Enter Lady Macbeth with a taper.
Lo you, here she comes! This is her very guise, and, upon my
life, fast asleep. Observe her; stand close.
DOCTOR. How came she by that light?
GENTLEWOMAN. Why, it stood by her. She has light by her
continually; 'tis her command.
DOCTOR. You see, her eyes are open.
GENTLEWOMAN. Ay, but their sense is shut.
DOCTOR. What is it she does now? Look how she rubs her hands.
GENTLEWOMAN. It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus
washing her hands. I have known her continue in this a quarter of
an hour.
LADY MACBETH. Yet here's a spot.
DOCTOR. Hark, she speaks! I will set down what comes from her, to
satisfy my remembrance the more strongly.
LADY MACBETH. Out, damned spot! Out, I say! One- two -why then 'tis
time to do't. Hell is murky. Fie, my lord, fie! A soldier, and
afeard? What need we fear who knows it, when none can call our
power to account? Yet who would have thought the old man to have
had so much blood in him?
DOCTOR. Do you mark that?
LADY MACBETH. The Thane of Fife had a wife; where is she now? What,
will these hands neer be clean? No more o' that, my lord, no more
o' that. You mar all with this starting.
DOCTOR. Go to, go to; you have known what you should not.
GENTLEWOMAN. She has spoke what she should not, I am sure of that.
Heaven knows what she has known.
LADY MACBETH. Here's the smell of the blood still. All the perfumes
of Arabia will not sweeten this little hand. Oh, oh, oh!
DOCTOR. What a sigh is there! The heart is sorely charged.
GENTLEWOMAN. I would not have such a heart in my bosom for the
dignity of the whole body.
DOCTOR. Well, well, well-
GENTLEWOMAN. Pray God it be, sir.
DOCTOR. This disease is beyond my practice. Yet I have known those
which have walked in their sleep who have died holily in their
beds.
LADY MACBETH. Wash your hands, put on your nightgown, look not so
pale. I tell you yet again, Banquo's buried; he cannot come out
on's grave.
DOCTOR. Even so?
LADY MACBETH. To bed, to bed; there's knocking at the gate. Come,
come, come, come, give me your hand.What's done cannot be undone.
To bed, to bed, to bed.
Exit.
DOCTOR. Will she go now to bed?
GENTLEWOMAN. Directly.
DOCTOR. Foul whisperings are abroad. Unnatural deeds
Do breed unnatural troubles; infected minds
To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets.
More needs she the divine than the physician.
God, God, forgive us all! Look after her;
Remove from her the means of all annoyance,
And still keep eyes upon her. So good night.
My mind she has mated and amazed my sight.
I think, but dare not speak.
GENTLEWOMAN. Good night, good doctor.
Exeunt.
SCENE II.
The country near Dunsinane. Drum and colors.
Enter Menteith, Caithness, Angus, Lennox, and Soldiers.
MENTEITH. The English power is near, led on by Malcolm,
His uncle Siward, and the good Macduff.
Revenges burn in them, for their dear causes
Would to the bleeding and the grim alarm
Excite the mortified man.
ANGUS. Near Birnam Wood
Shall we well meet them; that way are they coming.
CAITHNESS. Who knows if Donalbain be with his brother?
LENNOX. For certain, sir, he is not; I have a file
Of all the gentry. There is Seward's son
And many unrough youths that even now
Protest their first of manhood.
MENTEITH. What does the tyrant?
CAITHNESS. Great Dunsinane he strongly fortifies.
Some say he's mad; others, that lesser hate him,
Do call it valiant fury; but, for certain,
He cannot buckle his distemper'd cause
Within the belt of rule.
ANGUS. Now does he feel
His secret murthers sticking on his hands,
Now minutely revolts upbraid his faith-breach;
Those he commands move only in command,
Nothing in love. Now does he feel his title
Hang loose about him, like a giant's robe
Upon a dwarfish thief.
MENTEITH. Who then shall blame
His pester'd senses to recoil and start,
When all that is within him does condemn
Itself for being there?
CAITHNESS. Well, march we on
To give obedience where 'tis truly owed.
Meet we the medicine of the sickly weal,
And with him pour we, in our country's purge,
Each drop of us.
LENNOX. Or so much as it needs
To dew the sovereign flower and drown the weeds.
Make we our march towards Birnam. Exeunt marching.
SCENE III.
Dunsinane. A room in the castle.
Enter Macbeth, Doctor, and Attendants.
MACBETH. Bring me no more reports; let them fly all!
Till Birnam Wood remove to Dunsinane
I cannot taint with fear. What's the boy Malcolm?
Was he not born of woman? The spirits that know
All mortal consequences have pronounced me thus:
"Fear not, Macbeth; no man that's born of woman
Shall e'er have power upon thee." Then fly, false Thanes,
And mingle with the English epicures!
The mind I sway by and the heart I bear
Shall never sag with doubt nor shake with fear.
Enter a Servant.
The devil damn thee black, thou cream-faced loon!
Where got'st thou that goose look?
SERVANT. There is ten thousand-
MACBETH. Geese, villain?
SERVANT. Soldiers, sir.
MACBETH. Go prick thy face and over-red thy fear,
Thou lily-liver'd boy. What soldiers, patch?
Death of thy soul! Those linen cheeks of thine
Are counselors to fear. What soldiers, whey-face?
SERVANT. The English force, so please you.
MACBETH. Take thy face hence. Exit Servant.
Seyton-I am sick at heart,
When I behold- Seyton, I say!- This push
Will cheer me ever or disseat me now.
I have lived long enough. My way of life
Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf,
And that which should accompany old age,
As honor, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have; but in their stead,
Curses, not loud but deep, mouth-honor, breath,
Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare not.
Seyton!
Enter Seyton.
SEYTON. What's your gracious pleasure?
MACBETH. What news more?
SEYTON. All is confirm'd, my lord, which was reported.
MACBETH. I'll fight, 'til from my bones my flesh be hack'd.
Give me my armor.
SEYTON. 'Tis not needed yet.
MACBETH. I'll put it on.
Send out more horses, skirr the country round,
Hang those that talk of fear. Give me mine armor.
How does your patient, doctor?
DOCTOR. Not so sick, my lord,
As she is troubled with thick-coming fancies,
That keep her from her rest.
MACBETH. Cure her of that.
Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased,
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow,
Raze out the written troubles of the brain,
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff
Which weighs upon the heart?
DOCTOR. Therein the patient
Must minister to himself.
MACBETH. Throw physic to the dogs, I'll none of it.
Come, put mine armor on; give me my staff.
Seyton, send out. Doctor, the Thanes fly from me.
Come, sir, dispatch. If thou couldst, doctor, cast
The water of my land, find her disease
And purge it to a sound and pristine health,
I would applaud thee to the very echo,
That should applaud again. Pull't off, I say.
What rhubarb, cyme, or what purgative drug
Would scour these English hence? Hearst thou of them?
DOCTOR. Ay, my good lord, your royal preparation
Makes us hear something.
MACBETH. Bring it after me.
I will not be afraid of death and bane
Till Birnam Forest come to Dunsinane.
DOCTOR. [Aside.] Were I from Dunsinane away and clear,
Profit again should hardly draw me here. Exeunt.
SCENE IV.
Country near Birnam Wood. Drum and colors.
Enter Malcolm, old Seward and his Son, Macduff, Menteith, Caithness,
Angus, Lennox, Ross, and Soldiers, marching.
MALCOLM. Cousins, I hope the days are near at hand
That chambers will be safe.
MENTEITH. We doubt it nothing.
SIWARD. What wood is this before us?
MENTEITH. The Wood of Birnam.
MALCOLM. Let every soldier hew him down a bough,
And bear't before him; thereby shall we shadow
The numbers of our host, and make discovery
Err in report of us.
SOLDIERS. It shall be done.
SIWARD. We learn no other but the confident tyrant
Keeps still in Dunsinane and will endure
Our setting down before't.
MALCOLM. 'Tis his main hope;
For where there is advantage to be given,
Both more and less have given him the revolt,
And none serve with him but constrained things
Whose hearts are absent too.
MACDUFF. Let our just censures
Attend the true event, and put we on
Industrious soldiership.
SIWARD. The time approaches
That will with due decision make us know
What we shall say we have and what we owe.
Thoughts speculative their unsure hopes relate,
But certain issue strokes must arbitrate.
Towards which advance the war.
Exeunt Marching.
SCENE V.
Dunsinane. Within the castle.
Enter Macbeth, Seyton, and Soldiers, with drum and colors.
MACBETH. Hang out our banners on the outward walls;
The cry is still, "They come!" Our castle's strength
Will laugh a siege to scorn. Here let them lie
Till famine and the ague eat them up.
Were they not forced with those that should be ours,
We might have met them dareful, beard to beard,
And beat them backward home.
A cry of women within.
What is that noise?
SEYTON. It is the cry of women, my good lord. Exit.
MACBETH. I have almost forgot the taste of fears:
The time has been, my senses would have cool'd
To hear a night-shriek, and my fell of hair
Would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir
As life were in't. I have supp'd full with horrors;
Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts,
Cannot once start me.
Re-enter Seyton.
Wherefore was that cry?
SEYTON. The Queen, my lord, is dead.
MACBETH. She should have died hereafter;
There would have been a time for such a word.
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more. It is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
Enter a Messenger.
Thou comest to use thy tongue; thy story quickly.
MESSENGER. Gracious my lord,
I should report that which I say I saw,
But know not how to do it.
MACBETH. Well, say, sir.
MESSENGER. As I did stand my watch upon the hill,
I look'd toward Birnam, and anon, methought,
The Wood began to move.
MACBETH. Liar and slave!
MESSENGER. Let me endure your wrath, if't be not so.
Within this three mile may you see it coming;
I say, a moving grove.
MACBETH. If thou speak'st false,
Upon the next tree shalt thou hang alive,
Till famine cling thee; if thy speech be sooth,
I care not if thou dost for me as much.
I pull in resolution and begin
To doubt the equivocation of the fiend
That lies like truth. "Fear not, till Birnam Wood
Do come to Dunsinane," and now a wood
Comes toward Dunsinane. Arm, arm, and out!
If this which he avouches does appear,
There is nor flying hence nor tarrying here.
I 'gin to be aweary of the sun
And wish the estate o' the world were now undone.
Ring the alarum bell! Blow, wind! Come, wrack!
At least we'll die with harness on our back. Exeunt.
SCENE VI.
Dunsinane. Before the castle.
Enter Malcolm, old Siward, Macduff, and their Army, with boughs.
Drum and colors.
MALCOLM. Now near enough; your leavy screens throw down,
And show like those you are. You, worthy uncle,
Shall with my cousin, your right noble son,
Lead our first battle. Worthy Macduff and we
Shall take upon 's what else remains to do,
According to our order.
SIWARD. Fare you well.
Do we but find the tyrant's power tonight,
Let us be beaten if we cannot fight.
MACDUFF. Make all our trumpets speak, give them all breath,
Those clamorous harbingers of blood and death.
Exeunt.
SCENE VII.
Dunsinane. Before the castle. Alarums.
Enter Macbeth.
MACBETH. They have tied me to a stake; I cannot fly,
But bear-like I must fight the course. What's he
That was not born of woman? Such a one
Am I to fear, or none.
Enter young Siward.
YOUNG SIWARD. What is thy name?
MACBETH. Thou'lt be afraid to hear it.
YOUNG SIWARD. No, though thou call'st thyself a hotter name
Than any is in hell.
MACBETH. My name's Macbeth.
YOUNG SIWARD. The devil himself could not pronounce a title
More hateful to mine ear.
MACBETH. No, nor more fearful.
YOUNG SIWARD O Thou liest, abhorred tyrant; with my sword
I'll prove the lie thou speak'st.
They fight, and young Seward is slain.
MACBETH. Thou wast born of woman.
But swords I smile at, weapons laugh to scorn,
Brandish'd by man that's of a woman born. Exit.
Alarums. Enter Macduff.
MACDUFF. That way the noise is. Tyrant, show thy face!
If thou best slain and with no stroke of mine,
My wife and children's ghosts will haunt me still.
I cannot strike at wretched kerns, whose arms
Are hired to bear their staves. Either thou, Macbeth,
Or else my sword, with an unbatter'd edge,
I sheathe again undeeded. There thou shouldst be;
By this great clatter, one of greatest note
Seems bruited. Let me find him, Fortune!
And more I beg not. Exit. Alarums.
Enter Malcolm and old Siward.
SIWARD. This way, my lord; the castle's gently render'd.
The tyrant's people on both sides do fight,
The noble Thanes do bravely in the war,
The day almost itself professes yours,
And little is to do.
MALCOLM. We have met with foes
That strike beside us.
SIWARD. Enter, sir, the castle.
Exeunt. Alarum.
SCENE VIII.
Another part of the field.
Enter Macbeth.
MACBETH. Why should I play the Roman fool and die
On mine own sword? Whiles I see lives, the gashes
Do better upon them.
Enter Macduff.
MACDUFF. Turn, hell hound, turn!
MACBETH. Of all men else I have avoided thee.
But get thee back, my soul is too much charged
With blood of thine already.
MACDUFF. I have no words.
My voice is in my sword, thou bloodier villain
Than terms can give thee out! They fight.
MACBETH. Thou losest labor.
As easy mayst thou the intrenchant air
With thy keen sword impress as make me bleed.
Let fall thy blade on vulnerable crests;
I bear a charmed life, which must not yield
To one of woman born.
MACDUFF. Despair thy charm,
And let the angel whom thou still hast served
Tell thee, Macduff was from his mother's womb
Untimely ripp'd.
MACBETH. Accursed be that tongue that tells me so,
For it hath cow'd my better part of man!
And be these juggling fiends no more believed
That patter with us in a double sense,
That keep the word of promise to our ear
And break it to our hope. I'll not fight with thee.
MACDUFF. Then yield thee, coward,
And live to be the show and gaze o' the time.
We'll have thee, as our rarer monsters are,
Painted upon a pole, and underwrit,
"Here may you see the tyrant."
MACBETH. I will not yield,
To kiss the ground before young Malcolm's feet,
And to be baited with the rabble's curse.
Though Birnam Wood be come to Dunsinane,
And thou opposed, being of no woman born,
Yet I will try the last. Before my body
I throw my warlike shield! Lay on, Macduff,
And damn'd be him that first cries, "Hold, enough!"
Exeunt fighting. Alarums.
SCENE IX.
Retreat. Flourish. Enter, with drum and colors, Malcolm, old Siward, Ross,
the other Thanes, and Soldiers.
MALCOLM. I would the friends we miss were safe arrived.
SIWARD. Some must go off, and yet, by these I see,
So great a day as this is cheaply bought.
MALCOLM. Macduff is missing, and your noble son.
ROSS. Your son, my lord, has paid a soldier's debt.
He only lived but till he was a man,
The which no sooner had his prowess confirm'd
In the unshrinking station where he fought,
But like a man he died.
SIWARD. Then he is dead?
ROSS. Ay, and brought off the field. Your cause of sorrow
Must not be measured by his worth, for then
It hath no end.
SIWARD. Had he his hurts before?
ROSS. Ay, on the front.
SIWARD. Why then, God's soldier be he!
Had I as many sons as I have hairs,
I would not wish them to a fairer death.
And so his knell is knoll'd.
MALCOLM. He's worth more sorrow,
And that I'll spend for him.
SIWARD. He's worth no more:
They say he parted well and paid his score,
And so God be with him! Here comes newer comfort.
Re-enter Macduff, with Macbeth's head.
MACDUFF. Hail, King, for so thou art. Behold where stands
The usurper's cursed head. The time is free.
I see thee compass'd with thy kingdom's pearl
That speak my salutation in their minds,
Whose voices I desire aloud with mine-
Hail, King of Scotland!
ALL. Hail, King of Scotland! Flourish.
MALCOLM. We shall not spend a large expense of time
Before we reckon with your several loves
And make us even with you. My Thanes and kinsmen,
Henceforth be Earls, the first that ever Scotland
In such an honor named. What's more to do,
Which would be planted newly with the time,
As calling home our exiled friends abroad
That fled the snares of watchful tyranny,
Producing forth the cruel ministers
Of this dead butcher and his fiend-like queen,
Who, as 'tis thought, by self and violent hands
Took off her life; this, and what needful else
That calls upon us, by the grace of Grace
We will perform in measure, time, and place.
So thanks to all at once and to each one,
Whom we invite to see us crown'd at Scone.
Flourish. Exeunt.
-THE END-
<>
1605
MEASURE FOR MEASURE
by William Shakespeare
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
VINCENTIO, the Duke
ANGELO, the Deputy
ESCALUS, an ancient Lord
CLAUDIO, a young gentleman
LUCIO, a fantastic
Two other like Gentlemen
VARRIUS, a gentleman, servant to the Duke
PROVOST
THOMAS, friar
PETER, friar
A JUSTICE
ELBOW, a simple constable
FROTH, a foolish gentleman
POMPEY, a clown and servant to Mistress Overdone
ABHORSON, an executioner
BARNARDINE, a dissolute prisoner
ISABELLA, sister to Claudio
MARIANA, betrothed to Angelo
JULIET, beloved of Claudio
FRANCISCA, a nun
MISTRESS OVERDONE, a bawd
Lords, Officers, Citizens, Boy, and Attendants
<>
SCENE:
Vienna
ACT I. SCENE I.
The DUKE'S palace
Enter DUKE, ESCALUS, LORDS, and ATTENDANTS
DUKE. Escalus!
ESCALUS. My lord.
DUKE. Of government the properties to unfold
Would seem in me t' affect speech and discourse,
Since I am put to know that your own science
Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice
My strength can give you; then no more remains
But that to your sufficiency- as your worth is able-
And let them work. The nature of our people,
Our city's institutions, and the terms
For common justice, y'are as pregnant in
As art and practice hath enriched any
That we remember. There is our commission,
From which we would not have you warp. Call hither,
I say, bid come before us, Angelo. Exit an ATTENDANT
What figure of us think you he will bear?
For you must know we have with special soul
Elected him our absence to supply;
Lent him our terror, dress'd him with our love,
And given his deputation all the organs
Of our own power. What think you of it?
ESCALUS. If any in Vienna be of worth
To undergo such ample grace and honour,
It is Lord Angelo.
Enter ANGELO
DUKE. Look where he comes.
ANGELO. Always obedient to your Grace's will,
I come to know your pleasure.
DUKE. Angelo,
There is a kind of character in thy life
That to th' observer doth thy history
Fully unfold. Thyself and thy belongings
Are not thine own so proper as to waste
Thyself upon thy virtues, they on thee.
Heaven doth with us as we with torches do,
Not light them for themselves; for if our virtues
Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike
As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touch'd
But to fine issues; nor Nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor,
Both thanks and use. But I do bend my speech
To one that can my part in him advertise.
Hold, therefore, Angelo-
In our remove be thou at full ourself;
Mortality and mercy in Vienna
Live in thy tongue and heart. Old Escalus,
Though first in question, is thy secondary.
Take thy commission.
ANGELO. Now, good my lord,
Let there be some more test made of my metal,
Before so noble and so great a figure
Be stamp'd upon it.
DUKE. No more evasion!
We have with a leaven'd and prepared choice
Proceeded to you; therefore take your honours.
Our haste from hence is of so quick condition
That it prefers itself, and leaves unquestion'd
Matters of needful value. We shall write to you,
As time and our concernings shall importune,
How it goes with us, and do look to know
What doth befall you here. So, fare you well.
To th' hopeful execution do I leave you
Of your commissions.
ANGELO. Yet give leave, my lord,
That we may bring you something on the way.
DUKE. My haste may not admit it;
Nor need you, on mine honour, have to do
With any scruple: your scope is as mine own,
So to enforce or qualify the laws
As to your soul seems good. Give me your hand;
I'll privily away. I love the people,
But do not like to stage me to their eyes;
Though it do well, I do not relish well
Their loud applause and Aves vehement;
Nor do I think the man of safe discretion
That does affect it. Once more, fare you well.
ANGELO. The heavens give safety to your purposes!
ESCALUS. Lead forth and bring you back in happiness!
DUKE. I thank you. Fare you well. Exit
ESCALUS. I shall desire you, sir, to give me leave
To have free speech with you; and it concerns me
To look into the bottom of my place:
A pow'r I have, but of what strength and nature
I am not yet instructed.
ANGELO. 'Tis so with me. Let us withdraw together,
And we may soon our satisfaction have
Touching that point.
ESCALUS. I'll wait upon your honour. Exeunt
SCENE II.
A street
Enter Lucio and two other GENTLEMEN
LUCIO. If the Duke, with the other dukes, come not to composition
with the King of Hungary, why then all the dukes fall upon the
King.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Heaven grant us its peace, but not the King of
Hungary's!
SECOND GENTLEMAN. Amen.
LUCIO. Thou conclud'st like the sanctimonious pirate that went to
sea with the Ten Commandments, but scrap'd one out of the table.
SECOND GENTLEMAN. 'Thou shalt not steal'?
LUCIO. Ay, that he raz'd.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Why, 'twas a commandment to command the captain
and all the rest from their functions: they put forth to steal.
There's not a soldier of us all that, in the thanksgiving before
meat, do relish the petition well that prays for peace.
SECOND GENTLEMAN. I never heard any soldier dislike it.
LUCIO. I believe thee; for I think thou never wast where grace was
said.
SECOND GENTLEMAN. No? A dozen times at least.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. What, in metre?
LUCIO. In any proportion or in any language.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. I think, or in any religion.
LUCIO. Ay, why not? Grace is grace, despite of all controversy; as,
for example, thou thyself art a wicked villain, despite of all
grace.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Well, there went but a pair of shears between us.
LUCIO. I grant; as there may between the lists and the velvet.
Thou art the list.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. And thou the velvet; thou art good velvet; thou'rt
a three-pil'd piece, I warrant thee. I had as lief be a list of
an English kersey as be pil'd, as thou art pil'd, for a French
velvet. Do I speak feelingly now?
LUCIO. I think thou dost; and, indeed, with most painful feeling of
thy speech. I will, out of thine own confession, learn to begin
thy health; but, whilst I live, forget to drink after thee.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. I think I have done myself wrong, have I not?
SECOND GENTLEMAN. Yes, that thou hast, whether thou art tainted or
free.
Enter MISTRESS OVERDONE
LUCIO. Behold, behold, where Madam Mitigation comes! I have
purchas'd as many diseases under her roof as come to-
SECOND GENTLEMAN. To what, I pray?
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Judge.
SECOND GENTLEMAN. To three thousand dolours a year.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Ay, and more.
LUCIO. A French crown more.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Thou art always figuring diseases in me, but thou
art full of error; I am sound.
LUCIO. Nay, not, as one would say, healthy; but so sound as things
that are hollow: thy bones are hollow; impiety has made a feast
of thee.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. How now! which of your hips has the most profound
sciatica?
MRS. OVERDONE. Well, well! there's one yonder arrested and carried
to prison was worth five thousand of you all.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Who's that, I pray thee?
MRS. OVERDONE. Marry, sir, that's Claudio, Signior Claudio.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. Claudio to prison? 'Tis not so.
MRS. OVERDONE. Nay, but I know 'tis so: I saw him arrested; saw him
carried away; and, which is more, within these three days his
head to be chopp'd off.
LUCIO. But, after all this fooling, I would not have it so. Art
thou sure of this?
MRS. OVERDONE. I am too sure of it; and it is for getting Madam
Julietta with child.
LUCIO. Believe me, this may be; he promis'd to meet me two hours
since, and he was ever precise in promise-keeping.
SECOND GENTLEMAN. Besides, you know, it draws something near to the
speech we had to such a purpose.
FIRST GENTLEMAN. But most of all agreeing with the proclamation.
LUCIO. Away; let's go learn the truth of it.
Exeunt Lucio and GENTLEMEN
MRS. OVERDONE. Thus, what with the war, what with the sweat, what
with the gallows, and what with poverty, I am custom-shrunk.
Enter POMPEY
How now! what's the news with you?
POMPEY. Yonder man is carried to prison.
MRS. OVERDONE. Well, what has he done?
POMPEY. A woman.
MRS. OVERDONE. But what's his offence?
POMPEY. Groping for trouts in a peculiar river.
MRS. OVERDONE. What! is there a maid with child by him?
POMPEY. No; but there's a woman with maid by him. You have not
heard of the proclamation, have you?
MRS. OVERDONE. What proclamation, man?
POMPEY. All houses in the suburbs of Vienna must be pluck'd down.
MRS. OVERDONE. And what shall become of those in the city?
POMPEY. They shall stand for seed; they had gone down too, but that
a wise burgher put in for them.
MRS. OVERDONE. But shall all our houses of resort in the suburbs be
pull'd down?
POMPEY. To the ground, mistress.
MRS. OVERDONE. Why, here's a change indeed in the commonwealth!
What shall become of me?
POMPEY. Come, fear not you: good counsellors lack no clients.
Though you change your place you need not change your trade; I'll
be your tapster still. Courage, there will be pity taken on you;
you that have worn your eyes almost out in the service, you will
be considered.
MRS. OVERDONE. What's to do here, Thomas Tapster? Let's withdraw.
POMPEY. Here comes Signior Claudio, led by the provost to prison;
and there's Madam Juliet. Exeunt
Enter PROVOST, CLAUDIO, JULIET, and OFFICERS;
LUCIO following
CLAUDIO. Fellow, why dost thou show me thus to th' world?
Bear me to prison, where I am committed.
PROVOST. I do it not in evil disposition,
But from Lord Angelo by special charge.
CLAUDIO. Thus can the demigod Authority
Make us pay down for our offence by weight
The words of heaven: on whom it will, it will;
On whom it will not, so; yet still 'tis just.
LUCIO. Why, how now, Claudio, whence comes this restraint?
CLAUDIO. From too much liberty, my Lucio, liberty;
As surfeit is the father of much fast,
So every scope by the immoderate use
Turns to restraint. Our natures do pursue,
Like rats that ravin down their proper bane,
A thirsty evil; and when we drink we die.
LUCIO. If I could speak so wisely under an arrest, I would send for
certain of my creditors; and yet, to say the truth, I had as lief
have the foppery of freedom as the morality of imprisonment.
What's thy offence, Claudio?
CLAUDIO. What but to speak of would offend again.
LUCIO. What, is't murder?
CLAUDIO. No.
LUCIO. Lechery?
CLAUDIO. Call it so.
PROVOST. Away, sir; you must go.
CLAUDIO. One word, good friend. Lucio, a word with you.
