Than the soft myrtle:-But man, proud man!
Drest in a little brief authority:

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

Lucio. O, to him, to him, wench: he will reHe's coming, I perceive 't.

Prov.

[lent;

'Pray heaven, she win him! Isab. We cannot weigh our brother with our

self: 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.

Lucio. Art advis'd o' that? more on 't.
Ang. Why do you put these sayings upon me?
Isab. 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; 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.

She speaks, and 'tis

Such sense, that my sense breeds with it.-Fare you well.

Isab. Gentle my lord, turn back.

Ang. I will bethink me:-Come again to-mor

row.

Isab. Hark, how I'll bribe you: Good my lord, turn back.

Ang. How! bribe me?

Isab. Ay, with such gifts, that heaven shall share with you.

Lucio. You had marr'd all else.

Isab. Not with fond shekels of the tested gold, 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

[Aside to ISABEL.

Amen;

Isab. Heaven keep your honour safe!

Ang.

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

At what hour to-morrow

Isab.
Shall I attend your lordship?
Ang.

At any time 'fore noon.

Isab. Save your honour!

[Exeunt LUCIO, ISABELLA, and Provost. 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 I,
That lying by the violet, in the sun,

Do, as the carrion does, not as the flower,
Corrupt with virtuous season. Can it be,
That modesty may more betray our sense
Than woman's lightness? Having waste ground
enough,

Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary,
And pitch our evils there? O, fy, fy, fy!
What dost thou? or, what art thou, Angelo?
Dost thou desire her foully, for those things
That make her good? O, let her brother live:
Thieves for their robbery have authority,
When judges steal themselves. What? do I love
her,

That I desire to hear her speak again,
And feast upon her eyes? What is 't I dream on?
O 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.

SCENE III. A Room in a Prison.

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?

Duke. Bound by my charity, and my bless'd order,

I 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.

Prov. I would do more than that, if more were needful.

Enter JULIET.

Look, here comes one; a gentlewoman of mine, Who falling in the flames of her own youth, 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 he die?

Prov. As I do think, to-morrow.

I have provided for you; stay a while,

And you shall be conducted.

[To JULIET.

Duke. Repent you, fair one, of the sin you carry?

Juliet. I do; and bear the shame most patiently. Duke. I'll teach you how you shall arraign your conscience,

And try your penitence, if it be sound,

Or hollowly put on.

Juliet.

I'll gladly learn.

Duke. Love you the man that wrong'd you? Juliet. Yes, as I love the woman that wrong'd him.

Duke. So then, it seems, your most offenceful

act

Mutually.

Duke. Then was your sin of heavier kind than

his.

Juliet. I do confess it, and repent it, father.

Duke. 'Tis meet so, daughter: But lest you do

repent,

As that the sin hath brought you to this shame,Which sorrow is always toward ourselves, not heaven;

Showing, we'd not spare heaven as we love it, But as we stand in fear,

Juliet. I do repent me, as it is an evil; And take the shame with joy.

Duke.

There rest.

Your partner, as I hear, must die to-morrow, And I am going with instruction to him.Grace go with you! Benedicite!

[Exit. Juliet. Must die to-morrow! O, injurious love, That respites me a life, whose very comfort Is still a dying horror!

Prov.

'Tis pity of him.

[Exeunt.

SCENE IV. A Room in Angelo's House.

Enter ANGELO.

Ang. When I would pray and think, I think

and pray [words; To several subjects: heaven hath my empty Whilst my invention, hearing not my tongue, Anchors on Isabel: Heaven in my mouth, As if I did but only chew his 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. O place! O 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 still art blood!
Let's write good angel on the devil's horn,
'Tis not the devil's crest.

O heavens !

Why does my blood thus muster to my heart; Making both it unable for itself,

And dispossessing all the other parts

Of necessary fitness?

So play the foolish throngs with one that swoons;
Come all to help him, and so stop the air
By which he should revive and even so
The general, subject to a well-wish'd king,
Quit their own part, and in obsequious fondness
Crowd to his presence, where their untaught love
Must needs appear offence.

Enter ISABELLA.

How now, fair maid?

Isab. 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.

Isab. Even so?-Heaven keep your honour! [Retiring. Ang. Yet may he live awhile; and it may be, As long as you, or I: Yet he must die. Isab, Under your sentence?

Ang. Yea.

Isab. When, I beseech you? that in his reprieve,

Longer, or shorter, he may be so fitted,
That his soul sicken not.

Ang. Ha! Fye, these filthy vices! It were as good

To pardon him, that hath from nature stolen A man already made, as to remit

Their saucy sweetness, that do coin heaven's image

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 pose you quickly. Which had you rather, That the most just law Now took your brother's life; or, to redeem him, Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness, As she that he hath stain'd?