are chosen, they are glad to choose me for them: I do it for some piece of money, and go through with all. Escal. Look you, bring me in the names of some six or seven, the most sufficient of your parish. Elb. To your worship's house, sir? Escal. To my house: fare you well. [Exit ELBOW.] What's o'clock, think you? Just. Eleven, sir. Escal. I pray you home to dinner with me. Escal. It grieves me for the death of Claudio; But there's no remedy. Just. Lord Angelo is severe. Escal. It is but needful: Mercy is not itself that oft looks so; [Exeunt. SCENE II. Another Room in the same. Enter Provost and a Servant. Serv. He's hearing of a cause; he will come straight. I'll tell him of you. Prov. Pray you, do. [Exit Servant.] I'll know His pleasure: may be, he will relent: alas, He hath but as offended in a dream! All sects, all ages smack of this vice; and he Ang. Enter ANGELO. Now, what's the matter, provost. Prov. Is it your will Claudio shall die to-morrow? Ang. Did I not tell thee, yea? Hadst thou not order? Why dost thou ask again? Prov. Lest I might be too rash: Under your good correction, I have seen, Ang. Go to; let that be mine: I crave your honor's pardon. Do you your office, or give up your place, Prov. What shall be done, sir, with the groaning Juliet? Ang. Dispose of her To some more fitter place; and that with speed. Re-enter Servant. Serv. Here is the sister of the man condemned, Desires access to you. Ang. Hath he a sister? Prov. Ay, my good lord; a very virtuous maid, And to be shortly of a sisterhood, If not already. Ang. Well, let her be admitted. [Exit Servant. See you the fornicatress be removed: Let her have needful, but not lavish, means; There shall be order for it. Enter LUCIO and ISABELLA. Prov. Save your honor. [Offering to retire. Ang. Stay a little while.-[To Isab.] You are welcome: What's your will? Isab. I am a woful suitor to your honor; Please but your honor hear me. Ang. Well; what's your suit? Isab. There is a vice, that most I do abhor, Ang. And not my brother. Prov. Heaven give thee moving graces! Ang. Condemn the fault, and not the actor of it! To fine the faults, whose fine stands in record, Isab. [Retiring. Lucio. [To ISAB.] Give't not o'er so: to him again, en treat him: Kneel down before him, hang upon his gown; You are too cold; if you should need a pin, Isab. Must he needs die? Ang. Maiden, no remedy. Isab. Yes; I do think that you might pardon him, And neither Heaven, nor man, grieve at the mercy. Ang. I will not do't. Isab. But can you, if you would? Ang. Look, what I will not, that I cannot do. Isab. But might you do't, and do the world no wrong, If so your heart were touched with that remorse As mine is to him? Ang. He's sentenced; 'tis too late. Lucio. You are too cold. [To ISABELLA. Isab. Too late? why, no: I, that do speak a word, May call it back again: well, believe this, No ceremony that to great ones 'longs, Not the king's crown, nor the deputed sword, The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe, Become them with one half so good a grace, As mercy does. If he had been as you, And you as he, you would have slipped like him; But he, like you, would not have been so stern. Ang. Pray you, begone. Isab. I would to Heaven I had your potency, And you were Isabel! Should it then be thus? Alas! alas! Lucio. Ay, touch him: there's the vein. Ang. Be you content, fair maid; It is the law, not I, condemns your brother: Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son, [Aside. It should be thus with him; he must die to-morrow. him! He's not prepared for death! Even for our kitchens To our gross selves? Good, good my lord, bethink you: Who is it that hath died for this offence? There's many have committed it. Lucio. Ay, well said. Ang. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept: Those many had not dared to do that evil, If the first man that did the edict infringe, Had answered for his deed: now, 'tis awake; Takes note of what is done; and, like a prophet, Looks in a glass, that shows what future evils, (Either now, or by remissness new-conceived, And so in progress to be hatched and born,) Are now to have no successive degrees, But, where they live, to end. Isab. Yet show some pity. Ang. I show it most of all, when I show justice; For then I pity those I do not know, Which a dismissed offence would after gall; And do him right, that, answering one foul wrong, Your brother dies to-morrow: be content. Isab. So you must be the first, that gives this sentence; And he, that suffers. O, it is excellent To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous Lucio. That's well said. Isab. Could great men thunder As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet; Would use his heaven for thunder; nothing but thunder.- Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt, Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak, Than the soft myrtle: But man, proud man! Most ignorant of what he's most assured, His glassy essence, like an angry ape, Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven, As make the angels weep; who, with our spleens, Lucio. O, to him, to him, wench: he will relent; Prov. Pray Heaven, she win him! Isab. We cannot weigh our brother with ourself: Great men may jest with saints: 'tis wit in them! But, in the less, foul profanation. Lucio. Thou'rt in the right, girl; more o' that. Isab. That in the captain's but a choleric word, Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy. Lucio. Art advised o' that? More on't. Ang. Why do you put these sayings upon me? That skins the vice o' the top: go to your bosom; A natural guiltiness, such as is his, Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue Ang. She speaks, and 'tis Such sense, that my sense breeds with it. -Fare you well. Isab. Gentle my lord, turn back. Ang. I will bethink me: Come again to-morrow. Isab. Hark, how I'll bribe you: good my lord, turn back. Ang. How! Bribe me? Isab. Ay, with such gifts, that heaven shall share with you. Lucio. You had marred all else. Isab. Not with fond shekels of the tested gold, Ang. To-morrow. Well; come to me Lucio. Go to; it is well; away. [Aside to ISABel. Ang. Where prayers cross. Isab. Shall I attend your lordship? Ang. Amen. [Aside. At what hour to-morrow At any time 'fore noon. From thee; even from thy virtue. Isab. Save your honor! Ang. [Exeunt LUCIO, ISABELLA, and Provost. What's this? What's this? Is this her fault, or mine? The tempter, or the tempted, who sins most? Ha! That, lying by the violet, in the sun, |