LUCIO. A hundred, if they'll do you any good. Is lechery so look'd
after?
CLAUDIO. Thus stands it with me: upon a true contract
I got possession of Julietta's bed.
You know the lady; she is fast my wife,
Save that we do the denunciation lack
Of outward order; this we came not to,
Only for propagation of a dow'r
Remaining in the coffer of her friends.
From whom we thought it meet to hide our love
Till time had made them for us. But it chances
The stealth of our most mutual entertainment,
With character too gross, is writ on Juliet.
LUCIO. With child, perhaps?
CLAUDIO. Unhappily, even so.
And the new deputy now for the Duke-
Whether it be the fault and glimpse of newness,
Or whether that the body public be
A horse whereon the governor doth ride,
Who, newly in the seat, that it may know
He can command, lets it straight feel the spur;
Whether the tyranny be in his place,
Or in his eminence that fills it up,
I stagger in. But this new governor
Awakes me all the enrolled penalties
Which have, like unscour'd armour, hung by th' wall
So long that nineteen zodiacs have gone round
And none of them been worn; and, for a name,
Now puts the drowsy and neglected act
Freshly on me. 'Tis surely for a name.
LUCIO. I warrant it is; and thy head stands so tickle on thy
shoulders that a milkmaid, if she be in love, may sigh it off.
Send after the Duke, and appeal to him.
CLAUDIO. I have done so, but he's not to be found.
I prithee, Lucio, do me this kind service:
This day my sister should the cloister enter,
And there receive her approbation;
Acquaint her with the danger of my state;
Implore her, in my voice, that she make friends
To the strict deputy; bid herself assay him.
I have great hope in that; for in her youth
There is a prone and speechless dialect
Such as move men; beside, she hath prosperous art
When she will play with reason and discourse,
And well she can persuade.
LUCIO. I pray she may; as well for the encouragement of the like,
which else would stand under grievous imposition, as for the
enjoying of thy life, who I would be sorry should be thus
foolishly lost at a game of tick-tack. I'll to her.
CLAUDIO. I thank you, good friend Lucio.
LUCIO. Within two hours.
CLAUDIO. Come, officer, away. Exeunt
SCENE III.
A monastery
Enter DUKE and FRIAR THOMAS
DUKE. No, holy father; throw away that thought;
Believe not that the dribbling dart of love
Can pierce a complete bosom. Why I desire thee
To give me secret harbour hath a purpose
More grave and wrinkled than the aims and ends
Of burning youth.
FRIAR. May your Grace speak of it?
DUKE. My holy sir, none better knows than you
How I have ever lov'd the life removed,
And held in idle price to haunt assemblies
Where youth, and cost, a witless bravery keeps.
I have deliver'd to Lord Angelo,
A man of stricture and firm abstinence,
My absolute power and place here in Vienna,
And he supposes me travell'd to Poland;
For so I have strew'd it in the common ear,
And so it is received. Now, pious sir,
You will demand of me why I do this.
FRIAR. Gladly, my lord.
DUKE. We have strict statutes and most biting laws,
The needful bits and curbs to headstrong steeds,
Which for this fourteen years we have let slip;
Even like an o'ergrown lion in a cave,
That goes not out to prey. Now, as fond fathers,
Having bound up the threat'ning twigs of birch,
Only to stick it in their children's sight
For terror, not to use, in time the rod
Becomes more mock'd than fear'd; so our decrees,
Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead;
And liberty plucks justice by the nose;
The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart
Goes all decorum.
FRIAR. It rested in your Grace
To unloose this tied-up justice when you pleas'd;
And it in you more dreadful would have seem'd
Than in Lord Angelo.
DUKE. I do fear, too dreadful.
Sith 'twas my fault to give the people scope,
'Twould be my tyranny to strike and gall them
For what I bid them do; for we bid this be done,
When evil deeds have their permissive pass
And not the punishment. Therefore, indeed, my father,
I have on Angelo impos'd the office;
Who may, in th' ambush of my name, strike home,
And yet my nature never in the fight
To do in slander. And to behold his sway,
I will, as 'twere a brother of your order,
Visit both prince and people. Therefore, I prithee,
Supply me with the habit, and instruct me
How I may formally in person bear me
Like a true friar. Moe reasons for this action
At our more leisure shall I render you.
Only, this one: Lord Angelo is precise;
Stands at a guard with envy; scarce confesses
That his blood flows, or that his appetite
Is more to bread than stone. Hence shall we see,
If power change purpose, what our seemers be. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
A nunnery
Enter ISABELLA and FRANCISCA
ISABELLA. And have you nuns no farther privileges?
FRANCISCA. Are not these large enough?
ISABELLA. Yes, truly; I speak not as desiring more,
But rather wishing a more strict restraint
Upon the sisterhood, the votarists of Saint Clare.
LUCIO. [ Within] Ho! Peace be in this place!
ISABELLA. Who's that which calls?
FRANCISCA. It is a man's voice. Gentle Isabella,
Turn you the key, and know his business of him:
You may, I may not; you are yet unsworn;
When you have vow'd, you must not speak with men
But in the presence of the prioress;
Then, if you speak, you must not show your face,
Or, if you show your face, you must not speak.
He calls again; I pray you answer him. Exit FRANCISCA
ISABELLA. Peace and prosperity! 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 enskied 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 embrac'd.
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 pow'r 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 our blood
Could have attain'd th' 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 than him they try. What's open made to justice,
That justice seizes. What knows the laws
That thieves do pass on thieves? 'Tis very pregnant,
The jewel that we find, we stoop and take't,
Because we see it; but what we do not see
We tread upon, and never think of it.
You may not so extenuate his offence
For I have had such faults; but rather tell me,
When I, that censure him, do so offend,
Let mine own judgment pattern out my death,
And nothing come in partial. Sir, he must die.
ESCALUS. Be it as your wisdom will.
ANGELO. Where is the Provost?
PROVOST. Here, if it like your honour.
ANGELO. See that Claudio
Be executed by nine to-morrow morning;
Bring him his confessor; let him be prepar'd;
For that's the utmost of his pilgrimage. Exit PROVOST
ESCALUS. [Aside] Well, heaven forgive him! and forgive us all!
Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall;
Some run from breaks of ice, and answer none,
And some condemned for a fault alone.
Enter ELBOW and OFFICERS with FROTH and POMPEY
ELBOW. Come, bring them away; if these be good people in a
commonweal that do nothing but use their abuses in common houses,
I know no law; bring them away.
ANGELO. How now, sir! What's your name, and what's the matter?
ELBOW. If it please your honour, I am the poor Duke's constable,
and my name is Elbow; I do lean upon justice, sir, and do bring
in here before your good honour two notorious benefactors.
ANGELO. Benefactors! Well- what benefactors are they? Are they not
malefactors?
ELBOW. If it please your honour, I know not well what they are; but
precise villains they are, that I am sure of, and void of all
profanation in the world that good Christians ought to have.
ESCALUS. This comes off well; here's a wise officer.
ANGELO. Go to; what quality are they of? Elbow is your name? Why
dost thou not speak, Elbow?
POMPEY. He cannot, sir; he's out at elbow.
ANGELO. What are you, sir?
ELBOW. He, sir? A tapster, sir; parcel-bawd; one that serves a bad
woman; whose house, sir, was, as they say, pluck'd down in the
suburbs; and now she professes a hot-house, which, I think, is a
very ill house too.
ESCALUS. How know you that?
ELBOW. My Wife, sir, whom I detest before heaven and your honour-
ESCALUS. How! thy wife!
ELBOW. Ay, sir; whom I thank heaven, is an honest woman-
ESCALUS. Dost thou detest her therefore?
ELBOW. I say, sir, I will detest myself also, as well as she, that
this house, if it be not a bawd's house, it is pity of her life,
for it is a naughty house.
ESCALUS. How dost thou know that, constable?
ELBOW. Marry, sir, by my wife; who, if she had been a woman
cardinally given, might have been accus'd in fornication,
adultery, and all uncleanliness there.
ESCALUS. By the woman's means?
ELBOW. Ay, sir, by Mistress Overdone's means; but as she spit in
his face, so she defied him.
POMPEY. Sir, if it please your honour, this is not so.
ELBOW. Prove it before these varlets here, thou honourable man,
prove it.
ESCALUS. Do you hear how he misplaces?
POMPEY. Sir, she came in great with child; and longing, saving your
honour's reverence, for stew'd prunes. Sir, we had but two in the
house, which at that very distant time stood, as it were, in a
fruit dish, a dish of some three pence; your honours have seen
such dishes; they are not China dishes, but very good dishes.
ESCALUS. Go to, go to; no matter for the dish, sir.
POMPEY. No, indeed, sir, not of a pin; you are therein in the
right; but to the point. As I say, this Mistress Elbow, being, as
I say, with child, and being great-bellied, and longing, as I
said, for prunes; and having but two in the dish, as I said,
Master Froth here, this very man, having eaten the rest, as I
said, and, as I say, paying for them very honestly; for, as you
know, Master Froth, I could not give you three pence again-
FROTH. No, indeed.
POMPEY. Very well; you being then, if you be rememb'red, cracking
the stones of the foresaid prunes-
FROTH. Ay, so I did indeed.
POMPEY. Why, very well; I telling you then, if you be rememb'red,
that such a one and such a one were past cure of the thing you
wot of, unless they kept very good diet, as I told you-
FROTH. All this is true.
POMPEY. Why, very well then-
ESCALUS. Come, you are a tedious fool. To the purpose: what was
done to Elbow's wife that he hath cause to complain of? Come me
to what was done to her.
POMPEY. Sir, your honour cannot come to that yet.
ESCALUS. No, sir, nor I mean it not.
POMPEY. Sir, but you shall come to it, by your honour's leave. And,
I beseech you, look into Master Froth here, sir, a man of
fourscore pound a year; whose father died at Hallowmas- was't not
at Hallowmas, Master Froth?
FROTH. All-hallond eve.
POMPEY. Why, very well; I hope here be truths. He, sir, sitting, as
I say, in a lower chair, sir; 'twas in the Bunch of Grapes,
where, indeed, you have a delight to sit, have you not?
FROTH. I have so; because it is an open room, and good for winter.
POMPEY. Why, very well then; I hope here be truths.
ANGELO. This will last out a night in Russia,
When nights are longest there; I'll take my leave,
And leave you to the hearing of the cause,
Hoping you'll find good cause to whip them all.
ESCALUS. I think no less. Good morrow to your lordship.
[Exit ANGELO] Now, sir, come on; what was done to Elbow's wife,
once more?
POMPEY. Once?- sir. There was nothing done to her once.
ELBOW. I beseech you, sir, ask him what this man did to my wife.
POMPEY. I beseech your honour, ask me.
ESCALUS. Well, sir, what did this gentleman to her?
POMPEY. I beseech you, sir, look in this gentleman's face. Good
Master Froth, look upon his honour; 'tis for a good purpose. Doth
your honour mark his face?
ESCALUS. Ay, sir, very well.
POMPEY. Nay, I beseech you, mark it well.
ESCALUS. Well, I do so.
POMPEY. Doth your honour see any harm in his face?
ESCALUS. Why, no.
POMPEY. I'll be suppos'd upon a book his face is the worst thing
about him. Good then; if his face be the worst thing about him,
how could Master Froth do the constable's wife any harm? I would
know that of your honour.
ESCALUS. He's in the right, constable; what say you to it?
ELBOW. First, an it like you, the house is a respected house; next,
this is a respected fellow; and his mistress is a respected
woman.
POMPEY. By this hand, sir, his wife is a more respected person than
any of us all.
ELBOW. Varlet, thou liest; thou liest, wicket varlet; the time is
yet to come that she was ever respected with man, woman, or
child.
POMPEY. Sir, she was respected with him before he married with her.
ESCALUS. Which is the wiser here, Justice or Iniquity? Is this
true?
ELBOW. O thou caitiff! O thou varlet! O thou wicked Hannibal! I
respected with her before I was married to her! If ever I was
respected with her, or she with me, let not your worship think me
the poor Duke's officer. Prove this, thou wicked Hannibal, or
I'll have mine action of batt'ry on thee.
ESCALUS. If he took you a box o' th' ear, you might have your
action of slander too.
ELBOW. Marry, I thank your good worship for it. What is't your
worship's pleasure I shall do with this wicked caitiff?
ESCALUS. Truly, officer, because he hath some offences in him that
thou wouldst discover if thou couldst, let him continue in his
courses till thou know'st what they are.
ELBOW. Marry, I thank your worship for it. Thou seest, thou wicked
varlet, now, what's come upon thee: thou art to continue now,
thou varlet; thou art to continue.
ESCALUS. Where were you born, friend?
FROTH. Here in Vienna, sir.
ESCALUS. Are you of fourscore pounds a year?
FROTH. Yes, an't please you, sir.
ESCALUS. So. What trade are you of, sir?
POMPEY. A tapster, a poor widow's tapster.
ESCALUS. Your mistress' name?
POMPEY. Mistress Overdone.
ESCALUS. Hath she had any more than one husband?
POMPEY. Nine, sir; Overdone by the last.
ESCALUS. Nine! Come hither to me, Master Froth. Master Froth, I
would not have you acquainted with tapsters: they will draw you,
Master Froth, and you will hang them. Get you gone, and let me
hear no more of you.
FROTH. I thank your worship. For mine own part, I never come into
any room in a taphouse but I am drawn in.
ESCALUS. Well, no more of it, Master Froth; farewell. [Exit FROTH]
Come you hither to me, Master Tapster; what's your name, Master
Tapster?
POMPEY. Pompey.
ESCALUS. What else?
POMPEY. Bum, sir.
ESCALUS. Troth, and your bum is the greatest thing about you; so
that, in the beastliest sense, you are Pompey the Great. Pompey,
you are partly a bawd, Pompey, howsoever you colour it in being a
tapster. Are you not? Come, tell me true; it shall be the better
for you.
POMPEY. Truly, sir, I am a poor fellow that would live.
ESCALUS. How would you live, Pompey- by being a bawd? What do you
think of the trade, Pompey? Is it a lawful trade?
POMPEY. If the law would allow it, sir.
ESCALUS. But the law will not allow it, Pompey; nor it shall not be
allowed in Vienna.
POMPEY. Does your worship mean to geld and splay all the youth of
the city?
ESCALUS. No, Pompey.
POMPEY. Truly, sir, in my poor opinion, they will to't then. If
your worship will take order for the drabs and the knaves, you
need not to fear the bawds.
ESCALUS. There is pretty orders beginning, I can tell you: but it
is but heading and hanging.
POMPEY. If you head and hang all that offend that way but for ten
year together, you'll be glad to give out a commission for more
heads; if this law hold in Vienna ten year, I'll rent the fairest
house in it, after threepence a bay. If you live to see this come
to pass, say Pompey told you so.
ESCALUS. Thank you, good Pompey; and, in requital of your prophecy,
hark you: I advise you, let me not find you before me again upon
any complaint whatsoever- no, not for dwelling where you do; if I
do, Pompey, I shall beat you to your tent, and prove a shrewd
Caesar to you; in plain dealing, Pompey, I shall have you whipt.
So for this time, Pompey, fare you well.
POMPEY. I thank your worship for your good counsel; [Aside] but I
shall follow it as the flesh and fortune shall better determine.
Whip me? No, no; let carman whip his jade;
The valiant heart's not whipt out of his trade. Exit
ESCALUS. Come hither to me, Master Elbow; come hither, Master
Constable. How long have you been in this place of constable?
ELBOW. Seven year and a half, sir.
ESCALUS. I thought, by the readiness in the office, you had
continued in it some time. You say seven years together?
ELBOW. And a half, sir.
ESCALUS. Alas, it hath been great pains to you! They do you wrong
to put you so oft upon't. Are there not men in your ward
sufficient to serve it?
ELBOW. Faith, sir, few of any wit in such matters; as they are
chosen, they are glad to choose me for them; I do it for some
piece of money, and go through with all.
ESCALUS. Look you, bring me in the names of some six or seven, the
most sufficient of your parish.
ELBOW. To your worship's house, sir?
ESCALUS. To my house. Fare you well. [Exit ELBOW]
What's o'clock, think you?
JUSTICE. Eleven, sir.
ESCALUS. I pray you home to dinner with me.
JUSTICE. I humbly thank you.
ESCALUS. It grieves me for the death of Claudio;
But there's no remedy.
JUSTICE. Lord Angelo is severe.
ESCALUS. It is but needful:
Mercy is not itself that oft looks so;
Pardon is still the nurse of second woe.
But yet, poor Claudio! There is no remedy.
Come, sir. Exeunt
SCENE II.
Another room in ANGELO'S house
Enter PROVOST and a SERVANT
SERVANT. He's hearing of a cause; he will come straight.
I'll tell him of you.
PROVOST. Pray you do. [Exit SERVANT] I'll know
His pleasure; may be he will relent. Alas,
He hath but as offended in a dream!
All sects, all ages, smack of this vice; and he
To die for 't!
Enter ANGELO
ANGELO. Now, what's the matter, Provost?
PROVOST. Is it your will Claudio shall die to-morrow?
ANGELO. Did not I tell thee yea? Hadst thou not order?
Why dost thou ask again?
PROVOST. Lest I might be too rash;
Under your good correction, I have seen
When, after execution, judgment hath
Repented o'er his doom.
ANGELO. Go to; let that be mine.
Do you your office, or give up your place,
And you shall well be spar'd.
PROVOST. I crave your honour's pardon.
What shall be done, sir, with the groaning Juliet?
She's very near her hour.
ANGELO. Dispose of her
To some more fitter place, and that with speed.
Re-enter SERVANT
SERVANT. Here is the sister of the man condemn'd
Desires access to you.
ANGELO. Hath he a sister?
PROVOST. Ay, my good lord; a very virtuous maid,
And to be shortly of a sisterhood,
If not already.
ANGELO. Well, let her be admitted. Exit SERVANT
See you the fornicatress be remov'd;
Let her have needful but not lavish means;
There shall be order for't.
Enter Lucio and ISABELLA
PROVOST. [Going] Save your honour!
ANGELO. Stay a little while. [To ISABELLA] Y'are welcome; what's
your will?
ISABELLA. I am a woeful suitor to your honour,
Please but your honour hear me.
ANGELO. Well; what's your suit?
ISABELLA. There is a vice that most I do abhor,
And most desire should meet the blow of justice;
For which I would not plead, but that I must;
For which I must not plead, but that I am
At war 'twixt will and will not.
ANGELO. Well; the matter?
ISABELLA. I have a brother is condemn'd to die;
I do beseech you, let it be his fault,
And not my brother.
PROVOST. [Aside] Heaven give thee moving graces.
ANGELO. Condemn the fault and not the actor of it!
Why, every fault's condemn'd ere it be done;
Mine were the very cipher of a function,
To fine the faults whose fine stands in record,
And let go by the actor.
ISABELLA. O just but severe law!
I had a brother, then. Heaven keep your honour!
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] Give't not o'er so; to him again, entreat him,
Kneel down before him, hang upon his gown;
You are too cold: if you should need a pin,
You could not with more tame a tongue desire it.
To him, I say.
ISABELLA. Must he needs die?
ANGELO. Maiden, no remedy.
ISABELLA. Yes; I do think that you might pardon him.
And neither heaven nor man grieve at the mercy.
ANGELO. I will not do't.
ISABELLA. But can you, if you would?
ANGELO. Look, what I will not, that I cannot do.
ISABELLA. But might you do't, and do the world no wrong,
If so your heart were touch'd with that remorse
As mine is to him?
ANGELO. He's sentenc'd; 'tis too late.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] You are too cold.
ISABELLA. Too late? Why, no; I, that do speak a word,
May call it back again. Well, believe this:
No ceremony that to great ones longs,
Not the king's crown nor the deputed sword,
The marshal's truncheon nor the judge's robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does.
If he had been as you, and you as he,
You would have slipp'd like him; but he, like you,
Would not have been so stern.
ANGELO. Pray you be gone.
ISABELLA. I would to heaven I had your potency,
And you were Isabel! Should it then be thus?
No; I would tell what 'twere to be a judge
And what a prisoner.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] Ay, touch him; there's the vein.
ANGELO. Your brother is a forfeit of the law,
And you but waste your words.
ISABELLA. Alas! Alas!
Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once;
And He that might the vantage best have took
Found out the remedy. How would you be
If He, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are? O, think on that;
And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.
ANGELO. Be you content, fair maid.
It is the law, not I condemn your brother.
Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son,
It should be thus with him. He must die to-morrow.
ISABELLA. To-morrow! O, that's sudden! Spare him, spare him.
He's not prepar'd for death. Even for our kitchens
We kill the fowl of season; shall we serve heaven
With less respect than we do minister
To our gross selves? Good, good my lord, bethink you.
Who is it that hath died for this offence?
There's many have committed it.
LUCIO. [Aside] Ay, well said.
ANGELO. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.
Those many had not dar'd to do that evil
If the first that did th' edict infringe
Had answer'd for his deed. Now 'tis awake,
Takes note of what is done, and, like a prophet,
Looks in a glass that shows what future evils-
Either now or by remissness new conceiv'd,
And so in progress to be hatch'd and born-
Are now to have no successive degrees,
But here they live to end.
ISABELLA. Yet show some pity.
ANGELO. I show it most of all when I show justice;
For then I pity those I do not know,
Which a dismiss'd offence would after gall,
And do him right that, answering one foul wrong,
Lives not to act another. Be satisfied;
Your brother dies to-morrow; be content.
ISABELLA. So you must be the first that gives this sentence,
And he that suffers. O, it is excellent
To have a giant's strength! But it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] That's well said.
ISABELLA. Could great men thunder
As Jove himself does, Jove would never be quiet,
For every pelting petty officer
Would use his heaven for thunder,
Nothing but thunder. Merciful Heaven,
Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt,
Splits the unwedgeable and gnarled oak
Than the soft myrtle. But man, proud man,
Dress'd in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he's most assur'd,
His glassy essence, like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven
As makes the angels weep; who, with our speens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] O, to him, to him, wench! He will relent;
He's coming; I perceive 't.
PROVOST. [Aside] Pray heaven she win him.
ISABELLA. We cannot weigh our brother with ourself.
Great men may jest with saints: 'tis wit in them;
But in the less foul profanation.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] Thou'rt i' th' right, girl; more o' that.
ISABELLA. That in the captain's but a choleric word
Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] Art avis'd o' that? More on't.
ANGELO. Why do you put these sayings upon me?
ISABELLA. Because authority, though it err like others,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself
That skins the vice o' th' 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.
ANGELO. [Aside] She speaks, and 'tis
Such sense that my sense breeds with it.- Fare you well.
ISABELLA. Gentle my lord, turn back.
ANGELO. I will bethink me. Come again to-morrow.
ISABELLA. Hark how I'll bribe you; good my lord, turn back.
ANGELO. How, bribe me?
ISABELLA. Ay, with such gifts that heaven shall share with you.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA) You had marr'd all else.
ISABELLA. Not with fond sicles of the tested gold,
Or stones, whose rate 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.
ANGELO. Well; come to me to-morrow.
LUCIO. [To ISABELLA] Go to; 'tis well; away.
ISABELLA. Heaven keep your honour safe!
ANGELO. [Aside] Amen; for I
Am that way going to temptation
Where prayers cross.
ISABELLA. At what hour to-morrow
Shall I attend your lordship?
ANGELO. At any time 'fore noon.
ISABELLA. Save your honour! Exeunt all but ANGELO
ANGELO. 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 flow'r,
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, fie, fie, fie!
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 wond'red how. Exit
SCENE III.
A prison
Enter, severally, DUKE, disguised as a FRIAR, and PROVOST
DUKE. Hail to you, Provost! so I think you are.
PROVOST. I am the Provost. What's your will, good friar?
DUKE. Bound by my charity and my blest 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.
PROVOST. I would do more than that, if more were needful.
Enter JULIET
Look, here comes one; a gentlewoman of mine,
Who, falling in the flaws 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?
PROVOST. As I do think, to-morrow.
[To JULIET] I have provided for you; stay awhile
And you shall be conducted.
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
Was mutually committed.
JULIET. 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 would 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 law,
That respites me a life whose very comfort
Is still a dying horror!
PROVOST. 'Tis pity of him. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
ANGELO'S house
Enter ANGELO
ANGELO. When I would pray and think, I think and pray
To several subjects. Heaven hath my empty words,
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 sere 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 art blood.
Let's write 'good angel' on the devil's horn;
'Tis not the devil's crest.
Enter SERVANT
How now, who's there?
SERVANT. One Isabel, a sister, desires access to you.
ANGELO. Teach her the way. [Exit SERVANT] O heavens!
Why does my blood thus muster to my heart,
Making both it unable for itself
And dispossessing all my 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?
ISABELLA. I am come to know your pleasure.
ANGELO. That you might know it would much better please me
Than to demand what 'tis. Your brother cannot live.
ISABELLA. Even so! Heaven keep your honour!
ANGELO. Yet may he live awhile, and, it may be,
As long as you or I; yet he must die.
ISABELLA. Under your sentence?
ANGELO. Yea.
ISABELLA. When? I beseech you; that in his reprieve,
Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted
That his soul sicken not.
ANGELO. Ha! Fie, these filthy vices! It were as good
To pardon him that hath from nature stol'n
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.
ISABELLA. 'Tis set down so in heaven, but not in earth.
ANGELO. 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?
ISABELLA. Sir, believe this:
I had rather give my body than my soul.
ANGELO. I talk not of your soul; our compell'd sins
Stand more for number than for accompt.
ISABELLA. How say you?
ANGELO. Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can speak
Against the thing I say. 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 sin
To save this brother's life?
ISABELLA. Please you to do't,
I'll take it as a peril to my soul
It is no sin at all, but charity.
ANGELO. Pleas'd you to do't at peril of your soul,
Were equal poise of sin and charity.
ISABELLA. That I do beg his life, if it be sin,
Heaven let me bear it! You granting of my suit,
If that be sin, I'll make it my morn prayer
To have it added to the faults of mine,
And nothing of your answer.
ANGELO. Nay, but hear me;
Your sense pursues not mine; either you are ignorant
Or seem so, craftily; and that's not good.
ISABELLA. Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good
But graciously to know I am no better.
ANGELO. Thus wisdom wishes to appear most bright
When it doth tax itself; as these black masks
Proclaim an enshielded beauty ten times louder
Than beauty could, display'd. But mark me:
To be received plain, I'll speak more gross-
Your brother is to die.
