1    So then you hope of pardon from Lord Angelo?

2    The miserable have no other medicine
3    But only hope:
4    I've hope to live, and am prepared to die.

5    Be absolute for death; either death or life
6    Shall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with life:
7    If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing
8    That none but fools would keep: a breath thou art,
9    Servile to all the skyey influences,
10   That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st,
11   Hourly afflict: merely, thou art death's fool;
12   For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun
13   And yet runn'st toward him still. Thou art not noble;
14   For all the accommodations that thou bear'st
15   Are nursed by baseness. Thou'rt by no means valiant;
16   For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork
17   Of a poor worm. Thy best of rest is sleep,
18   And that thou oft provokest; yet grossly fear'st
19   Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself;
20   For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains
21   That issue out of dust. Happy thou art not;
22   For what thou hast not, still thou strivest to get,
23   And what thou hast, forget'st. Thou art not certain;
24   For thy complexion shifts to strange effects,
25   After the moon. If thou art rich, thou'rt poor;
26   For, like an ass whose back with ingots bows,
27   Thou bear's thy heavy riches but a journey,
28   And death unloads thee. Friend hast thou none;
29   For thine own bowels, which do call thee sire,
30   The mere effusion of thy proper loins,
31   Do curse the gout, serpigo, and the rheum,
32   For ending thee no sooner. Thou hast nor youth nor age,
33   But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep,
34   Dreaming on both; for all thy blessed youth
35   Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms
36   Of palsied eld; and when thou art old and rich,
37   Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty,
38   To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this
39   That bears the name of life? Yet in this life
40   Lie hid moe thousand deaths: yet death we fear,
41   That makes these odds all even.

42   I humbly thank you.
43   To sue to live, I find I seek to die;
44   And, seeking death, find life: let it come on.

Within
45    What, ho! Peace here; grace and good company!

46   Who's there? come in: the wish deserves a welcome.

47   Dear sir, ere long I'll visit you again.

48   Most holy sir, I thank you.

49   My business is a word or two with Claudio.

50   And very welcome. Look, signior, here's your sister.

51   Provost, a word with you.

52   As many as you please.

53   Bring me to hear them speak, where I may be concealed.

54   Now, sister, what's the comfort?

55   Why,
56   As all comforts are; most good, most good indeed.
57   Lord Angelo, having affairs to heaven,
58   Intends you for his swift ambassador,
59   Where you shall be an everlasting leiger:
60   Therefore your best appointment make with speed;
61   To-morrow you set on.

62   Is there no remedy?

63   None, but such remedy as, to save a head,
64   To cleave a heart in twain.

65   But is there any?

66   Yes, brother, you may live:
67   There is a devilish mercy in the judge,
68   If you'll implore it, that will free your life,
69   But fetter you till death.

70   Perpetual durance?

71   Ay, just; perpetual durance, a restraint,
72   Though all the world's vastidity you had,
73   To a determined scope.

74   But in what nature?

75   In such a one as, you consenting to't,
76   Would bark your honour from that trunk you bear,
77   And leave you naked.

78   Let me know the point.

79   O, I do fear thee, Claudio; and I quake,
80   Lest thou a feverous life shouldst entertain,
81   And six or seven winters more respect
82   Than a perpetual honour. Darest thou die?
83   The sense of death is most in apprehension;
84   And the poor beetle, that we tread upon,
85   In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great
86   As when a giant dies.

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

92   There spake my brother; there my father's grave
93   Did utter forth a voice. Yes, thou must die:
94   Thou art too noble to conserve a life
95   In base appliances. This outward-sainted deputy,
96   Whose settled visage and deliberate word
97   Nips youth i' the head and follies doth emmew
98   As falcon doth the fowl, is yet a devil
99   His filth within being cast, he would appear
100  A pond as deep as hell.

101  The prenzie Angelo!

102  O, 'tis the cunning livery of hell,
103  The damned'st body to invest and cover
104  In prenzie guards! Dost thou think, Claudio?
105  If I would yield him my virginity,
106  Thou mightst be freed.

107  O heavens! it cannot be.

108  Yes, he would give't thee, from this rank offence,
109  So to offend him still. This night's the time
110  That I should do what I abhor to name,
111  Or else thou diest to-morrow.

112  Thou shalt not do't.

113  O, were it but my life,
114  I'ld throw it down for your deliverance
115  As frankly as a pin.

116  Thanks, dear Isabel.

117  Be ready, Claudio, for your death tomorrow.

118  Yes. Has he affections in him,
119  That thus can make him bite the law by the nose,
120  When he would force it? Sure, it is no sin,
121  Or of the deadly seven, it is the least.

122  Which is the least?

123  If it were damnable, he being so wise,
124  Why would he for the momentary trick
125  Be perdurably fined? O Isabel!

126  What says my brother?

127  Death is a fearful thing.

128  And shamed life a hateful.

129  Ay, but to die, and go we know not where;
130  To lie in cold obstruction and to rot;
131  This sensible warm motion to become
132  A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
133  To bathe in fiery floods, or to reside
134  In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice;
135  To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,
136  And blown with restless violence round about
137  The pendent world; or to be worse than worst
138  Of those that lawless and incertain thought
139  Imagine howling: 'tis too horrible!
140  The weariest and most loathed worldly life
141  That age, ache, penury and imprisonment
142  Can lay on nature is a paradise
143  To what we fear of death.

