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quainted with tapsters; they will draw you master Froth, and you will hang them: Get you gone, and let me hear no more of you.

Froth. I thank your worship: For mine ow part, I never come into any room in a taphouse, 5 but I am drawn in.

Escal. Well; no more of it, master Froth:Farewell.--Come you hither to me, master tap-| ster; what's your name, master tapster?

Clown. Pompey. Escal. What else? Clown. Bum, sir.

Escal. I thought, by your readiness in the office, you had continued in it some tune: You say, seven years together? Elb. And a half, sir.

Escal. Alas! it hath been great pains to you they do you wrong to put you so oft upon't: Are there not men in your ward sufficient to serve it?

Elb. Faith, sir, few of any wit in such matters: as they are chosen, they are glad to chuse me for Othem; I do it for some piece of money, and go through with all.

Escal. Truth, and your bum is the greatest thing about you: so that, in the beastliest sense, you are Pompey the great. Pompey, you are partly a 15 bawd, Pompey, howsoever you colour it in being tapster; Are you not? Come, tell me true; it shall be the better for you.

Clown. Truly, sir, I am a poor fellow that would live.

20 Escal. How would you live, Pompey? by being a bawd? What do you think of the trade, Pompey? is it a lawful trade?

Clown. If the law will allow it, sir.

Escal. But the law will not allow it, Pompey;25 nor it shall not be allowed in Vienna.

Clown. Does your worship mean to geld and spay all the youth in the city?

E cal. No, Pompey.

Clown. Truly sir, in my poor opinion, they 30 will to't then: If your worship will take order for the drabs and the knaves, you need not to fear

the bawds.

Escal. There are pretty orders beginning, can tell you: it is but heading and hanging.

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Clown. If you head and hang all that offend that way but for ten years together, you'll be glad to give out a commission for more heads. If this law hold in Vienna ten years, I'll rent the fairest house in it, after three-pence a bay: If you live to see 40 this come to pass, say, Pompey told you so.

Escal. Thank you, good Pompey; and in requital of your prophecy, hark you,-I advise you, let me not find you before me again upon any complaint whatsoever, no, not for dwelling where you 45 do; if I do, Pompey, I shall beat you to your tent, and prove a shrewd Cæsar to you; in plain dealing, Pompey, I shall have you whipt: so, for this time, Pompey, fare you well.

Clown. I thank your worship for your good coun-50 sel; but I shall follow it, as the resh and fortune] shall better determine.

Whip me! No, no; let carman whip his jade; The valiant heart's not whipt out of his trade. [Ex it. Escal. Come hither to me, master Elbow; come 55 hither, master constable. Howlong have you been in this place of constable?

Elb. Seven year and a half, sir.

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Enter Procost and a Servant. Serr. 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
To die for it!-

Enter Angelo.

Ang. Now, what's the matter, provost?
Prov. Is it your will Claudioshall dieto morrow?
Ang. Did I not tell thee, yea? hadst thou not
Why dost thou ask again?
[order?

Frov. Lest I might be too rash:
Under your good correction, I have seen,
When, after execution, judgment hath
Repented o'er his doom.

Ang. Go to; let that be mine:
Do you your office, or give up your place,
And you shall well be spar'd.

Prot. I crave your honour's pardon.-
What shall be done, sir, with the groaning Juliet?
She's very near her hour.

Ang. Dispose of her

To some more fitting place; and that with speed. Re-enter Servant.

Sere. Here is the sister of the man condemn'd, Desires access to you.

Draw includes here a variety of senses. As it refers to the tapster, it means, to drain, to empty; as it refers to hang, it implies to be conveyed to execution on a hurdle. In Froth's answer, it imports the same as to bring along by some motive or power. Dr. Johnson says, a bay of building is, in

many parts of England, a common term, for the space between the main beams of the roof; so that a barn crossed twice with beams is a barn of three bays. In Staffordshire, it is applied to the two open spaces of a barn on each side the threshing-floor.

Arg.

Ang. Hath he a sister?

Prov. Ay, my good lord; a very virtuous maid,| And to be shortly of a sister-lood,

If not already.

Would not have been so stern.

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Ang. Pray you, be gone.

Isab. I would to heaven I had your potency, And you were Isabel! should it then be thus?

Ang. Well, let her be admitted. [Exit Servant. 5 No; I would tell what 'twere to be a judge,

See you, the fornicatress be remov'd;

Let her have needful, but not lavish means;

There shall be order for it.

Enter Lucio and Isabella.

Prov. Save your honour!

Ang. Stay yet a while.—[To Isab.] You are welcome: What's your will?

Isab. I am a woeful suitor to your honour, Please but your honour hear me.

Ang. Well; what's your suit?

