Sec. 26. Plea for pardon.

"Ing. He's sentenced; 'tis too late.

Isab. Too late? why, no; I, that do speak a word,
May call it back again: Well believe this,

No ceremony 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 slipt like him;
But he, like you, would not have been so stern.
Ang. Your brother is a forfeit of the law,

And you but waste your words.

Speaking of Bolingbroke, King Richard II, said: "K. Rich. O God: O God:

That e're this tongue of mine,

That laid the sentence of dread banishment

On yon proud man, should take it off again
With words of sooth."

(Act III, Scene III.)

After his exile, Norfolk said to King Richard II: "Nor. A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege, And all unlooked for from your highness mouth."

(Act I, Scene III.)

The Chief Justice explains to Henry V, how he had enforced the law, during his father's reign, and then concludes: “Ch. Jus. . . . After this cold considerance, sentence me." (2' Hen y IV, Act V, Scene II.)

King Henry V said to Sir Thomas Grey, after discovery of his treason:

"K. Hen. God quit you, in his mercy. Hear your sentence." (Act II, Scene II.)

Brabantio, on the loss of his daughter to the Moor, Othello, under the Duke's decision, said:

"He bears the sentence well that nothing bears,
But the free comfort which from thence he hears:
But he bears both the sentence and the sorrow,
That, to pay grief, must of poor patience borrow."

(Act I, Scene III.)

Tarquin lulls his conscience to rest with the philosophy that "Who fears a sentence or an old man's saw. Shall by a painted cloth be kept in awe."

(Rape of Lucrece, 244, 245.)

Isab. 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 breath within your lips,
Like man new made.

Ang. Be you content, fair maid:

It is the law, not I, condemns your brother:
Were he my kinsman, brother or my son,

It should be thus with him;-He must die to-morrow. Isab. To-morrow? O, that's sudden; Spare him, spare him. He's not prepared 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 offense?

There's many have committed it.

Ang. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept:
Those many had not dared to do that evil,
If the first man that did the edict infringe,
Had answered for his deed: now, 'tis awake.

Isab. Yet show some pity.

Ang. I show it most of all, when I show justice;
For then I pity those I do not know,

Which a dismiss'd offense 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.

Isab. 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.

Could great men thunder,

As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er 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.
Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarled oak,
Than the soft myrtle:-0, but mau, proud man;
Drest in a little brief authority;

Most ignorant of what he 's most assured,
His glassy essence,-like an angry ape,

Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,
As make the angels weep: who, with our spleens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal.

We cannot weigh our brother, with ourself:
Great men may jest with saints: 'tis wit in them;
But, in less, foul profanation.

Ang. Why do you put these sayings upon me?
Isab. Because authority, though it err like others,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself,

That skims the vice o' the top; Go to your bosom;
Knock there; and ask your heart, what it doth know
That's like my brother's fault: if it confess

A natural guiltiness, such as is his,

Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue
Against my brother's life."

This colloquy denotes a very accurate knowledge of the underlying principle of the pardoning power and that it is essentially an act of grace, proceeding from the power intrusted with the execution of the laws, which exempts the particular individual receiving the pardon from the punishment the law prescribes for the crime committed. As all pardons are necessarily in derogation of law, if the pardon is equitable, the law is bad, since good laws should be rigidly enforced and violations thereof ought not to be condoned or excused. But back of this, as human nature is frail, at best, the pardoning power is recognized, in order to prevent injustice, or to show mercy, in given cases, when to permit the law to be enforced would entail injustice. That the Poet had a clear and accurate understanding of this reason for the lodgment of the power invoked by Isabella cannot be doubted, after a perusal of this play.

1 Measure for Measure, Act II, Scene 11.

27 Pet. 160.

Bouvier's Law Dict.

Referring to the pardoning power, as an act of clemency, the Poet, in Comedy of Errors (Act I, Scene I) makes the Duke say:

Sec. 27. Punishment for seduction by Venetian law.—

"Duke.

morrow,

Your partner, as I hear, must die to

And I am going with instruction to him.
Grace go with you. Benedicite.

"Duke. But, though thou art adjudged to the death,

And passed sentence may not be recalled,

But to our honour's great disparagement,

Yet will I favor thee in what I can."

In King Richard II, the Duchess of York, pleading for the life of her son, to Bolingbroke, is made to say:

"Duch. Nay, do not say,-stand up;

But, pardon, first; and afterwards, stand up.
And if I were thy nurse, thy tongue to teach,
Pardon-should be the first word of thy speech.
I never longed to hear a word till now;
Say-pardon, king; let pity teach thee how;
The word is short, but not so short, as sweet;

No word like pardon, for king's mouth's so meet."

(Act V, Scene III.)

After discovery of his treason, the Earl of Cambridge, said to King Henry V: "Cam. God be thanked for prevention; which I, in sufferance heartily will rejoice, beseeching God and you, to pardon me." (Act II, Scene II.)

In replying to Stanley's plea for pardon, for his servant, King Edward said, in King Richard III: "K. Edw. . . when your carters, or your waiting-vassals, Have done a drunken slaughter, and defac'd The precious image of our dear Redeemer, You straight are on your knees for pardon, pardon; And I, unjustly, too, must grant it." (Act II, Scene I.)

Replying to the good offices of the King, as conveyed by Capucius, on her death bed, Queen Katherine said, in King Henry VIII: "Q. Kath. O my good lord, that comfort comes too late; 'tis like a pardon after execution." (Act IV, Scene I.)

In his death struggle Antony said to Cleopatra:

"Ant.

I will o'ertake thee, Cleopatra, and weep for my pardon." (Act IV, Scene XII.)

Reflecting upon his own guilt the King observes, in Hamlet: "King. May one be pardon'd and retain the offence?" (Act III. Scene III.)

Juliet.

Must die to-morrow: O injurious law,
That respites me a life whose very comfort
Is still a dying horror."

It is written that the law in question, as presented in the old tale, from which this play is taken, provided that the offender "should lose his head, and the woman offender should ever after be infamously noted." It will thus be seen that this punishment affords but little consolation to the injured party, as the future life would be a "comfort," but still "a dying horror."

Sec. 28. The severe judge.—

"Escal. You have paid the heavens your function, and the prisoner the very debt of your calling. I have laboured for the poor gentleman, to the extremest shore of my modesty; but my brother justice have I found so severe, that he hath forced me to tell him, he is indeed-justice.

Duke. If his own life answers the straitness of his proceeding it shall become him well; wherein, if he chance to fail, he hath sentenced himself."+

"Justice" was a title given, in England, to the judges of the common-law courts, and the same title is used in the United States, to indicate the presiding officers of such courts in the various State and Federal tribunals. It is a customary form to refer to an associate justice of such courts as "my brother justice."

"The straitness of his proceedings," refers to the details of the mode of carrying on the case against Claudio. "Proceeding" at common law, was the regular mode of carrying on a lawsuit."

'Measure for Measure, Act II, Scene III.

'Hecatommithi, of Giraldi Cinthio, published in Venice, in 1566. 'Rolfe's Measure for Measure, p. 174, notes.

'Measure for Measure, Act III, Scene II.

Anc. Laws and Inst. of Eng.; Coke, Litt. 71b; Leges Hen. 1. Secs. 24, 63.

Bouvier, Law Dict.