what does if thou dost nod, thou brak'st thy instrument mean?

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Have you READ the part where these words occur?
Did you notice the stage direction just before these words are spoken? :

LUCIUS plays music and sings a song, then falls asleep.

His instrument (a lute: a plucked stringed instrument with a long neck bearing frets and a rounded body with a flat front that is shaped like a halved egg) is across his upper chest. So if his head droops down, as it tends to do when sleeping upright, then...thou brak'st thy instrument - his head will hit the lute and break it....Show more