Duke.

I do fear, too dreadful:

Sith 'twas my fault to give the people scope,
'Twould be my tyranny to strike and gall them
For what I bid them do: for we bid this be done,
When evil deeds have their permissive pass

And not the punishment.

father,

Therefore indeed, my

I have on Angelo imposed the office;

Who may, in the ambush of my name, strike home,
And yet my nature never in the fight

To do in slander.

And to behold his sway,

I will, as 'twere a brother of your order,

Visit both prince and people: therefore, I prithee,
Supply me with the habit and instruct me
How I may formally in person bear me

Like a true friar. Moe reasons for this action
At our more leisure shall I render you;
Only, this one: Lord Angelo is precise;
Stands at a guard with envy; scarce confesses
That his blood flows, or that his appetite

Is more to bread than stone: hence shall we see,
If power change purpose, what our seemers be.

SCENE IV. A nunnery.

[Exeunt.

Enter ISABELLA and FRANCISCA.

Isab. And have you nuns no farther privileges?
Fran. Are not these large enough?

Isab. Yes, truly: I speak not as desiring more; But rather wishing a more strict restraint

43. To do in slander. This is probably corrupt, and no satisfactory emendation has been proposed. The suggested explanation, 'to bring in slander,' suits the context, but Shake

40

50

speare nowhere uses do in this archaic sense.

51. Stands at a guard with, stands on guard against; shows no weak places for envy or malice to attack.

Upon the sisterhood, the votarists of Saint Clare.
Lucio. [Within] Ho! Peace be in this place!
Who's that which calls?

Isab.

Fran. It is a man's voice. Gentle Isabella,
Turn you the key, and know his business of him;
You may,
I may not; you are yet unsworn.
When you have vow'd, you must not speak with

men

But in the presence of the prioress:

Then, if you speak, you must not show your face,

Or, if you show your face, you must not speak.
He calls again; I pray you, answer him.

[Exit. Isab. Peace and prosperity! Who is 't that calls?

Enter LUCIO.

Lucio. Hail, virgin, if you be, as those cheek

roses

Proclaim you are no less! Can you so stead me
As bring me to the sight of Isabella,

A novice of this place and the fair sister

To her unhappy brother Claudio?

Isab. Why 'her unhappy brother'? let me ask, The rather for I-now must make you know

I am that Isabella and his sister.

Lucio. Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets

you:

Not to be weary with you, he's in prison.

Isab. Woe me! for what?

Lucio. For that which, if myself might be his
judge,

He should receive his punishment in thanks :
He hath got his friend with child.

Isab. Sir, make me not your story.
Lucio.

It is true.

I would not-though 'tis my familiar sin 30. your story, the subject of your jest.

ΙΟ

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30

With maids to seem the lapwing and to jest,
Tongue far from heart-play with all virgins so:
I hold you as a thing ensky'd and sainted,
By your renouncement an immortal spirit,
And to be talk'd with in sincerity,

As with a saint.

Isab. You do blaspheme the good in mocking

me.

Lucio. Do not believe it. Fewness and truth,
'tis thus:

Your brother and his lover have embraced :
As those that feed grow full, as blossoming time.
That from the seedness the bare fallow brings
To teeming foison, even so her plenteous womb
Expresseth his full tilth and husbandry.

Isab. Some one with child by him? My cousin
Juliet ?

Lucio. Is she your cousin ?

Isab. Adoptedly; as school-maids change their

The duke is very strangely gone from hence;
Bore many gentlemen, myself being one,
In hand and hope of action: but we do learn
By those that know the very nerves of state,
His givings-out were of an infinite distance
From his true-meant design. Upon his place,
And with full line of his authority,

32. to seem the lapwing, i.e. to delude them by pretences, as the lapwing tries to divert the sportsman from the direction of its nest.

39. Fewness and truth, briefly

and truly.

43. foison, abundance.

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50

51, 52. Bore . . . in hand and hope of action, beguiled with the hope of action.

Governs Lord Angelo; a man whose blood
Is very snow-broth; one who never feels
The wanton stings and motions of the sense,
But doth rebate and blunt his natural edge
With profits of the mind, study and fast.
He-to give fear to use and liberty,
Which have for long run by the hideous law,
As mice by lions-hath pick'd out an act,
Under whose heavy sense your brother's life
Falls into forfeit: he arrests him on it;
And follows close the rigour of the statute,
To make him an example. All hope is gone,
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer
To soften Angelo: and that's my pith of business
'Twixt you and your poor brother.

Isab. Doth he so seek his life?

Lucio.

Has censured him

Already; and, as I hear, the provost hath
A warrant for his execution.

Isab. Alas! what poor ability's in me
To do him good?

Lucio.

Assay the power you have.

Isab. My power? Alas, I doubt-
Lucio.

Our doubts are traitors

And make us lose the good we oft might win

By fearing to attempt.

Go to Lord Angelo,

And let him learn to know, when maidens sue,
Men give like gods; but when they weep and kneel,
All their petitions are as freely theirs
As they themselves would owe them.
Isab. I'll see what I can do.

59. motions, impulses.

60. rebate, dull.

62. use and liberty, license

grown customary.

69. grace, good fortune.

60

70

80

72. censured, judged, condemned.

83. As if they themselves owned the petitions, i.e. had the granting of them in their own hands.

Lucio.

But speedily.

Isab. I will about it straight;
No longer staying but to give the mother
Notice of my affair. I humbly thank you :
Commend me to my brother: soon at night
I'll send him certain word of my success.
Lucio. I take my leave of you.
Isab.

Good sir, adieu.
[Exeunt.

90

ACT II.

SCENE I. A hall in ANGELO's house.

Enter ANGELO, ESCALUS, and a Justice, Provost, Officers, and other Attendants, behind.

Ang. We must not make a scarecrow of the law,
Setting it up to fear the birds of prey,

And let it keep one shape, till custom make it
Their perch and not their terror.

Escal.

Ay, but yet

Let us be keen, and rather cut a little,

Than fall, and bruise to death. Alas, this gentleman, Whom I would save, had a most noble father!

Let but your honour know,

Whom I believe to be most strait in virtue,
That, in the working of your own affections,
Had time cohered with place or place with wishing,
Or that the resolute acting of your blood

Could have attain'd the effect of your own purpose,
Whether you had not sometime in your life
Err'd in this point which now you censure him,
And pull'd the law upon you.

ΤΟ