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Or, by the affection that now guides me most,
I'll prove a tyrant to him: As for you,
Say what you can, my false o'erweighs your true.

[Exit.
Isab. To whom should I complain? Did I tell this,
Who would believe me? O perilous mouths,
That bear in them one and the self- same tongue,
Either of condemnation or approof!

Bidding the law make court'sy to their will;
Hlooking both right and wrong to the appetite,
To follow, as it draws. I'll to my brother:

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SCENE I.

The Prison.

АСТ

Enter Duke, Claudio, and Procost.

Duke. So,
then you hope of pardon from lord
Angelo?

Claud. The miserable have no other medicine,
But only hope:

I have hope to live, and am prepar'd to die.

[life:

[art,

III.

120 For thy own bowels, which do call thee sire,
The mere effusion of thy proper loins,
Do curse the gout, serpigo', and the rheum,
For ending thee no sooner: Thou hast nor youth,
But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep, [nor age;
25 Dreaming on both: for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms

Duke. Be absolute for death; either death or lifel
Shall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with 30
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing,
That none but fools would keep: a breath thou
Servile to all the skiey influences
That do this habitation, where thou keep'st,
Hourly afflict: merely, thou art death's fool;
For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun,
And yet runnest toward him still: Thou art not
noble;

Of palsied eld"; and when thou art old, and rich,
Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty
To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this,
That bears the name of life? Yet in this life [fear,
Lye hid more thousand deaths: yet death we
That makes these odds all even.

Claud. I humbly thank you.
To sue to live, I find, I seek to die;
35 And, seeking death, find life: Let it come on.
Enter Isabella.

For all the accommodations that thou bear's!,
Are nurs'd by baseness: Thou art by no means 40
valiant;

For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork

Of a

poor worm: Thy best of rest is sleep,
And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st
Thy death, which is no inore. Thou art not thyself; 45
For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains
That issue out of dust: Happy thou art not;
For what thou hast not, still thou striv'st to get;
And what thou hast, forget'st: Thou art not certain,
For thy complexion shifts to strange effects,
After the moon: If thou art rich, thou art poor:
For, like an ass, whose back with ingots bows,
Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey,
And death unloads thee: Friend hast thou none;

1

2

50

Isab. What, ho! Peace here; grace and good
company
[a welcome.
Proc. Who's there? Come in: the wish deserves
Duke. Dear sir, ere long I'll visit you again.
Claud. Most holy sir, I thank you.
Isab. My business is a word or two with Claudio.
Prov. And very welcome. Look, signior, here's
Duke. Provost, a word with you. [your sister.
Prov. As many as you please. [ceal'd,
Duke. Bring them to speak where I may be con-
Yet hear them. [Exeunt Duke and Provost.
Claud. Now, sister, what's the comfort?
Isab. Why, as all comforts are, most good in
Lord Angelo, having affairs to heaven,
Intends you for his swift ambassador,

14

[deed:

Where you shall be an everlasting leiger":[speed,
Therefore your best appointment make with
To-morrow you set on.

That is, temptation, instigation. Meaning, be determined to die, without any hope of life. Keep in this place signifies to care for. In the old farces called Moralities, the fool of the piece, in order to shew the inevitable approaches of death, is made to employ all his stratagems to avoid him; which, as the matter is ordered, brings the fool at every turn into his very jaws. 5 Worm is here substituted for any creeping thing or serpent. For effects we should read affects; that is, affections. "A kind of tetter. The drift of this period is to prove, that neither youth nor age can be said to be really enjoyed, which, in poetical language, is,-We have neither youth nor age. Eld is here used for old age, or persons worn out with years. Meaning a thousand deaths besides those which have been mentioned, 11 Leiger is the same with resident. "Appointment means preparation,

10

Claud

Claud. Is there no remedy?

Isab. None, but such remedy, as, to save ahead, To cleave a heart in twain.

Claud. But is there any?

