And I am going with instruction to him.

Grace go with you! Benedicite!

[Exit.

Juliet. Must die to-morrow! Oh, injurious love, That respites me a life, whose very comfort

Ang. 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 sear'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. Oh place! Oh 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.

1 Grown SEAR'D and tedious;] Warburton suggested “sear'd" for fear'd, as it stands in most copies of the first folio: that belonging to the Earl of Ellesmere has seard, as if the letters had been substituted for ƒ as the sheet was going through the press. We need not therefore doubt as to the adoption of "sear'd," instead of fear'd. The corr. fo. 1632 has sear—not "sear'd.”

Oh 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 path, and in obsequious fondness
Crowd to his presence, where their untaught love
Must needs appear offence.

How now, fair maid ?

Isab.

Enter ISABELLA.

I am come to know your pleasure. Ang. That you might know it, would much better please

me,

Than to demand what 'tis. Your brother cannot live.

Isab. Even so.-Heaven keep your honour!

Ang. Yet may he live a while; and, it may be,

As long as you, or I: yet he must die.

Isab. Under your sentence?

Ang. Yea.

Isab. When, I beseech you? that in his reprieve, Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted,

That his soul sicken not.

[Retiring.

Ang. Ha! Fye, 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.

Isab. "Tis set down so in heaven, but not in earth. Ang. Say you so? then, I shall poze you quickly. Which had you rather, that the most just law

• Making BOTH IT unable for itself,] Here the corr. fo. 1632 inverts "both it," but we cannot see any reason whatever for the change. Lower down it amends part, of the old copies, to "path," and in this change we concur, and have therefore placed it in our text.

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?

Isab.

Sir, believe this,
I had rather give my body than my soul.
Ang. I talk not of your soul. Our compell'd sins
Stand more for number than for accompt.

Isab.

How say you? Ang. 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 ?

Isab.

Please you to do't,

I'll take it as a peril to my soul:

It is no sin at all, but charity.

Ang. Pleas'd you to do't, at peril of your soul, Were equal poize of sin and charity.

Isab. That I do beg his life, if it be sin,

Heaven, let me bear it! you granting of my suit,
If that be sin, I'll make it my morn-prayer

To have it added to the faults of mine,

And nothing of your answer.

Ang.

Nay, but hear me.

Your sense pursues not mine: either you are ignorant,
Or seem so, crafty; and that is not good ‘.

Isab. Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good,

But graciously to know I am no better.

6

Ang. Thus wisdom wishes to appear most bright,
When it doth tax itself: as these black masks
Proclaim an in-shell'd beauty ten times louder
Than beauty could displayed.-But mark me:
To be received plain, I'll speak more gross.
Your brother is to die.

Isab. So.

Ang. And his offence is so, as it appears

♦ Or seem so, CRAFTY; and that is not good.] This is the old reading, and not craftily, as it has been modernized—“ or seem so, being crafty," is the meaning. • Let ME be ignorant,] “Me" was fitly added in the folio, 1632.

• Proclaim an IN-SHELL'D beauty] An emendation from the corr. fo. 1632, the old word in the printed folios being en-shield. The mask is the shell in which beauty concealed itself, and heightened expectation.

Accountant to the law upon that pain.

Isab. True.

Ang. Admit no other way to save his life, (As I subscribe not that, nor any other,

But in the force of question") that you, his sister,
Finding yourself desir'd of such a person,
Whose credit with the judge, or own great place,
Could fetch your brother from the manacles
Of the all-binding law'; and that there were
No earthly mean to save him, but that either
You must lay down the treasures of your body
To this suppos'd, or else to let him suffer,
What would you do?

Isab. As much for my poor brother, as myself:
That is, were I under the terms of death,
Th' impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies,
And strip myself to death, as to a bed

That longing I've been sick for', ere I'd yield
My body up to shame.

Ang. Were not you, then, as cruel, as the sentence That you have slander'd so?

Isab. Ignomy in ransom', and free pardon,

.Are of two houses: lawful mercy is

Nothing akin to foul redemption'.

" But in the FORCE of question)] i. e. In the compulsion of question, or for the sake of argument. Such is the lection of the corr. fo. 1632, in opposition to "in the loss of question," out of which no sense has yet been extracted. All the folios have "in the loss of question."

Of the all-BINDING law;] This, in fact, is Theobald's emendation for "allbuilding" of the folios, and Johnson was in favour of "all-binding :" that they were right we have now the evidence of the corr. fo. 1632.

• That longing I've been sick for,] So the corr. fo. 1632: the folio, 1623, omits the pronoun, and prints "That longing have been sick for."

IGNOMY in ransom,] The second folio reads ignominy for “ignomy:" the word "ignomy" occurs again in Vol. iii. p. 416, Vol. iv. p. 594, and Vol. v. p. 61. • Nothing AKIN to foul redemption.] The folios have kin for "akin;" but then they regulate the passage differently:

"lawful mercy

Is nothing kin to foul redemption."

Ang. You seem'd of late to make the law a tyrant; And rather prov'd the sliding of your brother

A merriment, than a vice.

Isab. Oh, pardon me, my lord! it oft falls out,

To have what we would have, we speak not what we mean. I something do excuse the thing I hate,

For his advantage that I dearly love.

Ang. We are all frail.

Isab.

Else let my brother die,

If not a feodary, but only he,

Owe, and succeed this weakness'.

Ang.

Nay, women are frail too.

Isab. Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves,
Which are as easy broke as they make forms.
Women!-Help heaven! men their creation mar
In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail,
For we are soft as our complexions are,

And credulous to false prints.

Ang.
I think it well;
And from this testimony of your own sex,

(Since, I suppose, we are made to be no stronger,
Than faults may shake our frames,) let me be bold:
I do arrest your words. Be that you are,

That is, a woman: if you be more, you're none;
If you be one, (as you are well express'd

By all external warrants,) show it now,

By putting on the destin❜d livery.

Isab. I have no tongue but one: gentle my lord,
Let me intreat you speak the former language.
Ang. Plainly, conceive I love you.

Isab. My brother did love Juliet; and you tell me,
That he shall die for't.

Ang. He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love. Isab. I know, your virtue hath a licence in't, Which seems a little fouler than it is,

• If not a feodary, but only he,

Owe, and succeed THIS weakness.] The word "this" (instead of thy, as it stands in the old copies) is from an old MS. note in the margin of the Earl of Ellesmere's first folio: it is probably right, and the meaning of the whole passage seems to be, "If we are not all frail, let my brother die, if he alone offend, and have no feodary (companion or accomplice) in this weakness." To "owe" is here, as in many other instances, to own. The two lines are erased in the corr. fo. 1632, as if not understood; yet there we find "this weakness" instead of “thy weakness:" "thy weakness" could only apply to Angelo.