ISABELLA. So.
ANGELO. And his offence is so, as it appears,
Accountant to the law upon that pain.
ISABELLA. True.
ANGELO. Admit no other way to save his life,
As I subscribe not that, nor any other,
But, in the loss of question, that you, his sister,
Finding yourself desir'd of such a person
Whose credit with the judge, or own great place,
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-binding law; and that there were
No earthly mean to save him but that either
You must lay down the treasures of your body
To this supposed, or else to let him suffer-
What would you do?
ISABELLA. As much for my poor brother as myself;
That is, were I under the terms of death,
Th' impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies,
And strip myself to death as to a bed
That longing have been sick for, ere I'd yield
My body up to shame.
ANGELO. Then must your brother die.
ISABELLA. And 'twere the cheaper way:
Better it were a brother died at once
Than that a sister, by redeeming him,
Should die for ever.
ANGELO. Were not you, then, as cruel as the sentence
That you have slander'd so?
ISABELLA. Ignominy in ransom and free pardon
Are of two houses: lawful mercy
Is nothing kin to foul redemption.
ANGELO. You seem'd of late to make the law a tyrant;
And rather prov'd the sliding of your brother
A merriment than a vice.
ISABELLA. O, pardon me, my lord! It oft falls out,
To have what we would have, we speak not what we mean:
I something do excuse the thing I hate
For his advantage that I dearly love.
ANGELO. We are all frail.
ISABELLA. Else let my brother die,
If not a fedary but only he
Owe and succeed thy weakness.
ANGELO. Nay, women are frail too.
ISABELLA. Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves,
Which are as easy broke as they make forms.
Women, help heaven! Men their creation mar
In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail;
For we are soft as our complexions are,
And credulous to false prints.
ANGELO. I think it well;
And from this testimony of your own sex,
Since I suppose we are made to be no stronger
Than faults may shake our frames, let me be bold.
I do arrest your words. Be that you are,
That is, a woman; if you be more, you're none;
If you be one, as you are well express'd
By all external warrants, show it now
By putting on the destin'd livery.
ISABELLA. I have no tongue but one; gentle, my lord,
Let me intreat you speak the former language.
ANGELO. Plainly conceive, I love you.
ISABELLA. My brother did love Juliet,
And you tell me that he shall die for't.
ANGELO. He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love.
ISABELLA. I know your virtue hath a license in't,
Which seems a little fouler than it is,
To pluck on others.
ANGELO. Believe me, on mine honour,
My words express my purpose.
ISABELLA. Ha! little honour to be much believ'd,
And most pernicious purpose! Seeming, seeming!
I will proclaim thee, Angelo, look for't.
Sign me a present pardon for my brother
Or, with an outstretch'd throat, I'll tell the world aloud
What man thou art.
ANGELO. Who will believe thee, Isabel?
My unsoil'd name, th' austereness of my life,
My vouch against you, and my place i' th' state,
Will so your accusation overweigh
That you shall stifle in your own report,
And smell of calumny. I have begun,
And now I give my sensual race the rein:
Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite;
Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes
That banish what they sue for; redeem thy brother
By yielding up thy body to my will;
Or else he must not only die the death,
But thy unkindness shall his death draw out
To ling'ring sufferance. Answer me to-morrow,
Or, by the affection that now guides me most,
I'll prove a tyrant to him. As for you,
Say what you can: my false o'erweighs your true. Exit
ISABELLA. To whom should I complain? Did I tell this,
Who would believe me? O perilous mouths
That bear in them one and the self-same tongue
Either of condemnation or approof,
Bidding the law make curtsy to their will;
Hooking both right and wrong to th' appetite,
To follow as it draws! I'll to my brother.
Though he hath fall'n by prompture of the blood,
Yet hath he in him such a mind of honour
That, had he twenty heads to tender down
On twenty bloody blocks, he'd yield them up
Before his sister should her body stoop
To such abhorr'd pollution.
Then, Isabel, live chaste, and, brother, die:
More than our brother is our chastity.
I'll tell him yet of Angelo's request,
And fit his mind to death, for his soul's rest. Exit
<>
ACT III. SCENE I.
The prison
Enter DUKE, disguised as before, CLAUDIO, and PROVOST
DUKE. So, then you hope of pardon from Lord Angelo?
CLAUDIO. The miserable have no other medicine
But only hope:
I have hope to Eve, and am prepar'd to die.
DUKE. Be absolute for death; either death or life
Shall thereby be the sweeter. Reason thus with life.
If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing
That none but fools would keep. A breath thou art,
Servile to all the skyey influences,
That dost this habitation where thou keep'st
Hourly afflict. Merely, thou art Death's fool;
For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun
And yet run'st toward him still. Thou art not noble;
For all th' accommodations that thou bear'st
Are nurs'd by baseness. Thou 'rt by no means valiant;
For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork
Of a poor worm. Thy best of rest is sleep,
And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st
Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself;
For thou exists on many a thousand grains
That 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 effects,
After 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 rheum,
For ending thee no sooner. Thou hast nor youth nor age,
But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep,
Dreaming on both; for all thy blessed youth
Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms
Of palsied eld; and when thou art old and rich,
Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty,
To make thy riches pleasant. What's yet in this
That bears the name of life? Yet in this life
Lie hid moe 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 conceal'd.
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;
To-morrow 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 determin'd 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 respect
Than a perpetual honour. Dar'st thou die?
The sense of death is most in apprehension;
And the poor beetle that we tread upon
In corporal sufferance finds a pang as great
As when a giant dies.
CLAUDIO. Why give you me this shame?
Think you I can a resolution fetch
From flow'ry tenderness? If I must die,
I will encounter darkness as a bride
And hug it in mine arms.
ISABELLA. There spake my brother; there my father's grave
Did utter forth a voice. Yes, thou must die:
Thou art too noble to conserve a life
In base appliances. This outward-sainted deputy,
Whose settled visage and deliberate word
Nips youth i' th' head, and follies doth enew
As falcon doth the fowl, is yet a devil;
His filth within being cast, he would appear
A pond as deep as hell.
CLAUDIO. The precise Angelo!
ISABELLA. O, 'tis the cunning livery of hell
The damned'st body to invest and cover
In precise guards! Dost thou think, Claudio,
If I would yield him my virginity
Thou mightst be freed?
CLAUDIO. O heavens! it cannot be.
ISABELLA. Yes, he would give't thee, from this rank offence,
So to offend him still. This night's the time
That I should do what I abhor to name,
Or else thou diest to-morrow.
CLAUDIO. Thou shalt not do't.
ISABELLA. O, were it but my life!
I'd throw it down for your deliverance
As frankly as a pin.
CLAUDIO. Thanks, dear Isabel.
ISABELLA. Be ready, Claudio, for your death to-morrow.
CLAUDIO. Yes. Has he affections in him
That thus can make him bite the law by th' nose
When 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 trick
Be perdurably fin'd?- 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 become
A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit
To bathe in fiery floods or to reside
In thrilling region of thick-ribbed ice;
To be imprison'd in the viewless winds,
And blown with restless violence round about
The pendent world; or to be worse than worst
Of those that lawless and incertain thought
Imagine howling- 'tis too horrible.
The weariest and most loathed worldly life
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment,
Can lay on nature is a paradise
To 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 far
That 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 life
From thine own sister's shame? What should I think?
Heaven shield my mother play'd my father fair!
For such a warped slip of wilderness
Ne'er issu'd from his blood. Take my defiance;
Die; perish. Might but my bending down
Reprieve 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.
CLAUDIO. O, hear me, Isabella.
Re-enter DUKE
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 awhile.
[Walks apart]
DUKE. Son, I have overheard what hath pass'd 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 judgment 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; to-morrow 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] Provost, a word with
you.
Re-enter PROVOST
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 convey'd 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 deceiv'd 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 by
oath, and the nuptial appointed; between which time of the
contract and limit of the solemnity her brother Frederick was
wreck'd 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, bestow'd 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.
Exeunt severally
Scene II.
The street before the prison
Enter, on one side, DUKE disguised as before; on the other, ELBOW,
and OFFICERS with POMPEY
ELBOW. Nay, if there be no remedy for it, but that you will needs
buy and sell men and women like beasts, we shall have all the
world drink brown and white bastard.
DUKE. O heavens! what stuff is here?
POMPEY. 'Twas never merry world since, of two usuries, the merriest
was put down, and the worser allow'd by order of law a furr'd
gown to keep him warm; and furr'd with fox on lamb-skins too, to
signify that craft, being richer than innocency, stands for the
facing.
ELBOW. Come your way, sir. Bless you, good father friar.
DUKE. And you, good brother father. What offence hath this man made
you, sir?
ELBOW. Marry, sir, he hath offended the law; and, sir, we take him
to be a thief too, sir, for we have found upon him, sir, a
strange picklock, which we have sent to the deputy.
DUKE. Fie, sirrah, a bawd, a wicked bawd!
The evil that thou causest to be done,
That is thy means to live. Do thou but think
What 'tis to cram a maw or clothe a back
From such a filthy vice; say to thyself
'From their abominable and beastly touches
I drink, I eat, array myself, and live.'
Canst thou believe thy living is a life,
So stinkingly depending? Go mend, go mend.
POMPEY. Indeed, it does stink in some sort, sir; but yet, sir,
I would prove-
DUKE. Nay, if the devil have given thee proofs for sin,
Thou wilt prove his. Take him to prison, officer;
Correction and instruction must both work
Ere this rude beast will profit.
ELBOW. He must before the deputy, sir; he has given him warning.
The deputy cannot abide a whoremaster; if he be a whoremonger,
and comes before him, he were as good go a mile on his errand.
DUKE. That we were all, as some would seem to be,
From our faults, as his faults from seeming, free.
ELBOW. His neck will come to your waist- a cord, sir.
Enter LUCIO
POMPEY. I spy comfort; I cry bail. Here's a gentleman, and a friend
of mine.
LUCIO. How now, noble Pompey! What, at the wheels of Caesar? Art
thou led in triumph? What, is there none of Pygmalion's images,
newly made woman, to be had now for putting the hand in the
pocket and extracting it clutch'd? What reply, ha? What say'st
thou to this tune, matter, and method? Is't not drown'd i' th'
last rain, ha? What say'st thou, trot? Is the world as it was,
man? Which is the way? Is it sad, and few words? or how? The
trick of it?
DUKE. Still thus, and thus; still worse!
LUCIO. How doth my dear morsel, thy mistress? Procures she still,
ha?
POMPEY. Troth, sir, she hath eaten up all her beef, and she is
herself in the tub.
LUCIO. Why, 'tis good; it is the right of it; it must be so; ever
your fresh whore and your powder'd bawd- an unshunn'd
consequence; it must be so. Art going to prison, Pompey?
POMPEY. Yes, faith, sir.
LUCIO. Why, 'tis not amiss, Pompey. Farewell; go, say I sent thee
thither. For debt, Pompey- or how?
ELBOW. For being a bawd, for being a bawd.
LUCIO. Well, then, imprison him. If imprisonment be the due of a
bawd, why, 'tis his right. Bawd is he doubtless, and of
antiquity, too; bawd-born. Farewell, good Pompey. Commend me to
the prison, Pompey. You will turn good husband now, Pompey; you
will keep the house.
POMPEY. I hope, sir, your good worship will be my bail.
LUCIO. No, indeed, will I not, Pompey; it is not the wear. I will
pray, Pompey, to increase your bondage. If you take it not
patiently, why, your mettle is the more. Adieu trusty Pompey.
Bless you, friar.
DUKE. And you.
LUCIO. Does Bridget paint still, Pompey, ha?
ELBOW. Come your ways, sir; come.
POMPEY. You will not bail me then, sir?
LUCIO. Then, Pompey, nor now. What news abroad, friar? what news?
ELBOW. Come your ways, sir; come.
LUCIO. Go to kennel, Pompey, go.
Exeunt ELBOW, POMPEY and OFFICERS
What news, friar, of the Duke?
DUKE. I know none. Can you tell me of any?
LUCIO. Some say he is with the Emperor of Russia; other some, he is
in Rome; but where is he, think you?
DUKE. I know not where; but wheresoever, I wish him well.
LUCIO. It was a mad fantastical trick of him to steal from the
state and usurp the beggary he was never born to. Lord Angelo
dukes it well in his absence; he puts transgression to't.
DUKE. He does well in't.
LUCIO. A little more lenity to lechery would do no harm in him;
something too crabbed that way, friar.
DUKE. It is too general a vice, and severity must cure it.
LUCIO. Yes, in good sooth, the vice is of a great kindred; it is
well allied; but it is impossible to extirp it quite, friar, till
eating and drinking be put down. They say this Angelo was not
made by man and woman after this downright way of creation. Is it
true, think you?
DUKE. How should he be made, then?
LUCIO. Some report a sea-maid spawn'd him; some, that he was begot
between two stock-fishes. But it is certain that when he makes
water his urine is congeal'd ice; that I know to be true. And he
is a motion generative; that's infallible.
DUKE. You are pleasant, sir, and speak apace.
LUCIO. Why, what a ruthless thing is this in him, for the rebellion
of a codpiece to take away the life of a man! Would the Duke that
is absent have done this? Ere he would have hang'd a man for the
getting a hundred bastards, he would have paid for the nursing a
thousand. He had some feeling of the sport; he knew the service,
and that instructed him to mercy.
DUKE. I never heard the absent Duke much detected for women; he was
not inclin'd that way.
LUCIO. O, sir, you are deceiv'd.
DUKE. 'Tis not possible.
LUCIO. Who- not the Duke? Yes, your beggar of fifty; and his use
was to put a ducat in her clack-dish. The Duke had crotchets in
him. He would be drunk too; that let me inform you.
DUKE. You do him wrong, surely.
LUCIO. Sir, I was an inward of his. A shy fellow was the Duke; and
I believe I know the cause of his withdrawing.
DUKE. What, I prithee, might be the cause?
LUCIO. No, pardon; 'tis a secret must be lock'd within the teeth
and the lips; but this I can let you understand: the greater file
of the subject held the Duke to be wise.
DUKE. Wise? Why, no question but he was.
LUCIO. A very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellow.
DUKE. Either this is envy in you, folly, or mistaking; the very
stream of his life, and the business he hath helmed, must, upon a
warranted need, give him a better proclamation. Let him be but
testimonied in his own bringings-forth, and he shall appear to
the envious a scholar, a statesman, and a soldier. Therefore you
speak unskilfully; or, if your knowledge be more, it is much
dark'ned in your malice.
LUCIO. Sir, I know him, and I love him.
DUKE. Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with dearer
love.
LUCIO. Come, sir, I know what I know.
DUKE. I can hardly believe that, since you know not what you speak.
But, if ever the Duke return, as our prayers are he may, let me
desire you to make your answer before him. If it be honest you
have spoke, you have courage to maintain it; I am bound to call
upon you; and I pray you your name?
LUCIO. Sir, my name is Lucio, well known to the Duke.
DUKE. He shall know you better, sir, if I may live to report you.
LUCIO. I fear you not.
DUKE. O, you hope the Duke will return no more; or you imagine me
too unhurtful an opposite. But, indeed, I can do you little harm:
you'll forswear this again.
LUCIO. I'll be hang'd first. Thou art deceiv'd in me, friar. But no
more of this. Canst thou tell if Claudio die to-morrow or no?
DUKE. Why should he die, sir?
LUCIO. Why? For filling a bottle with a tun-dish. I would the Duke
we talk of were return'd again. This ungenitur'd agent will
unpeople the province with continency; sparrows must not build in
his house-eaves because they are lecherous. The Duke yet would
have dark deeds darkly answered; he would never bring them to
light. Would he were return'd! Marry, this Claudio is condemned
for untrussing. Farewell, good friar; I prithee pray for me. The
Duke, I say to thee again, would eat mutton on Fridays. He's not
past it yet; and, I say to thee, he would mouth with a beggar
though she smelt brown bread and garlic. Say that I said so.
Farewell. Exit
DUKE. No might nor greatness in mortality
Can censure scape; back-wounding calumny
The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong
Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue?
But who comes here?
Enter ESCALUS, PROVOST, and OFFICERS with
MISTRESS OVERDONE
ESCALUS. Go, away with her to prison.
MRS. OVERDONE. Good my lord, be good to me; your honour is
accounted a merciful man; good my lord.
ESCALUS. Double and treble admonition, and still forfeit in the
same kind! This would make mercy swear and play the tyrant.
PROVOST. A bawd of eleven years' continuance, may it please your
honour.
MRS. OVERDONE. My lord, this is one Lucio's information against me.
Mistress Kate Keepdown was with child by him in the Duke's time;
he promis'd her marriage. His child is a year and a quarter old
come Philip and Jacob; I have kept it myself; and see how he goes
about to abuse me.
ESCALUS. That fellow is a fellow of much license. Let him be call'd
before us. Away with her to prison. Go to; no more words. [Exeunt
OFFICERS with MISTRESS OVERDONE] Provost, my brother Angelo will
not be alter'd: Claudio must die to-morrow. Let him be furnish'd
with divines, and have all charitable preparation. If my brother
wrought by my pity, it should not be so with him.
PROVOST. So please you, this friar hath been with him, and advis'd
him for th' entertainment of death.
ESCALUS. Good even, good father.
DUKE. Bliss and goodness on you!
ESCALUS. Of whence are you?
DUKE. Not of this country, though my chance is now
To use it for my time. I am a brother
Of gracious order, late come from the See
In special business from his Holiness.
ESCALUS. What news abroad i' th' world?
DUKE. None, but that there is so great a fever on goodness that the
dissolution of it must cure it. Novelty is only in request; and,
as it is, as dangerous to be aged in any kind of course as it is
virtuous to be constant in any undertakeing. There is scarce
truth enough alive to make societies secure; but security enough
to make fellowships accurst. Much upon this riddle runs the
wisdom of the world. This news is old enough, yet it is every
day's news. I pray you, sir, of what disposition was the Duke?
ESCALUS. One that, above all other strifes, contended especially to
know himself.
DUKE. What pleasure was he given to?
ESCALUS. Rather rejoicing to see another merry than merry at
anything which profess'd to make him rejoice; a gentleman of all
temperance. But leave we him to his events, with a prayer they
may prove prosperous; and let me desire to know how you find
Claudio prepar'd. I am made to understand that you have lent him
visitation.
DUKE. He professes to have received no sinister measure from his
judge, but most willingly humbles himself to the determination of
justice. Yet had he framed to himself, by the instruction of his
frailty, many deceiving promises of life; which I, by my good
leisure, have discredited to him, and now he is resolv'd to die.
ESCALUS. You have paid the heavens your function, and the prisoner
the very debt of your calling. I have labour'd for the poor
gentleman to the extremest shore of my modesty; but my brother
justice have I found so severe that he hath forc'd me to tell him
he is indeed Justice.
DUKE. If his own life answer the straitness of his proceeding, it
shall become him well; wherein if he chance to fail, he hath
sentenc'd himself.
ESCALUS. I am going to visit the prisoner. Fare you well.
DUKE. Peace be with you! Exeunt ESCALUS and PROVOST
He who the sword of heaven will bear
Should be as holy as severe;
Pattern in himself to know,
Grace to stand, and virtue go;
More nor less to others paying
Than by self-offences weighing.
Shame to him whose cruel striking
Kills for faults of his own liking!
Twice treble shame on Angelo,
To weed my vice and let his grow!
O, what may man within him hide,
Though angel on the outward side!
How may likeness, made in crimes,
Make a practice on the times,
To draw with idle spiders' strings
Most ponderous and substantial things!
Craft against vice I must apply.
With Angelo to-night shall lie
His old betrothed but despised;
So disguise shall, by th' disguised,
Pay with falsehood false exacting,
And perform an old contracting. Exit
Act IV. Scene I.
The moated grange at Saint Duke's
Enter MARIANA; and BOY singing
SONG
Take, O, take those lips away,
That so sweetly were forsworn;
And those eyes, the break of day,
Lights that do mislead the morn;
But my kisses bring again, bring again;
Seals of love, but seal'd in vain, seal'd in vain.
Enter DUKE, disguised as before
MARIANA. Break off thy song, and haste thee quick away;
Here comes a man of comfort, whose advice
Hath often still'd my brawling discontent. Exit BOY
I cry you mercy, sir, and well could wish
You had not found me here so musical.
Let me excuse me, and believe me so,
My mirth it much displeas'd, but pleas'd my woe.
DUKE. 'Tis good; though music oft hath such a charm
To make bad good and good provoke to harm.
I pray you tell me hath anybody inquir'd for me here to-day. Much
upon this time have I promis'd here to meet.
MARIANA. You have not been inquir'd after; I have sat here all day.
Enter ISABELLA
DUKE. I do constantly believe you. The time is come even now. I
shall crave your forbearance a little. May be I will call upon
you anon, for some advantage to yourself.
MARIANA. I am always bound to you. Exit
DUKE. Very well met, and well come.
What is the news from this good deputy?
ISABELLA. He hath a garden circummur'd with brick,
Whose western side is with a vineyard back'd;
And to that vineyard is a planched gate
That makes his opening with this bigger key;
This other doth command a little door
Which from the vineyard to the garden leads.
There have I made my promise
Upon the heavy middle of the night
To call upon him.
DUKE. But shall you on your knowledge find this way?
ISABELLA. I have ta'en a due and wary note upon't;
With whispering and most guilty diligence,
In action all of precept, he did show me
The way twice o'er.
DUKE. Are there no other tokens
Between you 'greed concerning her observance?
ISABELLA. No, none, but only a repair i' th' dark;
And that I have possess'd him my most stay
Can be but brief; for I have made him know
I have a servant comes with me along,
That stays upon me; whose persuasion is
I come about my brother.
DUKE. 'Tis well borne up.
I have not yet made known to Mariana
A word of this. What ho, within! come forth.
Re-enter MARIANA
I pray you be acquainted with this maid;
She comes to do you good.
ISABELLA. I do desire the like.
DUKE. Do you persuade yourself that I respect you?
MARIANA. Good friar, I know you do, and have found it.
DUKE. Take, then, this your companion by the hand,
Who hath a story ready for your ear.
I shall attend your leisure; but make haste;
The vaporous night approaches.
MARIANA. Will't please you walk aside?
Exeunt MARIANA and ISABELLA
DUKE. O place and greatness! Millions of false eyes
Are stuck upon thee. Volumes of report
Run with these false, and most contrarious quest
Upon thy doings. Thousand escapes of wit
Make thee the father of their idle dream,
And rack thee in their fancies.
Re-enter MARIANA and ISABELLA
Welcome, how agreed?
ISABELLA. She'll take the enterprise upon her, father,
If you advise it.
DUKE. It is not my consent,
But my entreaty too.
ISABELLA. Little have you to say,
When you depart from him, but, soft and low,
'Remember now my brother.'
MARIANA. Fear me not.
DUKE. Nor, gentle daughter, fear you not at all.
He is your husband on a pre-contract.
To bring you thus together 'tis no sin,
Sith that the justice of your title to him
Doth flourish the deceit. Come, let us go;
Our corn's to reap, for yet our tithe's to sow. Exeunt
SCENE II.
The prison
Enter PROVOST and POMPEY
PROVOST. Come hither, sirrah. Can you cut off a man's head?
POMPEY. If the man be a bachelor, sir, I can; but if he be a
married man, he's his wife's head, and I can never cut of a
woman's head.
PROVOST. Come, sir, leave me your snatches and yield me a direct
answer. To-morrow morning are to die Claudio and Barnardine. Here
is in our prison a common executioner, who in his office lacks a
helper; if you will take it on you to assist him, it shall redeem
you from your gyves; if not, you shall have your full time of
imprisonment, and your deliverance with an unpitied whipping, for
you have been a notorious bawd.
POMPEY. Sir, I have been an unlawful bawd time out of mind; but yet
I will be content to be a lawful hangman. I would be glad to
receive some instructions from my fellow partner.
PROVOST. What ho, Abhorson! Where's Abhorson there?
Enter ABHORSON
ABHORSON. Do you call, sir?
PROVOST. Sirrah, here's a fellow will help you to-morrow in your
execution. If you think it meet, compound with him by the year,
and let him abide here with you; if not, use him for the present,
and dismiss him. He cannot plead his estimation with you; he hath
been a bawd.
ABHORSON. A bawd, sir? Fie upon him! He will discredit our mystery.
PROVOST. Go to, sir; you weigh equally; a feather will turn the
scale. Exit
POMPEY. Pray, sir, by your good favour- for surely, sir, a good
favour you have but that you have a hanging look- do you call,
sir, your occupation a mystery?
ABHORSON. Ay, sir; a mystery.
POMPEY. Painting, sir, I have heard say, is a mystery; and your
whores, sir, being members of my occupation, using painting, do
prove my occupation a mystery; but what mystery there should be
in hanging, if I should be hang'd, I cannot imagine.
ABHORSON. Sir, it is a mystery.
POMPEY. Proof?
ABHORSON. Every true man's apparel fits your thief: if it be too
little for your thief, your true man thinks it big enough; if it
be too big for your thief, your thief thinks it little enough; so
every true man's apparel fits your thief.
Re-enter PROVOST
PROVOST. Are you agreed?
POMPEY. Sir, I will serve him; for I do find your hangman is a more
penitent trade than your bawd; he doth oftener ask forgiveness.
PROVOST. You, sirrah, provide your block and your axe to-morrow
four o'clock.
ABHORSON. Come on, bawd; I will instruct thee in my trade; follow.
POMPEY. I do desire to learn, sir; and I hope, if you have occasion
to use me for your own turn, you shall find me yare; for truly,
sir, for your kindness I owe you a good turn.
PROVOST. Call hither Barnardine and Claudio.
Exeunt ABHORSON and POMPEY
Th' one has my pity; not a jot the other,
Being a murderer, though he were my brother.
Enter CLAUDIO
Look, here's the warrant, Claudio, for thy death;
'Tis now dead midnight, and by eight to-morrow
Thou must be made immortal. Where's Barnardine?
CLAUDIO. As fast lock'd up in sleep as guiltless labour
When it lies starkly in the traveller's bones.
He will not wake.
PROVOST. Who can do good on him?
Well, go, prepare yourself. [Knocking within] But hark, what
noise?
Heaven give your spirits comfort! Exit CLAUDIO
[Knocking continues] By and by.
I hope it is some pardon or reprieve
For the most gentle Claudio.
Enter DUKE, disguised as before
Welcome, father.
DUKE. The best and wholesom'st spirits of the night
Envelop you, good Provost! Who call'd here of late?
