tries to get a message across to Romeo about Juliet and the sleeping potion but Romeo never receives this message, which later on proves to cost him his life even though Friar Lawrence tries to catch up with Romeo before he sees an unconscious Juliet in which he thinks is dead and kills himself but it is too late. Friar Lawrence’s foolish actions have led to a death and all he has to say for himself is “I dare no longer stay” and he flees the scene. Juliet regains consciousness and the friar makes one last attempt to save Juliet but she refuses to leave with him so he ends up leaving Juliet to do what she wanted (he couldn’t care less as long as he wasn’t in trouble) and the friar knows exactly what that was except he was too much of a gutless coward to make a proper effort to persuade Juliet to leave Romeo’s corpse and escape with him. Juliet’s family were all in grief when they saw Juliet in an unconscious state as they all believed that she was dead but in actual fact she was only in a deep sleep but instead of the Friar telling the now grieving family members that she was in fact alive he decided to hold a funeral ceremony for Juliet even though she was not dead. This is now the hypercritical side of Friar Lawrence as he is going very much against what the traditional Friar is supposed to be like and performing a funeral service for a girl who isn’t even dead and he knows it “Peace, ho! For shame! Confusion’s cure lives not in these confusions”. He is abusing his position as a Friar because of the way he lies and comes up with unstable ideas that lead to the deaths of Romeo and Juliet. This is legitimate proof that the friar is the main culprit to blame for the deaths of Romeo and Juliet, but he was not the only culprit, the nurse deserted Juliet along with her parents therefore making Juliet’s life seem increasingly worthless as she no longer had that good friend that she could confide in whenever she needed help and her parent would disown her and make her live on the street just because she loved Romeo and not Paris. The Friar was there to cause Romeo and Juliet the least amount of grief possible but in the end he ended up causing as much grief possible. The Friar did achieve his ultimate goal of uniting the two families that had been enemies for many years but at the expense of Romeo and Juliet themselves, which is not what he, had intended. When Friar Lawrence decided to confess his actions to the prince he showed true qualities of a Friar as he held nothing back and told everything he had done to lead to such a to such a tragedy, and he even admitted that he needed to be punished “Miscarried by my fault, let my old life be sacrific’d, some hour before his time, unto the rigour of severest law.”(Act 5 Scene 3). The friar seemed to get let off easily as he is pardoned by the Prince in a very forgiving manner “We still have known thee for a holy man” of course this is not the case as the friars real punishment is the fact that he has to live with the consequences of what he has done for the rest of his life. You cheater. Don’t copy it all .
By tahir sheikh-noor 11v