Friar Is To Blame For Romeo And Juliet's Death Essay

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In William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, Friar Lawrence is to blame for the death of Romeo Montague. Friar shows a lack of wisdom when it comes to giving advice to Romeo on his wish to marry Juliet. He knows that Romeo was previously in love with Rosaline and, within one day, he has fallen in love with another girl. Instead of telling Romeo he needs to take time to get to know Juliet, Friar agrees to marry them that day. Friar Lawrence’s decision eventually leads to the downfall of the teen lovers. While Friar believes that he can end the fued between the Capulets and Montagues, he does not contemplate the issues that can come from his decision. When speaking to Romeo, Friar says that, “In one respect I’ll thy assistance be, For this alliance may so happy …show more content…

He does not think of all the consequences and problems that can come from a secret marriage. Friar is usually very wise and thinks things through, but when it comes to Romeo and Juliet’s marriage, he does not think things through clearly. Not only did Friar allow these two children to get married, he let Juliet play dead to get out of marrying Paris. He knew it was wrong to allow this adolescent to fake a death and “ruin” her parents life. Now, Friar John has no blame in this, but if it is so urgent that Friar Lawrence gets the note to Romeo, he should have given it to someone who he knew would not get distracted. Back to the fake death, he knew that he could be punished for helping Juliet to play dead. They both single handedly broke her mother’s, father’s, and Paris’s heart. When speaking to Juliet about the plan, Friar says, “Hold daughter, I do spy a kind of hope, which craves as desperate an execution as that is desperate which we would prevent, If, rather than to marry County Paris, thou hast the strength of will to [slay] thyself,”(Shakespeare IV.i.69-73). He gives Juliet the idea to play