Measure For Measure

1 Enter Provost and a Servant.
2 SERVANT.
3 He’s hearing of a cause. He will come straight.
4 I’ll tell him of you.
5 PROVOST.
6 Pray you do.
7 [_Exit Servant._]
8 I’ll know
9 His pleasure, may be he will relent. Alas,
10 He hath but as offended in a dream;
11 All sects, all ages, smack of this vice, and he
12 To die for ’t!
13 Enter Angelo.
14 ANGELO.
15 Now, what’s the matter, Provost?
16 PROVOST.
17 Is it your will Claudio shall die tomorrow?
18 ANGELO.
19 Did not I tell thee yea? Hadst thou not order?
20 Why dost thou ask again?
21 PROVOST.
22 Lest I might be too rash.
23 Under your good correction, I have seen
24 When, after execution, judgement hath
25 Repented o’er his doom.
26 ANGELO.
27 Go to; let that be mine.
28 Do you your office, or give up your place,
29 And you shall well be spared.
30 PROVOST.
31 I crave your honour’s pardon.
32 What shall be done, sir, with the groaning Juliet?
33 She’s very near her hour.
34 ANGELO.
35 Dispose of her
36 To some more fitter place; and that with speed.
37 Enter Servant.
38 SERVANT.
39 Here is the sister of the man condemned
40 Desires access to you.
41 ANGELO.
42 Hath he a sister?
43 PROVOST.
44 Ay, my good lord, a very virtuous maid,
45 And to be shortly of a sisterhood,
46 If not already.
47 ANGELO.
48 Well, let her be admitted.
49 [_Exit Servant._]
50 See you the fornicatress be removed;
51 Let her have needful but not lavish means;
52 There shall be order for it.
53 Enter Lucio and Isabella.
54 PROVOST.
55 [_Offering to retire_.] Save your honour!
56 ANGELO.
57 Stay a little while. [_To Isabella_.] You are welcome. What’s your
58 will?
59 ISABELLA.
60 I am a woeful suitor to your honour,
61 Please but your honour hear me.
62 ANGELO.
63 Well, what’s your suit?
64 ISABELLA.
65 There is a vice that most I do abhor,
66 And most desire should meet the blow of justice;
67 For which I would not plead, but that I must;
68 For which I must not plead, but that I am
69 At war ’twixt will and will not.
70 ANGELO.
71 Well, the matter?
72 ISABELLA.
73 I have a brother is condemned to die;
74 I do beseech you, let it be his fault,
75 And not my brother.
76 PROVOST.
77 Heaven give thee moving graces.
78 ANGELO.
79 Condemn the fault, and not the actor of it?
80 Why, every fault’s condemned ere it be done.
81 Mine were the very cipher of a function
82 To find the faults whose fine stands in record,
83 And let go by the actor.
84 ISABELLA.
85 O just but severe law!
86 I had a brother, then. Heaven keep your honour!
87 [_Going._]
88 LUCIO.
89 [_To Isabella_.] Give’t not o’er so. To him again, entreat him,
90 Kneel down before him, hang upon his gown;
91 You are too cold. If you should need a pin,
92 You could not with more tame a tongue desire it.
93 To him, I say.
94 ISABELLA.
95 Must he needs die?
96 ANGELO.
97 Maiden, no remedy.
98 ISABELLA.
99 Yes, I do think that you might pardon him,
100 And neither heaven nor man grieve at the mercy.
101 ANGELO.
102 I will not do’t.
103 ISABELLA.
104 But can you if you would?
105 ANGELO.
106 Look, what I will not, that I cannot do.
107 ISABELLA.
108 But might you do’t, and do the world no wrong,
109 If so your heart were touched with that remorse
110 As mine is to him?
111 ANGELO.
112 He’s sentenced, ’tis too late.
113 LUCIO.
114 [_To Isabella_.] You are too cold.
115 ISABELLA.
116 Too late? Why, no. I that do speak a word
117 May call it back again. Well, believe this:
118 No ceremony that to great ones longs,
119 Not the king’s crown, nor the deputed sword,
120 The marshal’s truncheon, nor the judge’s robe,
121 Become them with one half so good a grace
122 As mercy does.
123 If he had been as you, and you as he,
124 You would have slipped like him, but he like you
125 Would not have been so stern.
126 ANGELO.
127 Pray you be gone.
128 ISABELLA.
129 I would to heaven I had your potency,
130 And you were Isabel! Should it then be thus?
131 No; I would tell what ’twere to be a judge
132 And what a prisoner.
133 LUCIO.
134 [_Aside_.] Ay, touch him; there’s the vein.
