Measure for Measure

who sins most?
Ha!
Not she: nor doth she tempt: but it is I
That, lying by the violet in the sun,
Do as the carrion does, not as the flower,
Corrupt with virtuous season. Can it be
That modesty may more betray our sense
Than woman’s lightness? Having waste ground enough,
Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary
And pitch our evils there? O, 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. Even till now,
When men were fond, I smiled and wonder’d how. Exit.

Scene III

A room in 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, sentenced; 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. I have provided for you: stay awhile, To Juliet. 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 towards 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 love, That respites me a life, whose very comfort Is still a dying horror!
Provost	’Tis pity of him. Exeunt.

Scene IV

A room in 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 fear’d and tedious; yea, my gravity, Wherein⁠—let no man hear me⁠—I take pride, Could I with boot change for an idle plume, Which the air beats for vain. O place, O form, How often dost thou with thy case, thy habit, Wrench awe from fools and tie the wiser souls To thy false seeming! Blood, thou art blood: Let’s write good angel on the devil’s horn: ’Tis not the devil’s crest.
	Enter a 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 stolen A man already made, as to remit Their saucy sweetness that do coin heaven’s image In stamps that are forbid: ’tis all as easy Falsely to take away a life true made As to put metal in restrained means To make a false one.
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