Isab. There is a vice that most I do abhor, And most desire should meet the blow of justice: For which I would not plead, but that I must; For which I must not plead, but that I am At war, 'twixt will, and will not.

Ang. Well; the matter?

Isab. I have a brother is condemn'd to die: I do beseech you, let it be his fault, And not my brother.

Prov. Heaven give thee moving graces!

Ang. Condemn the fault, and not the actor of it! Why, every fault's condemn'd, ere it be done: Mine were the very cypher of a function, To find the faults, whose fine stands in record, And let go by the actor.

Isab. O just, but severe law!

I had a brother then.-Heaven keep your honour! Lucio. [To Isab.] Give not o'er so: to him again, intreat him;

Kneel down before him, hang upon his gown;
You are too cold: if you should need a pin,
You could not with more tame a tongue desire it:
To him, I say.

Isub. Must he needs die?
Ang. Maiden, no remedy.

10

And what a prisoner.

Lucio. [dside. Ay, touch him: there's the vein. Ang. Your brother is a forteit of the law, And you but waste your words.

Isub. Alas! alas!

Why, all the souls that were2, were forfeit once: And IIe that might the 'vantage best have took, Found out the remedy: How would you be, If He, which is the top of judgment, should 15 But judge you, as you are? O, think on that, And mercy then will breathe within your lips, Like man new made'.

Ang. Be you content, fair maid;

It is the law, not I, condemns your brother. 20 Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son, [row. It should be thus with him:-he must die to-inorIsub. To-morrow? Oh, that's sudden! Spare

him, spare him;

He's not prepar'd for death! Even for our kitchens 25 We kill the fowl, of season; shall we serve heaven With less respect than we do minister [you: To our gross selves? Good, good my lord, bethink Who is it that hath died for this offence? There's many have committed it. Lucio. Ay, well said.

30

[slept: Ang. The law hath not been dead, tho' it hath Those many had not dar'd to do that evil, If the first man, that did the edict infringe, Had answer'd for his deed: now, 'tis awake; 35 Takes note of what is done; and, like a prophet, Looks in a glass that shews what future evils, (Either now, or by remissness new-conceiv'd, And so in progress to be hatch'd and born) Are now to have no successive degrees, But, ere they live, to end.

[him, 40

Isub. Yes; I do think that you might pardon 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 touch'd with that remorse
As mine is to him?

Ang. He is sentenc'd; 'tis too late.
Lucio. You are too cold.

[To Isabel.
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,

Isab. Yet shew some pity.

Ang. I shew it most of all, when I shew justice; For then I pity those I do not know,

Which a dismiss'd offence would alter gall; 45 And do him right, that, answering one foul wrong, Lives not to act another, Be satisfy'd;

50

Your brother dies to-morrow; be content.

Isab. So you must be the first, that gives this senAnd he, that suffers: Oh, it is excell nt [tence; To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous, To use it like a giant.

Lucio. That's well said.

Isab. Could great men thunder

As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet, 55 For every pelting', petty officer [thunder.Would use his heaven for thunder; nothing but Merciful heaven!

If he had been as you, and you as he,
You would have slipt, like him; but he, like you, [66]

Thou rather with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak, l'han the soft myrtle: O, but man! proud man,

That is, pity. Perhaps we ought to read are. 'Meaning, perfect as the first man was, when he came from the hands of his Creator. 4 * This alludes to the fopperies of the beril, a ball of crystal much used at that time by cheats and fortune-tellers to predict by. Paltry, That is, knotted.

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(Drest in a little brief authority;

Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd,
His glassy essence,) like an angry ape,
Play's such fantastick tricks betore high heaven,
As make the angels weep; who, with our spleens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal'.

Lucio. Oh, to him, to him, wench; he will relent: He's coming; I perceive't.

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 cholerick word,| Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy.

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10

15

Lucio. Art advis'd o' that? more on't.
Aug. Why do you put these sayings upon me?
Isub. Because authority,though it err like others,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself,
That skins the vice o' the top: Go to your bosom ; 20
Knock there; and ask your heart, what it doth know
That's like my brother's fault: if it confess
A natural guiltiness, such as is his,

Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue
Against my brother's life.

Ang. [Aside.] She speaks, and 'tis

Such sense, that my sense breeds with it. [To Isab. Fare you well.

[row.

25

Isab. Gentle my lord, turn back.
Ang. I will bethink me:-Come again to-mor-30
Isab. Hark, how I'll bribe you: Good my lord,
Ang. How! bribe me?
[turn back.
Isab. Ay, with such gifts, that heaven shall share
Lucio. You had marr'd all else' [with you.
Isab. Not with fond shekels of the tested 'gold, 35
Or stones, whose rates are either rich or poor,
As fancy values them: but with true prayers,
That shall be up at heaven, and enter there,
Ere sun-rise; prayers from preserved souls',
From fasting maids, whose minds are dedicate
To nothing temporal.