Isab. Yes, brother, you may live;
There is a devilish mercy in the judge,

If you'll implore it, that will free your life,
But fetter you till death.

Claud. Perpetual durance?

5

Isab. Ay, just, perpetual durance; a restraint, 10
Though all the world's vastidity you had,
To a determin'd scope.

Claud. But in what nature?

Isab. In such a one as (you consenting to 't) Would bark your honour from that trunk you bear, And leave you naked.

Claud. Let me know the point.

Isab. Oh, I do fear thee, Claudio; and I quake,
Lest thou a feverous life should'st entertain,
And six or seven winters more respect
Than a perpetual honour. Dar'st thou die?
The sense of death is most in apprehension;
And the poor beetle, that we tread upon,
In corporal sufferance finds à pang as great
As when a giant dies.

Claud. Why give you me this shame?
Think you I can a resolution fetch
From flowery tenderness? If I must die,
I will encounter darkness as a bride,
And hug it in mine arms.

That thus can make him bite the law by the nose,
When he would force it? sure it is no sin:
Or of the deadly seven it is the least.

Isab. Which is the least?

Claud. If it were damnable, he, being so wise, Why would he for the momentary trick

5

[where;

Be perdurably fin'd? Oh Isabel!
Isub. What says my brother?
Claud. Death is a fearful thing.
Isab. And shained life a hateful.
Claud. Ay, but to die, and go we know not
To lye in cold obstruction, and to rot;
This sensible warm motion to become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
15 To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice;
To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,

And blown with restless violence round about
The pendant world; or to be worse than worst
20Of those, that lawless and incertain thoughts
Imagine howling!-'tis too horrible!

The weariest and most loathed worldly life,
That age, ach, penury, and imprisonment
Can lay on nature, is a paradise

25 To what we fear of death.
Isab. Alas! alas!

[ther's grave 30

Isab. There spake my brother; there my fa-
Did utter forth a voice! Yes, thou must die:
Thou art too noble to conserve a life

In base appliances. This outward-sainted deputy,
Whose settled visage and deliberate word
Nips youth i' the head, and follies doth emmew,
As faulcon doth the fowl',--is yet a devil :
His filth within being cast 2, he would appear
A pond as deep as hell.

Claud. The princely Angelo?

Isab. Oh, 'tis the cunning livery of hell,
The damned'st body to invest and cover
In princely guards! Dost thou think, Claudio,
If I would yield him my virginity,
Thou might'st be freed?

Claud. Oh, heavens! it cannot be. [offence,
Isab. Yes, he would give it thee, for this rank
So to offend him still: This night's the time
That I should do what I abhor to name,
Or else throu dy'st to-morrow.

Claud. Thou shalt not do't.

Isab. Oh, were it but my life,

Claud. Sweet sister, let me live:
What sin

you do to save a brother's life,
Nature dispenses with the deed so far,
That it becomes a virtue.

Isab. Oh, you beast!

Oh, faithless coward! Oh, dishonest wretch!
Wilt thou be made a man, out of my vice?
Is 't not a kind of incest, to take life [think!
35 From thine own sister's shame? What should I
Heaven shield, my mother play'd my father fair!
For such a warped slip of wilderness
Ne'er issu'd from his blood. Take my defiance'.
Die; perish! Might but my bending down
40 Reprieve thee from thy fate, it should proceed:
I'll pray a thousand prayers for thy death,
No word to save thee.

45

50

[morrow. 55

I'd throw it down for your deliverance

As frankly as a pin.

Claud. Thanks, dear Isabel.

Isab. Be ready, Claudio, for your death to
Claud. Yes. Has he affections in him,

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Isab. What is your will?

Duke. Might you dispense with your leisure, I would by and by have some speech with you: the satisfaction I would require, is likewise your Jown benefit.

Isab. I have no superfluous leisure; my stay must

That is, in the ornaments of

To emmew is a term in falconry. The meaning of the passage is, In whose presence youth are afraid to shew their tollies. 2 To cast a pond is to empty it of mud. royalty. That is, when he is putting the law in force against me.