PROVOST. None, since the curfew rung.
DUKE. Not Isabel?
PROVOST. No.
DUKE. They will then, ere't be long.
PROVOST. What comfort is for Claudio?
DUKE. There's some in hope.
PROVOST. It is a bitter deputy.
DUKE. Not so, not so; his life is parallel'd
Even with the stroke and line of his great justice;
He doth with holy abstinence subdue
That in himself which he spurs on his pow'r
To qualify in others. Were he meal'd with that
Which he corrects, then were he tyrannous;
But this being so, he's just. [Knocking within] Now are they
come. Exit PROVOST
This is a gentle provost; seldom when
The steeled gaoler is the friend of men. [Knocking within]
How now, what noise! That spirit's possess'd with haste
That wounds th' unsisting postern with these strokes.
Re-enter PROVOST
PROVOST. There he must stay until the officer
Arise to let him in; he is call'd up.
DUKE. Have you no countermand for Claudio yet
But he must die to-morrow?
PROVOST. None, sir, none.
DUKE. As near the dawning, Provost, as it is,
You shall hear more ere morning.
PROVOST. Happily
You something know; yet I believe there comes
No countermand; no such example have we.
Besides, upon the very siege of justice,
Lord Angelo hath to the public ear
Profess'd the contrary.
Enter a MESSENGER
This is his lordship's man.
DUKE. And here comes Claudio's pardon.
MESSENGER. My lord hath sent you this note; and by me this further
charge, that you swerve not from the smallest article of it,
neither in time, matter, or other circumstance. Good morrow; for
as I take it, it is almost day.
PROVOST. I shall obey him. Exit MESSENGER
DUKE. [Aside] This is his pardon, purchas'd by such sin
For which the pardoner himself is in;
Hence hath offence his quick celerity,
When it is borne in high authority.
When vice makes mercy, mercy's so extended
That for the fault's love is th' offender friended.
Now, sir, what news?
PROVOST. I told you: Lord Angelo, belike thinking me remiss in mine
office, awakens me with this unwonted putting-on; methinks
strangely, for he hath not us'd it before.
DUKE. Pray you, let's hear.
PROVOST. [Reads] 'Whatsoever you may hear to the contrary, let
Claudio be executed by four of the clock, and, in the afternoon,
Barnardine. For my better satisfaction, let me have Claudio's
head sent me by five. Let this be duly performed, with a thought
that more depends on it than we must yet deliver. Thus fail not
to do your office, as you will answer it at your peril.'
What say you to this, sir?
DUKE. What is that Barnardine who is to be executed in th'
afternoon?
PROVOST. A Bohemian born; but here nurs'd up and bred.
One that is a prisoner nine years old.
DUKE. How came it that the absent Duke had not either deliver'd him
to his liberty or executed him? I have heard it was ever his
manner to do so.
PROVOST. His friends still wrought reprieves for him; and, indeed,
his fact, till now in the government of Lord Angelo, came not to
an undoubted proof.
DUKE. It is now apparent?
PROVOST. Most manifest, and not denied by himself.
DUKE. Hath he borne himself penitently in prison? How seems he to
be touch'd?
PROVOST. A man that apprehends death no more dreadfully but as a
drunken sleep; careless, reckless, and fearless, of what's past,
present, or to come; insensible of mortality and desperately
mortal.
DUKE. He wants advice.
PROVOST. He will hear none. He hath evermore had the liberty of the
prison; give him leave to escape hence, he would not; drunk many
times a day, if not many days entirely drunk. We have very oft
awak'd him, as if to carry him to execution, and show'd him a
seeming warrant for it; it hath not moved him at all.
DUKE. More of him anon. There is written in your brow, Provost,
honesty and constancy. If I read it not truly, my ancient skill
beguiles me; but in the boldness of my cunning I will lay myself
in hazard. Claudio, whom here you have warrant to execute, is no
greater forfeit to the law than Angelo who hath sentenc'd him. To
make you understand this in a manifested effect, I crave but four
days' respite; for the which you are to do me both a present and
a dangerous courtesy.
PROVOST. Pray, sir, in what?
DUKE. In the delaying death.
PROVOST. Alack! How may I do it, having the hour limited, and an
express command, under penalty, to deliver his head in the view
of Angelo? I may make my case as Claudio's, to cross this in the
smallest.
DUKE. By the vow of mine order, I warrant you, if my instructions
may be your guide. Let this Barnardine be this morning executed,
and his head borne to Angelo.
PROVOST. Angelo hath seen them both, and will discover the favour.
DUKE. O, death's a great disguiser; and you may add to it. Shave
the head and tie the beard; and say it was the desire of the
penitent to be so bar'd before his death. You know the course is
common. If anything fall to you upon this more than thanks and
good fortune, by the saint whom I profess, I will plead against
it with my life.
PROVOST. Pardon me, good father; it is against my oath.
DUKE. Were you sworn to the Duke, or to the deputy?
PROVOST. To him and to his substitutes.
DUKE. You will think you have made no offence if the Duke avouch
the justice of your dealing?
PROVOST. But what likelihood is in that?
DUKE. Not a resemblance, but a certainty. Yet since I see you
fearful, that neither my coat, integrity, nor persuasion, can
with ease attempt you, I will go further than I meant, to pluck
all fears out of you. Look you, sir, here is the hand and seal of
the Duke. You know the character, I doubt not; and the signet is
not strange to you.
PROVOST. I know them both.
DUKE. The contents of this is the return of the Duke; you shall
anon over-read it at your pleasure, where you shall find within
these two days he will be here. This is a thing that Angelo knows
not; for he this very day receives letters of strange tenour,
perchance of the Duke's death, perchance entering into some
monastery; but, by chance, nothing of what is writ. Look, th'
unfolding star calls up the shepherd. Put not yourself into
amazement how these things should be: all difficulties are but
easy when they are known. Call your executioner, and off with
Barnardine's head. I will give him a present shrift, and advise
him for a better place. Yet you are amaz'd, but this shall
absolutely resolve you. Come away; it is almost clear dawn.
Exeunt
SCENE III.
The prison
Enter POMPEY
POMPEY. I am as well acquainted here as I was in our house of
profession; one would think it were Mistress Overdone's own
house, for here be many of her old customers. First, here's young
Master Rash; he's in for a commodity of brown paper and old
ginger, nine score and seventeen pounds, of which he made five
marks ready money. Marry, then ginger was not much in request,
for the old women were all dead. Then is there here one Master
Caper, at the suit of Master Threepile the mercer, for some four
suits of peach-colour'd satin, which now peaches him a beggar.
Then have we here young Dizy, and young Master Deepvow, and
Master Copperspur, and Master Starvelackey, the rapier and dagger
man, and young Dropheir that kill'd lusty Pudding, and Master
Forthlight the tilter, and brave Master Shootie the great
traveller, and wild Halfcan that stabb'd Pots, and, I think,
forty more- all great doers in our trade, and are now 'for the
Lord's sake.'
Enter ABHORSON
ABHORSON. Sirrah, bring Barnardine hither.
POMPEY. Master Barnardine! You must rise and be hang'd, Master
Barnardine!
ABHORSON. What ho, Barnardine!
BARNARDINE. [Within] A pox o' your throats! Who makes that noise
there? What are you?
POMPEY. Your friends, sir; the hangman. You must be so good, sir,
to rise and be put to death.
BARNARDINE. [ Within ] Away, you rogue, away; I am sleepy.
ABHORSON. Tell him he must awake, and that quickly too.
POMPEY. Pray, Master Barnardine, awake till you are executed, and
sleep afterwards.
ABHORSON. Go in to him, and fetch him out.
POMPEY. He is coming, sir, he is coming; I hear his straw rustle.
Enter BARNARDINE
ABHORSON. Is the axe upon the block, sirrah?
POMPEY. Very ready, sir.
BARNARDINE. How now, Abhorson, what's the news with you?
ABHORSON. Truly, sir, I would desire you to clap into your prayers;
for, look you, the warrant's come.
BARNARDINE. You rogue, I have been drinking all night; I am not
fitted for't.
POMPEY. O, the better, sir! For he that drinks all night and is
hanged betimes in the morning may sleep the sounder all the next
day.
Enter DUKE, disguised as before
ABHORSON. Look you, sir, here comes your ghostly father.
Do we jest now, think you?
DUKE. Sir, induced by my charity, and hearing how hastily you are
to depart, I am come to advise you, comfort you, and pray with
you.
BARNARDINE. Friar, not I; I have been drinking hard all night, and
I will have more time to prepare me, or they shall beat out my
brains with billets. I will not consent to die this day, that's
certain.
DUKE. O, Sir, you must; and therefore I beseech you
Look forward on the journey you shall go.
BARNARDINE. I swear I will not die to-day for any man's persuasion.
DUKE. But hear you-
BARNARDINE. Not a word; if you have anything to say to me, come to
my ward; for thence will not I to-day. Exit
DUKE. Unfit to live or die. O gravel heart!
After him, fellows; bring him to the block.
Exeunt ABHORSON and POMPEY
Enter PROVOST
PROVOST. Now, sir, how do you find the prisoner?
DUKE. A creature unprepar'd, unmeet for death;
And to transport him in the mind he is
Were damnable.
PROVOST. Here in the prison, father,
There died this morning of a cruel fever
One Ragozine, a most notorious pirate,
A man of Claudio's years; his beard and head
Just of his colour. What if we do omit
This reprobate till he were well inclin'd,
And satisfy the deputy with the visage
Of Ragozine, more like to Claudio?
DUKE. O, 'tis an accident that heaven provides!
Dispatch it presently; the hour draws on
Prefix'd by Angelo. See this be done,
And sent according to command; whiles I
Persuade this rude wretch willingly to die.
PROVOST. This shall be done, good father, presently.
But Barnardine must die this afternoon;
And how shall we continue Claudio,
To save me from the danger that might come
If he were known alive?
DUKE. Let this be done:
Put them in secret holds, both Barnardine and Claudio.
Ere twice the sun hath made his journal greeting
To the under generation, you shall find
Your safety manifested.
PROVOST. I am your free dependant.
DUKE. Quick, dispatch, and send the head to Angelo.
Exit PROVOST
Now will I write letters to Angelo-
The Provost, he shall bear them- whose contents
Shall witness to him I am near at home,
And that, by great injunctions, I am bound
To enter publicly. Him I'll desire
To meet me at the consecrated fount,
A league below the city; and from thence,
By cold gradation and well-balanc'd form.
We shall proceed with Angelo.
Re-enter PROVOST
PROVOST. Here is the head; I'll carry it myself.
DUKE. Convenient is it. Make a swift return;
For I would commune with you of such things
That want no ear but yours.
PROVOST. I'll make all speed. Exit
ISABELLA. [ Within ] Peace, ho, be here!
DUKE. The tongue of Isabel. She's come to know
If yet her brother's pardon be come hither;
But I will keep her ignorant of her good,
To make her heavenly comforts of despair
When it is least expected.
Enter ISABELLA
ISABELLA. Ho, by your leave!
DUKE. Good morning to you, fair and gracious daughter.
ISABELLA. The better, given me by so holy a man.
Hath yet the deputy sent my brother's pardon?
DUKE. He hath releas'd him, Isabel, from the world.
His head is off and sent to Angelo.
ISABELLA. Nay, but it is not so.
DUKE. It is no other.
Show your wisdom, daughter, in your close patience,
ISABELLA. O, I will to him and pluck out his eyes!
DUKE. You shall not be admitted to his sight.
ISABELLA. Unhappy Claudio! Wretched Isabel!
Injurious world! Most damned Angelo!
DUKE. This nor hurts him nor profits you a jot;
Forbear it, therefore; give your cause to heaven.
Mark what I say, which you shall find
By every syllable a faithful verity.
The Duke comes home to-morrow. Nay, dry your eyes.
One of our covent, and his confessor,
Gives me this instance. Already he hath carried
Notice to Escalus and Angelo,
Who do prepare to meet him at the gates,
There to give up their pow'r. If you can, pace your wisdom
In that good path that I would wish it go,
And you shall have your bosom on this wretch,
Grace of the Duke, revenges to your heart,
And general honour.
ISABELLA. I am directed by you.
DUKE. This letter, then, to Friar Peter give;
'Tis that he sent me of the Duke's return.
Say, by this token, I desire his company
At Mariana's house to-night. Her cause and yours
I'll perfect him withal; and he shall bring you
Before the Duke; and to the head of Angelo
Accuse him home and home. For my poor self,
I am combined by a sacred vow,
And shall be absent. Wend you with this letter.
Command these fretting waters from your eyes
With a light heart; trust not my holy order,
If I pervert your course. Who's here?
Enter LUCIO
LUCIO. Good even. Friar, where's the Provost?
DUKE. Not within, sir.
LUCIO. O pretty Isabella, I am pale at mine heart to see thine eyes
so red. Thou must be patient. I am fain to dine and sup with
water and bran; I dare not for my head fill my belly; one
fruitful meal would set me to't. But they say the Duke will be
here to-morrow. By my troth, Isabel, I lov'd thy brother. If the
old fantastical Duke of dark corners had been at home, he had
lived. Exit ISABELLA
DUKE. Sir, the Duke is marvellous little beholding to your reports;
but the best is, he lives not in them.
LUCIO. Friar, thou knowest not the Duke so well as I do; he's a
better woodman than thou tak'st him for.
DUKE. Well, you'll answer this one day. Fare ye well.
LUCIO. Nay, tarry; I'll go along with thee; I can tell thee pretty
tales of the Duke.
DUKE. You have told me too many of him already, sir, if they be
true; if not true, none were enough.
LUCIO. I was once before him for getting a wench with child.
DUKE. Did you such a thing?
LUCIO. Yes, marry, did I; but I was fain to forswear it: they would
else have married me to the rotten medlar.
DUKE. Sir, your company is fairer than honest. Rest you well.
LUCIO. By my troth, I'll go with thee to the lane's end. If bawdy
talk offend you, we'll have very little of it. Nay, friar, I am a
kind of burr; I shall stick. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
ANGELO'S house
Enter ANGELO and ESCALUS
ESCALUS. Every letter he hath writ hath disvouch'd other.
ANGELO. In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much
like to madness; pray heaven his wisdom be not tainted! And why
meet him at the gates, and redeliver our authorities there?
ESCALUS. I guess not.
ANGELO. And why should we proclaim it in an hour before his
ent'ring that, if any crave redress of injustice, they should
exhibit their petitions in the street?
ESCALUS. He shows his reason for that: to have a dispatch of
complaints; and to deliver us from devices hereafter, which
shall then have no power to stand against us.
ANGELO. Well, I beseech you, let it be proclaim'd;
Betimes i' th' morn I'll call you at your house;
Give notice to such men of sort and suit
As are to meet him.
ESCALUS. I shall, sir; fare you well.
ANGELO. Good night. Exit ESCALUS
This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unpregnant
And dull to all proceedings. A deflow'red maid!
And by an eminent body that enforc'd
The law against it! But that her tender shame
Will not proclaim against her maiden loss,
How might she tongue me! Yet reason dares her no;
For my authority bears a so credent bulk
That no particular scandal once can touch
But it confounds the breather. He should have liv'd,
Save that his riotous youth, with dangerous sense,
Might in the times to come have ta'en revenge,
By so receiving a dishonour'd life
With ransom of such shame. Would yet he had liv'd!
Alack, when once our grace we have forgot,
Nothing goes right; we would, and we would not. Exit
SCENE V.
Fields without the town
Enter DUKE in his own habit, and Friar PETER
DUKE. These letters at fit time deliver me. [Giving letters]
The Provost knows our purpose and our plot.
The matter being afoot, keep your instruction
And hold you ever to our special drift;
Though sometimes you do blench from this to that
As cause doth minister. Go, call at Flavius' house,
And tell him where I stay; give the like notice
To Valentinus, Rowland, and to Crassus,
And bid them bring the trumpets to the gate;
But send me Flavius first.
PETER. It shall be speeded well. Exit FRIAR
Enter VARRIUS
DUKE. I thank thee, Varrius; thou hast made good haste.
Come, we will walk. There's other of our friends
Will greet us here anon. My gentle Varrius! Exeunt
SCENE VI.
A street near the city gate
Enter ISABELLA and MARIANA
ISABELLA. To speak so indirectly I am loath;
I would say the truth; but to accuse him so,
That is your part. Yet I am advis'd to do it;
He says, to veil full purpose.
MARIANA. Be rul'd by him.
ISABELLA. Besides, he tells me that, if peradventure
He speak against me on the adverse side,
I should not think it strange; for 'tis a physic
That's bitter to sweet end.
MARIANA. I would Friar Peter-
Enter FRIAR PETER
ISABELLA. O, peace! the friar is come.
PETER. Come, I have found you out a stand most fit,
Where you may have such vantage on the Duke
He shall not pass you. Twice have the trumpets sounded;
The generous and gravest citizens
Have hent the gates, and very near upon
The Duke is ent'ring; therefore, hence, away. Exeunt
<>
ACT V. SCENE I.
The city gate
Enter at several doors DUKE, VARRIUS, LORDS; ANGELO, ESCALUS, Lucio,
PROVOST, OFFICERS, and CITIZENS
DUKE. My very worthy cousin, fairly met!
Our old and faithful friend, we are glad to see you.
ANGELO, ESCALUS. Happy return be to your royal Grace!
DUKE. Many and hearty thankings to you both.
We have made inquiry of you, and we hear
Such goodness of your justice that our soul
Cannot but yield you forth to public thanks,
Forerunning more requital.
ANGELO. You make my bonds still greater.
DUKE. O, your desert speaks loud; and I should wrong it
To lock it in the wards of covert bosom,
When it deserves, with characters of brass,
A forted residence 'gainst the tooth of time
And razure of oblivion. Give me your hand.
And let the subject see, to make them know
That outward courtesies would fain proclaim
Favours that keep within. Come, Escalus,
You must walk by us on our other hand,
And good supporters are you.
Enter FRIAR PETER and ISABELLA
PETER. Now is your time; speak loud, and kneel before him.
ISABELLA. Justice, O royal Duke! Vail your regard
Upon a wrong'd- I would fain have said a maid!
O worthy Prince, dishonour not your eye
By throwing it on any other object
Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
And given me justice, justice, justice, justice.
DUKE. Relate your wrongs. In what? By whom? Be brief.
Here is Lord Angelo shall give you justice;
Reveal yourself to him.
ISABELLA. O worthy Duke,
You bid me seek redemption of the devil!
Hear me yourself; for that which I must speak
Must either punish me, not being believ'd,
Or wring redress from you. Hear me, O, hear me, here!
ANGELO. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm;
She hath been a suitor to me for her brother,
Cut off by course of justice-
ISABELLA. By course of justice!
ANGELO. And she will speak most bitterly and strange.
ISABELLA. Most strange, but yet most truly, will I speak.
That Angelo's forsworn, is it not strange?
That Angelo's a murderer, is't not strange?
That Angelo is an adulterous thief,
An hypocrite, a virgin-violator,
Is it not strange and strange?
DUKE. Nay, it is ten times strange.
ISABELLA. It is not truer he is Angelo
Than this is all as true as it is strange;
Nay, it is ten times true; for truth is truth
To th' end of reck'ning.
DUKE. Away with her. Poor soul,
She speaks this in th' infirmity of sense.
ISABELLA. O Prince! I conjure thee, as thou believ'st
There is another comfort than this world,
That thou neglect me not with that opinion
That I am touch'd with madness. Make not impossible
That which but seems unlike: 'tis not impossible
But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground,
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,
In all his dressings, characts, titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain. Believe it, royal Prince,
If he be less, he's nothing; but he's more,
Had I more name for badness.
DUKE. By mine honesty,
If she be mad, as I believe no other,
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,
As e'er I heard in madness.
ISABELLA. O gracious Duke,
Harp not on that; nor do not banish reason
For inequality; but let your reason serve
To make the truth appear where it seems hid,
And hide the false seems true.
DUKE. Many that are not mad
Have, sure, more lack of reason. What would you say?
ISABELLA. I am the sister of one Claudio,
Condemn'd upon the act of fornication
To lose his head; condemn'd by Angelo.
I, in probation of a sisterhood,
Was sent to by my brother; one Lucio
As then the messenger-
LUCIO. That's I, an't like your Grace.
I came to her from Claudio, and desir'd her
To try her gracious fortune with Lord Angelo
For her poor brother's pardon.
ISABELLA. That's he, indeed.
DUKE. You were not bid to speak.
LUCIO. No, my good lord;
Nor wish'd to hold my peace.
DUKE. I wish you now, then;
Pray you take note of it; and when you have
A business for yourself, pray heaven you then
Be perfect.
LUCIO. I warrant your honour.
DUKE. The warrant's for yourself; take heed to't.
ISABELLA. This gentleman told somewhat of my tale.
LUCIO. Right.
DUKE. It may be right; but you are i' the wrong
To speak before your time. Proceed.
ISABELLA. I went
To this pernicious caitiff deputy.
DUKE. That's somewhat madly spoken.
ISABELLA. Pardon it;
The phrase is to the matter.
DUKE. Mended again. The matter- proceed.
ISABELLA. In brief- to set the needless process by,
How I persuaded, how I pray'd, and kneel'd,
How he refell'd me, and how I replied,
For this was of much length- the vile conclusion
I now begin with grief and shame to utter:
He would not, but by gift of my chaste body
To his concupiscible intemperate lust,
Release my brother; and, after much debatement,
My sisterly remorse confutes mine honour,
And I did yield to him. But the next morn betimes,
His purpose surfeiting, he sends a warrant
For my poor brother's head.
DUKE. This is most likely!
ISABELLA. O that it were as like as it is true!
DUKE. By heaven, fond wretch, thou know'st not what thou speak'st,
Or else thou art suborn'd against his honour
In hateful practice. First, his integrity
Stands without blemish; next, it imports no reason
That with such vehemency he should pursue
Faults proper to himself. If he had so offended,
He would have weigh'd thy brother by himself,
And not have cut him off. Some one hath set you on;
Confess the truth, and say by whose advice
Thou cam'st here to complain.
ISABELLA. And is this all?
Then, O you blessed ministers above,
Keep me in patience; and, with ripened time,
Unfold the evil which is here wrapt up
In countenance! Heaven shield your Grace from woe,
As I, thus wrong'd, hence unbelieved go!
DUKE. I know you'd fain be gone. An officer!
To prison with her! Shall we thus permit
A blasting and a scandalous breath to fall
On him so near us? This needs must be a practice.
Who knew of your intent and coming hither?
ISABELLA. One that I would were here, Friar Lodowick.
DUKE. A ghostly father, belike. Who knows that Lodowick?
LUCIO. My lord, I know him; 'tis a meddling friar.
I do not like the man; had he been lay, my lord,
For certain words he spake against your Grace
In your retirement, I had swing'd him soundly.
DUKE. Words against me? This's a good friar, belike!
And to set on this wretched woman here
Against our substitute! Let this friar be found.
LUCIO. But yesternight, my lord, she and that friar,
I saw them at the prison; a saucy friar,
A very scurvy fellow.
PETER. Blessed be your royal Grace!
I have stood by, my lord, and I have heard
Your royal ear abus'd. First, hath this woman
Most wrongfully accus'd your substitute;
Who is as free from touch or soil with her
As she from one ungot.
DUKE. We did believe no less.
Know you that Friar Lodowick that she speaks of?
PETER. I know him for a man divine and holy;
Not scurvy, nor a temporary meddler,
As he's reported by this gentleman;
And, on my trust, a man that never yet
Did, as he vouches, misreport your Grace.
LUCIO. My lord, most villainously; believe it.
PETER. Well, he in time may come to clear himself;
But at this instant he is sick, my lord,
Of a strange fever. Upon his mere request-
Being come to knowledge that there was complaint
Intended 'gainst Lord Angelo- came I hither
To speak, as from his mouth, what he doth know
Is true and false; and what he, with his oath
And all probation, will make up full clear,
Whensoever he's convented. First, for this woman-
To justify this worthy nobleman,
So vulgarly and personally accus'd-
Her shall you hear disproved to her eyes,
Till she herself confess it.
DUKE. Good friar, let's hear it. Exit ISABELLA guarded
Do you not smile at this, Lord Angelo?
O heaven, the vanity of wretched fools!
Give us some seats. Come, cousin Angelo;
In this I'll be impartial; be you judge
Of your own cause.
Enter MARIANA veiled
Is this the witness, friar?
FIRST let her show her face, and after speak.
MARIANA. Pardon, my lord; I will not show my face
Until my husband bid me.
DUKE. What, are you married?
MARIANA. No, my lord.
DUKE. Are you a maid?
MARIANA. No, my lord.
DUKE. A widow, then?
MARIANA. Neither, my lord.
DUKE. Why, you are nothing then; neither maid, widow, nor wife.
LUCIO. My lord, she may be a punk; for many of them are neither
maid, widow, nor wife.
DUKE. Silence that fellow. I would he had some cause
To prattle for himself.
LUCIO. Well, my lord.
MARIANA. My lord, I do confess I ne'er was married,
And I confess, besides, I am no maid.
I have known my husband; yet my husband
Knows not that ever he knew me.
LUCIO. He was drunk, then, my lord; it can be no better.
DUKE. For the benefit of silence, would thou wert so too!
LUCIO. Well, my lord.
DUKE. This is no witness for Lord Angelo.
MARIANA. Now I come to't, my lord:
She that accuses him of fornication,
In self-same manner doth accuse my husband;
And charges him, my lord, with such a time
When I'll depose I had him in mine arms,
With all th' effect of love.
ANGELO. Charges she moe than me?
MARIANA. Not that I know.
DUKE. No? You say your husband.
MARIANA. Why, just, my lord, and that is Angelo,
Who thinks he knows that he ne'er knew my body,
But knows he thinks that he knows Isabel's.
ANGELO. This is a strange abuse. Let's see thy face.
MARIANA. My husband bids me; now I will unmask.
[Unveiling]
This is that face, thou cruel Angelo,
Which once thou swor'st was worth the looking on;
This is the hand which, with a vow'd contract,
Was fast belock'd in thine; this is the body
That took away the match from Isabel,
And did supply thee at thy garden-house
In her imagin'd person.
DUKE. Know you this woman?
LUCIO. Carnally, she says.
DUKE. Sirrah, no more.
LUCIO. Enough, my lord.
