Complete Plays, The (362 page)

Escalus

My lord, we’ll do it throughly.

Exit Duke

Signior Lucio, did not you say you knew that
Friar Lodowick to be a dishonest person?

Lucio

‘Cucullus non facit monachum:’ honest in nothing but in his clothes; and one that hath spoke most villanous speeches of the duke.

Escalus

We shall entreat you to abide here till he come and enforce them against him: we shall find this friar a notable fellow.

Lucio

As any in Vienna, on my word.

Escalus

Call that same Isabel here once again; I would speak with her.

Exit an Attendant

Pray you, my lord, give me leave to question; you shall see how I’ll handle her.

Lucio

Not better than he, by her own report.

Escalus

Say you?

Lucio

Marry, sir, I think, if you handled her privately, she would sooner confess: perchance, publicly, she’ll be ashamed.

Escalus

I will go darkly to work with her.

Lucio

That’s the way; for women are light at midnight.

Re-enter Officers with Isabella; and Provost with the Duke Vincentio in his friar’s habit

Escalus

Come on, mistress: here’s a gentlewoman denies all that you have said.

Lucio

My lord, here comes the rascal I spoke of; here with the provost.

Escalus

In very good time: speak not you to him till we call upon you.

Lucio

Mum.

Escalus

Come, sir: did you set these women on to slander
Lord Angelo? they have confessed you did.

Duke Vincentio

’Tis false.

Escalus

How! know you where you are?

Duke Vincentio

Respect to your great place! and let the devil
Be sometime honour’d for his burning throne!
Where is the duke? ’tis he should hear me speak.

Escalus

The duke’s in us; and we will hear you speak:
Look you speak justly.

Duke Vincentio

Boldly, at least. But, O, poor souls,
Come you to seek the lamb here of the fox?
Good night to your redress! Is the duke gone?
Then is your cause gone too. The duke’s unjust,
Thus to retort your manifest appeal,
And put your trial in the villain’s mouth
Which here you come to accuse.

Lucio

This is the rascal; this is he I spoke of.

Escalus

Why, thou unreverend and unhallow’d friar,
Is’t not enough thou hast suborn’d these women
To accuse this worthy man, but, in foul mouth
And in the witness of his proper ear,
To call him villain? and then to glance from him
To the duke himself, to tax him with injustice?
Take him hence; to the rack with him! We’ll touse you
Joint by joint, but we will know his purpose.
What ’unjust’!

Duke Vincentio

   
Be not so hot; the duke
Dare no more stretch this finger of mine than he
Dare rack his own: his subject am I not,
Nor here provincial. My business in this state
Made me a looker on here in Vienna,
Where I have seen corruption boil and bubble
Till it o’er-run the stew; laws for all faults,
But faults so countenanced, that the strong statutes
Stand like the forfeits in a barber’s shop,
As much in mock as mark.

Escalus

Slander to the state! Away with him to prison!

Angelo

What can you vouch against him, Signior Lucio?
Is this the man that you did tell us of?

Lucio

’Tis he, my lord. Come hither, goodman baldpate: do you know me?

Duke Vincentio

I remember you, sir, by the sound of your voice: I met you at the prison, in the absence of the duke.

Lucio

O, did you so? And do you remember what you said of the duke?

Duke Vincentio

Most notedly, sir.

Lucio

Do you so, sir? And was the duke a fleshmonger, a fool, and a coward, as you then reported him to be?

Duke Vincentio

You must, sir, change persons with me, ere you make that my report: you, indeed, spoke so of him; and much more, much worse.

Lucio

O thou damnable fellow! Did not I pluck thee by the nose for thy speeches?

Duke Vincentio

I protest I love the duke as I love myself.

Angelo

Hark, how the villain would close now, after his treasonable abuses!

Escalus

Such a fellow is not to be talked withal. Away with him to prison! Where is the provost? Away with him to prison! lay bolts enough upon him: let him speak no more. Away with those giglots too, and with the other confederate companion!

