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ears? Can this be true? Stand I condemned for pride and scorn so much? The sense of wounded vanity is lost in bitter feelings, and she is infinitely more struck by what is said in praise of Benedick, and the history of his supposed love for her than by the dispraise of herself. The immediate success of the trick is a most natural consequence of the self-assurance and magnanimity of her character; she is so accustomed to assert dominion over the spirits of others, that she cannot suspect the possibility of a plot laid against herself. A haughty, excitable, and violent temper is another of the characteristics of Beatrice; but there is more of impulse than of passion in her vehemence. In the marriage scene where she has beheld her gentle-spirited cousin,--whom she loves the more for those very qualities which are most unlike her own,--slandered, deserted, and devoted to public shame, her indignation, and the eagerness with which she hungers and thirsts after revenge, are, like the rest of her character, open, ardent, impetuous, but not deep or implacable. When she bursts into that outrageous speech-- Is he not approved in the height a villain that hath slandered, scorned, dishonored my kinswoman? O that I were a man! What! bear her in hand until they come to take hands; and then, with public accusation, uncovered slander, unmitigated rancor--O God, that I were a man! I would eat his heart in the market-place! And when she commands her lover, as the first proof of his affection, "to kill Claudio," the very consciousness of the exaggeration,--of the contrast between the real good-nature of Beatrice and the fierce tenor of her language, keeps alive the comic effect, mingling the ludicrous with the serious. It is remarkable that, notwithstanding the point and vivacity of the dialogue, few of the speeches of Beatrice are capable of a general application, or engrave themselves distinctly on the memory; they contain more mirth than matter; and though wit be the predominant feature in the dramatic portrait, Beatrice more charms and dazzles us by what she is than by what she _says_. It is not merely her sparkling repartees and saucy jests, it is the soul of wit, and the spirit of gayety in forming the whole character,--looking out from her brilliant eyes, and laughing on her full lips that pout with scorn,--which we have before us, moving and full of life. On the whole, we dismiss Benedick
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