Act IIIScene I
A room in the prison
Enter Duke, Claudio and Provost.
Duke
So then you hope of pardon from Lord Angelo?
Claudio
The miserable have no other medicineBut only hope.I have hope to live, and am prepared to die.
Duke
Be absolute for death. Either death or lifeShall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with life:If I do lose thee, I do lose a thingThat none but fools would keep. A breath thou art,Servile to all the skyey influencesThat dost this habitation where thou keep’stHourly afflict. Merely, thou art death’s fool;For him thou labour’st by thy flight to shun,And yet runn’st toward him still. Thou art not noble;For all th’ accommodations that thou bear’stAre nursed by baseness. Thou’rt by no means valiant;For thou dost fear the soft and tender forkOf a poor worm. Thy best of rest is sleep,And that thou oft provok’st, yet grossly fear’stThy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself;For thou exists on many a thousand grainsThat issue out of dust. Happy thou art not;For what thou hast not, still thou striv’st to get,And what thou hast, forget’st. Thou art not certain;For thy complexion shifts to strange effectsAfter the moon. If thou art rich, thou’rt poor;For, like an ass whose back with ingots bows,Thou bear’st thy heavy riches but a journey,And death unloads thee. Friend hast thou none;For thine own bowels which do call thee sire,The mere effusion of thy proper loins,Do curse the gout, serpigo, and the rheumFor ending thee no sooner. Thou hast nor youth nor age,But as it were an after-dinner’s sleepDreaming on both; for all thy blessed youthBecomes as aged, and doth beg the almsOf palsied eld; and when thou art old and rich,Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beautyTo make thy riches pleasant. What’s yet in thisThat bears the name of life? Yet in this lifeLie hid more thousand deaths; yet death we fear,That makes these odds all even.
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
Within.
What ho! Peace here; grace and good company!
Provost
Who’s there? Come in. The wish deserves a welcome.
Duke
Dear sir, ere long I’ll visit you again.
Claudio
Most holy sir, I thank you.
Enter Isabella.
Isabella
My business is a word or two with Claudio.
Provost
And very welcome. Look, signior, here’s your sister.
Duke
Provost, a word with you.
Provost
As many as you please.
Duke
Bring me to hear them speak, where I may be concealed.
Exeunt Duke and Provost.
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;Tomorrow 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 respectThan a perpetual honour. Dar’st thou die?The sense of death is most in apprehension;And the poor beetle that we tread uponIn corporal sufferance finds a pang as greatAs when a giant dies.
Claudio
Why give you me this shame?Think you I can a resolution fetchFrom flowery tenderness? If I must die,I will encounter darkness as a brideAnd hug it in mine arms.
Isabella
There spake my brother! There my father’s graveDid utter forth a voice. Yes, thou must die.Thou art too noble to conserve a lifeIn base appliances. This outward-sainted deputy,Whose settled visage and deliberate wordNips youth i’ th’ head, and follies doth enewAs falcon doth the fowl, is yet a devil.His filth within being cast, he would appearA pond as deep as hell.
Claudio
The precise Angelo?
Isabella
O, ’tis the cunning livery of hellThe damned’st body to invest and coverIn precise guards! Dost thou think, Claudio,If I would yield him my virginityThou mightst be freed?
Claudio
O heavens, it cannot be.
Isabella
Yes, he would give it thee, from this rank offence,So to offend him still. This night’s the timeThat I should do what I abhor to name,Or else thou diest tomorrow.
Claudio
Thou shalt not do’t.
Isabella
O, were it but my life,I’d throw it down for your deliveranceAs frankly as a pin.
Claudio
Thanks, dear Isabel.
Isabella
Be ready, Claudio, for your death tomorrow.
Claudio
Yes. Has he affections in himThat thus can make him bite the law by th’ noseWhen 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 trickBe 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 becomeA kneaded clod; and the delighted spiritTo bathe in fiery floods, or to resideIn thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice;To be imprisoned in the viewless windsAnd blown with restless violence round aboutThe pendent world; or to be worse than worstOf those that lawless and incertain thoughtImagine howling—’tis too horrible.The weariest and most loathed worldly lifeThat age, ache, penury, and imprisonmentCan lay on nature is a paradiseTo what we fear of death.
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 farThat 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 lifeFrom thine own sister’s shame? What should I think?Heaven shield my mother played my father fair,For such a warped slip of wildernessNe’er issued from his blood. Take my defiance,Die, perish! Might but my bending downReprieve thee from thy fate, it should proceed.I’ll pray a thousand prayers for thy death,No word to save thee.
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 that thou diest quickly.
Going.
Claudio
O, hear me, Isabella.
Enter Duke as a Friar.