Ang. Well; come to me to-morrow.
Lucio. Goto'; 'tis well; [Aside to Isabel.]away.
Isab. Heaven keep your honour safe!
Ang. Amen:

For I'am that way going to temptation, [Aside.
Where prayers cross'.

Isab. At what hour to-morrow

Shall I attend your lordship?
Ang. At any time 'fore noon.

Isab. Save your honour! [Ex. Lucio and Isab. Ang. From thee: even from thy virtue!What's this? what's this? Is this her fault or mine? The tempter, or the tempted, who sins most? Ha, Not she; nor doth she tempt; but it is 1,

That lying by the violet in the s sun,

Do as the carrion does, not as the flower,
Corrupt with virtuous season. Can it be,

That modesty may more betray our sense [nough,
Than woman's lightness? having waste ground e
Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary,

And pitch our evils there? Oh, fie, fie, fie!
What dost thou, or what art thou, Angelo?
Dost thou desire her foully, for those things
That make her good? Oh, let her brother live:
Thieves for their robbery have authority, [her,
When judges steal themselves. What?" do I love
That I desire to hear her speak again,

And feast upon her eyes? what is 't I dream on?
Oh, cunning enemy, that, to catch a saint,
With saints dost bait thy hook! Most dangerous
Is that temptation, that doth goad us on
To sin in loving virtue: never could the strumpet,
With all her double vigour, art and nature,
Once stir my temper; but this virtuous maid
Subdues me quite:--Ever, till now,

When men were fond, I smil'd, and wonder'd
how.
[Exit.

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Enter Duke, habited like a Friar, and Provost.
Duke. Hail to you, provost ! so I think you are.
Prov. I am the provost: What's your will,
good friar?
[order,

Duke. Bound by my charity, and my bless'd
come to visit the afflicted spirits
Here in the prison: do me the common right
To let me see them; and to make me know.
The nature of their crimes, that I may minister
To them accordingly.
[needful.

Proc. I would do more than that, if more were
Enter Juliet.

Look, here comes one; a gentlewoman of mine, 40Who falling in the flaws of her own youth,

145

50

Hath blister'd her report: She is with child; And he that got it, sentenc'd: a young man More fit to do another such offence,

Than die for this.

Duke. When must be die?

Proc. As I do think, to-morrow,

I have provided for you; stay a while, [To Juliet And you shall be conducted.

Duke. Repent you, fair one, of the sin you carry?
Juliet. Ido; and bear the shame most patiently.
Duke. I'll teach you how you shall arraign your
con-cience,

And try your penitence, if it be sound,
Or hollowly put on.

55

Julict. Pil'gladly learn.

Fond

4 That

Dr. Warburton supposes, that Shakspeare meant by spleen, that peculiar turn of the human mind, which always inclines it to a spiteful, unseasonable mirth; that had the angels that, they would laugh themselves out or their immortality, by indulging a passion which does not deserve that prerogative, The ancients thought, that immoderate laughter was caused by the bigness of the spleen. here means, valued or prized by folly. That is, cupelled, brought to the test, refined. is, preserved from the corruption of the world. Dr. Johnson thinks, that, instead of where we should read, which your prayers cross. The meaning of the passage will then be, The temptation under which, I labour is that which thou hast unknowingly thwarted with thy prayer. Perhaps it were better to djiames. That is, has distigured her fame or reputation.

read

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Duke.

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Ang. When I would pray and think, I think 30 [words;

and pray

[image
Their sawcy sweetness, that do coin heaven's
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.

[earth.

Isab. 'Tis set down so in heaven, but not in
Ang. Say you so? then I shall poze you quickly.
Which had you rather, that the most just law
Now took your brother's life; or, fo redeem him,
35 Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness,
As she that he hath stain'd?

Isab. Sir, believe this,

I had rather give my body than my soul. [sins
Ang. I talk not of your soul: Our compell'd
40 Stand more for number than for accompt.
Isab. How say you?

To several subjects: heaven hath my empty
Whilst my intention 2, hearing not my tongue,
Anchors on Isabel: Heaven is in my mouth,
As if I did but only chew its name;
And in my heart, the strong and swelling evil
Of my conception: The state, whereon I studied,
Is like a good thing, being often read,
Grown fear'd and tedious; yea, my gravity,
Wherein (let no man hear me) I take pride,
Could I, with boot, change for an idle plume
Which the air beats for vain. Oh place! oh form!
How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit,
Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wiser souls
To thy false seeming? Blood, thou art but blood; 45
Let's write good angel on the devil's horn,
'Tis not the devil's crest'.

Enter Sercant.

