Measure for Measure | Page 7

Who is't that calls?
[Enter LUCIO.]
LUCIO. Hail, virgin, if you be; as those cheek-roses Proclaim you are
no less! Can you so stead me As bring me to the sight of Isabella, A
novice of this place, and the fair sister To her unhappy brother Claudio?
ISABELLA. Why her unhappy brother? let me ask; The rather, for I
now must make you know I am that Isabella, and his sister.
LUCIO. Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets you: Not to be
weary with you, he's in prison.
ISABELLA. Woe me! For what?
LUCIO. For that which, if myself might be his judge, He should
receive his punishment in thanks: He hath got his friend with child.
ISABELLA. Sir, make me not your story.
LUCIO. It is true. I would not--though 'tis my familiar sin With maids
to seem the lapwing, and to jest, Tongue far from heart--play with all
virgins so: I hold you as a thing ensky'd and sainted; By your
renouncement an immortal spirit; And to be talk'd with in sincerity, As

with a saint.
ISABELLA. You do blaspheme the good in mocking me.
LUCIO. Do not believe it. Fewness and truth, 'tis thus: Your brother
and his lover have embraced: As those that feed grow full: as
blossoming time, That from the seedness the bare fallow brings To
teeming foison; even so her plenteous womb Expresseth his full tilth
and husbandry.
ISABELLA. Some one with child by him?--My cousin Juliet?
LUCIO. Is she your cousin?
ISABELLA. Adoptedly, as school-maids change their names By vain
though apt affection.
LUCIO. She it is.
ISABELLA. O, let him marry her!
LUCIO. This is the point. The duke is very strangely gone from hence;
Bore many gentlemen, myself being one, In hand, and hope of action:
but we do learn By those that know the very nerves of state, His
givings out were of an infinite distance From his true-meant design.
Upon his place, And with full line of his authority, Governs Lord
Angelo: a man whose blood Is very snow-broth; one who never feels
The wanton stings and motions of the sense. But doth rebate and blunt
his natural edge With profits of the mind, study, and fast. He,--to give
fear to use and liberty, Which have for long run by the hideous law, As
mice by lions,--hath pick'd out an act, Under whose heavy sense your
brother's life Falls into forfeit: he arrests him on it; And follows close
the rigour of the statute To make him an example; all hope is gone.
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer To soften Angelo: and
that's my pith Of business 'twixt you and your poor brother.
ISABELLA. Doth he so seek his life?
LUCIO. Has censur'd him Already; and, as I hear, the provost hath A
warrant for his execution.
ISABELLA. Alas! what poor ability's in me To do him good.
LUCIO. Assay the power you have.
ISABELLA. My power! alas, I doubt,--
LUCIO. Our doubts are traitors, And make us lose the good we oft
might win By fearing to attempt. Go to Lord Angelo, And let him learn
to know, when maidens sue, Men give like gods; but when they weep
and kneel, All their petitions are as freely theirs As they themselves

would owe them.
ISABELLA. I'll see what I can do.
LUCIO. But speedily.
ISABELLA. I will about it straight; No longer staying but to give the
Mother Notice of my affair. I humbly thank you: Commend me to my
brother: soon at night I'll send him certain word of my success.
LUCIO. I take my leave of you.
ISABELLA. Good sir, adieu.
[Exeunt.]

ACT II.
Scene I. A hall in ANGELO'S house.
[Enter ANGELO, ESCALUS, a JUSTICE, PROVOST, Officers, and
other Attendants.]
ANGELO. We must not make a scarecrow of the law, Setting it up to
fear the birds of prey, And let it keep one shape till custom make it
Their perch, and not their terror.
ESCALUS. Ay, but yet Let us be keen, and rather cut a little Than fall
and bruise to death. Alas! this gentleman, Whom I would save, had a
most noble father. Let but your honour know,-- Whom I believe to be
most strait in virtue,-- That, in the working of your own affections, Had
time coher'd with place, or place with wishing, Or that the resolute
acting of your blood Could have attain'd the effect of your own purpose,
Whether you had not sometime in your life Err'd in this point which
now you censure him, And pull'd the law upon you.
ANGELO. 'Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus, Another thing to fall.
I not deny The jury, passing on the prisoner's life, May, in the sworn
twelve, have a thief or two Guiltier