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Lastingly. • That is,

the spirit accustomed here to ease and delights. This was properly urged as an aggravation to the sharpness of the torments spoken of. Wilderness is here used for wildness.

fusal. 9 An established habit.

* Defiance is re

be

be stolen out of other affairs; but I will attend you a while.

Duke. [To Claudio aside.] Son, I have overheard what hath past between you and your sister. Angelo had never the purpose to corrupt her: on- 5 ly he hath made an essay of her virtue, to practise his judgment with the disposition of natures: she, having the truth of honour in her, hath made him that gracious denial, which he is most glad to receive: I am confessor to Angelo, and I know 10 this to be true; therefore prepare yourself to death:-Do not satisfy your resolution with hopes that are fallible: to-morrow you must die; go to your knees, and make ready.

Claud. Let me ask my sister pardon. I am so out 15 of love with life, that I will sue to be rid of it.

[Exit Claudio. Re-enter Provost. Duke. Hold you there': Farewell. Provost, a word with you.

Prov. What's your will, father?

Duke. That now you are come, you will be gone: Leave me a while with the maid; my mind promises with my habit, no loss shall touch her by my company. Prov. In good time".

was affianc'd to her by oath, and the nuptial appointed: between which time of the contract, and limit of the solemnity, her brother Frederick was wreck'd at sea, having in that perish'd vessel the dowry of his sister. But mark, how heavily this befel to the poor gentlewoman: there shie lost a noble and renowned brother, in his love toward her ever most kind and natural; with him the portion and sinew of her fortune, her marriage-dowry; with both, her combinate 1 husband, this well-seeming Angelo.

Isab. Can this be so? Did Angelo so leave her! Duke. Left her in her tears, and dry'd not one of them with his comfort; swallow'd his vows whole, pretending, in her, discoveries of dishonour: in few, bestow'd her on her own lamentation, which yet she wears for his sake; and he, a marble to her tears, is washed with them, but relents not.

Isab. What a merit were it in death, to take 20 this poor maid from the world! What corruption in this life, that it will let this man live!-But bow out of this can she avail?

[Exit Prov. 25 Duke. The hand, that hath made you fair, hath made you good: the goodness, that is cheap in beauty, makes beauty brief in goodness; but grace, being the soul of your complexion, should keep the body of it ever fair. The assault, that 30 Angelo hath made to you, fortune hath convey'd to my understanding; and, but that frailty hath examples for his falling, I should wonder at Angelo: How would you do to content this substitute, and to save your brother?

had

35

Isab. I am now going to resolve him: rather my brother die by the law, than my son should be unlawfully born. But oh, how much is the good duke deceived in Angelo! If ever he returns, and I can speak to him, I will open my 40 lips in vain, or discover his government.

Duke. That shall not be much amiss: yet, as the matter now stands, he will avoid your accusation; he made trial of you only.-Therefore fasten your ear on my advisings; to the love I have in 45 doing good, a remedy presents itself. I do make myself believe, that you may most uprighteously do a poor wronged lady a merited benefit; redeem your brother from the angry law; do no stain to your own gracious person; and much 50 please the absent duke, if, peradventure, he shall ever return to have hearing of this business.

Isab. Let me hear you speak further: I have spirit to do any thing, that appears not foul in the truth of my spirit.

Duke. Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful. Have you not heard speak of Mariana, the sister of Frederick, the great soldier, who miscaried at sea?] Isab. I have heard of the lady, and good words went with her name.

Duke. Her should this Angelo have marry'd ;]

Duke. It is a rupture that you may easily heai: and the cure of it not only saves your brother, but keeps you from dishonour in doing it. Isab. Shew me how, good father.