How now, who's there?

[speak
Ang. Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can
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?

Isab. Please you to do't,
I'll take it as a peril to my soul,

Serv. One Isabel, a sister, desires access to you. 50 It is no sin at all, but charity.

Ang. Teach her the way. [Solus.] Ohheavens!

Why does my blood thus muster to my heart,

Making both it unable for itself,

And dispossessing all my other parts

Of necessary fitness?

That is, repent not on this account.

Ang. Pleas'd you to do't, at peril of your soul, Were equal poize of sin and charity.

Isab. That I'do beg his life, if it be sin, Heaven, let me bear it! You granting of my suit, 55 If that be sin, I'll make it my morn prayer

Intention here signifies eagerness of desire. The old folio, however, reads invention, by which the poet might mean imagination. 3 Profit, advantage. 4 Case is here put for outside, or external shew. The meaning is, Let the most wicked thing have but a virtuous pretence, and it shall pass for innocent. Thus if we write good angel on the devil's horn, 'tis not taken any longer to be the devil's crest. "This phrase of the general, means the people or multitude subject to a king, &c. That is, saucy indulgence of the appetite. The sense of this passage is simply, that murder is as easy as fornication, and it is as improper to pardon the latter as the former.

Το

To have it added to the faults of mine,
And nothing of your, answer'.

Ang. Nay, but hear me;
[ignorant,
Your sense pursues not mine: either you are
Or seem so, crattily; and that's not good.

Isub. Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good,
But graciously to know I am no better.

Ang. 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 displayed.-But mark me; To be received plain, I'll speak more gross: Your brother is to die.

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Ang. 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 desir'd of such a person,
Whose credit with the judge, or own great place,]
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-binding law; and that there were

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20 By putting on the destin'd livery.

Isab. I have no tongue but one: gentle my lord,
Let me intreat you, speak the former language.
Ang. Plainly conceive, I love you.
Isab. My brother did love Juliet;

No earthly mean to save him, but that either 25 And you tell me, that he shall die for it.

You must lay down the treasures of your body
To this supposed, or else let him suffer;
What would you do?

Isab. As much for my poor brother, as myself:
That is, Were I under the terms of death,
The impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies,
And strip myself to death, as to a bed
That longing I have been sick for, ere I'd yield
My body up to shame.

Ang. Then must your brother die.
Isab. And 'twere the cheaper way:
Better it were, a brother dy'd at once,
Than that a sister, by redeeming him,
Should die for ever.

Ang. Were not you then as cruel as the sentence
That you have slander'd so?

Isab. Ignominy in ransom, and free pardon,
Are of two houses: lawful mercy
Is nothing kin to foul redemption.

30

Ang. He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love.
Isab. I know your virtue hath a licence in't,
Which seems a little fouler than it is,
To pluck on others.

Ang. Believe me, on mine honour,
My words express my purpose.

Isab. Ha! little honour to be much believ❜d, And most pernicious purpose!-Seeming, seeming 10!

35I will proclaim thee, Angelo; look for’t:
Sign me a present pardon for my brother,
Or, with an out-stretch'd throat, I'll tell the world
Aloud, what man thou art.

Ang. Who will believe thee, Isabel?

40 My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life,
My vouch" against you, and my place i' the state,
Will so your accusation over-weigh,
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 appetite;
Lay by all nicety, and prolixious blushes, [ther
That banish what they sue for; redeem thy bro-
By yielding up thy body to my will;

[rant ;
Ang. You seem'd of late to make the law a ty-45
And rather prov'd the sliding of your brother
A merriment than a vice.

Isab. 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.

50 Or else he must not only die the death,
But thy unkindness shall his death draw ont
To lingering sufferance: answer me to-morrow,

5

2

Meaning, the faults of mine answer are the faults which I am to answer for. That is, a beauty covered as with a shield. These masks probably mean, the masks of the audience. Puin here means penalty, punishment. To subscribe, here signifies, to agree to. Dr. Warburton observes, this passage is so obscure, but the allusion so fine, that it deserves to be explained. A feodary was one who in the times of vassalage held lands of the chief lord, under the tenure of paying rent and service: which tenures were call'd feuda amongst the Goths. Now, says Angelo, "we are all frail." "Yes", replies Isabella; "if all mankind were not feodaries, who owe what they are to this tenure of imbecility, and who succeed each other by the same tenure, as well as my brother, I would give him up." The comparing mankind, lying under the weight of original sin, to a feodury, who owes suit and service to his lord, is, I think, not ill imagined. Το awe, in this place, signiles to own, to have possession. Perhaps we should read, take forms• That is, in imitating them. That is, take any impres gion. That is, Hypocrisy, hypocrisy. "Fouch is the testimony one man bears for another.

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Or,

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