Along with the portrait is also a scroll, which bears the followinginscription:
You that choose not by the view Chance as fair and choose as true. Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content and seek no new.
If you be well pleased with this,
And hold your fortune for your bliss, Turn you where your lady is,
And claim her with a loving kiss.(131-38)
The fairy-tale rhyme emphasizes the idea of fate or fortune. Portia’s father did not want his daughter to marry someone who made his choices based on appearances. Love (and marriage) based on appearances or other superficial circumstances will not last. The metaphor suggests that the fancy or love between Bassanio and Portia, then, is not bred or engendered in the eyes.