Duke Vincentio

[To Provost]
 
Stay, sir; stay awhile.

Angelo

What, resists he? Help him, Lucio.

Lucio

Come, sir; come, sir; come, sir; foh, sir! Why, you bald-pated, lying rascal, you must be hooded, must you? Show your knave’s visage, with a pox to you! show your sheep-biting face, and be hanged an hour! Will’t not off?

Pulls off the friar’s hood, and discovers Duke Vincentio

Duke Vincentio

Thou art the first knave that e’er madest a duke.
First, provost, let me bail these gentle three.

To Lucio

Sneak not away, sir; for the friar and you
Must have a word anon. Lay hold on him.

Lucio

This may prove worse than hanging.

Duke Vincentio

[To Escalus]
 
What you have spoke I pardon: sit you down:
We’ll borrow place of him.

To Angelo

Sir, by your leave.
Hast thou or word, or wit, or impudence,
That yet can do thee office? If thou hast,
Rely upon it till my tale be heard,
And hold no longer out.

Angelo

O my dread lord,
I should be guiltier than my guiltiness,
To think I can be undiscernible,
When I perceive your grace, like power divine,
Hath look’d upon my passes. Then, good prince,
No longer session hold upon my shame,
But let my trial be mine own confession:
Immediate sentence then and sequent death
Is all the grace I beg.

Duke Vincentio

Come hither, Mariana.
Say, wast thou e’er contracted to this woman?

Angelo

I was, my lord.

Duke Vincentio

Go take her hence, and marry her instantly.
Do you the office, friar; which consummate,
Return him here again. Go with him, provost.

Exeunt Angelo, Mariana, Friar Peter and Provost

Escalus

My lord, I am more amazed at his dishonour
Than at the strangeness of it.

Duke Vincentio

Come hither, Isabel.
Your friar is now your prince: as I was then
Advertising and holy to your business,
Not changing heart with habit, I am still
Attorney’d at your service.

Isabella

O, give me pardon,
That I, your vassal, have employ’d and pain’d
Your unknown sovereignty!

Duke Vincentio

You are pardon’d, Isabel:
And now, dear maid, be you as free to us.
Your brother’s death, I know, sits at your heart;
And you may marvel why I obscured myself,
Labouring to save his life, and would not rather
Make rash remonstrance of my hidden power
Than let him so be lost. O most kind maid,
It was the swift celerity of his death,
Which I did think with slower foot came on,
That brain’d my purpose. But, peace be with him!
That life is better life, past fearing death,
Than that which lives to fear: make it your comfort,
So happy is your brother.

Isabella

I do, my lord.

Re-enter Angelo, Mariana, Friar Peter, and Provost

Duke Vincentio

For this new-married man approaching here,
Whose salt imagination yet hath wrong’d
Your well defended honour, you must pardon
For Mariana’s sake: but as he adjudged your brother,—
Being criminal, in double violation
Of sacred chastity and of promise-breach
Thereon dependent, for your brother’s life,—
The very mercy of the law cries out
Most audible, even from his proper tongue,
‘An Angelo for Claudio, death for death!’
Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers leisure;
Like doth quit like, and Measure still For Measure.
Then, Angelo, thy fault’s thus manifested;
Which, though thou wouldst deny, denies thee vantage.
We do condemn thee to the very block
Where Claudio stoop’d to death, and with like haste.
Away with him!

Mariana

   
O my most gracious lord,
I hope you will not mock me with a husband.

Duke Vincentio

It is your husband mock’d you with a husband.
Consenting to the safeguard of your honour,
I thought your marriage fit; else imputation,
For that he knew you, might reproach your life
And choke your good to come; for his possessions,
Although by confiscation they are ours,
We do instate and widow you withal,
To buy you a better husband.

Mariana

O my dear lord,
I crave no other, nor no better man.

