Romeo and Juliet — Act 2, Scene 6

original text and modern English, side by side

Friar Lawrence’s Cell · Friar Lawrence, Romeo, Juliet

Romeo waits at Friar Lawrence's cell for Juliet to arrive so they can be secretly married. The Friar warns Romeo against loving too intensely and too fast, right before Juliet enters and the two lovers exchange rapturous vows, and the Friar leads them off to perform the wedding ceremony immediately.

Enter Friar Lawrence and Romeo

Friar Lawrence

So smile the heavens upon this holy act

That after-hours with sorrow chide us not.

May the heavens smile so kindly on this sacred act that we're never punished with sorrow for it later.

Romeo

Amen, amen, but come what sorrow can,

It cannot countervail the exchange of joy

That one short minute gives me in her sight.

Amen, amen — but whatever sorrow might come, it could never outweigh the joy I feel in just one short minute of looking at her.

Do thou but close our hands with holy words,

Then love-devouring death do what he dare,

It is enough I may but call her mine.

Just join our hands with your holy words, and then let death, devourer of love, do whatever it dares — it's enough for me that I get to call her mine.

Friar Lawrence

These violent delights have violent ends,

And in their triumph die; like fire and powder,

Which as they kiss consume.

Intense pleasures like this tend to come to violent ends — they burn themselves out at their very peak, like fire meeting gunpowder, consumed the instant they touch.

The sweetest honey

Is loathsome in his own deliciousness,

And in the taste confounds the appetite.

Even the sweetest honey becomes sickening in its own richness, and ruins your appetite for more the moment you taste it.

Therefore love moderately: long love doth so;

So love in moderation — that's how lasting love works.

Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.

Love that rushes in too fast arrives just as poorly as love that's too slow.

Enter Juliet

Friar Lawrence

Here comes the lady.

Here comes the lady now.

O, so light a foot

Will ne’er wear out the everlasting flint.

Oh, such a light step will never wear down solid stone.

A lover may bestride the gossamers

That idles in the wanton summer air

And yet not fall; so light is vanity.

A person in love could practically walk on spider-silk drifting lazily in the summer air and never fall — that's how weightless infatuation is.

Juliet

Good even to my ghostly confessor.

Good evening to my spiritual confessor.

Friar Lawrence

Romeo shall thank thee, daughter, for us both.

Romeo will thank you, my daughter, on behalf of us both.

Juliet

As much to him, else is his thanks too much.

The same greeting back to him, or else his thanks would be too generous a trade.

Romeo

Ah, Juliet, if the measure of thy joy

Be heap’d like mine, and that thy skill be more

To blazon it, then sweeten with thy breath

This neighbour air, and let rich music’s tongue

Unfold the imagin’d happiness that both

Receive in either by this dear encounter.

Ah, Juliet, if your joy is piled as high as mine, and if you're better than I am at putting it into words, then let your voice sweeten the air around us, and let beautiful, musical language describe the happiness we're both imagining that we'll receive from each other through this precious meeting.

Juliet

Conceit more rich in matter than in words,

Brags of his substance, not of ornament.

A feeling that's richer in substance than in fancy words shows off what it actually contains, not just decoration.

They are but beggars that can count their worth;

Only beggars can count up exactly what they're worth

But my true love is grown to such excess,

I cannot sum up sum of half my wealth.

— but my true love has grown so immense that I can't even add up half of how much I have.

Friar Lawrence

Come, come with me, and we will make short work,

For, by your leaves, you shall not stay alone

Till holy church incorporate two in one.

Come, come with me, and we'll get this done quickly — because, if you'll excuse me, I won't leave you two alone together until the church has officially made you one.

Exeunt.

Romeo and Juliet Act 2, Scene 6 summary

Who appears in this scene

Friar Lawrence, Romeo, Juliet — Friar Lawrence’s Cell.

Famous lines in Romeo and Juliet Act 2, Scene 6, explained

“These violent delights have violent ends,” (line 9): Friar Lawrence's warning to Romeo just before marrying him and Juliet: intense passions that burn hot tend to burn out — or self-destruct — just as intensely. It's the clearest piece of foreshadowing in the play, predicting the lovers' fate almost exactly, and the line has become widely quoted (including as the epigraph for HBO's Westworld) as a general warning against reckless intensity.

Keep reading

About this translation: the original text follows the public-domain Project Gutenberg Globe edition; the modern English translation was written in-house for Polytranslator and is reviewed on an ongoing basis (last revised August 2026). Free to print and photocopy for classroom use. Cite as: “Romeo and Juliet, Act 2, Scene 6. Polytranslator side-by-side translation, polytranslator.com/shakespeare/romeo-and-juliet/act-2-scene-6.”

Studying the language itself? Our Shakespearean English course teaches thou/thee, the verbs, and the meter — free through Unit 2. Or try the Shakespearean English translator.