Must have a word anon. (To one or more) 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.

⌈ Escalus sits ⌉

(To Angelo) Sir, by your leave.

⌈ He takes Angelo’s seat ⌉

Hast thou or word or wit or impudence

That yet can do thee office? If thou hast,

Rely upon it till my tale be heard,

And hold no longer out.

ANGELO O my dread lord,

I should be guiltier than my guiltiness

To think I can be undiscernible,

When I perceive your grace, like power divine,

Hath looked 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.

(To Angelo) 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 the

Provost

ESCALUS

My lord, I am more amazed 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

Attorneyed at your service.

ISABELLA

O, give me pardon,

That I, your vassal, have employed and pained

Your unknown sovereignty.

DUKE

You are pardoned, Isabel.

And now, dear maid, be you as free to us.

Your brother’s death I know sits at your heart,

And you may marvel why I obscured myself,

Labouring to save his life, and would not rather

Make rash remonstrance of my hidden power

Than let him so be lost. O most kind maid,

It was the swift celerity of his death,

Which I did think with slower foot came on,

That brained 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.

Enter Angelo, Mariana, Friar Peter, and the Provost

DUKE

For this new-married man approaching here,

Whose salt imagination yet hath wronged

Your well-defended honour, you must pardon

For Mariana’s sake; but as he adjudged your

brother—

Being criminal in double violation

Of sacred chastity and of promise-breach,

Thereon dependent, for your brother’s life—

The very mercy of the law cries out

Most audible, even from his proper tongue,

‘An Angelo for Claudio, death for death’.

Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers leisure;

Like doth quit like, and measure still for measure.

Then, Angelo, thy fault’s thus manifested,

Which, though thou wouldst deny, denies thee

vantage.

We do condemn thee to the very block

Where Claudio stooped 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 mocked 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 enstate and widow you with all,

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—

DUKE

You do but lose your labour.—

Away with him to death. (To Lucio) Now, sir, to you.

MARIANA (kneeling)

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 are moulded out of faults,

And, for the most, become much more the better

For being a little bad. So may my husband.

O Isabel, will you not lend a knee?

DUKE

He dies for Claudio’s death.

ISABELLA (kneeling) Most bounteous sir,

Look, if it please you, on this man condemned

As if my brother lived. I partly think

A due sincerity governed 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 perished by the way. Thoughts are no subjects,