ANGELO. My lord, I must confess I know this woman;
And five years since there was some speech of marriage
Betwixt myself and her; which was broke off,
Partly for that her promised proportions
Came short of composition; but in chief
For that her reputation was disvalued
In levity. Since which time of five years
I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her,
Upon my faith and honour.
MARIANA. Noble Prince,
As there comes light from heaven and words from breath,
As there is sense in truth and truth in virtue,
I am affianc'd this man's wife as strongly
As words could make up vows. And, my good lord,
But Tuesday night last gone, in's garden-house,
He knew me as a wife. As this is true,
Let me in safety raise me from my knees,
Or else for ever be confixed here,
A marble monument!
ANGELO. I did but smile till now.
Now, good my lord, give me the scope of justice;
My patience here is touch'd. I do perceive
These poor informal women are no more
But instruments of some more mightier member
That sets them on. Let me have way, my lord,
To find this practice out.
DUKE. Ay, with my heart;
And punish them to your height of pleasure.
Thou foolish friar, and thou pernicious woman,
Compact with her that's gone, think'st thou thy oaths,
Though they would swear down each particular saint,
Were testimonies against his worth and credit,
That's seal'd in approbation? You, Lord Escalus,
Sit with my cousin; lend him your kind pains
To find out this abuse, whence 'tis deriv'd.
There is another friar that set them on;
Let him be sent for.
PETER. Would lie were here, my lord! For he indeed
Hath set the women on to this complaint.
Your provost knows the place where he abides,
And he may fetch him.
DUKE. Go, do it instantly. Exit PROVOST
And you, my noble and well-warranted cousin,
Whom it concerns to hear this matter forth,
Do with your injuries as seems you best
In any chastisement. I for a while will leave you;
But stir not you till you have well determin'd
Upon these slanderers.
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 villainous 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 asham'd.
Re-enter OFFICERS with ISABELLA; and PROVOST with the
DUKE in his friar's habit
ESCALUS. I will go darkly to work with her.
LUCIO. That's the way; for women are light at midnight.
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 confess'd you did.
DUKE. 'Tis false.
ESCALUS. How! Know you where you are?
DUKE. 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. 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 unhallowed 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 th' Duke himself, to tax him with injustice?
Take him hence; to th' rack with him! We'll touze you
Joint by joint, but we will know his purpose.
What, 'unjust'!
DUKE. 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'errun the stew: laws for all faults,
But faults so countenanc'd that the strong statutes
Stand like the forfeits in a barber's shop,
As much in mock as mark.
ESCALUS. Slander to th' 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, good-man bald-pate.
Do you know me?
DUKE. 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. 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. 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. 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 talk'd 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 giglets
too, and with the other confederate companion!
[The PROVOST lays bands on the DUKE]
DUKE. 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 hang'd an hour! Will't not off?
[Pulls off the FRIAR'S bood and discovers the DUKE]
DUKE. Thou art the first knave that e'er mad'st 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. [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 pow'r 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. Come hither, Mariana.
Say, wast thou e'er contracted to this woman?
ANGELO. I was, my lord.
DUKE. 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 amaz'd at his dishonour
Than at the strangeness of it.
DUKE. 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. 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 obscur'd myself,
Labouring to save his life, and would not rather
Make rash remonstrance of my hidden pow'r
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. 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 adjudg'd 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. 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. Never crave him; we are definitive.
MARIANA. Gentle my liege- [Kneeling]
DUKE. 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. 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 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. He dies for Claudio's death.
ISABELLA. [Kneeling] Most bounteous sir,
Look, if it please you, on this man condemn'd,
As if my brother liv'd. 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. 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. Had you a special warrant for the deed?
PROVOST. No, my good lord; it was by private message.
DUKE. 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 reserv'd alive.
DUKE. What's he?
PROVOST. His name is Barnardine.
DUKE. 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. Which is that Barnardine?
PROVOST. This, my lord.
DUKE. 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 squar'st 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 muffl'd fellow's that?
PROVOST. This is another prisoner that I sav'd,
Who should have died when Claudio lost his head;
As like almost to Claudio as himself. [Unmuffles CLAUDIO]
DUKE. [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 quick'ning 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 deserv'd 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.
DUKE. Whipt first, sir, and hang'd after.
Proclaim it, Provost, round about the city,
If any woman wrong'd by this lewd fellow-
As I have heard him swear himself there's one
Whom he begot with child, let her appear,
And he shall marry her. The nuptial finish'd,
Let him be whipt and hang'd.
LUCIO. I beseech your Highness, do not marry me to a whore. Your
Highness said even now I made you a duke; good my lord, do not
recompense me in making me a cuckold.
DUKE. Upon mine honour, thou shalt marry her.
Thy slanders I forgive; and therewithal
Remit thy other forfeits. Take him to prison;
And see our pleasure herein executed.
LUCIO. Marrying a punk, my lord, is pressing to death, whipping,
and hanging.
DUKE. Slandering a prince deserves it.
Exeunt OFFICERS with LUCIO
She, Claudio, that you wrong'd, look you restore.
Joy to you, Mariana! Love her, Angelo;
I have confess'd her, and I know her virtue.
Thanks, good friend Escalus, for thy much goodness;
There's more behind that is more gratulate.
Thanks, Provost, for thy care and secrecy;
We shall employ thee in a worthier place.
Forgive him, Angelo, that brought you home
The head of Ragozine for Claudio's:
Th' offence pardons itself. Dear Isabel,
I have a motion much imports your good;
Whereto if you'll a willing ear incline,
What's mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.
So, bring us to our palace, where we'll show
What's yet behind that's meet you all should know.
Exeunt
THE END
<>
1597
THE MERCHANT OF VENICE
by William Shakespeare
DRAMATIS PERSONAE
THE DUKE OF VENICE
THE PRINCE OF MOROCCO, suitor to Portia
THE PRINCE OF ARRAGON, " " "
ANTONIO, a merchant of Venice
BASSANIO, his friend, suitor to Portia
SOLANIO, friend to Antonio and Bassanio
SALERIO, " " " " "
GRATIANO, " " " " "
LORENZO, in love with Jessica
SHYLOCK, a rich Jew
TUBAL, a Jew, his friend
LAUNCELOT GOBBO, a clown, servant to Shylock
OLD GOBBO, father to Launcelot
LEONARDO, servant to Bassanio
BALTHASAR, servant to Portia
STEPHANO, " " "
PORTIA, a rich heiress
NERISSA, her waiting-maid
JESSICA, daughter to Shylock
Magnificoes of Venice, Officers of the Court of Justice,
Gaoler, Servants, and other Attendants
<>
SCENE:
Venice, and PORTIA'S house at Belmont
ACT I. SCENE I.
Venice. A street
Enter ANTONIO, SALERIO, and SOLANIO
ANTONIO. In sooth, I know not why I am so sad.
It wearies me; you say it wearies you;
But how I caught it, found it, or came by it,
What stuff 'tis made of, whereof it is born,
I am to learn;
And such a want-wit sadness makes of me
That I have much ado to know myself.
SALERIO. Your mind is tossing on the ocean;
There where your argosies, with portly sail-
Like signiors and rich burghers on the flood,
Or as it were the pageants of the sea-
Do overpeer the petty traffickers,
That curtsy to them, do them reverence,
As they fly by them with their woven wings.
SOLANIO. Believe me, sir, had I such venture forth,
The better part of my affections would
Be with my hopes abroad. I should be still
Plucking the grass to know where sits the wind,
Peering in maps for ports, and piers, and roads;
And every object that might make me fear
Misfortune to my ventures, out of doubt,
Would make me sad.
SALERIO. My wind, cooling my broth,
Would blow me to an ague when I thought
What harm a wind too great might do at sea.
I should not see the sandy hour-glass run
But I should think of shallows and of flats,
And see my wealthy Andrew dock'd in sand,
Vailing her high top lower than her ribs
To kiss her burial. Should I go to church
And see the holy edifice of stone,
And not bethink me straight of dangerous rocks,
Which, touching but my gentle vessel's side,
Would scatter all her spices on the stream,
Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks,
And, in a word, but even now worth this,
And now worth nothing? Shall I have the thought
To think on this, and shall I lack the thought
That such a thing bechanc'd would make me sad?
But tell not me; I know Antonio
Is sad to think upon his merchandise.
ANTONIO. Believe me, no; I thank my fortune for it,
My ventures are not in one bottom trusted,
Nor to one place; nor is my whole estate
Upon the fortune of this present year;
Therefore my merchandise makes me not sad.
SOLANIO. Why then you are in love.
ANTONIO. Fie, fie!
SOLANIO. Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad
Because you are not merry; and 'twere as easy
For you to laugh and leap and say you are merry,
Because you are not sad. Now, by two-headed Janus,
Nature hath fram'd strange fellows in her time:
Some that will evermore peep through their eyes,
And laugh like parrots at a bag-piper;
And other of such vinegar aspect
That they'll not show their teeth in way of smile
Though Nestor swear the jest be laughable.
Enter BASSANIO, LORENZO, and GRATIANO
Here comes Bassanio, your most noble kinsman,
Gratiano and Lorenzo. Fare ye well;
We leave you now with better company.
SALERIO. I would have stay'd till I had made you merry,
If worthier friends had not prevented me.
ANTONIO. Your worth is very dear in my regard.
I take it your own business calls on you,
And you embrace th' occasion to depart.
SALERIO. Good morrow, my good lords.
BASSANIO. Good signiors both, when shall we laugh? Say when.
You grow exceeding strange; must it be so?
SALERIO. We'll make our leisures to attend on yours.
Exeunt SALERIO and SOLANIO
LORENZO. My Lord Bassanio, since you have found Antonio,
We two will leave you; but at dinner-time,
I pray you, have in mind where we must meet.
BASSANIO. I will not fail you.
GRATIANO. You look not well, Signior Antonio;
You have too much respect upon the world;
They lose it that do buy it with much care.
Believe me, you are marvellously chang'd.
ANTONIO. I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano-
A stage, where every man must play a part,
And mine a sad one.
GRATIANO. Let me play the fool.
With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come;
And let my liver rather heat with wine
Than my heart cool with mortifying groans.
Why should a man whose blood is warm within
Sit like his grandsire cut in alabaster,
Sleep when he wakes, and creep into the jaundice
By being peevish? I tell thee what, Antonio-
I love thee, and 'tis my love that speaks-
There are a sort of men whose visages
Do cream and mantle like a standing pond,
And do a wilful stillness entertain,
With purpose to be dress'd in an opinion
Of wisdom, gravity, profound conceit;
As who should say 'I am Sir Oracle,
And when I ope my lips let no dog bark.'
O my Antonio, I do know of these
That therefore only are reputed wise
For saying nothing; when, I am very sure,
If they should speak, would almost damn those ears
Which, hearing them, would call their brothers fools.
I'll tell thee more of this another time.
But fish not with this melancholy bait
For this fool gudgeon, this opinion.
Come, good Lorenzo. Fare ye well awhile;
I'll end my exhortation after dinner.
LORENZO. Well, we will leave you then till dinner-time.
I must be one of these same dumb wise men,
For Gratiano never lets me speak.
GRATIANO. Well, keep me company but two years moe,
Thou shalt not know the sound of thine own tongue.
ANTONIO. Fare you well; I'll grow a talker for this gear.
GRATIANO. Thanks, i' faith, for silence is only commendable
In a neat's tongue dried, and a maid not vendible.
Exeunt GRATIANO and LORENZO
ANTONIO. Is that anything now?
BASSANIO. Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than
any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid
in, two bushels of chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find
them, and when you have them they are not worth the search.
ANTONIO. Well; tell me now what lady is the same
To whom you swore a secret pilgrimage,
That you to-day promis'd to tell me of?
BASSANIO. 'Tis not unknown to you, Antonio,
How much I have disabled mine estate
By something showing a more swelling port
Than my faint means would grant continuance;
Nor do I now make moan to be abridg'd
From such a noble rate; but my chief care
Is to come fairly off from the great debts
Wherein my time, something too prodigal,
Hath left me gag'd. To you, Antonio,
I owe the most, in money and in love;
And from your love I have a warranty
To unburden all my plots and purposes
How to get clear of all the debts I owe.
ANTONIO. I pray you, good Bassanio, let me know it;
And if it stand, as you yourself still do,
Within the eye of honour, be assur'd
My purse, my person, my extremest means,
Lie all unlock'd to your occasions.
BASSANIO. In my school-days, when I had lost one shaft,
I shot his fellow of the self-same flight
The self-same way, with more advised watch,
To find the other forth; and by adventuring both
I oft found both. I urge this childhood proof,
Because what follows is pure innocence.
I owe you much; and, like a wilful youth,
That which I owe is lost; but if you please
To shoot another arrow that self way
Which you did shoot the first, I do not doubt,
As I will watch the aim, or to find both,
Or bring your latter hazard back again
And thankfully rest debtor for the first.
ANTONIO. You know me well, and herein spend but time
To wind about my love with circumstance;
And out of doubt you do me now more wrong
In making question of my uttermost
Than if you had made waste of all I have.
Then do but say to me what I should do
That in your knowledge may by me be done,
And I am prest unto it; therefore, speak.
BASSANIO. In Belmont is a lady richly left,
And she is fair and, fairer than that word,
Of wondrous virtues. Sometimes from her eyes
I did receive fair speechless messages.
Her name is Portia- nothing undervalu'd
To Cato's daughter, Brutus' Portia.
Nor is the wide world ignorant of her worth;
For the four winds blow in from every coast
Renowned suitors, and her sunny locks
Hang on her temples like a golden fleece,
Which makes her seat of Belmont Colchos' strond,
And many Jasons come in quest of her.
O my Antonio, had I but the means
To hold a rival place with one of them,
I have a mind presages me such thrift
That I should questionless be fortunate.
ANTONIO. Thou know'st that all my fortunes are at sea;
Neither have I money nor commodity
To raise a present sum; therefore go forth,
Try what my credit can in Venice do;
That shall be rack'd, even to the uttermost,
To furnish thee to Belmont to fair Portia.
Go presently inquire, and so will I,
Where money is; and I no question make
To have it of my trust or for my sake. Exeunt
SCENE II.
Belmont. PORTIA'S house
Enter PORTIA with her waiting-woman, NERISSA
PORTIA. By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is aweary of this
great world.
NERISSA. You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the
same abundance as your good fortunes are; and yet, for aught I
see, they are as sick that surfeit with too much as they that
starve with nothing. It is no mean happiness, therefore, to be
seated in the mean: superfluity come sooner by white hairs, but
competency lives longer.
PORTIA. Good sentences, and well pronounc'd.
NERISSA. They would be better, if well followed.
PORTIA. If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do,
chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottages princes'
palaces. It is a good divine that follows his own instructions; I
can easier teach twenty what were good to be done than to be one
of the twenty to follow mine own teaching. The brain may devise
laws for the blood, but a hot temper leaps o'er a cold decree;
such a hare is madness the youth, to skip o'er the meshes of good
counsel the cripple. But this reasoning is not in the fashion to
choose me a husband. O me, the word 'choose'! I may neither
choose who I would nor refuse who I dislike; so is the will of a
living daughter curb'd by the will of a dead father. Is it not
hard, Nerissa, that I cannot choose one, nor refuse none?
NERISSA. Your father was ever virtuous, and holy men at their death
have good inspirations; therefore the lott'ry that he hath
devised in these three chests, of gold, silver, and lead- whereof
who chooses his meaning chooses you- will no doubt never be
chosen by any rightly but one who you shall rightly love. But
what warmth is there in your affection towards any of these
princely suitors that are already come?
PORTIA. I pray thee over-name them; and as thou namest them, I will
describe them; and according to my description, level at my
affection.
NERISSA. First, there is the Neapolitan prince.
PORTIA. Ay, that's a colt indeed, for he doth nothing but talk of
his horse; and he makes it a great appropriation to his own good
parts that he can shoe him himself; I am much afear'd my lady his
mother play'd false with a smith.
NERISSA. Then is there the County Palatine.
PORTIA. He doth nothing but frown, as who should say 'An you will
not have me, choose.' He hears merry tales and smiles not. I fear
he will prove the weeping philosopher when he grows old, being so
full of unmannerly sadness in his youth. I had rather be married
to a death's-head with a bone in his mouth than to either of
these. God defend me from these two!
NERISSA. How say you by the French lord, Monsieur Le Bon?
PORTIA. God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man. In
truth, I know it is a sin to be a mocker, but he- why, he hath a
horse better than the Neapolitan's, a better bad habit of
frowning than the Count Palatine; he is every man in no man. If a
throstle sing he falls straight a-cap'ring; he will fence with
his own shadow; if I should marry him, I should marry twenty
husbands. If he would despise me, I would forgive him; for if he
love me to madness, I shall never requite him.
NERISSA. What say you then to Falconbridge, the young baron of
England?
PORTIA. You know I say nothing to him, for he understands not me,
nor I him: he hath neither Latin, French, nor Italian, and you
will come into the court and swear that I have a poor pennyworth
in the English. He is a proper man's picture; but alas, who can
converse with a dumb-show? How oddly he is suited! I think he
bought his doublet in Italy, his round hose in France, his bonnet
in Germany, and his behaviour everywhere.
NERISSA. What think you of the Scottish lord, his neighbour?
PORTIA. That he hath a neighbourly charity in him, for he borrowed
a box of the ear of the Englishman, and swore he would pay him
again when he was able; I think the Frenchman became his surety,
and seal'd under for another.
NERISSA. How like you the young German, the Duke of Saxony's
nephew?
PORTIA. Very vilely in the morning when he is sober; and most
vilely in the afternoon when he is drunk. When he is best, he is
a little worse than a man, and when he is worst, he is little
better than a beast. An the worst fall that ever fell, I hope I
shall make shift to go without him.
NERISSA. If he should offer to choose, and choose the right casket,
you should refuse to perform your father's will, if you should
refuse to accept him.
PORTIA. Therefore, for fear of the worst, I pray thee set a deep
glass of Rhenish wine on the contrary casket; for if the devil be
within and that temptation without, I know he will choose it. I
will do anything, Nerissa, ere I will be married to a sponge.
NERISSA. You need not fear, lady, the having any of these lords;
they have acquainted me with their determinations, which is
indeed to return to their home, and to trouble you with no more
suit, unless you may be won by some other sort than your father's
imposition, depending on the caskets.
PORTIA. If I live to be as old as Sibylla, I will die as chaste as
Diana, unless I be obtained by the manner of my father's will. I
am glad this parcel of wooers are so reasonable; for there is not
one among them but I dote on his very absence, and I pray God
grant them a fair departure.
NERISSA. Do you not remember, lady, in your father's time, a
Venetian, a scholar and a soldier, that came hither in company of
the Marquis of Montferrat?
PORTIA. Yes, yes, it was Bassanio; as I think, so was he call'd.
NERISSA. True, madam; he, of all the men that ever my foolish eyes
look'd upon, was the best deserving a fair lady.
PORTIA. I remember him well, and I remember him worthy of thy
praise.
Enter a SERVINGMAN
How now! what news?
SERVINGMAN. The four strangers seek for you, madam, to take their
leave; and there is a forerunner come from a fifth, the Prince of
Morocco, who brings word the Prince his master will be here
to-night.
PORTIA. If I could bid the fifth welcome with so good heart as I
can bid the other four farewell, I should be glad of his
approach; if he have the condition of a saint and the complexion
of a devil, I had rather he should shrive me than wive me.
Come, Nerissa. Sirrah, go before.
Whiles we shut the gate upon one wooer, another knocks at the
door. Exeunt
SCENE III.
Venice. A public place
Enter BASSANIO With SHYLOCK the Jew
SHYLOCK. Three thousand ducats- well.
BASSANIO. Ay, sir, for three months.
SHYLOCK. For three months- well.
BASSANIO. For the which, as I told you, Antonio shall be bound.
SHYLOCK. Antonio shall become bound- well.
BASSANIO. May you stead me? Will you pleasure me? Shall I know your
answer?
SHYLOCK. Three thousand ducats for three months, and Antonio bound.
BASSANIO. Your answer to that.
SHYLOCK. Antonio is a good man.
BASSANIO. Have you heard any imputation to the contrary?
SHYLOCK. Ho, no, no, no, no; my meaning in saying he is a good man
is to have you understand me that he is sufficient; yet his means
are in supposition: he hath an argosy bound to Tripolis, another
to the Indies; I understand, moreover, upon the Rialto, he hath a
third at Mexico, a fourth for England- and other ventures he
hath, squand'red abroad. But ships are but boards, sailors but
men; there be land-rats and water-rats, water-thieves and
land-thieves- I mean pirates; and then there is the peril of
waters, winds, and rocks. The man is, notwithstanding,
sufficient. Three thousand ducats- I think I may take his bond.
BASSANIO. Be assur'd you may.
SHYLOCK. I will be assur'd I may; and, that I may be assured, I
will bethink me. May I speak with Antonio?
BASSANIO. If it please you to dine with us.
SHYLOCK. Yes, to smell pork, to eat of the habitation which your
prophet, the Nazarite, conjured the devil into! I will buy with
you, sell with you, talk with you, walk with you, and so
following; but I will not eat with you, drink with you, nor pray
with you. What news on the Rialto? Who is he comes here?
Enter ANTONIO
BASSANIO. This is Signior Antonio.
SHYLOCK. [Aside] How like a fawning publican he looks!
I hate him for he is a Christian;
But more for that in low simplicity
He lends out money gratis, and brings down
The rate of usance here with us in Venice.
If I can catch him once upon the hip,
I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him.
He hates our sacred nation; and he rails,
Even there where merchants most do congregate,
On me, my bargains, and my well-won thrift,
Which he calls interest. Cursed be my tribe
If I forgive him!
BASSANIO. Shylock, do you hear?
SHYLOCK. I am debating of my present store,
And, by the near guess of my memory,
I cannot instantly raise up the gross
Of full three thousand ducats. What of that?
Tubal, a wealthy Hebrew of my tribe,
Will furnish me. But soft! how many months
Do you desire? [To ANTONIO] Rest you fair, good signior;
Your worship was the last man in our mouths.
ANTONIO. Shylock, albeit I neither lend nor borrow
By taking nor by giving of excess,
Yet, to supply the ripe wants of my friend,
I'll break a custom. [To BASSANIO] Is he yet possess'd
How much ye would?
SHYLOCK. Ay, ay, three thousand ducats.
ANTONIO. And for three months.
SHYLOCK. I had forgot- three months; you told me so.
Well then, your bond; and, let me see- but hear you,
Methoughts you said you neither lend nor borrow
Upon advantage.
ANTONIO. I do never use it.
SHYLOCK. When Jacob graz'd his uncle Laban's sheep-
This Jacob from our holy Abram was,
As his wise mother wrought in his behalf,
The third possessor; ay, he was the third-
ANTONIO. And what of him? Did he take interest?
SHYLOCK. No, not take interest; not, as you would say,
Directly int'rest; mark what Jacob did:
When Laban and himself were compromis'd
That all the eanlings which were streak'd and pied
Should fall as Jacob's hire, the ewes, being rank,
In end of autumn turned to the rams;
And when the work of generation was
Between these woolly breeders in the act,
The skilful shepherd pill'd me certain wands,
And, in the doing of the deed of kind,
He stuck them up before the fulsome ewes,
Who, then conceiving, did in eaning time
Fall parti-colour'd lambs, and those were Jacob's.
This was a way to thrive, and he was blest;
And thrift is blessing, if men steal it not.
ANTONIO. This was a venture, sir, that Jacob serv'd for;
A thing not in his power to bring to pass,
But sway'd and fashion'd by the hand of heaven.
Was this inserted to make interest good?
Or is your gold and silver ewes and rams?
SHYLOCK. I cannot tell; I make it breed as fast.
But note me, signior.
ANTONIO. [Aside] Mark you this, Bassanio,
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul producing holy witness
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
O, what a goodly outside falsehood hath!
SHYLOCK. Three thousand ducats- 'tis a good round sum.
Three months from twelve; then let me see, the rate-
ANTONIO. Well, Shylock, shall we be beholding to you?
SHYLOCK. Signior Antonio, many a time and oft
In the Rialto you have rated me
About my moneys and my usances;
Still have I borne it with a patient shrug,
For suff'rance is the badge of all our tribe;
You call me misbeliever, cut-throat dog,
And spit upon my Jewish gaberdine,
And all for use of that which is mine own.
Well then, it now appears you need my help;
Go to, then; you come to me, and you say
'Shylock, we would have moneys.' You say so-
You that did void your rheum upon my beard
And foot me as you spurn a stranger cur
Over your threshold; moneys is your suit.
What should I say to you? Should I not say
'Hath a dog money? Is it possible
A cur can lend three thousand ducats?' Or
Shall I bend low and, in a bondman's key,
With bated breath and whisp'ring humbleness,
Say this:
'Fair sir, you spit on me on Wednesday last,
You spurn'd me such a day; another time
You call'd me dog; and for these courtesies
I'll lend you thus much moneys'?
ANTONIO. I am as like to call thee so again,
To spit on thee again, to spurn thee too.
If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not
As to thy friends- for when did friendship take
A breed for barren metal of his friend?-
But lend it rather to thine enemy,
Who if he break thou mayst with better face
Exact the penalty.
SHYLOCK. Why, look you, how you storm!
I would be friends with you, and have your love,
Forget the shames that you have stain'd me with,
Supply your present wants, and take no doit
Of usance for my moneys, and you'll not hear me.
This is kind I offer.
BASSANIO. This were kindness.
SHYLOCK. This kindness will I show.
Go with me to a notary, seal me there
Your single bond, and, in a merry sport,
If you repay me not on such a day,
In such a place, such sum or sums as are
Express'd in the condition, let the forfeit
Be nominated for an equal pound
Of your fair flesh, to be cut off and taken
In what part of your body pleaseth me.
ANTONIO. Content, in faith; I'll seal to such a bond,
And say there is much kindness in the Jew.
BASSANIO. You shall not seal to such a bond for me;
I'll rather dwell in my necessity.
ANTONIO. Why, fear not, man; I will not forfeit it;
Within these two months- that's a month before
This bond expires- I do expect return
Of thrice three times the value of this bond.
SHYLOCK. O father Abram, what these Christians are,
Whose own hard dealings teaches them suspect
The thoughts of others! Pray you, tell me this:
If he should break his day, what should I gain
By the exaction of the forfeiture?
A pound of man's flesh taken from a man
Is not so estimable, profitable neither,
As flesh of muttons, beefs, or goats. I say,
To buy his favour, I extend this friendship;
If he will take it, so; if not, adieu;
And, for my love, I pray you wrong me not.