135 ANGELO.
136 Your brother is a forfeit of the law,
137 And you but waste your words.
138 ISABELLA.
139 Alas, alas!
140 Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once,
141 And He that might the vantage best have took
142 Found out the remedy. How would you be
143 If He, which is the top of judgement, should
144 But judge you as you are? O, think on that,
145 And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
146 Like man new made.
147 ANGELO.
148 Be you content, fair maid.
149 It is the law, not I, condemns your brother.
150 Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son,
151 It should be thus with him. He must die tomorrow.
152 ISABELLA.
153 Tomorrow? O, that’s sudden! Spare him, spare him!
154 He’s not prepared for death. Even for our kitchens
155 We kill the fowl of season. Shall we serve heaven
156 With less respect than we do minister
157 To our gross selves? Good, good my lord, bethink you.
158 Who is it that hath died for this offence?
159 There’s many have committed it.
160 LUCIO.
161 Ay, well said.
162 ANGELO.
163 The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.
164 Those many had not dared to do that evil
165 If the first that did th’ edict infringe
166 Had answered for his deed. Now ’tis awake,
167 Takes note of what is done, and, like a prophet,
168 Looks in a glass that shows what future evils,
169 Either now, or by remissness new conceived,
170 And so in progress to be hatched and born,
171 Are now to have no successive degrees,
172 But, where they live, to end.
173 ISABELLA.
174 Yet show some pity.
175 ANGELO.
176 I show it most of all when I show justice;
177 For then I pity those I do not know,
178 Which a dismissed offence would after gall,
179 And do him right that, answering one foul wrong,
180 Lives not to act another. Be satisfied;
181 Your brother dies tomorrow; be content.
182 ISABELLA.
183 So you must be the first that gives this sentence,
184 And he that suffers. O, it is excellent
185 To have a giant’s strength; but it is tyrannous
186 To use it like a giant.
187 LUCIO.
188 That’s well said.
189 ISABELLA.
190 Could great men thunder
191 As Jove himself does, Jove would ne’er be quiet,
192 For every pelting petty officer
193 Would use his heaven for thunder.
194 Nothing but thunder. Merciful Heaven,
195 Thou rather with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt
196 Splits the unwedgeable and gnarled oak,
197 Than the soft myrtle. But man, proud man,
198 Dressed in a little brief authority,
199 Most ignorant of what he’s most assured,
200 His glassy essence, like an angry ape
201 Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven
202 As makes the angels weep; who, with our spleens,
203 Would all themselves laugh mortal.
204 LUCIO.
205 O, to him, to him, wench! He will relent;
206 He’s coming. I perceive ’t.
207 PROVOST.
208 Pray heaven she win him.
209 ISABELLA.
210 We cannot weigh our brother with ourself.
211 Great men may jest with saints; ’tis wit in them,
212 But in the less, foul profanation.
213 LUCIO.
214 Thou’rt i’ th’ right, girl; more o’ that.
215 ISABELLA.
216 That in the captain’s but a choleric word
217 Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy.
218 LUCIO.
219 Art advised o’ that? More on’t.
220 ANGELO.
221 Why do you put these sayings upon me?
222 ISABELLA.
223 Because authority, though it err like others,
224 Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself
225 That skins the vice o’ th’ top. Go to your bosom,
226 Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know
227 That’s like my brother’s fault. If it confess
228 A natural guiltiness such as is his,
229 Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue
230 Against my brother’s life.
231 ANGELO.
232 She speaks, and ’tis such sense
233 That my sense breeds with it. [_Going_.]
234 Fare you well.
235 ISABELLA.
236 Gentle my lord, turn back.
237 ANGELO.
238 I will bethink me. Come again tomorrow.
239 ISABELLA.
240 Hark how I’ll bribe you. Good my lord, turn back.
241 ANGELO.
242 How? Bribe me?
243 ISABELLA.
244 Ay, with such gifts that heaven shall share with you.
245 LUCIO.
246 You had marred all else.
247 ISABELLA.
248 Not with fond shekels of the tested gold,
249 Or stones, whose rates are either rich or poor
250 As fancy values them, but with true prayers,
251 That shall be up at heaven and enter there
252 Ere sunrise, prayers from preserved souls,
253 From fasting maids, whose minds are dedicate
254 To nothing temporal.
255 ANGELO.
256 Well; come to me tomorrow.
257 LUCIO.
258 [_Aside to Isabella_.] Go to, ’tis well; away.
259 ISABELLA.
260 Heaven keep your honour safe.
261 ANGELO.
262 [_Aside_.] Amen.
263 For I am that way going to temptation,
264 Where prayers cross.
265 ISABELLA.
266 At what hour tomorrow
267 Shall I attend your lordship?
268 ANGELO.
269 At any time ’fore noon.
270 ISABELLA.
271 Save your honour.
272 [_Exeunt Isabella, Lucio and Provost._]
273 ANGELO.
274 From thee, even from thy virtue!
275 What’s this? What’s this? Is this her fault or mine?
276 The tempter or the tempted, who sins most, ha?
277 Not she; nor doth she tempt; but it is I
278 That, lying by the violet in the sun,
279 Do as the carrion does, not as the flower,
280 Corrupt with virtuous season. Can it be
281 That modesty may more betray our sense
282 Than woman’s lightness? Having waste ground enough,
283 Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary
284 And pitch our evils there? O, fie, fie, fie!
285 What dost thou, or what art thou, Angelo?
286 Dost thou desire her foully for those things
287 That make her good? O, let her brother live.
288 Thieves for their robbery have authority
289 When judges steal themselves. What, do I love her,
290 That I desire to hear her speak again
291 And feast upon her eyes? What is’t I dream on?
292 O cunning enemy, that, to catch a saint,
293 With saints dost bait thy hook! Most dangerous
294 Is that temptation that doth goad us on
295 To sin in loving virtue. Never could the strumpet
296 With all her double vigour, art, and nature,
297 Once stir my temper, but this virtuous maid
298 Subdues me quite. Ever till now
299 When men were fond, I smiled and wondered how.
300 [_Exit._]