But doth rebate and blunt his natural edge
With profits of the mind, study and fast.
He (to give fear to use9 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 10 by your fair
To soften Angelo: And that's my pith
Of business 'twixt you and your poor brother.

Isab. Doth he so seek his life?

Lucio.

prayer

Has censur'd 11 him

Already; and, as I hear, the provost hath
A warrant for his execution.

Isab. Alas! what poor ability's in me
To do him good?

Lucio.

Assay the power you have.

Isab. 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

12 them.

8 To rebate is to make dull: Aciem ferri hebetare.-Baret. 9 i. e. to intimidate use, or practices long countenanced by

custom.

10 i. e. power of gaining favour.

11 To censure is to judge. This is the poet's general meaning for the word, but the editors have given him several others. Here they interpret it censured, sentenced. We have it again in the next

scene:

When I that censure him do so offend,

Let mine own judgment pattern out my death.'

12 To owe is to have, to possess.

Isab. I'll see what I can do.

Lucio.

Isab. I will about it straight;

But speedily.

No longer staying but to give the mother 13
Notice of my affair. I humbly thank you:
Commend me to my brother: soon at night
I'll send him certain word of
Lucio. I take my leave of

my success.

you.

Isab.

Good sir, adieu.

[Exeunt.

ACT II.

SCENE I. A Hall in Angelo's House.

Enter ANGELO, ESCALUS, a Justice, Provost1, Officers, and other Attendants.

Ang. We must not make a scare-crow 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.

Escal.

Ay, but yet

Let us be keen, and rather cut a little,

Than fall 3, 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❜d5 with place, or place with wishing, Or that the resolute acting of your blood

13 i. e. the abbess.

1 A kind of sheriff or jailer, so called in foreign countries. 2 To fear is to affright.

3 i. e. throw down; to fall a tree is still used for to fell it. i. e. examine.

5 i. e. suited.

Could have attain'd the effect of your own purpose,
Whether you had not sometime in your life
Err'd in this point which now you censure him,
And pull'd the law upon you.

Ang. '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.
That thieves do pass

What know the laws,
on thieves? 'Tis very pregnant,

The jewel that we find, we stoop and take it,
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 9 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.
Escal. Be it as your wisdom will.
Ang.

Where is the provost?

Prov. Here, if it like your honour.
Ang.

See that Claudio

Be executed by nine to-morrow morning:
Bring him his confessor, let him be prepared;
For that's the utmost of his pilgrimage.

[Exit Provost. Escal. Well, heaven forgive him; and forgive us all!

6 To complete the sense of this line for seems to be required :which now you censure him for.' But Shakspeare frequently uses eliptical expressions.

7 An old forensic term, signifying to pass judgment, or sentence. 8 Full of force or conviction, or full of proof in itself. So, in Othello, Act ii. Sc. 1, As it is a most pregnant and unforc'd position.'

9 i. e. cause I have had such faults.

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall 10:
Some run from brakes 11 of vice, and answer none;
And some condemned for a fault alone.

Enter ELBOW, FROTH, Clown, Officers, &c.

Elb. Come, bring them away: if these be good people in a common-weal, that do nothing but use their abuses in common houses, I know no law; bring them away.

Ang. How now, sir! What's your name? and what's the matter?

Elb. 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.

Ang. Benefactors! Well; what benefactors are they? are they not malefactors?

Elb. 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.

Escal. This comes off well 12; here's a wise officer.

10 This line is printed in Italics as a quotation in the first folio. The first folio here reads- Some run from brakes of ice.' The correction was made by Rowe. Brakes most probably here signify thorny perplexities; but a brake was also used to signify a trap or snare. Thus in Skelton's Ellinour Rummin:

" It was a stale to take-the devil in a brake.' And in Holland's Leaguer, a Comedy, by Sh. Marmion-her I'll make

A stale to catch this courtier in a brake.'

There can be no allusion to the instrument of torture mentioned by Steevens. A brake seems to have signified an engine or instrument in general.

12 i. e. is well told. The meaning of this phrase, when seriously applied to speech, is 'This is well delivered,' 'this story is well told.' But in the present instance it is used ironically.

is

Ang. Go to: What quality are they of? Elbow your name? Why dost thou not speak, Elbow? Clo. He cannot, sir; he's out at elbow.

Ang. What are you, sir?

Elb. He, sir? a tapster, sir; parcel-bawd; one that serves a bad woman; whose house, sir, was, as they say, plucked down in the suburbs; and now she professes 13 a hot-house, which, I think, is a very ill house too.

Escal. How know you that?

Elb. My wife, sir, whom I detest 14 before heaven and your honour,

Escal. How! thy wife?

Elb. Ay, sir; whom, I thank heaven, is an honest woman,

Escal. Dost thou detest her therefore?

Elb. 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.

Escal. How dost thou know that, constable? Elb. Marry, sir, by my wife; who, if she had been a woman cardinally given, might have been accused in fornication, adultery, and all uncleanliness there. Escal. By the woman's means?

Elb. Ay, sir, by mistress Over-done's means: but as she spit in his face, so she defied him.

Clo. Sir, if it please your honour, this is not so. Elb. Prove it before these varlets here, thou honourable man, prove it.

Escal. Do you hear how he misplaces?

[TO ANGELO. Clo. Sir, she came in great with child; and longing (saving your honour's reverence), for stew'd

13 Professes a hot house, i. e. keeps a bagnio.

14 Detest, for protest, or attest.