My abfolute Pow'r and Place here in Vienna ;
And he fuppofes nie travell❜d to Poland ;
For fo I've ftrew'd it in the common ear,
And fo it is receiv'd: now, pious Sir,
You will demand of me, why I do this?
Fri. Gladly, my lord.

Duke. We have ftrict Statutes and moft biting Laws, The needful bites and curbs for head ftrong Steeds, ' Which for thefe nineteen years we have let fleep; Even like an o'er-grown 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 flick it in their Children's fight,

For terror, not to ufe; in time the rod

Becomes more mock'd, than fear'd: fo our Decrees,

A man of STRICT URE and let lip.] For fourteen I have firm abftinence.

e. a man of the exacteft conduct, and practifed in the fub. dual of his paffions. Ure an old word for ufe, practice, so enur d, habituated to. WARBURTON, Stricture may e fily be used for Brianefs; ure is indeed an old word, but, I think, always applied to things, never to perfons.

made no Scruple to replace nine-
teen. I have alter'd the odd
Phrafe of letting the Laws flip:
for how does it fort with the
Comparison that follows, of a
Lion in his Cave that went not
out to prey? But letting the
Law fleep, adds a particular Pro-
priety to the thing reprefented,
and accords exactly too with the
Simile. It is the Metaphor too,
that our Author feems fond of
using upon this Occafion, in se-
veral other Paffages of this Play.
The Law bath not been dead,
tho it hath flept;
-'Tis now awake.

In the copies, The needful Bits and Curbs for headstrong Weeds:] There is no matter of Analogy or Confonance, in the Metaphors here: and, tho' the Copies agree, I do not think, the Author would have talk'd of Bits and Curbs for Weeds. On the oder hand, nothing can be mte proper, than to compare Pertons of unbridled Licentiousness Awakes me all th' enrolled Pe to head frong Steeds; and, in this View, bridling the Paffions has been a phrafe adopted by our beft Poets, THEOBALD.

2 In former editions, Which for thefe fourteen years we have

And fo, again,

but this new Governer

nalties ;

and for a Name Now puts the drowly and neg leted & Freshly on me.

THEOBALD.

Dead

Dead to infliction, to themselves are dead;
And liberty plucks Juftice by the nose;
The baby beats the nurse, and quite athwart
Goes all decorum.

Fri. It rested in your Grace

T' unloose this ty'd up juftice, when you pleas'd:
And it in you more dreadful would have feem'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 ftrike and gall them,
For what I bid them do. For we bid this be done,
When evil deeds have their permiffive pafs,

And not the punishment. Therefore, indeed, my father,
I have on Angelo impos'd the office :

Who may in the ambush of my name ftrike home,
And yet, my nature never in the fight

To do it flander. 3 And to behold his fway,

I will, as 'twere a Brother of your Order,

Vifit both prince and people. Therefore, pr'ythee,
Supply me with the habit, and inftruct me

How I may formally in perfon bear,

Like a true Friar. More reafons for this action.
At our more leifure fhall I render you;

Only, this one:-Lord Anglo is precife;

4

Stands at a guard with envy; scarce confeffes
That his blood flows, or that his appetite

Is more to bread than ftone: hence fhall we fee,

If pow'r change purpose, what our feemers be. [Exeunt.

3 The text ftood. So do in flander.] Sir Thomas Hanmer has very well corrected it thus,

To do it flander.

4 Stands at a guard.] Stands

on terms of defiance.

Ꭲ .

SCENE

Enter Ifabella and Francifca.

ND have you Nuns no further privileges?

Ifab. A Nun. Are not these large enough?

Ifab. Yes, truly; I fpeak not as defiring more;
But rather wishing a more strict restraint
Upon the fifter-hood, the votarifts of Saint Clare.
Lucio. [within.] Hoa! Peace be in this place!
Ifeb. Who's that which calls?

