Context and Meaning of given text

 This passage is a famous excerpt from William Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice, specifically from Act V, Scene 1.

Reference to Context

These lines are spoken by Portia as she returns to her estate in Belmont with her waiting-woman, Nerissa, under the cover of night. At this point in the play, the intense legal drama in Venice has concluded. Portia, who had disguised herself as a young lawyer (Balthazar) to save Antonio’s life, is reflecting on the nature of light, power, and relativity as she approaches her home.

Explanation

In these lines, Portia uses a series of analogies to explain how the presence of something truly great makes a lesser version of the same thing seem insignificant.

• "So doth the greater glory dim the less"

  Portia observes a candle burning in her hall and remarks on how its light seems much brighter in the dark. However, she realizes that once the moon rises or the sun comes out, that candle’s light will be overwhelmed. She is philosophizing that "glory" is relative; a small achievement looks grand only when there is nothing truly great to compare it to.

• "A substitute shines brightly as a king until a king be by"

  She uses the political analogy of a deputy or a "substitute." While the King is away, his representative enjoys great respect and appears powerful. But the moment the true King returns, the substitute loses his reflected glory and is seen merely as a subject once more.

• "And then his state empties itself as doth an inland brook into the main of waters"

  She compares the power of the substitute to a small stream (inland brook) flowing into the vast ocean (the main of waters). Just as a stream loses its individual identity and becomes insignificant when it merges with the sea, a lesser glory is swallowed up by a greater one.