ANTONIO. Yes, Shylock, I will seal unto this bond.
SHYLOCK. Then meet me forthwith at the notary's;
Give him direction for this merry bond,
And I will go and purse the ducats straight,
See to my house, left in the fearful guard
Of an unthrifty knave, and presently
I'll be with you.
ANTONIO. Hie thee, gentle Jew. Exit SHYLOCK
The Hebrew will turn Christian: he grows kind.
BASSANIO. I like not fair terms and a villain's mind.
ANTONIO. Come on; in this there can be no dismay;
My ships come home a month before the day. Exeunt
<>
ACT II. SCENE I.
Belmont. PORTIA'S house
Flourish of cornets. Enter the PRINCE of MOROCCO, a tawny Moor all in white,
and three or four FOLLOWERS accordingly, with PORTIA, NERISSA, and train
PRINCE OF Morocco. Mislike me not for my complexion,
The shadowed livery of the burnish'd sun,
To whom I am a neighbour, and near bred.
Bring me the fairest creature northward born,
Where Phoebus' fire scarce thaws the icicles,
And let us make incision for your love
To prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine.
I tell thee, lady, this aspect of mine
Hath fear'd the valiant; by my love, I swear
The best-regarded virgins of our clime
Have lov'd it too. I would not change this hue,
Except to steal your thoughts, my gentle queen.
PORTIA. In terms of choice I am not solely led
By nice direction of a maiden's eyes;
Besides, the lott'ry of my destiny
Bars me the right of voluntary choosing.
But, if my father had not scanted me,
And hedg'd me by his wit to yield myself
His wife who wins me by that means I told you,
Yourself, renowned Prince, then stood as fair
As any comer I have look'd on yet
For my affection.
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. Even for that I thank you.
Therefore, I pray you, lead me to the caskets
To try my fortune. By this scimitar,
That slew the Sophy and a Persian prince,
That won three fields of Sultan Solyman,
I would o'erstare the sternest eyes that look,
Outbrave the heart most daring on the earth,
Pluck the young sucking cubs from the she-bear,
Yea, mock the lion when 'a roars for prey,
To win thee, lady. But, alas the while!
If Hercules and Lichas play at dice
Which is the better man, the greater throw
May turn by fortune from the weaker band.
So is Alcides beaten by his page;
And so may I, blind Fortune leading me,
Miss that which one unworthier may attain,
And die with grieving.
PORTIA. You must take your chance,
And either not attempt to choose at all,
Or swear before you choose, if you choose wrong,
Never to speak to lady afterward
In way of marriage; therefore be advis'd.
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. Nor will not; come, bring me unto my chance.
PORTIA. First, forward to the temple. After dinner
Your hazard shall be made.
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. Good fortune then,
To make me blest or cursed'st among men!
[Cornets, and exeunt]
SCENE II.
Venice. A street
Enter LAUNCELOT GOBBO
LAUNCELOT. Certainly my conscience will serve me to run from this
Jew my master. The fiend is at mine elbow and tempts me, saying
to me 'Gobbo, Launcelot Gobbo, good Launcelot' or 'good Gobbo' or
'good Launcelot Gobbo, use your legs, take the start, run away.'
My conscience says 'No; take heed, honest Launcelot, take heed,
honest Gobbo' or, as aforesaid, 'honest Launcelot Gobbo, do not
run; scorn running with thy heels.' Well, the most courageous
fiend bids me pack. 'Via!' says the fiend; 'away!' says the
fiend. 'For the heavens, rouse up a brave mind' says the fiend
'and run.' Well, my conscience, hanging about the neck of my
heart, says very wisely to me 'My honest friend Launcelot, being
an honest man's son' or rather 'an honest woman's son'; for
indeed my father did something smack, something grow to, he had a
kind of taste- well, my conscience says 'Launcelot, budge not.'
'Budge,' says the fiend. 'Budge not,' says my conscience.
'Conscience,' say I, (you counsel well.' 'Fiend,' say I, 'you
counsel well.' To be rul'd by my conscience, I should stay with
the Jew my master, who- God bless the mark!- is a kind of devil;
and, to run away from the Jew, I should be ruled by the fiend,
who- saving your reverence!- is the devil himself. Certainly the
Jew is the very devil incarnation; and, in my conscience, my
conscience is but a kind of hard conscience to offer to counsel
me to stay with the Jew. The fiend gives the more friendly
counsel. I will run, fiend; my heels are at your commandment; I
will run.
Enter OLD GOBBO, with a basket
GOBBO. Master young man, you, I pray you, which is the way to
master Jew's?
LAUNCELOT. [Aside] O heavens! This is my true-begotten father,
who, being more than sand-blind, high-gravel blind, knows me not.
I will try confusions with him.
GOBBO. Master young gentleman, I pray you, which is the way to
master Jew's?
LAUNCELOT. Turn up on your right hand at the next turning, but, at
the next turning of all, on your left; marry, at the very next
turning, turn of no hand, but turn down indirectly to the Jew's
house.
GOBBO. Be God's sonties, 'twill be a hard way to hit! Can you tell
me whether one Launcelot, that dwells with him, dwell with him or
no?
LAUNCELOT. Talk you of young Master Launcelot? [Aside] Mark me
now; now will I raise the waters.- Talk you of young Master
Launcelot?
GOBBO. No master, sir, but a poor man's son; his father, though I
say't, is an honest exceeding poor man, and, God be thanked, well
to live.
LAUNCELOT. Well, let his father be what 'a will, we talk of young
Master Launcelot.
GOBBO. Your worship's friend, and Launcelot, sir.
LAUNCELOT. But I pray you, ergo, old man, ergo, I beseech you, talk
you of young Master Launcelot?
GOBBO. Of Launcelot, an't please your mastership.
LAUNCELOT. Ergo, Master Launcelot. Talk not of Master Launcelot,
father; for the young gentleman, according to Fates and Destinies
and such odd sayings, the Sisters Three and such branches of
learning, is indeed deceased; or, as you would say in plain
terms, gone to heaven.
GOBBO. Marry, God forbid! The boy was the very staff of my age, my
very prop.
LAUNCELOT. Do I look like a cudgel or a hovel-post, a staff or a
prop? Do you know me, father?
GOBBO. Alack the day, I know you not, young gentleman; but I pray
you tell me, is my boy- God rest his soul!- alive or dead?
LAUNCELOT. Do you not know me, father?
GOBBO. Alack, sir, I am sand-blind; I know you not.
LAUNCELOT. Nay, indeed, if you had your eyes, you might fail of the
knowing me: it is a wise father that knows his own child. Well,
old man, I will tell you news of your son. Give me your blessing;
truth will come to light; murder cannot be hid long; a man's son
may, but in the end truth will out.
GOBBO. Pray you, sir, stand up; I am sure you are not Launcelot my
boy.
LAUNCELOT. Pray you, let's have no more fooling about it, but give
me your blessing; I am Launcelot, your boy that was, your son
that is, your child that shall be.
GOBBO. I cannot think you are my son.
LAUNCELOT. I know not what I shall think of that; but I am
Launcelot, the Jew's man, and I am sure Margery your wife is my
mother.
GOBBO. Her name is Margery, indeed. I'll be sworn, if thou be
Launcelot, thou art mine own flesh and blood. Lord worshipp'd
might he be, what a beard hast thou got! Thou hast got more hair
on thy chin than Dobbin my fill-horse has on his tail.
LAUNCELOT. It should seem, then, that Dobbin's tail grows backward;
I am sure he had more hair of his tail than I have of my face
when I last saw him.
GOBBO. Lord, how art thou chang'd! How dost thou and thy master
agree? I have brought him a present. How 'gree you now?
LAUNCELOT. Well, well; but, for mine own part, as I have set up my
rest to run away, so I will not rest till I have run some ground.
My master's a very Jew. Give him a present! Give him a halter. I
am famish'd in his service; you may tell every finger I have with
my ribs. Father, I am glad you are come; give me your present to
one Master Bassanio, who indeed gives rare new liveries; if I
serve not him, I will run as far as God has any ground. O rare
fortune! Here comes the man. To him, father, for I am a Jew, if I
serve the Jew any longer.
Enter BASSANIO, with LEONARDO, with a FOLLOWER or two
BASSANIO. You may do so; but let it be so hasted that supper be
ready at the farthest by five of the clock. See these letters
delivered, put the liveries to making, and desire Gratiano to
come anon to my lodging. Exit a SERVANT
LAUNCELOT. To him, father.
GOBBO. God bless your worship!
BASSANIO. Gramercy; wouldst thou aught with me?
GOBBO. Here's my son, sir, a poor boy-
LAUNCELOT. Not a poor boy, sir, but the rich Jew's man, that would,
sir, as my father shall specify-
GOBBO. He hath a great infection, sir, as one would say, to serve-
LAUNCELOT. Indeed the short and the long is, I serve the Jew, and
have a desire, as my father shall specify-
GOBBO. His master and he, saving your worship's reverence, are
scarce cater-cousins-
LAUNCELOT. To be brief, the very truth is that the Jew, having done
me wrong, doth cause me, as my father, being I hope an old man,
shall frutify unto you-
GOBBO. I have here a dish of doves that I would bestow upon your
worship; and my suit is-
LAUNCELOT. In very brief, the suit is impertinent to myself, as
your worship shall know by this honest old man; and, though I say
it, though old man, yet poor man, my father.
BASSANIO. One speak for both. What would you?
LAUNCELOT. Serve you, sir.
GOBBO. That is the very defect of the matter, sir.
BASSANIO. I know thee well; thou hast obtain'd thy suit.
Shylock thy master spoke with me this day,
And hath preferr'd thee, if it be preferment
To leave a rich Jew's service to become
The follower of so poor a gentleman.
LAUNCELOT. The old proverb is very well parted between my master
Shylock and you, sir: you have the grace of God, sir, and he hath
enough.
BASSANIO. Thou speak'st it well. Go, father, with thy son.
Take leave of thy old master, and inquire
My lodging out. [To a SERVANT] Give him a livery
More guarded than his fellows'; see it done.
LAUNCELOT. Father, in. I cannot get a service, no! I have ne'er a
tongue in my head! [Looking on his palm] Well; if any man in
Italy have a fairer table which doth offer to swear upon a book- I
shall have good fortune. Go to, here's a simple line of life;
here's a small trifle of wives; alas, fifteen wives is nothing;
a'leven widows and nine maids is a simple coming-in for one man.
And then to scape drowning thrice, and to be in peril of my life
with the edge of a feather-bed-here are simple scapes. Well, if
Fortune be a woman, she's a good wench for this gear. Father,
come; I'll take my leave of the Jew in the twinkling.
Exeunt LAUNCELOT and OLD GOBBO
BASSANIO. I pray thee, good Leonardo, think on this.
These things being bought and orderly bestowed,
Return in haste, for I do feast to-night
My best esteem'd acquaintance; hie thee, go.
LEONARDO. My best endeavours shall be done herein.
Enter GRATIANO
GRATIANO. Where's your master?
LEONARDO. Yonder, sir, he walks. Exit
GRATIANO. Signior Bassanio!
BASSANIO. Gratiano!
GRATIANO. I have suit to you.
BASSANIO. You have obtain'd it.
GRATIANO. You must not deny me: I must go with you to Belmont.
BASSANIO. Why, then you must. But hear thee, Gratiano:
Thou art too wild, too rude, and bold of voice-
Parts that become thee happily enough,
And in such eyes as ours appear not faults;
But where thou art not known, why there they show
Something too liberal. Pray thee, take pain
To allay with some cold drops of modesty
Thy skipping spirit; lest through thy wild behaviour
I be misconst'red in the place I go to
And lose my hopes.
GRATIANO. Signior Bassanio, hear me:
If I do not put on a sober habit,
Talk with respect, and swear but now and then,
Wear prayer-books in my pocket, look demurely,
Nay more, while grace is saying hood mine eyes
Thus with my hat, and sigh, and say amen,
Use all the observance of civility
Like one well studied in a sad ostent
To please his grandam, never trust me more.
BASSANIO. Well, we shall see your bearing.
GRATIANO. Nay, but I bar to-night; you shall not gauge me
By what we do to-night.
BASSANIO. No, that were pity;
I would entreat you rather to put on
Your boldest suit of mirth, for we have friends
That purpose merriment. But fare you well;
I have some business.
GRATIANO. And I must to Lorenzo and the rest;
But we will visit you at supper-time. Exeunt
SCENE III.
Venice. SHYLOCK'S house
Enter JESSICA and LAUNCELOT
JESSICA. I am sorry thou wilt leave my father so.
Our house is hell; and thou, a merry devil,
Didst rob it of some taste of tediousness.
But fare thee well; there is a ducat for thee;
And, Launcelot, soon at supper shalt thou see
Lorenzo, who is thy new master's guest.
Give him this letter; do it secretly.
And so farewell. I would not have my father
See me in talk with thee.
LAUNCELOT. Adieu! tears exhibit my tongue. Most beautiful pagan,
most sweet Jew! If a Christian do not play the knave and get
thee, I am much deceived. But, adieu! these foolish drops do
something drown my manly spirit; adieu!
JESSICA. Farewell, good Launcelot. Exit LAUNCELOT
Alack, what heinous sin is it in me
To be asham'd to be my father's child!
But though I am a daughter to his blood,
I am not to his manners. O Lorenzo,
If thou keep promise, I shall end this strife,
Become a Christian and thy loving wife. Exit
SCENE IV.
Venice. A street
Enter GRATIANO, LORENZO, SALERIO, and SOLANIO
LORENZO. Nay, we will slink away in suppertime,
Disguise us at my lodging, and return
All in an hour.
GRATIANO. We have not made good preparation.
SALERIO. We have not spoke us yet of torch-bearers.
SOLANIO. 'Tis vile, unless it may be quaintly ordered;
And better in my mind not undertook.
LORENZO. 'Tis now but four o'clock; we have two hours
To furnish us.
Enter LAUNCELOT, With a letter
Friend Launcelot, what's the news?
LAUNCELOT. An it shall please you to break up this, it shall seem
to signify.
LORENZO. I know the hand; in faith, 'tis a fair hand,
And whiter than the paper it writ on
Is the fair hand that writ.
GRATIANO. Love-news, in faith!
LAUNCELOT. By your leave, sir.
LORENZO. Whither goest thou?
LAUNCELOT. Marry, sir, to bid my old master, the Jew, to sup
to-night with my new master, the Christian.
LORENZO. Hold, here, take this. Tell gentle Jessica
I will not fail her; speak it privately.
Go, gentlemen, Exit LAUNCELOT
Will you prepare you for this masque to-night?
I am provided of a torch-bearer.
SALERIO. Ay, marry, I'll be gone about it straight.
SOLANIO. And so will I.
LORENZO. Meet me and Gratiano
At Gratiano's lodging some hour hence.
SALERIO. 'Tis good we do so. Exeunt SALERIO and SOLANIO
GRATIANO. Was not that letter from fair Jessica?
LORENZO. I must needs tell thee all. She hath directed
How I shall take her from her father's house;
What gold and jewels she is furnish'd with;
What page's suit she hath in readiness.
If e'er the Jew her father come to heaven,
It will be for his gentle daughter's sake;
And never dare misfortune cross her foot,
Unless she do it under this excuse,
That she is issue to a faithless Jew.
Come, go with me, peruse this as thou goest;
Fair Jessica shall be my torch-bearer. Exeunt
SCENE V.
Venice. Before SHYLOCK'S house
Enter SHYLOCK and LAUNCELOT
SHYLOCK. Well, thou shalt see; thy eyes shall be thy judge,
The difference of old Shylock and Bassanio.-
What, Jessica!- Thou shalt not gormandize
As thou hast done with me- What, Jessica!-
And sleep and snore, and rend apparel out-
Why, Jessica, I say!
LAUNCELOT. Why, Jessica!
SHYLOCK. Who bids thee call? I do not bid thee call.
LAUNCELOT. Your worship was wont to tell me I could do nothing
without bidding.
Enter JESSICA
JESSICA. Call you? What is your will?
SHYLOCK. I am bid forth to supper, Jessica;
There are my keys. But wherefore should I go?
I am not bid for love; they flatter me;
But yet I'll go in hate, to feed upon
The prodigal Christian. Jessica, my girl,
Look to my house. I am right loath to go;
There is some ill a-brewing towards my rest,
For I did dream of money-bags to-night.
LAUNCELOT. I beseech you, sir, go; my young master doth expect your
reproach.
SHYLOCK. So do I his.
LAUNCELOT. And they have conspired together; I will not say you
shall see a masque, but if you do, then it was not for nothing
that my nose fell a-bleeding on Black Monday last at six o'clock
i' th' morning, falling out that year on Ash Wednesday was four
year, in th' afternoon.
SHYLOCK. What, are there masques? Hear you me, Jessica:
Lock up my doors, and when you hear the drum,
And the vile squealing of the wry-neck'd fife,
Clamber not you up to the casements then,
Nor thrust your head into the public street
To gaze on Christian fools with varnish'd faces;
But stop my house's ears- I mean my casements;
Let not the sound of shallow fopp'ry enter
My sober house. By Jacob's staff, I swear
I have no mind of feasting forth to-night;
But I will go. Go you before me, sirrah;
Say I will come.
LAUNCELOT. I will go before, sir. Mistress, look out at window for
all this.
There will come a Christian by
Will be worth a Jewess' eye. Exit
SHYLOCK. What says that fool of Hagar's offspring, ha?
JESSICA. His words were 'Farewell, mistress'; nothing else.
SHYLOCK. The patch is kind enough, but a huge feeder,
Snail-slow in profit, and he sleeps by day
More than the wild-cat; drones hive not with me,
Therefore I part with him; and part with him
To one that I would have him help to waste
His borrowed purse. Well, Jessica, go in;
Perhaps I will return immediately.
Do as I bid you, shut doors after you.
Fast bind, fast find-
A proverb never stale in thrifty mind. Exit
JESSICA. Farewell; and if my fortune be not crost,
I have a father, you a daughter, lost. Exit
SCENE VI.
Venice. Before SHYLOCK'S house
Enter the maskers, GRATIANO and SALERIO
GRATIANO. This is the pent-house under which Lorenzo
Desired us to make stand.
SALERIO. His hour is almost past.
GRATIANO. And it is marvel he out-dwells his hour,
For lovers ever run before the clock.
SALERIO. O, ten times faster Venus' pigeons fly
To seal love's bonds new made than they are wont
To keep obliged faith unforfeited!
GRATIANO. That ever holds: who riseth from a feast
With that keen appetite that he sits down?
Where is the horse that doth untread again
His tedious measures with the unbated fire
That he did pace them first? All things that are
Are with more spirit chased than enjoyed.
How like a younker or a prodigal
The scarfed bark puts from her native bay,
Hugg'd and embraced by the strumpet wind;
How like the prodigal doth she return,
With over-weather'd ribs and ragged sails,
Lean, rent, and beggar'd by the strumpet wind!
Enter LORENZO
SALERIO. Here comes Lorenzo; more of this hereafter.
LORENZO. Sweet friends, your patience for my long abode!
Not I, but my affairs, have made you wait.
When you shall please to play the thieves for wives,
I'll watch as long for you then. Approach;
Here dwells my father Jew. Ho! who's within?
Enter JESSICA, above, in boy's clothes
JESSICA. Who are you? Tell me, for more certainty,
Albeit I'll swear that I do know your tongue.
LORENZO. Lorenzo, and thy love.
JESSICA. Lorenzo, certain; and my love indeed;
For who love I so much? And now who knows
But you, Lorenzo, whether I am yours?
LORENZO. Heaven and thy thoughts are witness that thou art.
JESSICA. Here, catch this casket; it is worth the pains.
I am glad 'tis night, you do not look on me,
For I am much asham'd of my exchange;
But love is blind, and lovers cannot see
The pretty follies that themselves commit,
For, if they could, Cupid himself would blush
To see me thus transformed to a boy.
LORENZO. Descend, for you must be my torch-bearer.
JESSICA. What! must I hold a candle to my shames?
They in themselves, good sooth, are too too light.
Why, 'tis an office of discovery, love,
And I should be obscur'd.
LORENZO. So are you, sweet,
Even in the lovely garnish of a boy.
But come at once,
For the close night doth play the runaway,
And we are stay'd for at Bassanio's feast.
JESSICA. I will make fast the doors, and gild myself
With some moe ducats, and be with you straight.
Exit above
GRATIANO. Now, by my hood, a gentle, and no Jew.
LORENZO. Beshrew me, but I love her heartily,
For she is wise, if I can judge of her,
And fair she is, if that mine eyes be true,
And true she is, as she hath prov'd herself;
And therefore, like herself, wise, fair, and true,
Shall she be placed in my constant soul.
Enter JESSICA, below
What, art thou come? On, gentlemen, away;
Our masquing mates by this time for us stay.
Exit with JESSICA and SALERIO
Enter ANTONIO
ANTONIO. Who's there?
GRATIANO. Signior Antonio?
ANTONIO. Fie, fie, Gratiano, where are all the rest?
'Tis nine o'clock; our friends all stay for you;
No masque to-night; the wind is come about;
Bassanio presently will go aboard;
I have sent twenty out to seek for you.
GRATIANO. I am glad on't; I desire no more delight
Than to be under sail and gone to-night. Exeunt
SCENE VII.
Belmont. PORTIA's house
Flourish of cornets. Enter PORTIA, with the PRINCE OF MOROCCO,
and their trains
PORTIA. Go draw aside the curtains and discover
The several caskets to this noble Prince.
Now make your choice.
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. The first, of gold, who this inscription bears:
'Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire.'
The second, silver, which this promise carries:
'Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves.'
This third, dull lead, with warning all as blunt:
'Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath.'
How shall I know if I do choose the right?
PORTIA. The one of them contains my picture, Prince;
If you choose that, then I am yours withal.
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. Some god direct my judgment! Let me see;
I will survey th' inscriptions back again.
What says this leaden casket?
'Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath.'
Must give- for what? For lead? Hazard for lead!
This casket threatens; men that hazard all
Do it in hope of fair advantages.
A golden mind stoops not to shows of dross;
I'll then nor give nor hazard aught for lead.
What says the silver with her virgin hue?
'Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves.'
As much as he deserves! Pause there, Morocco,
And weigh thy value with an even hand.
If thou beest rated by thy estimation,
Thou dost deserve enough, and yet enough
May not extend so far as to the lady;
And yet to be afeard of my deserving
Were but a weak disabling of myself.
As much as I deserve? Why, that's the lady!
I do in birth deserve her, and in fortunes,
In graces, and in qualities of breeding;
But more than these, in love I do deserve.
What if I stray'd no farther, but chose here?
Let's see once more this saying grav'd in gold:
'Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire.'
Why, that's the lady! All the world desires her;
From the four corners of the earth they come
To kiss this shrine, this mortal-breathing saint.
The Hyrcanian deserts and the vasty wilds
Of wide Arabia are as throughfares now
For princes to come view fair Portia.
The watery kingdom, whose ambitious head
Spits in the face of heaven, is no bar
To stop the foreign spirits, but they come
As o'er a brook to see fair Portia.
One of these three contains her heavenly picture.
Is't like that lead contains her? 'Twere damnation
To think so base a thought; it were too gross
To rib her cerecloth in the obscure grave.
Or shall I think in silver she's immur'd,
Being ten times undervalued to tried gold?
O sinful thought! Never so rich a gem
Was set in worse than gold. They have in England
A coin that bears the figure of an angel
Stamp'd in gold; but that's insculp'd upon.
But here an angel in a golden bed
Lies all within. Deliver me the key;
Here do I choose, and thrive I as I may!
PORTIA. There, take it, Prince, and if my form lie there,
Then I am yours. [He opens the golden casket]
PRINCE OF MOROCCO. O hell! what have we here?
A carrion Death, within whose empty eye
There is a written scroll! I'll read the writing.
'All that glisters is not gold,
Often have you heard that told;
Many a man his life hath sold
But my outside to behold.
Gilded tombs do worms infold.
Had you been as wise as bold,
Young in limbs, in judgment old,
Your answer had not been inscroll'd.
Fare you well, your suit is cold.'
Cold indeed, and labour lost,
Then farewell, heat, and welcome, frost.
Portia, adieu! I have too griev'd a heart
To take a tedious leave; thus losers part.
Exit with his train. Flourish of cornets
PORTIA. A gentle riddance. Draw the curtains, go.
Let all of his complexion choose me so. Exeunt
SCENE VIII.
Venice. A street
Enter SALERIO and SOLANIO
SALERIO. Why, man, I saw Bassanio under sail;
With him is Gratiano gone along;
And in their ship I am sure Lorenzo is not.
SOLANIO. The villain Jew with outcries rais'd the Duke,
Who went with him to search Bassanio's ship.
SALERIO. He came too late, the ship was under sail;
But there the Duke was given to understand
That in a gondola were seen together
Lorenzo and his amorous Jessica;
Besides, Antonio certified the Duke
They were not with Bassanio in his ship.
SOLANIO. I never heard a passion so confus'd,
So strange, outrageous, and so variable,
As the dog Jew did utter in the streets.
'My daughter! O my ducats! O my daughter!
Fled with a Christian! O my Christian ducats!
Justice! the law! My ducats and my daughter!
A sealed bag, two sealed bags of ducats,
Of double ducats, stol'n from me by my daughter!
And jewels- two stones, two rich and precious stones,
Stol'n by my daughter! Justice! Find the girl;
She hath the stones upon her and the ducats.'
SALERIO. Why, all the boys in Venice follow him,
Crying, his stones, his daughter, and his ducats.
SOLANIO. Let good Antonio look he keep his day,
Or he shall pay for this.
SALERIO. Marry, well rememb'red;
I reason'd with a Frenchman yesterday,
Who told me, in the narrow seas that part
The French and English, there miscarried
A vessel of our country richly fraught.
I thought upon Antonio when he told me,
And wish'd in silence that it were not his.
SOLANIO. You were best to tell Antonio what you hear;
Yet do not suddenly, for it may grieve him.
SALERIO. A kinder gentleman treads not the earth.
I saw Bassanio and Antonio part.
Bassanio told him he would make some speed
Of his return. He answered 'Do not so;
Slubber not business for my sake, Bassanio,
But stay the very riping of the time;
And for the Jew's bond which he hath of me,
Let it not enter in your mind of love;
Be merry, and employ your chiefest thoughts
To courtship, and such fair ostents of love
As shall conveniently become you there.'
