My Passage

I know this is past the Friday deadline.  But if possible, I would like to memorize one of Iago's speeches from Othello for our assignment.  The passage is thus:

Virtue! a fig! 'tis in ourselves that we are thus, or thus.  Our bodies are our gardens, to the which our wills are gardeners; so that if we will plant nettles or sow lettuce, set hyssop and weed up thyme, supply it with one gender of herbs or distract it with many, either to have it sterile with idleness or manurred with industry, why, the power and corrigible authority of this lies in our wills.  If the balance of our lives had not one scale of reason to poise another of sensuality, the blood and baseness of our natures would conduct us to most preposterous conclusions; but we have reason to cool our raging motions, our carnal stings, our unbitted lusts, whereof I take this that you call love to be a sect or scion.

I have chosen this passage because it examines the nature of man to control and create oneself.  I have not teased out full meaning from this speech but would love the chance to do so.  College is a period in time during which students spur their own growth and development (to fit with the above garden theme).  As a result, I think this passage could be pertinent to my own formation.  In growing in myself, I should also grow in my ability to understand and appreciate the genius of Shakespeare.