Duke Vincentio

Never crave him; we are definitive.

Mariana

Gentle my liege,—

Kneeling

Duke Vincentio

   
You do but lose your labour.
Away with him to death!

To Lucio

Now, sir, to you.

Mariana

O my good lord! Sweet Isabel, take my part;
Lend me your knees, and all my life to come
I’ll lend you all my life to do you service.

Duke Vincentio

Against all sense you do importune her:
Should she kneel down in mercy of this fact,
Her brother’s ghost his paved bed would break,
And take her hence in horror.

Mariana

Isabel,
Sweet Isabel, do yet but kneel by me;
Hold up your hands, say nothing; I’ll speak all.
They say, best men are moulded out of faults;
And, for the most, become much more the better
For being a little bad: so may my husband.
O Isabel, will you not lend a knee?

Duke Vincentio

He dies for Claudio’s death.

Isabella

Most bounteous sir,

Kneeling

Look, if it please you, on this man condemn’d,
As if my brother lived: I partly think
A due sincerity govern’d his deeds,
Till he did look on me: since it is so,
Let him not die. My brother had but justice,
In that he did the thing for which he died:
For Angelo,
His act did not o’ertake his bad intent,
And must be buried but as an intent
That perish’d by the way: thoughts are no subjects;
Intents but merely thoughts.

Mariana

Merely, my lord.

Duke Vincentio

Your suit’s unprofitable; stand up, I say.
I have bethought me of another fault.
Provost, how came it Claudio was beheaded
At an unusual hour?

Provost

It was commanded so.

Duke Vincentio

Had you a special warrant for the deed?

Provost

No, my good lord; it was by private message.

Duke Vincentio

For which I do discharge you of your office:
Give up your keys.

Provost

   
Pardon me, noble lord:
I thought it was a fault, but knew it not;
Yet did repent me, after more advice;
For testimony whereof, one in the prison,
That should by private order else have died,
I have reserved alive.

Duke Vincentio

What’s he?

Provost

His name is Barnardine.

Duke Vincentio

I would thou hadst done so by Claudio.
Go fetch him hither; let me look upon him.

Exit Provost

Escalus

I am sorry, one so learned and so wise
As you, Lord Angelo, have still appear’d,
Should slip so grossly, both in the heat of blood.
And lack of temper’d judgment afterward.

Angelo

I am sorry that such sorrow I procure:
And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart
That I crave death more willingly than mercy;
’Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it.

Re-enter Provost, with Barnardine, Claudio muffled, and Juliet

Duke Vincentio

Which is that Barnardine?

Provost

This, my lord.

Duke Vincentio

There was a friar told me of this man.
Sirrah, thou art said to have a stubborn soul.
That apprehends no further than this world,
And squarest thy life according. Thou’rt condemn’d:
But, for those earthly faults, I quit them all;
And pray thee take this mercy to provide
For better times to come. Friar, advise him;
I leave him to your hand. What muffled fellow’s that?

Provost

This is another prisoner that I saved.
Who should have died when Claudio lost his head;
As like almost to Claudio as himself.

Unmuffles Claudio

Duke Vincentio

[To Isabella]
 
If he be like your brother, for his sake
Is he pardon’d; and, for your lovely sake,
Give me your hand and say you will be mine.
He is my brother too: but fitter time for that.
By this Lord Angelo perceives he’s safe;
Methinks I see a quickening in his eye.
Well, Angelo, your evil quits you well:
Look that you love your wife; her worth worth yours.
I find an apt remission in myself;
And yet here’s one in place I cannot pardon.

To Lucio

You, sirrah, that knew me for a fool, a coward,
One all of luxury, an ass, a madman;
Wherein have I so deserved of you,
That you extol me thus?

Lucio

’Faith, my lord. I spoke it but according to the trick. If you will hang me for it, you may; but I had rather it would please you I might be whipt.