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Provost: 'Tis pity of him.
ANGELO: When I would pray and think, I think and pray To several subjects. Heaven hath my empty words; Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue, Anchors on Isabel: Heaven in my mouth, As if I did but only chew his name; And in my heart the strong and swelling evil Of my conception. The state, whereon I studied Is lik...
Servant: One Isabel, a sister, desires access to you.
ANGELO: Teach her the way. O heavens! Why does my blood thus muster to my heart, Making both it unable for itself, And dispossessing all my other parts Of necessary fitness? So play the foolish throngs with one that swoons; Come all to help him, and so stop the air By which he should revive: and even so The general, su...
ISABELLA: I am come to know your pleasure.
ANGELO: That you might know it, would much better please me Than to demand what 'tis. Your brother cannot live.
ISABELLA: Even so. Heaven keep your honour!
ANGELO: Yet may he live awhile; and, it may be, As long as you or I yet he must die.
ISABELLA: Under your sentence?
ANGELO: Yea.
ISABELLA: When, I beseech you? that in his reprieve, Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted That his soul sicken not.
ANGELO: Ha! fie, these filthy vices! It were as good To pardon him that hath from nature stolen A man already made, as to remit Their saucy sweetness that do coin heaven's image In stamps that are forbid: 'tis all as easy Falsely to take away a life true made As to put metal in restrained means To make a false one.
ISABELLA: 'Tis set down so in heaven, but not in earth.
ANGELO: Say you so? then I shall pose you quickly. Which had you rather, that the most just law Now took your brother's life; or, to redeem him, Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness As she that he hath stain'd?
ISABELLA: Sir, believe this, I had rather give my body than my soul.
ANGELO: I talk not of your soul: our compell'd sins Stand more for number than for accompt.
ISABELLA: How say you?
ANGELO: Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can speak Against the thing I say. Answer to this: I, now the voice of the recorded law, Pronounce a sentence on your brother's life: Might there not be a charity in sin To save this brother's life?
ISABELLA: Please you to do't, I'll take it as a peril to my soul, It is no sin at all, but charity.
ANGELO: Pleased you to do't at peril of your soul, Were equal poise of sin and charity.
ISABELLA: That I do beg his life, if it be sin, Heaven let me bear it! you granting of my suit, If that be sin, I'll make it my morn prayer To have it added to the faults of mine, And nothing of your answer.
ANGELO: Nay, but hear me. Your sense pursues not mine: either you are ignorant, Or seem so craftily; and that's not good.
ISABELLA: Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good, But graciously to know I am no better.
ANGELO: Thus wisdom wishes to appear most bright When it doth tax itself; as these black masks Proclaim an enshield beauty ten times louder Than beauty could, display'd. But mark me; To be received plain, I'll speak more gross: Your brother is to die.
ISABELLA: So.
ANGELO: And his offence is so, as it appears, Accountant to the law upon that pain.
ISABELLA: True.
ANGELO: Admit no other way to save his life,-- As I subscribe not that, nor any other, But in the loss of question,--that you, his sister, Finding yourself desired of such a person, Whose credit with the judge, or own great place, Could fetch your brother from the manacles Of the all-building law; and that there were N...
ISABELLA: As much for my poor brother as myself: That is, were I under the terms of death, The impression of keen whips I'ld wear as rubies, And strip myself to death, as to a bed That longing have been sick for, ere I'ld yield My body up to shame.
ANGELO: Then must your brother die.
ISABELLA: And 'twere the cheaper way: Better it were a brother died at once, Than that a sister, by redeeming him, Should die for ever.
ANGELO: Were not you then as cruel as the sentence That you have slander'd so?
ISABELLA: Ignomy in ransom and free pardon Are of two houses: lawful mercy Is nothing kin to foul redemption.
ANGELO: You seem'd of late to make the law a tyrant; And rather proved the sliding of your brother A merriment than a vice.
ISABELLA: O, pardon me, my lord; it oft falls out, To have what we would have, we speak not what we mean: I something do excuse the thing I hate, For his advantage that I dearly love.
ANGELO: We are all frail.
ISABELLA: Else let my brother die, If not a feodary, but only he Owe and succeed thy weakness.
ANGELO: Nay, women are frail too.
ISABELLA: Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves; Which are as easy broke as they make forms. Women! Help Heaven! men their creation mar In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail; For we are soft as our complexions are, And credulous to false prints.
ANGELO: I think it well: And from this testimony of your own sex,-- Since I suppose we are made to be no stronger Than faults may shake our frames,--let me be bold; I do arrest your words. Be that you are, That is, a woman; if you be more, you're none; If you be one, as you are well express'd By all external warrants, ...
ISABELLA: I have no tongue but one: gentle my lord, Let me entreat you speak the former language.
ANGELO: Plainly conceive, I love you.
ISABELLA: My brother did love Juliet, And you tell me that he shall die for it.
ANGELO: He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love.
ISABELLA: I know your virtue hath a licence in't, Which seems a little fouler than it is, To pluck on others.
