So It Was Fate

"I have always believed that all things depended upon Fortune, and nothing upon ourselves." -George Gordon Byron. In the play Romeo and Juliet by William Shakespeare, fate plays a significant role in the teenage-lovers deaths. Romeo buys the death dram because fate intervenes when Bathlazar tells him that Juliet is dead. Romeo tells an apothecary, "Let me have a dram of poison, such soon spreading gear as will disperse itself throughout the veins" (Act 5.1). Fate is controlling Romeo when he buys the poison because he doesn't know that Juliet is in fact alive. Fate caused Friar Laurence's' letter not to be delivered. Friar John explains that "[He] could not send it - here it is again - nor get a messenger to bring it to [him], so fearful were they of infection" (Act 5.2). Fate controls the letter being sent to Romeo which was not sent because Friar John was locked in a plague-quarantined house and could not send the letter. Destiny took Romeo and Juliet's lives. Father Laurence explains to Juliet that "That greater power than we can contradict hath the thwarted our intents. Come, come away thy husband in thy bosom there lies dead" (Act 5.3). The Friar tries to explain that they no longer had control over what they did, that fate was the greater power controlling everything. Fate was indeed the greatest factor in the tragic death of Romeo and Juliet.