Othello Quote Log: Act 2, Scene 3 (to End)

"And what’s he then that says I play the villain, / When this advice is free I give and honest, / Probal to thinking and indeed the course / To win the Moor again? For ’tis most easy / Th' inclining Desdemona to subdue / In any honest suit. She’s framed as fruitful / As the free elements. And then for her / To win the Moor, were 't to renounce his baptism, / All seals and symbols of redeemèd sin, / His soul is so enfettered to her love, / That she may make, unmake, do what she list, / Even as her appetite shall play the god / With his weak function. How am I then a villain / To counsel Cassio to this parallel course, / Directly to his good? Divinity of hell! / When devils will the blackest sins put on / They do suggest at first with heavenly shows / As I do now. For whiles this honest fool / Plies Desdemona to repair his fortune /

And she for him pleads strongly to the Moor, / I’ll pour this pestilence into his ear: / That she repeals him for her body’s lust. / And by how much she strives to do him good / She shall undo her credit with the Moor. / So will I turn her virtue into pitch / And out of her own goodness make the net / That shall enmesh them all" (2.3 356-382).

By giving Cassio good advice, Iago believes that he has eliminated the possibility of being believed as evil. He wasn't lying to Cassio when he gave him advice about Othello. It is the right way to get back on good terms with Othello; Cassio will try to get on good terms with Desdemona first. Since Othello is so blindly in love with Desdemona, Iago says, Othello will do anything Desdemona says. This specifically refers to reinstating Cassio. Iago's plan is to get Othello to the side while Cassio and Desdemona speak, so that Othello can see them together, thus planting the seed of jealousy. He wants Othello to believe that the reason she will take Cassio's side is because she loves him, which is not true: Iago tells Cassio that because Desdemona is a caring person, she will side with Cassio. Iago wants to reverse this and trick Othello into jealousy. He has turned his attention away from Cassio and now onto Othello.