ANGELO: Believe me, on mine honour, My words express my purpose.
ISABELLA: Ha! little honour to be much believed, And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming! I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for't: Sign me a present pardon for my brother, Or with an outstretch'd throat I'll tell the world aloud What man thou art.
ANGELO: Who will believe thee, Isabel? My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life, My vouch against you, and my place i' the state, Will so your accusation overweigh, That you shall stifle in your own report And smell of calumny. I have begun, And now I give my sensual race the rein: Fit thy consent to my sharp appet...
ISABELLA: 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: Hooking both right and wrong to the appetite, To follow as it draws! I'll to my brother: Though h...
DUKE VINCENTIO: So then you hope of pardon from Lord Angelo?
CLAUDIO: The miserable have no other medicine But only hope: I've hope to live, and am prepared to die.
DUKE VINCENTIO: Be absolute for death; either death or life Shall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with life: If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing That none but fools would keep: a breath thou art, Servile to all the skyey influences, That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st, Hourly afflict: merely, thou art de...
CLAUDIO: I humbly thank you. To sue to live, I find I seek to die; And, seeking death, find life: let it come on.
ISABELLA:
Provost: Who's there? come in: the wish deserves a welcome.
DUKE VINCENTIO: Dear sir, ere long I'll visit you again.
CLAUDIO: Most holy sir, I thank you.
ISABELLA: My business is a word or two with Claudio.
Provost: And very welcome. Look, signior, here's your sister.
DUKE VINCENTIO: Provost, a word with you.
Provost: As many as you please.
DUKE VINCENTIO: Bring me to hear them speak, where I may be concealed.
CLAUDIO: Now, sister, what's the comfort?
ISABELLA: Why, As all comforts are; most good, most good indeed. Lord Angelo, having affairs to heaven, Intends you for his swift ambassador, Where you shall be an everlasting leiger: Therefore your best appointment make with speed; To-morrow you set on.
CLAUDIO: Is there no remedy?
ISABELLA: None, but such remedy as, to save a head, To cleave a heart in twain.
CLAUDIO: But is there any?
ISABELLA: 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.
CLAUDIO: Perpetual durance?
ISABELLA: Ay, just; perpetual durance, a restraint, Though all the world's vastidity you had, To a determined scope.
CLAUDIO: But in what nature?
ISABELLA: In such a one as, you consenting to't, Would bark your honour from that trunk you bear, And leave you naked.
CLAUDIO: Let me know the point.
ISABELLA: O, I do fear thee, Claudio; and I quake, Lest thou a feverous life shouldst entertain, And six or seven winters more respect Than a perpetual honour. Darest thou die? The sense of death is most in apprehension; And the poor beetle, that we tread upon, In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great As when a gia...
CLAUDIO: 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.
ISABELLA: There spake my brother; there my father's grave 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 falcon doth the fowl, is yet a devil His...
CLAUDIO: The prenzie Angelo!
ISABELLA: O, 'tis the cunning livery of hell, The damned'st body to invest and cover In prenzie guards! Dost thou think, Claudio? If I would yield him my virginity, Thou mightst be freed.
CLAUDIO: O heavens! it cannot be.
ISABELLA: Yes, he would give't thee, from this rank offence, So to offend him still. This night's the time That I should do what I abhor to name, Or else thou diest to-morrow.
CLAUDIO: Thou shalt not do't.
ISABELLA: O, were it but my life, I'ld throw it down for your deliverance As frankly as a pin.
CLAUDIO: Thanks, dear Isabel.
ISABELLA: Be ready, Claudio, for your death tomorrow.
CLAUDIO: Yes. Has he affections in him, 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.
ISABELLA: Which is the least?
CLAUDIO: If it were damnable, he being so wise, Why would he for the momentary trick Be perdurably fined? O Isabel!
ISABELLA: What says my brother?
CLAUDIO: Death is a fearful thing.
ISABELLA: And shamed life a hateful.
CLAUDIO: Ay, but to die, and go we know not where; To lie in cold obstruction and to rot; This sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice; To be imprison'd in the viewless winds, And blown with restless violence ...
ISABELLA: Alas, alas!
CLAUDIO: 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.
ISABELLA: O you beast! O faithless coward! O dishonest wretch! Wilt thou be made a man out of my vice? Is't not a kind of incest, to take life From thine own sister's shame? What should I think? Heaven shield my mother play'd my father fair! For such a warped slip of wilderness Ne'er issued from his blood. Take my defi...
CLAUDIO: Nay, hear me, Isabel.
ISABELLA: O, fie, fie, fie! Thy sin's not accidental, but a trade. Mercy to thee would prove itself a bawd: 'Tis best thou diest quickly.
CLAUDIO: O hear me, Isabella!
DUKE VINCENTIO: Vouchsafe a word, young sister, but one word.
ISABELLA: What is your will?
DUKE VINCENTIO: Might you dispense with your leisure, I would by and by have some speech with you: the satisfaction I would require is likewise your own benefit.