Duke. This fore-named maid hath yet in her the continuance of her first affection; his unjust unkindness, that in all reason should have quenched her love, hath, like an impediment in the current, made it more violent and unruly. Go you to Angelo; answer his requiring with a plausible obe dience; agree with his demands to the point; only refer yourself to this advantage,—first, that your stay with him may not be long; that the time may have all shadow and silence in it, and the place answer to convenience: this being granted in course, now follows all. We shall advise this wronged maid to stead up your appointment, go in your place; if the encounter acknowledge itself hereafter, it may compel him to her recompence: and here, by this, is your brother saved, your honour untainted, the poor Mariana advantaged, and the corrupt deputy scaled'. The maid will I frame and make fit for his attempt. If you think well to carry this as you may, the doubleness of the benefit defends the deceit from reproof. What think you of it?

Isab. The image of it gives me content already; and, I trust, it will grow to a most prosperous perfection.

Duke. It lies much in your holding up: Haste you speedily to Angelo; if for this night he intreat you to his bed, give him promise of satis55 faction. I will presently to St. Luke's; there, at themoated grange' resides this dejected Mariana: at that place call upon me; and dispatch with Angelo, that it may be quickly.

60

Isab. I thank you for this comfort: Fare you well, good father.

[Exeunt severally.

4 To scale

* Combinate means betrothed.

Persevere in that resolution. 2 i. e. Very well. means, to reach him notwithstanding the elevation of his situation. house.

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SCENE II.
The Street.

Re-enter Duke as a Friar, Elbow, Clown, and
Officers.

Elb. Nay, if there be no remedy for it, but that you will needs buy and sell men and women like beasts, we shall have all the world drink brown and white bastard'.

5

Duke. Oh, heavens! what stuff is here? Clown. "Twas never merry world, since, of two 10 usuries, the merriest was put down, and the worser allow'd, by order of law, a furr'd gown to keep him warm; and furr'd with fox and lambskins too, to signify, that craft being richer than innocency, stands for the facing.

Elb. Come your way, sir:-Bless you, good

father friar.

Duke. And you, good brother father: What offence hath this man made you, sir?

there none of Pigmalion's images, newly made woman, to be had now, for putting the hand in the pocket and extracting it clutch'd? What reply? ha? what say'st thou to this tune, matter, and method? Is 't not drown'd i' the last rain? ha? What say'st thou, trot'? is the world as it was, man? Which is the way? is it sad, and few words? or how? the trick of it?

Duke. Still thus, and thus! still worse! Lucio. How doth my dear morsel, thy mistress? procures she still ha?

Clown. Troth, sir, she hath eaten up all her beef, and she is herself in the tub*.

Lucio. Why, 'tis good; it is the right of it; it 15must be so: ever your fresh whore, and your powder'd bawd: an unshunn'd consequence; it inust be so: Art going to prison, Pompey? Clown. Yes, faith, sir.

Elb. Marry, sir, he hath offended the law; 20 and, sir, we take him to be a thief too, sir; for we have found upon him, sir, a strange picklock, which we have sent to the deputy.

Duke. Fie, sirrah; a bawd, a wicked bawd!
The evil that thou causest to be done,
That is thy means to live: Do thou but think
What 'tis to cram a maw, or cloath a back,
From such a filthy vice: say to thyself,-
From their abominable and beastly touches
I drink, I eat, array myself, and live.
Canst thou believe thy living is a life,
So stinkingly depending? Go, mend, go, mend,
Clown. Indeed, it does stink in some sort, sir:
but yet, sir, I would prove-
[for sin,
Duke. Nay, if the devil hath given thee proofs
Thou wilt prove his. Take him to prison, officer;
Correction and instruction must both work,
Ere this rude beast will profit.

Lucio. Why, 'tis not amiss, Pompey: fare well: go; say, I sent thee thither. For debt, Pompey or how ?

Elb. For being a bawd, for being a bawd.

Lucio. Well, then imprison him; if imprisonment be the due of a bawd, why, 'tis his right: 25 Bawd is he, doubtless, and of antiquity too; bawdborn. Farewell, good Pompey: Commend me to the prison, Pompey: You will turn good husband now, Pompey; you will keep the house. Clown. I hope, sir, your good worship will be 30my bail.