And even there, his eye being big with tears,
Turning his face, he put his hand behind him,
And with affection wondrous sensible
He wrung Bassanio's hand; and so they parted.
SOLANIO. I think he only loves the world for him.
I pray thee, let us go and find him out,
And quicken his embraced heaviness
With some delight or other.
SALERIO. Do we so. Exeunt
SCENE IX.
Belmont. PORTIA'S house
Enter NERISSA, and a SERVITOR
NERISSA. Quick, quick, I pray thee, draw the curtain straight;
The Prince of Arragon hath ta'en his oath,
And comes to his election presently.
Flourish of cornets. Enter the PRINCE OF ARRAGON,
PORTIA, and their trains
PORTIA. Behold, there stand the caskets, noble Prince.
If you choose that wherein I am contain'd,
Straight shall our nuptial rites be solemniz'd;
But if you fail, without more speech, my lord,
You must be gone from hence immediately.
ARRAGON. I am enjoin'd by oath to observe three things:
First, never to unfold to any one
Which casket 'twas I chose; next, if I fail
Of the right casket, never in my life
To woo a maid in way of marriage;
Lastly,
If I do fail in fortune of my choice,
Immediately to leave you and be gone.
PORTIA. To these injunctions every one doth swear
That comes to hazard for my worthless self.
ARRAGON. And so have I address'd me. Fortune now
To my heart's hope! Gold, silver, and base lead.
'Who chooseth me must give and hazard all he hath.'
You shall look fairer ere I give or hazard.
What says the golden chest? Ha! let me see:
'Who chooseth me shall gain what many men desire.'
What many men desire- that 'many' may be meant
By the fool multitude, that choose by show,
Not learning more than the fond eye doth teach;
Which pries not to th' interior, but, like the martlet,
Builds in the weather on the outward wall,
Even in the force and road of casualty.
I will not choose what many men desire,
Because I will not jump with common spirits
And rank me with the barbarous multitudes.
Why, then to thee, thou silver treasure-house!
Tell me once more what title thou dost bear.
'Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves.'
And well said too; for who shall go about
To cozen fortune, and be honourable
Without the stamp of merit? Let none presume
To wear an undeserved dignity.
O that estates, degrees, and offices,
Were not deriv'd corruptly, and that clear honour
Were purchas'd by the merit of the wearer!
How many then should cover that stand bare!
How many be commanded that command!
How much low peasantry would then be gleaned
From the true seed of honour! and how much honour
Pick'd from the chaff and ruin of the times,
To be new varnish'd! Well, but to my choice.
'Who chooseth me shall get as much as he deserves.'
I will assume desert. Give me a key for this,
And instantly unlock my fortunes here.
[He opens the silver casket]
PORTIA. [Aside] Too long a pause for that which you find there.
ARRAGON. What's here? The portrait of a blinking idiot
Presenting me a schedule! I will read it.
How much unlike art thou to Portia!
How much unlike my hopes and my deservings!
'Who chooseth me shall have as much as he deserves.'
Did I deserve no more than a fool's head?
Is that my prize? Are my deserts no better?
PORTIA. To offend and judge are distinct offices
And of opposed natures.
ARRAGON. What is here? [Reads]
'The fire seven times tried this;
Seven times tried that judgment is
That did never choose amiss.
Some there be that shadows kiss,
Such have but a shadow's bliss.
There be fools alive iwis
Silver'd o'er, and so was this.
Take what wife you will to bed,
I will ever be your head.
So be gone; you are sped.'
Still more fool I shall appear
By the time I linger here.
With one fool's head I came to woo,
But I go away with two.
Sweet, adieu! I'll keep my oath,
Patiently to bear my wroth. Exit with his train
PORTIA. Thus hath the candle sing'd the moth.
O, these deliberate fools! When they do choose,
They have the wisdom by their wit to lose.
NERISSA. The ancient saying is no heresy:
Hanging and wiving goes by destiny.
PORTIA. Come, draw the curtain, Nerissa.
Enter a SERVANT
SERVANT. Where is my lady?
PORTIA. Here; what would my lord?
SERVANT. Madam, there is alighted at your gate
A young Venetian, one that comes before
To signify th' approaching of his lord,
From whom he bringeth sensible regreets;
To wit, besides commends and courteous breath,
Gifts of rich value. Yet I have not seen
So likely an ambassador of love.
A day in April never came so sweet
To show how costly summer was at hand
As this fore-spurrer comes before his lord.
PORTIA. No more, I pray thee; I am half afeard
Thou wilt say anon he is some kin to thee,
Thou spend'st such high-day wit in praising him.
Come, come, Nerissa, for I long to see
Quick Cupid's post that comes so mannerly.
NERISSA. Bassanio, Lord Love, if thy will it be! Exeunt
<>
ACT III. SCENE I.
Venice. A street
Enter SOLANIO and SALERIO
SOLANIO. Now, what news on the Rialto?
SALERIO. Why, yet it lives there uncheck'd that Antonio hath a ship
of rich lading wreck'd on the narrow seas; the Goodwins I think
they call the place, a very dangerous flat and fatal, where the
carcases of many a tall ship lie buried, as they say, if my
gossip Report be an honest woman of her word.
SOLANIO. I would she were as lying a gossip in that as ever knapp'd
ginger or made her neighbours believe she wept for the death of a
third husband. But it is true, without any slips of prolixity or
crossing the plain highway of talk, that the good Antonio, the
honest Antonio- O that I had a title good enough to keep his name
company!-
SALERIO. Come, the full stop.
SOLANIO. Ha! What sayest thou? Why, the end is, he hath lost a
ship.
SALERIO. I would it might prove the end of his losses.
SOLANIO. Let me say amen betimes, lest the devil cross my prayer,
for here he comes in the likeness of a Jew.
Enter SHYLOCK
How now, Shylock? What news among the merchants?
SHYLOCK. You knew, none so well, none so well as you, of my
daughter's flight.
SALERIO. That's certain; I, for my part, knew the tailor that made
the wings she flew withal.
SOLANIO. And Shylock, for his own part, knew the bird was flidge;
and then it is the complexion of them all to leave the dam.
SHYLOCK. She is damn'd for it.
SALERIO. That's certain, if the devil may be her judge.
SHYLOCK. My own flesh and blood to rebel!
SOLANIO. Out upon it, old carrion! Rebels it at these years?
SHYLOCK. I say my daughter is my flesh and my blood.
SALERIO. There is more difference between thy flesh and hers than
between jet and ivory; more between your bloods than there is
between red wine and Rhenish. But tell us, do you hear whether
Antonio have had any loss at sea or no?
SHYLOCK. There I have another bad match: a bankrupt, a prodigal,
who dare scarce show his head on the Rialto; a beggar, that was
us'd to come so smug upon the mart. Let him look to his bond. He
was wont to call me usurer; let him look to his bond. He was wont
to lend money for a Christian courtesy; let him look to his bond.
SALERIO. Why, I am sure, if he forfeit, thou wilt not take his
flesh. What's that good for?
SHYLOCK. To bait fish withal. If it will feed nothing else, it will
feed my revenge. He hath disgrac'd me and hind'red me half a
million; laugh'd at my losses, mock'd at my gains, scorned my
nation, thwarted my bargains, cooled my friends, heated mine
enemies. And what's his reason? I am a Jew. Hath not a Jew eyes?
Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections,
passions, fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons,
subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed
and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If
you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh?
If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we
not revenge? If we are like you in the rest, we will resemble you
in that. If a Jew wrong a Christian, what is his humility?
Revenge. If a Christian wrong a Jew, what should his sufferance
be by Christian example? Why, revenge. The villainy you teach me
I will execute; and itshall go hard but I will better the
instruction.
Enter a MAN from ANTONIO
MAN. Gentlemen, my master Antonio is at his house, and desires to
speak with you both.
SALERIO. We have been up and down to seek him.
Enter TUBAL
SOLANIO. Here comes another of the tribe; a third cannot be
match'd, unless the devil himself turn Jew.
Exeunt SOLANIO, SALERIO, and MAN
SHYLOCK. How now, Tubal, what news from Genoa? Hast thou found my
daughter?
TUBAL. I often came where I did hear of her, but cannot find her.
SHYLOCK. Why there, there, there, there! A diamond gone, cost me
two thousand ducats in Frankfort! The curse never fell upon our
nation till now; I never felt it till now. Two thousand ducats in
that, and other precious, precious jewels. I would my daughter
were dead at my foot, and the jewels in her ear; would she were
hears'd at my foot, and the ducats in her coffin! No news of
them? Why, so- and I know not what's spent in the search. Why,
thou- loss upon loss! The thief gone with so much, and so much to
find the thief; and no satisfaction, no revenge; nor no ill luck
stirring but what lights o' my shoulders; no sighs but o' my
breathing; no tears but o' my shedding!
TUBAL. Yes, other men have ill luck too: Antonio, as I heard in
Genoa-
SHYLOCK. What, what, what? Ill luck, ill luck?
TUBAL. Hath an argosy cast away coming from Tripolis.
SHYLOCK. I thank God, I thank God. Is it true, is it true?
TUBAL. I spoke with some of the sailors that escaped the wreck.
SHYLOCK. I thank thee, good Tubal. Good news, good news- ha, ha!-
heard in Genoa.
TUBAL. Your daughter spent in Genoa, as I heard, one night,
fourscore ducats.
SHYLOCK. Thou stick'st a dagger in me- I shall never see my gold
again. Fourscore ducats at a sitting! Fourscore ducats!
TUBAL. There came divers of Antonio's creditors in my company to
Venice that swear he cannot choose but break.
SHYLOCK. I am very glad of it; I'll plague him, I'll torture him; I
am glad of it.
TUBAL. One of them showed me a ring that he had of your daughter
for a monkey.
SHYLOCK. Out upon her! Thou torturest me, Tubal. It was my
turquoise; I had it of Leah when I was a bachelor; I would not
have given it for a wilderness of monkeys.
TUBAL. But Antonio is certainly undone.
SHYLOCK. Nay, that's true; that's very true. Go, Tubal, fee me an
officer; bespeak him a fortnight before. I will have the heart of
him, if he forfeit; for, were he out of Venice, I can make what
merchandise I will. Go, Tubal, and meet me at our synagogue; go,
good Tubal; at our synagogue, Tubal. Exeunt
SCENE II.
Belmont. PORTIA'S house
Enter BASSANIO, PORTIA, GRATIANO, NERISSA, and all their trains
PORTIA. I pray you tarry; pause a day or two
Before you hazard; for, in choosing wrong,
I lose your company; therefore forbear a while.
There's something tells me- but it is not love-
I would not lose you; and you know yourself
Hate counsels not in such a quality.
But lest you should not understand me well-
And yet a maiden hath no tongue but thought-
I would detain you here some month or two
Before you venture for me. I could teach you
How to choose right, but then I am forsworn;
So will I never be; so may you miss me;
But if you do, you'll make me wish a sin,
That I had been forsworn. Beshrew your eyes!
They have o'erlook'd me and divided me;
One half of me is yours, the other half yours-
Mine own, I would say; but if mine, then yours,
And so all yours. O! these naughty times
Puts bars between the owners and their rights;
And so, though yours, not yours. Prove it so,
Let fortune go to hell for it, not I.
I speak too long, but 'tis to peize the time,
To eke it, and to draw it out in length,
To stay you from election.
BASSANIO. Let me choose;
For as I am, I live upon the rack.
PORTIA. Upon the rack, Bassanio? Then confess
What treason there is mingled with your love.
BASSANIO. None but that ugly treason of mistrust
Which makes me fear th' enjoying of my love;
There may as well be amity and life
'Tween snow and fire as treason and my love.
PORTIA. Ay, but I fear you speak upon the rack,
Where men enforced do speak anything.
BASSANIO. Promise me life, and I'll confess the truth.
PORTIA. Well then, confess and live.
BASSANIO. 'Confess' and 'love'
Had been the very sum of my confession.
O happy torment, when my torturer
Doth teach me answers for deliverance!
But let me to my fortune and the caskets.
PORTIA. Away, then; I am lock'd in one of them.
If you do love me, you will find me out.
Nerissa and the rest, stand all aloof;
Let music sound while he doth make his choice;
Then, if he lose, he makes a swan-like end,
Fading in music. That the comparison
May stand more proper, my eye shall be the stream
And wat'ry death-bed for him. He may win;
And what is music then? Then music is
Even as the flourish when true subjects bow
To a new-crowned monarch; such it is
As are those dulcet sounds in break of day
That creep into the dreaming bridegroom's ear
And summon him to marriage. Now he goes,
With no less presence, but with much more love,
Than young Alcides when he did redeem
The virgin tribute paid by howling Troy
To the sea-monster. I stand for sacrifice;
The rest aloof are the Dardanian wives,
With bleared visages come forth to view
The issue of th' exploit. Go, Hercules!
Live thou, I live. With much much more dismay
I view the fight than thou that mak'st the fray.
A SONG
the whilst BASSANIO comments on the caskets to himself
Tell me where is fancy bred,
Or in the heart or in the head,
How begot, how nourished?
Reply, reply.
It is engend'red in the eyes,
With gazing fed; and fancy dies
In the cradle where it lies.
Let us all ring fancy's knell:
I'll begin it- Ding, dong, bell.
ALL. Ding, dong, bell.
BASSANIO. So may the outward shows be least themselves;
The world is still deceiv'd with ornament.
In law, what plea so tainted and corrupt
But, being season'd with a gracious voice,
Obscures the show of evil? In religion,
What damned error but some sober brow
Will bless it, and approve it with a text,
Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?
There is no vice so simple but assumes
Some mark of virtue on his outward parts.
How many cowards, whose hearts are all as false
As stairs of sand, wear yet upon their chins
The beards of Hercules and frowning Mars;
Who, inward search'd, have livers white as milk!
And these assume but valour's excrement
To render them redoubted. Look on beauty
And you shall see 'tis purchas'd by the weight,
Which therein works a miracle in nature,
Making them lightest that wear most of it;
So are those crisped snaky golden locks
Which make such wanton gambols with the wind
Upon supposed fairness often known
To be the dowry of a second head-
The skull that bred them in the sepulchre.
Thus ornament is but the guiled shore
To a most dangerous sea; the beauteous scarf
Veiling an Indian beauty; in a word,
The seeming truth which cunning times put on
To entrap the wisest. Therefore, thou gaudy gold,
Hard food for Midas, I will none of thee;
Nor none of thee, thou pale and common drudge
'Tween man and man; but thou, thou meagre lead,
Which rather threaten'st than dost promise aught,
Thy plainness moves me more than eloquence,
And here choose I. Joy be the consequence!
PORTIA. [Aside] How all the other passions fleet to air,
As doubtful thoughts, and rash-embrac'd despair,
And shudd'ring fear, and green-ey'd jealousy!
O love, be moderate, allay thy ecstasy,
In measure rain thy joy, scant this excess!
I feel too much thy blessing. Make it less,
For fear I surfeit.
BASSANIO. [Opening the leaden casket] What find I here?
Fair Portia's counterfeit! What demi-god
Hath come so near creation? Move these eyes?
Or whether riding on the balls of mine
Seem they in motion? Here are sever'd lips,
Parted with sugar breath; so sweet a bar
Should sunder such sweet friends. Here in her hairs
The painter plays the spider, and hath woven
A golden mesh t' entrap the hearts of men
Faster than gnats in cobwebs. But her eyes-
How could he see to do them? Having made one,
Methinks it should have power to steal both his,
And leave itself unfurnish'd. Yet look how far
The substance of my praise doth wrong this shadow
In underprizing it, so far this shadow
Doth limp behind the substance. Here's the scroll,
The continent and summary of my fortune.
'You that choose not by the view,
Chance as fair and choose as true!
Since this fortune falls to you,
Be content and seek no new.
If you be well pleas'd with this,
And hold your fortune for your bliss,
Turn to where your lady is
And claim her with a loving kiss.'
A gentle scroll. Fair lady, by your leave;
I come by note, to give and to receive.
Like one of two contending in a prize,
That thinks he hath done well in people's eyes,
Hearing applause and universal shout,
Giddy in spirit, still gazing in a doubt
Whether those peals of praise be his or no;
So, thrice-fair lady, stand I even so,
As doubtful whether what I see be true,
Until confirm'd, sign'd, ratified by you.
PORTIA. You see me, Lord Bassanio, where I stand,
Such as I am. Though for myself alone
I would not be ambitious in my wish
To wish myself much better, yet for you
I would be trebled twenty times myself,
A thousand times more fair, ten thousand times more rich,
That only to stand high in your account
I might in virtues, beauties, livings, friends,
Exceed account. But the full sum of me
Is sum of something which, to term in gross,
Is an unlesson'd girl, unschool'd, unpractis'd;
Happy in this, she is not yet so old
But she may learn; happier than this,
She is not bred so dull but she can learn;
Happiest of all is that her gentle spirit
Commits itself to yours to be directed,
As from her lord, her governor, her king.
Myself and what is mine to you and yours
Is now converted. But now I was the lord
Of this fair mansion, master of my servants,
Queen o'er myself; and even now, but now,
This house, these servants, and this same myself,
Are yours- my lord's. I give them with this ring,
Which when you part from, lose, or give away,
Let it presage the ruin of your love,
And be my vantage to exclaim on you.
BASSANIO. Madam, you have bereft me of all words;
Only my blood speaks to you in my veins;
And there is such confusion in my powers
As, after some oration fairly spoke
By a beloved prince, there doth appear
Among the buzzing pleased multitude,
Where every something, being blent together,
Turns to a wild of nothing, save of joy
Express'd and not express'd. But when this ring
Parts from this finger, then parts life from hence;
O, then be bold to say Bassanio's dead!
NERISSA. My lord and lady, it is now our time
That have stood by and seen our wishes prosper
To cry 'Good joy.' Good joy, my lord and lady!
GRATIANO. My Lord Bassanio, and my gentle lady,
I wish you all the joy that you can wish,
For I am sure you can wish none from me;
And, when your honours mean to solemnize
The bargain of your faith, I do beseech you
Even at that time I may be married too.
BASSANIO. With all my heart, so thou canst get a wife.
GRATIANO. I thank your lordship, you have got me one.
My eyes, my lord, can look as swift as yours:
You saw the mistress, I beheld the maid;
You lov'd, I lov'd; for intermission
No more pertains to me, my lord, than you.
Your fortune stood upon the caskets there,
And so did mine too, as the matter falls;
For wooing here until I sweat again,
And swearing till my very roof was dry
With oaths of love, at last- if promise last-
I got a promise of this fair one here
To have her love, provided that your fortune
Achiev'd her mistress.
PORTIA. Is this true, Nerissa?
NERISSA. Madam, it is, so you stand pleas'd withal.
BASSANIO. And do you, Gratiano, mean good faith?
GRATIANO. Yes, faith, my lord.
BASSANIO. Our feast shall be much honoured in your marriage.
GRATIANO. We'll play with them: the first boy for a thousand
ducats.
NERISSA. What, and stake down?
GRATIANO. No; we shall ne'er win at that sport, and stake down-
But who comes here? Lorenzo and his infidel?
What, and my old Venetian friend, Salerio!
Enter LORENZO, JESSICA, and SALERIO, a messenger
from Venice
BASSANIO. Lorenzo and Salerio, welcome hither,
If that the youth of my new int'rest here
Have power to bid you welcome. By your leave,
I bid my very friends and countrymen,
Sweet Portia, welcome.
PORTIA. So do I, my lord;
They are entirely welcome.
LORENZO. I thank your honour. For my part, my lord,
My purpose was not to have seen you here;
But meeting with Salerio by the way,
He did entreat me, past all saying nay,
To come with him along.
SALERIO. I did, my lord,
And I have reason for it. Signior Antonio
Commends him to you. [Gives BASSANIO a letter]
BASSANIO. Ere I ope his letter,
I pray you tell me how my good friend doth.
SALERIO. Not sick, my lord, unless it be in mind;
Nor well, unless in mind; his letter there
Will show you his estate. [BASSANIO opens the letter]
GRATIANO. Nerissa, cheer yond stranger; bid her welcome.
Your hand, Salerio. What's the news from Venice?
How doth that royal merchant, good Antonio?
I know he will be glad of our success:
We are the Jasons, we have won the fleece.
SALERIO. I would you had won the fleece that he hath lost.
PORTIA. There are some shrewd contents in yond same paper
That steals the colour from Bassanio's cheek:
Some dear friend dead, else nothing in the world
Could turn so much the constitution
Of any constant man. What, worse and worse!
With leave, Bassanio: I am half yourself,
And I must freely have the half of anything
That this same paper brings you.
BASSANIO. O sweet Portia,
Here are a few of the unpleasant'st words
That ever blotted paper! Gentle lady,
When I did first impart my love to you,
I freely told you all the wealth I had
Ran in my veins- I was a gentleman;
And then I told you true. And yet, dear lady,
Rating myself at nothing, you shall see
How much I was a braggart. When I told you
My state was nothing, I should then have told you
That I was worse than nothing; for indeed
I have engag'd myself to a dear friend,
Engag'd my friend to his mere enemy,
To feed my means. Here is a letter, lady,
The paper as the body of my friend,
And every word in it a gaping wound
Issuing life-blood. But is it true, Salerio?
Hath all his ventures fail'd? What, not one hit?
From Tripolis, from Mexico, and England,
From Lisbon, Barbary, and India,
And not one vessel scape the dreadful touch
Of merchant-marring rocks?
SALERIO. Not one, my lord.
Besides, it should appear that, if he had
The present money to discharge the Jew,
He would not take it. Never did I know
A creature that did bear the shape of man
So keen and greedy to confound a man.
He plies the Duke at morning and at night,
And doth impeach the freedom of the state,
If they deny him justice. Twenty merchants,
The Duke himself, and the magnificoes
Of greatest port, have all persuaded with him;
But none can drive him from the envious plea
Of forfeiture, of justice, and his bond.
JESSICA. When I was with him, I have heard him swear
To Tubal and to Chus, his countrymen,
That he would rather have Antonio's flesh
Than twenty times the value of the sum
That he did owe him; and I know, my lord,
If law, authority, and power, deny not,
It will go hard with poor Antonio.
PORTIA. Is it your dear friend that is thus in trouble?
BASSANIO. The dearest friend to me, the kindest man,
The best condition'd and unwearied spirit
In doing courtesies; and one in whom
The ancient Roman honour more appears
Than any that draws breath in Italy.
PORTIA. What sum owes he the Jew?
BASSANIO. For me, three thousand ducats.
PORTIA. What! no more?
Pay him six thousand, and deface the bond;
Double six thousand, and then treble that,
Before a friend of this description
Shall lose a hair through Bassanio's fault.
First go with me to church and call me wife,
And then away to Venice to your friend;
For never shall you lie by Portia's side
With an unquiet soul. You shall have gold
To pay the petty debt twenty times over.
When it is paid, bring your true friend along.
My maid Nerissa and myself meantime
Will live as maids and widows. Come, away;
For you shall hence upon your wedding day.
Bid your friends welcome, show a merry cheer;
Since you are dear bought, I will love you dear.
But let me hear the letter of your friend.
BASSANIO. [Reads] 'Sweet Bassanio, my ships have all miscarried,
my creditors grow cruel, my estate is very low, my bond to the
Jew is forfeit; and since, in paying it, it is impossible I
should live, all debts are clear'd between you and I, if I might
but see you at my death. Notwithstanding, use your pleasure; if
your love do not persuade you to come, let not my letter.'
PORTIA. O love, dispatch all business and be gone!
BASSANIO. Since I have your good leave to go away,
I will make haste; but, till I come again,
No bed shall e'er be guilty of my stay,
Nor rest be interposer 'twixt us twain. Exeunt
SCENE III.
Venice. A street
Enter SHYLOCK, SOLANIO, ANTONIO, and GAOLER
SHYLOCK. Gaoler, look to him. Tell not me of mercy-
This is the fool that lent out money gratis.
Gaoler, look to him.
ANTONIO. Hear me yet, good Shylock.
SHYLOCK. I'll have my bond; speak not against my bond.
I have sworn an oath that I will have my bond.
Thou call'dst me dog before thou hadst a cause,
But, since I am a dog, beware my fangs;
The Duke shall grant me justice. I do wonder,
Thou naughty gaoler, that thou art so fond
To come abroad with him at his request.
ANTONIO. I pray thee hear me speak.
SHYLOCK. I'll have my bond. I will not hear thee speak;
I'll have my bond; and therefore speak no more.
I'll not be made a soft and dull-ey'd fool,
To shake the head, relent, and sigh, and yield,
To Christian intercessors. Follow not;
I'll have no speaking; I will have my bond. Exit
SOLANIO. It is the most impenetrable cur
That ever kept with men.
ANTONIO. Let him alone;
I'll follow him no more with bootless prayers.
He seeks my life; his reason well I know:
I oft deliver'd from his forfeitures
Many that have at times made moan to me;
Therefore he hates me.
SOLANIO. I am sure the Duke
Will never grant this forfeiture to hold.
ANTONIO. The Duke cannot deny the course of law;
For the commodity that strangers have
With us in Venice, if it be denied,
Will much impeach the justice of the state,
Since that the trade and profit of the city
Consisteth of all nations. Therefore, go;
These griefs and losses have so bated me
That I shall hardly spare a pound of flesh
To-morrow to my bloody creditor.
Well, gaoler, on; pray God Bassanio come
To see me pay his debt, and then I care not. Exeunt
SCENE IV.
Belmont. PORTIA'S house
Enter PORTIA, NERISSA, LORENZO, JESSICA, and BALTHASAR
LORENZO. Madam, although I speak it in your presence,
You have a noble and a true conceit
Of godlike amity, which appears most strongly
In bearing thus the absence of your lord.
But if you knew to whom you show this honour,
How true a gentleman you send relief,
How dear a lover of my lord your husband,
I know you would be prouder of the work
Than customary bounty can enforce you.
PORTIA. I never did repent for doing good,
Nor shall not now; for in companions
That do converse and waste the time together,
Whose souls do bear an equal yoke of love,
There must be needs a like proportion
Of lineaments, of manners, and of spirit,
Which makes me think that this Antonio,
Being the bosom lover of my lord,
Must needs be like my lord. If it be so,
How little is the cost I have bestowed
In purchasing the semblance of my soul
From out the state of hellish cruelty!
This comes too near the praising of myself;
Therefore, no more of it; hear other things.
Lorenzo, I commit into your hands
The husbandry and manage of my house
Until my lord's return; for mine own part,
I have toward heaven breath'd a secret vow
To live in prayer and contemplation,
Only attended by Nerissa here,
Until her husband and my lord's return.
