How often doft thou with thy cafe, thy habit,
Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wifer fouls
To thy false seeming? blood, thou art but blood:
" Let's write good angel on the devil's horn;
Tis not the devil's creft.

Enter Servant.

How now, who's there?

Serv. One Ifabel, a fifter, defires access to you. Ang. Teach her the way. Oh heav'ns! Why does my blood thus mufter to my heart, Making both That unable for itself,

And difpoffeffing all my other parts

Of neceffary fitnefs?

So play the foolish throngs with one that fwoons;
Come all to help him, and fo ftop the air
By which he should revive and even fo
The gen'ral fubjects to a well-wifht King
Quit their own part, and in obfequious fondness
Crowd to his prefence, where their untaught love
Muft needs appear offence. How now, fair maid?

8 Let's write good angel on the devil's horn;

'Tis not the devil's creft.] i. e. Let the most wicked thing have but a virtuous pretence, and it fhall pafs for innocent. This was his conclufion from his preceeding words,

ob form!

How often doft thou with thy cafe, thy habit,
Wrench awe from fools, and tie the wifer fouls

To thy falfe feeming?

But the Oxford Editor makes him conclude juft counter to his own premifes; by altering it to,

Is't not the devil's creft.

So that, according to this alteration, the reafoning ftands thus.Falfe feeming wrenches awe from fools, and deceives the wife. Therefore, Let us but write good angel on the devil's born; (i. e. give him the appearance of an angel;) and what then? Is't not the devil's creft? (i. e. he fhall be esteem'd a devil.)

S CE EN E

XI.

Enter Ifabella.

Ifab. I am come to know your pleasure.

Ang. That you might know it, would much better please me,

Than to demand, what 'tis. Your brother cannot live. Ifab. Ev'n fo?-Heaven keep your Honour !

[Going. Ang. Yet may he live a while; and, it may be, As long as you or I; yet he must die. Ifab. Under your fentence?

Ang. Yea.

Ifab. When, I befeech you? that in his reprieve, Longer or fhorter, he may be fo fitted,

That his foul ficken not.

Ang. Ha? fie, these filthy vices! 'twere as good
To pardon him, that hath from nature stol❜n
A man already made, as to remit

Their fawcy fweetness, that do coin heav'n's image
In stamps that are forbid : 9 'tis all as eafie,
Falfely to take away a life true made;

As to put metal in reftrained means,

To make a falfe one.

Ifab. 'Tis fet down fo in heav'n, but not in earth. Ang. And fay you fo? then I fhall poze you quickly.

Which had you rather, that the most just law
Now took your brother's life; or, to redeem him,

9 'tis all as eafie, ] Eafie is here put for light or trifling. 'Tis, fays he, as light or trifling a crime to do fo, as fo, &c. Which the Oxford Editor not apprehending, has alter'd it to juft; for 'is much easier to conceive what Shakespear fhould fay, than what he does fay. So just before, the poet faid, with his ufual licence, their fawcy fweetness, for fawry indulgence of the appetite. And this, forfooth, must be changed to farvey lewdness, tho' the epithet confines us, as it were, to the poet's word.

L

Give up your body to fuch fweet uncleanness,
As fhe, that he hath ftain'd?

Ifab. Sir, believe this,

I had rather give my body than my foul.

Ang. I talk not of your foul; our compell'd fins Stand more for number than accompt.

Ifab. How fay you?

Ang. Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can fpeak Against the thing I fay. 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 fin,
To fave this brother's life?

Ifab. Please you to do't,

I'll take it as a peril to my foul,
It is no fin at all, but charity.

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

Ifab. That I do beg his life, if it be fin,
Heav'n, let me bear it! you, granting my fuit,
If that be fin, I'll make it my morn-pray'r
To have it added to the faults of mine,
And nothing of your answer.

Ang. Nay, but hear me :

Your fenfe purfues not mine: either, you're ignorant; Or feem fo, craftily; and that's not good.

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

Ang. Thus wifdom wishes to appear most bright, When it doth tax itself: as these black masks, Proclaim an en-fhield beauty ten times louder, Than beauty could difplay'd. But mark me, To be received plain, I'll fpeak more grofs; Your brother is to die.

Ifab. So.

Ang. And his offence is fo, as it appears Accountant to the law upon that pain.

Ifab. True.

Ang. Admit no other way to fave his life.
(As I fubfcribe not that, nor any other,
But in the lofs of queftion,) that you his fifter,
Finding yourself defir'd of fuch a perfon,
Whole credit with the judge, or own great place,
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-holding law; and that there were
No earthly mean to fave him, but that either
You must lay down the treafures of your body
To this fuppos'd, or elfe to let him fuffer;
What would you do?

Ifab. As much for my poor brother, as myself:
That is, were I under the terms of death,
Th' impreffion of keen whips I'd wear as rubies,
And ftrip myself to death, as to a bed
That longing I've been fick for, ere I'd yield
My body up to shame.

Ang. Then muft your brother die.
Ifab. And 'twere the cheaper way;
Better it were, a brother dy'd at once;
Than that a fifter, by redeeming him,
Should die for ever.

Ang. Were not you then as cruel as the fentence, That you have flander'd fo?

Ifab. As ignominious ranfom, and free pardon, Are of two houfes; lawful mercy, fure,

Is nothing kin to foul redemption.

Ang. You feem'd of late to make the law a tyrant, And rather prov'd the fliding of your brother

A merriment, than a vice.

Ifab. Oh pardon me, my lord; it oft falls out, To have what we would have, we speak not what we

mean:

I fomething do excufe the thing I hate,

For his advantage that I dearly love.

Ang.

Ifab. Elfe let my brother die.
If not a feodary, but only he,
Owe, and fucceed by weakness!
Ang. Nay, women are frail too.

[felves;

Ifab. Ay, as the glaffes where they view themWhich are as eafy broke, as they make forms. Women! Help heav'n; men their creation mar, In profiting by them: nay, call us ten times frail; For we are foft as our complexions are, • And credulous to falfe prints.

Ang. I think it well;

And from this teftimony of your own sex,
(Since I fuppofe we're made to be no ftronger,
Than faults may shake our frames) let me be bold;
I do arreft your words: be That you are,

That is, a woman; if you're more, you're none.
you be one, as you are well exprefs'd

If

By all external warrants, fhew it now,

By putting on the deftin'd livery.

Ijab. I have no tongue but one; gentle, my lord, Let me intreat you, fpeak the formal language. Ang. Plainly conceive, 'I love you.

Ifab. My brother did love Juliet;

And you tell me, that he shall die for it.

1 Elfe let my brother die,

66

If not a feodary, but only be, &c.] This is fo obfcure, but the allufion fo fine, that it deferves to be explain'd. A feodary was one, that in the times of vaffalage held lands of the chief lord, under the tenure of paying rent and fervice: which tenures were call'd feuda amongst the Goths. Now, fays Angelo, we are all frail; yes, re"plies fabella; if all mankind were not feodaries, who owe what they are to this tenure of imbecillity, and who fucceed each other "by the fame tenure, as well as my brother, I would give him up." The comparing mankind, lying under the weight of original fin, to a feodary, who owes fuit and fervice to his lord, is, I think, not ill imagined.

2 And credulous to false prints.] i. e. take any impression.

-Speak the FORMER language.] We should read FORMAL, 'which he here ufes for plain, direct.

VOL. I.

Ang