Lucio. No, indeed, will I not, Pompey; it is not the wear. I will pray, Pompey, to encrease your bondage: if you take it not patiently, why, your mettle is the imore: Adieu, trusty Pompey. 35-Bless you, friar.

Elb. He must before the deputy, sir; he has given him warning: the deputy cannot abide a 40| whore-master: if he be a whore-monger, and comes before him, he were as good go a mile on his errand.

Duke. That we were all as some would seem to be, Free from all faults, as faults from seeming free! Enter Lucio.

Elb. His neck will come to your waist, a cord, sir.

Clown. I spy comfort; I cry bail: here's a gentleman, and a friend of mine.

Lucio. How now, noble Pompey? what, at the heels of Cæsar? art thou led in triuinph? What, is

Duke. And you.

Lucio. Does Bridget paint still, Pompey? ha?
Elb. Come your ways, sir; come.
Clown. You will not bail me then, sir?
Lucio. Then, Pompey? nor now.― -What
news abroad, friar? what news?
Elb. Come your ways, sir, come.
Lucio. Go,-to kennel, Pompey,-go.

[Exeunt Elbow, Clown, and Officers.

45 What news, friar, of the duke?

150

Duke. I know none; Can you tell me of any Lucio. Some say, he is with the emperor of Russia: other some, he is in Rome: But where is he, think you?

Duke. I know not where: but wheresoever, I wish him well.

Lucio. It was a mad fantastical trick of him, to

A kind of sweet wine, then much in vogue. 2 Meaning, his neck will be tied, like your waist, with a rope.-Q. Does not this rather mean the method of conveying criminals to justice, or execu tion, with a cord tied round the neck of the criminal and the middle of the officer? 3 Trot is a familiar address to a man, among the provincial vulgar. * Dr. Warburton says, the author here alludes to the lues venerea, and its effects. At that time the cure of it was performed either by guiacum, or mercurial unctions: and in both cases the patient was kept up very warm and close; that in the first application the sweat might be promoted; and lest, in the other, he should take cold, which was fatal. "The regimen for the course of guiacum (says Dr. Freind in his History of Physick, vol. II. p. 380.) was at first strangely circumstantial; and so rigorous, that the patient was put into a dungeon in order to make him sweat; and in-that manner, as Fallopius expresses it, the bones, and the very man himself was macerated," Wiseman says, in England they use a tub for this purpose, as abroad, a cave, or oven, or dungeon. A person under cure for a ves nereal complaint, is now grossly said to be in the pickling or por dering tub, That is, it is not

the fashion.

steal

steal from the state, and usurp the beggary he was never born to. Lord Angelo dukes it well in his absence; he puts transgression to 't.

Duke. He does well in 't.

Lucio. A little more lenity to lechery would 5 do no harm in him: something too crabbed that way, friar.

Duke, It is too general a vice, and severity must cure it.

Lucio. Yes, in good sooth, the vice is of a great kindred; it is well ally'd: but it is impossible to extirp it quite, friar, till eating and drinking be put down. They say, this Angelo was not made by man and woman, after the downright way of creation: Is it true, think you?

10

Lucio. Sir, I know him, and I love him. Duke. Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with dearer love.

Lucio. Come, sir, I know what I know.

Duke. I can hardly believe that, since you know not what you speak. But, if ever the duke return, (as our prayers are he may) let me desire you to make your answer before him: If it be honest you have spoke, you have courage to maintain it: I am bound to call upon you, and I pray you, your name?

Lucio. Sir, my name is Lucio; well known to

the duke.

Duke. He shall know you better, sir, if I may 15live to report you.

Duke. How should he be made then? Lucio.Some report, a sea-maid spawn'd him :some, that he was got between two stock-fishes: -But it is certain, that when he makes water, his urine is congeal dice; that I know to be true:-20 and he is a motion ungenerative'; that's infallible.

