PROTEUS Thus have I shunned the fire for fear of burning
And drenched me in the sea where I am drowned.
I feared to show my father Julia’s letter
Lest he should take exceptions to my love,
And with the vantage of mine own excuse
Hath he excepted most against my love.
O, how this spring of love resembleth
The uncertain glory of an April day,
Which now shows all the beauty of the sun,
And by and by a cloud takes all away.
[Enter Pantino]
PANTINO Sir Proteus, your father calls for you.
He is in haste, therefore I pray you go.
PROTEUS Why, this it is. My heart accords thereto,
And yet a thousand times it answers ‘No’.
Exeunt (1.3.78-91)
Oh what a tangled web we weave; Proteus’s little white lie has backfired spectacularly. Thus have I shunned the fire for fear of burning—I backed off from the potentially dangerous—or just awkward—confession to my father about My Girlfriend—and drenched me in the sea where I am drowned. Out of the frying pan into the fire; I’ve fallen off a cliff into an absolute disaster. (Proteus is being over-dramatic, just like Julia, although with considerably more self-pity—and it is entirely his own fault.) I feared to show my father Julia’s letter, lest he should take exceptions to my love. He might have—disapproved? raised objections to my choice? laughed at me? and with the vantage of mine own excuse hath he excepted most against my love. He’s used my own story against me and done something even worse, really compromised my relationship—by sending me away! O, how this spring of love resembleth the uncertain glory of an April day, which now shows all the beauty of the sun, and by and by a cloud takes all away. It was going so well! I was so happy, so full of hope to have a letter back from Julia, telling me that She Feels The Same Way—and now my little white lie has wrecked everything, and my father has well and truly rained on my parade. Love is every bit as uncertain and changeable as the weather in springtime, one moment sunshine, the next, showers.
He could go on and on like this, no doubt, but Pantino has been sent back to hurry him along: Sir Proteus, your father calls for you. He is in haste, therefore I pray you go. Hurry up, he’s waiting! Get a move on! And Proteus has no choice—and he even acknowledges that he’s torn. Why, this it is: this is the situation. My heart accords thereto—I would actually quite like to go? I would like to obey my father, go to Milan to see my friend? But, at the same time, yet a thousand times, even more loudly and insistently, it answers ‘no’. O woe is me!
And that’s the end of the first act.