Nun. It is a man's voice. Gentle Isabella,
Turn you the key, and know his bufinefs of him;
You may; I may not; you are yet unfworn:
When you have vow'd, you must not fpeak with men,
But in the presence of the Priorefs:

Then, if you speak, you must not fhew your face;
Or, if you fhew your face, you must not speak.
He calls again; I pray you, anfwer him. [Exit Franc.
Ifab. Peace and profperity! who is't that calls?

Enter Lucio.

Lucio. Hail, virgin, (if you be) as those cheek-rofes Proclaim you are no lefs; can you so stead me, As bring me to the fight of Ifabella,

A novice of this place, and the fair fifter

To her unhappy brother Claudio?

Ijab. Why her unhappy brother? let me afk The rather, for I now muft make you know

I am that Ifabella, and his fifter.

Lucio. Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets you; Not to be weary with you, he's in prison.

Ifab. Wo me! for what?

Lucio. For that, which, if myfelf might be his judge, He fhould receive his punishment in thanks;

He

He hath got his friend with child.

Ifab. Sir, make me not your story. "
Lucio. 'Tis true:-I would not (tho' 'tis my
fin

With maids to feem the lapwing, and to jeft,
Tongue far from heart) play with all virgins fo.
I hold you as a thing en-fky'd, and fainted;
By your renouncement, an immortal Spirit ;
And to be talk'd with in fincerity,

As with a Saint.

familiar

Ifab. You do blafpheme the good, in mocking me.
Lucio. Do not believe it. Fewnefs and truth, 'tis thus.
Your brother and his lover having embrac❜d,
As thofe that feed grow full; as bloffoming time?
That from the feednefs the bare fallow brings
To teeming foyfon, fo her plentious womb
Expreffeth his full tilth and husbandry.

Ifab. Some one with child by him?-my cousin Juliet?
Lucio. Is fhe your coufin?

Ijab. Adoptedly, as school-maids change their names,

5-make me not your flory.] Do not, by deceiving me, make me a fubject for a tale.

6

'tis my familiar fin With maids to feem the lap

wing,- The Oxford Edi tor's note, on this pafiage, is in thefe words. The lapwings fly with feeming fright and anxiety far from their nefts, to deceive thofe who feek their young. And do not all other birds do the fame? But what has this to dɔ with the infidelity of a general lover to whom this bird is compared. It is another quality of the lapwing, that is here alluded to, viz. its perpetually flying fo low and fo near the faffenger, that he thinks he has it, and then is fuddenly gone again. This made it a proverbial expreffion

to fignify a lover's falfhood; and it feems to be a very old one: for Chaucer, in his Plowman's Tale, fays-And lapwings that well conith lie. WARBURTON.

7 -as blooming time That from the feedness the bare fallow brings

To teeming foyfen; fo-] As the fentence now ftands it is apparently ungrammatical, I read,

At blooming time, &c. That is, As they that feed grow full, so her womb now at bloiton.ing time, at that time through which the feed time proceeds to the harvest, her womb ihows what has been doing. Lucio ludicrously calls pregnancy blooming time, the time when fruit is promifes, though not yet ripe.

Py

By vain, tho' apt, affection.

Lucio. She it is.

Ifab. O, let him marry her!

Lucio. This is the point.

8

The Duke is very ftrangely gone from hence;
Bore many gentlemen, mylelf being one,
In hand and hope of action; but we learn
By thole that know the very nerves of state,
His givings out were of an infinite diftance
From his true-meant defign. Upon his place,
And with full line of his authority,
Governs lord Angelo; a man whose blood
Is very fnow-broth; one who never feels
The wanton ftings and motions of the sense;
But doth rebate and blunt his natural edge
With profits of the mind, study and fait.
He, to give fear to * ufe and liberty,
Which have long time run by the hideous law,
As mice by lions, hath pickt out an act,
Under whofe heavy fenfe your brother's life
Falls into forfeit: he arrefts him on it;
And follows clofe the rigour of the statute,
To make him an example. All hope's gone,
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer
To foften Angelo; and that's my pith of bufinefs
'Twixt you and your poor brother.

Ifab. Doth he fo

Seek for his life?

I

Lucio. H'as cenfur'd him already;

And, as I hear, the Provost hath a warant