Duke. You are pleasant, sir; and speak apace.
Lucio. Why, what a ruthless thing is this in
him, for the rebellion of a cod-piece, to take
away the life of a man? Would the duke, that is 25
absent, have done this? Ere he would have
hang'd a man for the getting a hundred bastards,
he would have paid for the nursing a thousand:
he had some feeling of the sport; he knew the
service, and that instructed him to mercy.

Duke. I never heard the absent duke much de-
tected for women; he was not inclin'd that way.
Lucio. Oh, sir, you are deceiv'd.
Duke. 'Tis not possible.

30

Lucio. Who? not the duke? yes, your beggar 35 of fifty--and his use was, to put a ducat in her clack-dish': the duke had crotchets in him: lle would be drunk too; that let me inform you.

Duke. You do him wrong, surely.

Lucio. Sir, I was an inward of his A shy 40 fellow was the duke; and, I believe, I know the cause of his withdrawing.

Duke. What, I pr'ythee, might be the cause?| Lucio. No-pardon;- 'tis a secret must be lock'd within the teeth and the lips: but this 145| can let you understand,-The greater file of the subject held the duke to be wise.

Duke. Wise? why, no question but he was. Lucio. A very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellow.

Duke. Either this is envy in you, folly, or mistaking; the very stream of his life, and the business he had helmed', must, upon a warranted need, give him a better proclamation. Let him

Lucio. I fear you not.

Duke. Oh, you hope the duke will return no more; or you imagine me too unhurtful an opposite. But, indeed, I can do you little harin: you'll forswear this again.

Lucio. I'll be hang'd first: thou art deceiv'd in me, iriar. But no more of this: Canst thou tell, if Claudio die to-morrow, or no?

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Duke. Why should he die, sir?

Lucio. Why? for filling a bottle with a tun-dish. would, the duke, we talk of, were return'd again: this ungenitur'd agent will unpeople the province with continency; sparrows must not build in his house-eaves, because they are lecherous. The duke yet would have dark deeds darkly answered; he would never bring them to light ;Would he were return'd! Marry, this Claudio is condemned for untrussing. Farewell, good triar; I pr'ythee, pray for me. The duke, I say to thee again, would eat mutton on Fridays. He's now past it; yet, and I say to thee, he would mouth with a beggar, though she smelt brown bread and garlick: say, that I said so. Farewell. [Exit. Duke. No might nor greatness in mortality Can censure 'scape; back-wounding calumny The whitest virtue strikes: What king so strong, Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue? But who comes here?

Enter Escalus, Provost, Bard, and Officers.
Escal. Go, away with her to prison.

Buwd. Good my lord, be good to me; your honour is accounted a merciful man: good my lord.

Escal. Double and treble admonition, and still forfeit in the same kind? this would make inercy 50swear, and play the tyrant.

Prov. A bawd of eleven years continuance, may it please your honour.

Bawd. My lord, this is one Lucio's information against me: Mistress Kate Keep-down was with

be but testimonied in his own bringings forth,|55|child by him in the duke's time; he promis'd her and he shall appear, to the envious, a scholar, a statesman, and a soldier: Therefore, you speak unskilfully; or, if your knowledge be more, it is much darkened in your malice.

marriage; his child is a year and a quarter old, come Philip and Jacob; I have kept it myself; and see, how he goes about to abuse ine.

Escal. That fellow is a fellow of much licence:

1 The meaning of this passage is, that though Angelo have the organs of generation, yet that he makes no more use of them, than if he were an inanimate puppet. A wooden dish with which beggars, in those times, used to make known their poverty, by clacking its moveable cover to shew that it was empty. This is at present a custom al o with the nummers and plough-bullocks in the inland counties. Inward means intimate. The greater number. That is, steered through. ! Meaning, would have a wench, which was called a luced mutton. See note 2, p. 24.

-let

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