There is a monastery two miles off,
And there we will abide. I do desire you
Not to deny this imposition,
The which my love and some necessity
Now lays upon you.
LORENZO. Madam, with all my heart
I shall obey you in an fair commands.
PORTIA. My people do already know my mind,
And will acknowledge you and Jessica
In place of Lord Bassanio and myself.
So fare you well till we shall meet again.
LORENZO. Fair thoughts and happy hours attend on you!
JESSICA. I wish your ladyship all heart's content.
PORTIA. I thank you for your wish, and am well pleas'd
To wish it back on you. Fare you well, Jessica.
Exeunt JESSICA and LORENZO
Now, Balthasar,
As I have ever found thee honest-true,
So let me find thee still. Take this same letter,
And use thou all th' endeavour of a man
In speed to Padua; see thou render this
Into my cousin's hands, Doctor Bellario;
And look what notes and garments he doth give thee,
Bring them, I pray thee, with imagin'd speed
Unto the traject, to the common ferry
Which trades to Venice. Waste no time in words,
But get thee gone; I shall be there before thee.
BALTHASAR. Madam, I go with all convenient speed. Exit
PORTIA. Come on, Nerissa, I have work in hand
That you yet know not of; we'll see our husbands
Before they think of us.
NERISSA. Shall they see us?
PORTIA. They shall, Nerissa; but in such a habit
That they shall think we are accomplished
With that we lack. I'll hold thee any wager,
When we are both accoutred like young men,
I'll prove the prettier fellow of the two,
And wear my dagger with the braver grace,
And speak between the change of man and boy
With a reed voice; and turn two mincing steps
Into a manly stride; and speak of frays
Like a fine bragging youth; and tell quaint lies,
How honourable ladies sought my love,
Which I denying, they fell sick and died-
I could not do withal. Then I'll repent,
And wish for all that, that I had not kill'd them.
And twenty of these puny lies I'll tell,
That men shall swear I have discontinued school
About a twelvemonth. I have within my mind
A thousand raw tricks of these bragging Jacks,
Which I will practise.
NERISSA. Why, shall we turn to men?
PORTIA. Fie, what a question's that,
If thou wert near a lewd interpreter!
But come, I'll tell thee all my whole device
When I am in my coach, which stays for us
At the park gate; and therefore haste away,
For we must measure twenty miles to-day. Exeunt
SCENE V.
Belmont. The garden
Enter LAUNCELOT and JESSICA
LAUNCELOT. Yes, truly; for, look you, the sins of the father are to
be laid upon the children; therefore, I promise you, I fear you.
I was always plain with you, and so now I speak my agitation of
the matter; therefore be o' good cheer, for truly I think you are
damn'd. There is but one hope in it that can do you any good, and
that is but a kind of bastard hope, neither.
JESSICA. And what hope is that, I pray thee?
LAUNCELOT. Marry, you may partly hope that your father got you not-
that you are not the Jew's daughter.
JESSICA. That were a kind of bastard hope indeed; so the sins of my
mother should be visited upon me.
LAUNCELOT. Truly then I fear you are damn'd both by father and
mother; thus when I shun Scylla, your father, I fall into
Charybdis, your mother; well, you are gone both ways.
JESSICA. I shall be sav'd by my husband; he hath made me a
Christian.
LAUNCELOT. Truly, the more to blame he; we were Christians enow
before, e'en as many as could well live one by another. This
making of Christians will raise the price of hogs; if we grow all
to be pork-eaters, we shall not shortly have a rasher on the
coals for money.
Enter LORENZO
JESSICA. I'll tell my husband, Launcelot, what you say; here he
comes.
LORENZO. I shall grow jealous of you shortly, Launcelot, if you
thus get my wife into corners.
JESSICA. Nay, you need nor fear us, Lorenzo; Launcelot and I are
out; he tells me flatly there's no mercy for me in heaven,
because I am a Jew's daughter; and he says you are no good member
of the commonwealth, for in converting Jews to Christians you
raise the price of pork.
LORENZO. I shall answer that better to the commonwealth than you
can the getting up of the negro's belly; the Moor is with child
by you, Launcelot.
LAUNCELOT. It is much that the Moor should be more than reason; but
if she be less than an honest woman, she is indeed more than I
took her for.
LORENZO. How every fool can play upon the word! I think the best
grace of wit will shortly turn into silence, and discourse grow
commendable in none only but parrots. Go in, sirrah; bid them
prepare for dinner.
LAUNCELOT. That is done, sir; they have all stomachs.
LORENZO. Goodly Lord, what a wit-snapper are you! Then bid them
prepare dinner.
LAUNCELOT. That is done too, sir, only 'cover' is the word.
LORENZO. Will you cover, then, sir?
LAUNCELOT. Not so, sir, neither; I know my duty.
LORENZO. Yet more quarrelling with occasion! Wilt thou show the
whole wealth of thy wit in an instant? I pray thee understand a
plain man in his plain meaning: go to thy fellows, bid them cover
the table, serve in the meat, and we will come in to dinner.
LAUNCELOT. For the table, sir, it shall be serv'd in; for the meat,
sir, it shall be cover'd; for your coming in to dinner, sir, why,
let it be as humours and conceits shall govern.
Exit
LORENZO. O dear discretion, how his words are suited!
The fool hath planted in his memory
An army of good words; and I do know
A many fools that stand in better place,
Garnish'd like him, that for a tricksy word
Defy the matter. How cheer'st thou, Jessica?
And now, good sweet, say thy opinion,
How dost thou like the Lord Bassanio's wife?
JESSICA. Past all expressing. It is very meet
The Lord Bassanio live an upright life,
For, having such a blessing in his lady,
He finds the joys of heaven here on earth;
And if on earth he do not merit it,
In reason he should never come to heaven.
Why, if two gods should play some heavenly match,
And on the wager lay two earthly women,
And Portia one, there must be something else
Pawn'd with the other; for the poor rude world
Hath not her fellow.
LORENZO. Even such a husband
Hast thou of me as she is for a wife.
JESSICA. Nay, but ask my opinion too of that.
LORENZO. I will anon; first let us go to dinner.
JESSICA. Nay, let me praise you while I have a stomach.
LORENZO. No, pray thee, let it serve for table-talk;
Then howsome'er thou speak'st, 'mong other things
I shall digest it.
JESSICA. Well, I'll set you forth. Exeunt
ACT IV. SCENE I.
Venice. The court of justice
Enter the DUKE, the MAGNIFICOES, ANTONIO, BASSANIO, GRATIANO, SALERIO,
and OTHERS
DUKE OF VENICE. What, is Antonio here?
ANTONIO. Ready, so please your Grace.
DUKE OF VENICE. I am sorry for thee; thou art come to answer
A stony adversary, an inhuman wretch,
Uncapable of pity, void and empty
From any dram of mercy.
ANTONIO. I have heard
Your Grace hath ta'en great pains to qualify
His rigorous course; but since he stands obdurate,
And that no lawful means can carry me
Out of his envy's reach, I do oppose
My patience to his fury, and am arm'd
To suffer with a quietness of spirit
The very tyranny and rage of his.
DUKE OF VENICE. Go one, and call the Jew into the court.
SALERIO. He is ready at the door; he comes, my lord.
Enter SHYLOCK
DUKE OF VENICE. Make room, and let him stand before our face.
Shylock, the world thinks, and I think so too,
That thou but leadest this fashion of thy malice
To the last hour of act; and then, 'tis thought,
Thou'lt show thy mercy and remorse, more strange
Than is thy strange apparent cruelty;
And where thou now exacts the penalty,
Which is a pound of this poor merchant's flesh,
Thou wilt not only loose the forfeiture,
But, touch'd with human gentleness and love,
Forgive a moiety of the principal,
Glancing an eye of pity on his losses,
That have of late so huddled on his back-
Enow to press a royal merchant down,
And pluck commiseration of his state
From brassy bosoms and rough hearts of flint,
From stubborn Turks and Tartars, never train'd
To offices of tender courtesy.
We all expect a gentle answer, Jew.
SHYLOCK. I have possess'd your Grace of what I purpose,
And by our holy Sabbath have I sworn
To have the due and forfeit of my bond.
If you deny it, let the danger light
Upon your charter and your city's freedom.
You'll ask me why I rather choose to have
A weight of carrion flesh than to receive
Three thousand ducats. I'll not answer that,
But say it is my humour- is it answer'd?
What if my house be troubled with a rat,
And I be pleas'd to give ten thousand ducats
To have it ban'd? What, are you answer'd yet?
Some men there are love not a gaping pig;
Some that are mad if they behold a cat;
And others, when the bagpipe sings i' th' nose,
Cannot contain their urine; for affection,
Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood
Of what it likes or loathes. Now, for your answer:
As there is no firm reason to be rend'red
Why he cannot abide a gaping pig;
Why he, a harmless necessary cat;
Why he, a woollen bagpipe, but of force
Must yield to such inevitable shame
As to offend, himself being offended;
So can I give no reason, nor I will not,
More than a lodg'd hate and a certain loathing
I bear Antonio, that I follow thus
A losing suit against him. Are you answered?
BASSANIO. This is no answer, thou unfeeling man,
To excuse the current of thy cruelty.
SHYLOCK. I am not bound to please thee with my answers.
BASSANIO. Do all men kill the things they do not love?
SHYLOCK. Hates any man the thing he would not kill?
BASSANIO. Every offence is not a hate at first.
SHYLOCK. What, wouldst thou have a serpent sting thee twice?
ANTONIO. I pray you, think you question with the Jew.
You may as well go stand upon the beach
And bid the main flood bate his usual height;
You may as well use question with the wolf,
Why he hath made the ewe bleat for the lamb;
You may as well forbid the mountain pines
To wag their high tops and to make no noise
When they are fretten with the gusts of heaven;
You may as well do anything most hard
As seek to soften that- than which what's harder?-
His jewish heart. Therefore, I do beseech you,
Make no moe offers, use no farther means,
But with all brief and plain conveniency
Let me have judgment, and the Jew his will.
BASSANIO. For thy three thousand ducats here is six.
SHYLOCK. If every ducat in six thousand ducats
Were in six parts, and every part a ducat,
I would not draw them; I would have my bond.
DUKE OF VENICE. How shalt thou hope for mercy, rend'ring none?
SHYLOCK. What judgment shall I dread, doing no wrong?
You have among you many a purchas'd slave,
Which, fike your asses and your dogs and mules,
You use in abject and in slavish parts,
Because you bought them; shall I say to you
'Let them be free, marry them to your heirs-
Why sweat they under burdens?- let their beds
Be made as soft as yours, and let their palates
Be season'd with such viands'? You will answer
'The slaves are ours.' So do I answer you:
The pound of flesh which I demand of him
Is dearly bought, 'tis mine, and I will have it.
If you deny me, fie upon your law!
There is no force in the decrees of Venice.
I stand for judgment; answer; shall I have it?
DUKE OF VENICE. Upon my power I may dismiss this court,
Unless Bellario, a learned doctor,
Whom I have sent for to determine this,
Come here to-day.
SALERIO. My lord, here stays without
A messenger with letters from the doctor,
New come from Padua.
DUKE OF VENICE. Bring us the letters; call the messenger.
BASSANIO. Good cheer, Antonio! What, man, courage yet!
The Jew shall have my flesh, blood, bones, and all,
Ere thou shalt lose for me one drop of blood.
ANTONIO. I am a tainted wether of the flock,
Meetest for death; the weakest kind of fruit
Drops earliest to the ground, and so let me.
You cannot better be employ'd, Bassanio,
Than to live still, and write mine epitaph.
Enter NERISSA dressed like a lawyer's clerk
DUKE OF VENICE. Came you from Padua, from Bellario?
NERISSA. From both, my lord. Bellario greets your Grace.
[Presents a letter]
BASSANIO. Why dost thou whet thy knife so earnestly?
SHYLOCK. To cut the forfeiture from that bankrupt there.
GRATIANO. Not on thy sole, but on thy soul, harsh Jew,
Thou mak'st thy knife keen; but no metal can,
No, not the hangman's axe, bear half the keenness
Of thy sharp envy. Can no prayers pierce thee?
SHYLOCK. No, none that thou hast wit enough to make.
GRATIANO. O, be thou damn'd, inexecrable dog!
And for thy life let justice be accus'd.
Thou almost mak'st me waver in my faith,
To hold opinion with Pythagoras
That souls of animals infuse themselves
Into the trunks of men. Thy currish spirit
Govern'd a wolf who, hang'd for human slaughter,
Even from the gallows did his fell soul fleet,
And, whilst thou layest in thy unhallowed dam,
Infus'd itself in thee; for thy desires
Are wolfish, bloody, starv'd and ravenous.
SHYLOCK. Till thou canst rail the seal from off my bond,
Thou but offend'st thy lungs to speak so loud;
Repair thy wit, good youth, or it will fall
To cureless ruin. I stand here for law.
DUKE OF VENICE. This letter from Bellario doth commend
A young and learned doctor to our court.
Where is he?
NERISSA. He attendeth here hard by
To know your answer, whether you'll admit him.
DUKE OF VENICE. With all my heart. Some three or four of you
Go give him courteous conduct to this place.
Meantime, the court shall hear Bellario's letter.
CLERK. [Reads] 'Your Grace shall understand that at the receipt
of your letter I am very sick; but in the instant that your
messenger came, in loving visitation was with me a young doctor
of Rome- his name is Balthazar. I acquainted him with the cause
in controversy between the Jew and Antonio the merchant; we
turn'd o'er many books together; he is furnished with my opinion
which, bettered with his own learning-the greatness whereof I
cannot enough commend- comes with him at my importunity to fill
up your Grace's request in my stead. I beseech you let his lack
of years be no impediment to let him lack a reverend estimation,
for I never knew so young a body with so old a head. I leave him
to your gracious acceptance, whose trial shall better publish his
commendation.'
Enter PORTIA for BALTHAZAR, dressed like a Doctor of Laws
DUKE OF VENICE. YOU hear the learn'd Bellario, what he writes;
And here, I take it, is the doctor come.
Give me your hand; come you from old Bellario?
PORTIA. I did, my lord.
DUKE OF VENICE. You are welcome; take your place.
Are you acquainted with the difference
That holds this present question in the court?
PORTIA. I am informed throughly of the cause.
Which is the merchant here, and which the Jew?
DUKE OF VENICE. Antonio and old Shylock, both stand forth.
PORTIA. Is your name Shylock?
SHYLOCK. Shylock is my name.
PORTIA. Of a strange nature is the suit you follow;
Yet in such rule that the Venetian law
Cannot impugn you as you do proceed.
You stand within his danger, do you not?
ANTONIO. Ay, so he says.
PORTIA. Do you confess the bond?
ANTONIO. I do.
PORTIA. Then must the Jew be merciful.
SHYLOCK. On what compulsion must I? Tell me that.
PORTIA. The quality of mercy is not strain'd;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings;
But mercy is above this sceptred sway,
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's
When mercy seasons justice. Therefore, Jew,
Though justice be thy plea, consider this-
That in the course of justice none of us
Should see salvation; we do pray for mercy,
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy. I have spoke thus much
To mitigate the justice of thy plea,
Which if thou follow, this strict court of Venice
Must needs give sentence 'gainst the merchant there.
SHYLOCK. My deeds upon my head! I crave the law,
The penalty and forfeit of my bond.
BASSANIO. Yes; here I tender it for him in the court;
Yea, twice the sum; if that will not suffice,
I will be bound to pay it ten times o'er
On forfeit of my hands, my head, my heart;
If this will not suffice, it must appear
That malice bears down truth. And, I beseech you,
Wrest once the law to your authority;
To do a great right do a little wrong,
And curb this cruel devil of his will.
PORTIA. It must not be; there is no power in Venice
Can alter a decree established;
'Twill be recorded for a precedent,
And many an error, by the same example,
Will rush into the state; it cannot be.
SHYLOCK. A Daniel come to judgment! Yea, a Daniel!
O wise young judge, how I do honour thee!
PORTIA. I pray you, let me look upon the bond.
SHYLOCK. Here 'tis, most reverend Doctor; here it is.
PORTIA. Shylock, there's thrice thy money off'red thee.
SHYLOCK. An oath, an oath! I have an oath in heaven.
Shall I lay perjury upon my soul?
No, not for Venice.
PORTIA. Why, this bond is forfeit;
And lawfully by this the Jew may claim
A pound of flesh, to be by him cut off
Nearest the merchant's heart. Be merciful.
Take thrice thy money; bid me tear the bond.
SHYLOCK. When it is paid according to the tenour.
It doth appear you are a worthy judge;
You know the law; your exposition
Hath been most sound; I charge you by the law,
Whereof you are a well-deserving pillar,
Proceed to judgment. By my soul I swear
There is no power in the tongue of man
To alter me. I stay here on my bond.
ANTONIO. Most heartily I do beseech the court
To give the judgment.
PORTIA. Why then, thus it is:
You must prepare your bosom for his knife.
SHYLOCK. O noble judge! O excellent young man!
PORTIA. For the intent and purpose of the law
Hath full relation to the penalty,
Which here appeareth due upon the bond.
SHYLOCK. 'Tis very true. O wise and upright judge,
How much more elder art thou than thy looks!
PORTIA. Therefore, lay bare your bosom.
SHYLOCK. Ay, his breast-
So says the bond; doth it not, noble judge?
'Nearest his heart,' those are the very words.
PORTIA. It is so. Are there balance here to weigh
The flesh?
SHYLOCK. I have them ready.
PORTIA. Have by some surgeon, Shylock, on your charge,
To stop his wounds, lest he do bleed to death.
SHYLOCK. Is it so nominated in the bond?
PORTIA. It is not so express'd, but what of that?
'Twere good you do so much for charity.
SHYLOCK. I cannot find it; 'tis not in the bond.
PORTIA. You, merchant, have you anything to say?
ANTONIO. But little: I am arm'd and well prepar'd.
Give me your hand, Bassanio; fare you well.
Grieve not that I am fall'n to this for you,
For herein Fortune shows herself more kind
Than is her custom. It is still her use
To let the wretched man outlive his wealth,
To view with hollow eye and wrinkled brow
An age of poverty; from which ling'ring penance
Of such misery doth she cut me off.
Commend me to your honourable wife;
Tell her the process of Antonio's end;
Say how I lov'd you; speak me fair in death;
And, when the tale is told, bid her be judge
Whether Bassanio had not once a love.
Repent but you that you shall lose your friend,
And he repents not that he pays your debt;
For if the Jew do cut but deep enough,
I'll pay it instantly with all my heart.
BASSANIO. Antonio, I am married to a wife
Which is as dear to me as life itself;
But life itself, my wife, and all the world,
Are not with me esteem'd above thy life;
I would lose all, ay, sacrifice them all
Here to this devil, to deliver you.
PORTIA. Your wife would give you little thanks for that,
If she were by to hear you make the offer.
GRATIANO. I have a wife who I protest I love;
I would she were in heaven, so she could
Entreat some power to change this currish Jew.
NERISSA. 'Tis well you offer it behind her back;
The wish would make else an unquiet house.
SHYLOCK. [Aside] These be the Christian husbands! I have a
daughter-
Would any of the stock of Barrabas
Had been her husband, rather than a Christian!-
We trifle time; I pray thee pursue sentence.
PORTIA. A pound of that same merchant's flesh is thine.
The court awards it and the law doth give it.
SHYLOCK. Most rightful judge!
PORTIA. And you must cut this flesh from off his breast.
The law allows it and the court awards it.
SHYLOCK. Most learned judge! A sentence! Come, prepare.
PORTIA. Tarry a little; there is something else.
This bond doth give thee here no jot of blood:
The words expressly are 'a pound of flesh.'
Take then thy bond, take thou thy pound of flesh;
But, in the cutting it, if thou dost shed
One drop of Christian blood, thy lands and goods
Are, by the laws of Venice, confiscate
Unto the state of Venice.
GRATIANO. O upright judge! Mark, Jew. O learned judge!
SHYLOCK. Is that the law?
PORTIA. Thyself shalt see the act;
For, as thou urgest justice, be assur'd
Thou shalt have justice, more than thou desir'st.
GRATIANO. O learned judge! Mark, Jew. A learned judge!
SHYLOCK. I take this offer then: pay the bond thrice,
And let the Christian go.
BASSANIO. Here is the money.
PORTIA. Soft!
The Jew shall have all justice. Soft! No haste.
He shall have nothing but the penalty.
GRATIANO. O Jew! an upright judge, a learned judge!
PORTIA. Therefore, prepare thee to cut off the flesh.
Shed thou no blood, nor cut thou less nor more
But just a pound of flesh; if thou tak'st more
Or less than a just pound- be it but so much
As makes it light or heavy in the substance,
Or the division of the twentieth part
Of one poor scruple; nay, if the scale do turn
But in the estimation of a hair-
Thou diest, and all thy goods are confiscate.
GRATIANO. A second Daniel, a Daniel, Jew!
Now, infidel, I have you on the hip.
PORTIA. Why doth the Jew pause? Take thy forfeiture.
SHYLOCK. Give me my principal, and let me go.
BASSANIO. I have it ready for thee; here it is.
PORTIA. He hath refus'd it in the open court;
He shall have merely justice, and his bond.
GRATIANO. A Daniel still say I, a second Daniel!
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word.
SHYLOCK. Shall I not have barely my principal?
PORTIA. Thou shalt have nothing but the forfeiture
To be so taken at thy peril, Jew.
SHYLOCK. Why, then the devil give him good of it!
I'll stay no longer question.
PORTIA. Tarry, Jew.
The law hath yet another hold on you.
It is enacted in the laws of Venice,
If it be proved against an alien
That by direct or indirect attempts
He seek the life of any citizen,
The party 'gainst the which he doth contrive
Shall seize one half his goods; the other half
Comes to the privy coffer of the state;
And the offender's life lies in the mercy
Of the Duke only, 'gainst all other voice.
In which predicament, I say, thou stand'st;
For it appears by manifest proceeding
That indirectly, and directly too,
Thou hast contrived against the very life
Of the defendant; and thou hast incurr'd
The danger formerly by me rehears'd.
Down, therefore, and beg mercy of the Duke.
GRATIANO. Beg that thou mayst have leave to hang thyself;
And yet, thy wealth being forfeit to the state,
Thou hast not left the value of a cord;
Therefore thou must be hang'd at the state's charge.
DUKE OF VENICE. That thou shalt see the difference of our spirit,
I pardon thee thy life before thou ask it.
For half thy wealth, it is Antonio's;
The other half comes to the general state,
Which humbleness may drive unto a fine.
PORTIA. Ay, for the state; not for Antonio.
SHYLOCK. Nay, take my life and all, pardon not that.
You take my house when you do take the prop
That doth sustain my house; you take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live.
PORTIA. What mercy can you render him, Antonio?
GRATIANO. A halter gratis; nothing else, for God's sake!
ANTONIO. So please my lord the Duke and all the court
To quit the fine for one half of his goods;
I am content, so he will let me have
The other half in use, to render it
Upon his death unto the gentleman
That lately stole his daughter-
Two things provided more; that, for this favour,
He presently become a Christian;
The other, that he do record a gift,
Here in the court, of all he dies possess'd
Unto his son Lorenzo and his daughter.
DUKE OF VENICE. He shall do this, or else I do recant
The pardon that I late pronounced here.
PORTIA. Art thou contented, Jew? What dost thou say?
SHYLOCK. I am content.
PORTIA. Clerk, draw a deed of gift.
SHYLOCK. I pray you, give me leave to go from hence;
I am not well; send the deed after me
And I will sign it.
DUKE OF VENICE. Get thee gone, but do it.
GRATIANO. In christ'ning shalt thou have two god-fathers;
Had I been judge, thou shouldst have had ten more,
To bring thee to the gallows, not to the font.
Exit SHYLOCK
DUKE OF VENICE. Sir, I entreat you home with me to dinner.
PORTIA. I humbly do desire your Grace of pardon;
I must away this night toward Padua,
And it is meet I presently set forth.
DUKE OF VENICE. I am sorry that your leisure serves you not.
Antonio, gratify this gentleman,
For in my mind you are much bound to him.
Exeunt DUKE, MAGNIFICOES, and train
BASSANIO. Most worthy gentleman, I and my friend
Have by your wisdom been this day acquitted
Of grievous penalties; in lieu whereof
Three thousand ducats, due unto the Jew,
We freely cope your courteous pains withal.
ANTONIO. And stand indebted, over and above,
In love and service to you evermore.
PORTIA. He is well paid that is well satisfied,
And I, delivering you, am satisfied,
And therein do account myself well paid.
My mind was never yet more mercenary.
I pray you, know me when we meet again;
I wish you well, and so I take my leave.
BASSANIO. Dear sir, of force I must attempt you further;
Take some remembrance of us, as a tribute,
Not as fee. Grant me two things, I pray you,
Not to deny me, and to pardon me.
PORTIA. You press me far, and therefore I will yield.
[To ANTONIO] Give me your gloves, I'll wear them for your sake.
[To BASSANIO] And, for your love, I'll take this ring from you.
Do not draw back your hand; I'll take no more,
And you in love shall not deny me this.
BASSANIO. This ring, good sir- alas, it is a trifle;
I will not shame myself to give you this.
PORTIA. I will have nothing else but only this;
And now, methinks, I have a mind to it.
BASSANIO.. There's more depends on this than on the value.
The dearest ring in Venice will I give you,
And find it out by proclamation;
Only for this, I pray you, pardon me.
PORTIA. I see, sir, you are liberal in offers;
You taught me first to beg, and now, methinks,
You teach me how a beggar should be answer'd.
BASSANIO. Good sir, this ring was given me by my wife;
And, when she put it on, she made me vow
That I should neither sell, nor give, nor lose it.
PORTIA. That 'scuse serves many men to save their gifts.
And if your wife be not a mad woman,
And know how well I have deserv'd this ring,
She would not hold out enemy for ever
For giving it to me. Well, peace be with you!
Exeunt PORTIA and NERISSA
ANTONIO. My Lord Bassanio, let him have the ring.
Let his deservings, and my love withal,
Be valued 'gainst your wife's commandment.
BASSANIO. Go, Gratiano, run and overtake him;
Give him the ring, and bring him, if thou canst,
Unto Antonio's house. Away, make haste. Exit GRATIANO
Come, you and I will thither presently;
And in the morning early will we both
Fly toward Belmont. Come, Antonio. Exeunt