Duke
Vouchsafe a word, young sister, but one word.
Isabella
What is your will?
Duke
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.
Isabella
I have no superfluous leisure, my stay must be stolen out of other affairs, but I will attend you a while.
Duke
To Claudio aside.
Son, I have overheard what hath passed between you and your sister. Angelo had never the purpose to corrupt her; only he hath made an assay of her virtue, to practise his judgement with the disposition of natures. She, having the truth of honour in her, hath made him that gracious denial which he is most glad to receive. I am confessor to Angelo, and I know this to be true; therefore prepare yourself to death. Do not satisfy your resolution with hopes that are fallible. Tomorrow you must die; go to your knees and make ready.
Claudio
Let me ask my sister pardon. I am so out of love with life that I will sue to be rid of it.
Duke
Hold you there. Farewell.
Exit Claudio.
Enter Provost.
Provost, a word with you.
Provost
What’s your will, father?
Duke
That, now you are come, you will be gone. Leave me a while with the maid; my mind promises with my habit no loss shall touch her by my company.
Provost
In good time.
Exit Provost.
Duke
The hand that hath made you fair hath made you good. The goodness that is cheap in beauty makes beauty brief in goodness; but grace, being the soul of your complexion, shall keep the body of it ever fair. The assault that Angelo hath made to you, fortune hath conveyed to my understanding; and, but that frailty hath examples for his falling, I should wonder at Angelo. How will you do to content this substitute, and to save your brother?
Isabella
I am now going to resolve him. I had rather my brother die by the law than my son should be unlawfully born. But, O, how much is the good Duke deceived in Angelo! If ever he return, and I can speak to him, I will open my lips in vain, or discover his government.
Duke
That shall not be much amiss. Yet, as the matter now stands, he will avoid your accusation: he made trial of you only. Therefore fasten your ear on my advisings, to the love I have in doing good, a remedy presents itself. I do make myself believe that you may most uprighteously do a poor wronged lady a merited benefit; redeem your brother from the angry law; do no stain to your own gracious person; and much please the absent Duke, if peradventure he shall ever return to have hearing of this business.
Isabella
Let me hear you speak farther. I have spirit to do anything that appears not foul in the truth of my spirit.
Duke
Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful. Have you not heard speak of Mariana, the sister of Frederick, the great soldier who miscarried at sea?
Isabella
I have heard of the lady, and good words went with her name.
Duke
She should this Angelo have married, was affianced to her oath, and the nuptial appointed. Between which time of the contract and limit of the solemnity, her brother Frederick was wrecked at sea, having in that perished vessel the dowry of his sister. But mark how heavily this befell to the poor gentlewoman. There she lost a noble and renowned brother, in his love toward her ever most kind and natural; with him, the portion and sinew of her fortune, her marriage dowry; with both, her combinate husband, this well-seeming Angelo.
Isabella
Can this be so? Did Angelo so leave her?
Duke
Left her in her tears, and dried not one of them with his comfort, swallowed his vows whole, pretending in her discoveries of dishonour; in few, bestowed her on her own lamentation, which she yet wears for his sake; and he, a marble to her tears, is washed with them, but relents not.
Isabella
What a merit were it in death to take this poor maid from the world! What corruption in this life, that it will let this man live! But how out of this can she avail?
Duke
It is a rupture that you may easily heal, and the cure of it not only saves your brother, but keeps you from dishonour in doing it.
Isabella
Show me how, good father.
Duke
This forenamed maid hath yet in her the continuance of her first affection. His unjust unkindness, that in all reason should have quenched her love, hath, like an impediment in the current, made it more violent and unruly. Go you to Angelo; answer his requiring with a plausible obedience; agree with his demands to the point. Only refer yourself to this advantage: first, that your stay with him may not be long; that the time may have all shadow and silence in it; and the place answer to convenience. This being granted in course, and now follows all. We shall advise this wronged maid to stead up your appointment, go in your place. If the encounter acknowledge itself hereafter, it may compel him to her recompense; and here, by this, is your brother saved, your honour untainted, the poor Mariana advantaged, and the corrupt deputy scaled. The maid will I frame and make fit for his attempt. If you think well to carry this as you may, the doubleness of the benefit defends the deceit from reproof. What think you of it?
Isabella
The image of it gives me content already, and I trust it will grow to a most prosperous perfection.
Duke
It lies much in your holding up. Haste you speedily to Angelo; if for this night he entreat you to his bed, give him promise of satisfaction. I will presently to Saint Luke’s; there at the moated grange resides this dejected Mariana. At that place call upon me; and dispatch with Angelo, that it may be quickly.
Isabella
I thank you for this comfort. Fare you well, good father.
Exit Isabella.