144  Alas, alas!

145  Sweet sister, let me live:
146  What sin you do to save a brother's life,
147  Nature dispenses with the deed so far
148  That it becomes a virtue.

149  O you beast!
150  O faithless coward! O dishonest wretch!
151  Wilt thou be made a man out of my vice?
152  Is't not a kind of incest, to take life
153  From thine own sister's shame? What should I think?
154  Heaven shield my mother play'd my father fair!
155  For such a warped slip of wilderness
156  Ne'er issued from his blood. Take my defiance!
157  Die, perish! Might but my bending down
158  Reprieve thee from thy fate, it should proceed:
159  I'll pray a thousand prayers for thy death,
160  No word to save thee.

161  Nay, hear me, Isabel.

162  O, fie, fie, fie!
163  Thy sin's not accidental, but a trade.
164  Mercy to thee would prove itself a bawd:
165  'Tis best thou diest quickly.

166  O hear me, Isabella!

167  Vouchsafe a word, young sister, but one word.

168  What is your will?

169  Might you dispense with your leisure, I would by and
170  by have some speech with you: the satisfaction I
171  would require is likewise your own benefit.

172  I have no superfluous leisure; my stay must be
173  stolen out of other affairs; but I will attend you awhile.

174  Son, I have overheard what hath passed between you
175  and your sister. Angelo had never the purpose to
176  corrupt her; only he hath made an essay of her
177  virtue to practise his judgment with the disposition
178  of natures: she, having the truth of honour in her,
179  hath made him that gracious denial which he is most
180  glad to receive. I am confessor to Angelo, and I
181  know this to be true; therefore prepare yourself to
182  death: do not satisfy your resolution with hopes
183  that are fallible: tomorrow you must die; go to
184  your knees and make ready.

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

187  Hold you there: farewell.
Exit CLAUDIO
188  Provost, a word with you!

189  What's your will, father

190  That now you are come, you will be gone. Leave me
191  awhile with the maid: my mind promises with my
192  habit no loss shall touch her by my company.

193  In good time.

194  The hand that hath made you fair hath made you good:
195  the goodness that is cheap in beauty makes beauty
196  brief in goodness; but grace, being the soul of
197  your complexion, shall keep the body of it ever
198  fair. The assault that Angelo hath made to you,
199  fortune hath conveyed to my understanding; and, but
200  that frailty hath examples for his falling, I should
201  wonder at Angelo. How will you do to content this
202  substitute, and to save your brother?

203  I am now going to resolve him: I had rather my
204  brother die by the law than my son should be
205  unlawfully born. But, O, how much is the good duke
206  deceived in Angelo! If ever he return and I can
207  speak to him, I will open my lips in vain, or
208  discover his government.

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

220  Let me hear you speak farther. I have spirit to do
221  anything that appears not foul in the truth of my spirit.

222  Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful. Have
223  you not heard speak of Mariana, the sister of
224  Frederick the great soldier who miscarried at sea?

225  I have heard of the lady, and good words went with her name.

226  She should this Angelo have married; was affianced
227  to her by oath, and the nuptial appointed: between
228  which time of the contract and limit of the
229  solemnity, her brother Frederick was wrecked at sea,
230  having in that perished vessel the dowry of his
231  sister. But mark how heavily this befell to the
232  poor gentlewoman: there she lost a noble and
233  renowned brother, in his love toward her ever most
234  kind and natural; with him, the portion and sinew of
235  her fortune, her marriage-dowry; with both, her
236  combinate husband, this well-seeming Angelo.

237  Can this be so? did Angelo so leave her?

238  Left her in her tears, and dried not one of them
239  with his comfort; swallowed his vows whole,
240  pretending in her discoveries of dishonour: in few,
241  bestowed her on her own lamentation, which she yet
242  wears for his sake; and he, a marble to her tears,
243  is washed with them, but relents not.

244  What a merit were it in death to take this poor maid
245  from the world! What corruption in this life, that
246  it will let this man live! But how out of this can she avail?

247  It is a rupture that you may easily heal: and the
248  cure of it not only saves your brother, but keeps
249  you from dishonour in doing it.

250  Show me how, good father.

251  This forenamed maid hath yet in her the continuance
252  of her first affection: his unjust unkindness, that
253  in all reason should have quenched her love, hath,
254  like an impediment in the current, made it more
255  violent and unruly. Go you to Angelo; answer his
256  requiring with a plausible obedience; agree with
257  his demands to the point; only refer yourself to
258  this advantage, first, that your stay with him may
259  not be long; that the time may have all shadow and
260  silence in it; and the place answer to convenience.
261  This being granted in course,--and now follows
262  all,--we shall advise this wronged maid to stead up
263  your appointment, go in your place; if the encounter
264  acknowledge itself hereafter, it may compel him to
265  her recompense: and here, by this, is your brother
266  saved, your honour untainted, the poor Mariana
267  advantaged, and the corrupt deputy scaled. The maid
268  will I frame and make fit for his attempt. If you
269  think well to carry this as you may, the doubleness
270  of the benefit defends the deceit from reproof.
271  What think you of it?

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

274  It lies much in your holding up. Haste you speedily
275  to Angelo: if for this night he entreat you to his
276  bed, give him promise of satisfaction. I will
277  presently to Saint Luke's: there, at the moated
278  grange, resides this dejected Mariana. At that
279  place call upon me; and dispatch with Angelo, that
280  it may be quickly.

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