Iago's insight, within certain limits, into human nature; his ingenuity
and address in working upon it; his quickness and versatility in dealing
with sudden difficulties and unforeseen opportunities, have probably no
parallel among dramatic characters. Equally remarkable is his strength
of will. Not Socrates himself, not the ideal sage of the Stoics, was
more lord of himself than Iago appears to be. It is not merely that he
never betrays his true nature; he seems to be master of _all_ the
motions that might affect his will. In the most dangerous moments of his
plot, when the least slip or accident would be fatal, he never shows a
trace of nervousness. When Othello takes him by the throat he merely
shifts his part with his usual instantaneous adroitness. When he is
attacked and wounded at the end he is perfectly unmoved. As Mr.
Swinburne says, you cannot believe for a moment that the pain of torture
will ever open Iago's lips. He is equally unassailable by the
temptations of indolence or of sensuality. It is difficult to imagine
him inactive; and though he has an obscene mind, and doubtless took his
pleasures when and how he chose, he certainly took them by choice and
not from weakness, and if pleasure interfered with his purposes the
holiest of ascetics would not put it more resolutely by.
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