By throwing it on any other object,
Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
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And given me justice! Justice! Justice! Justice!
DUKE
Relate your wrongs. In what? By whom? Be brief.
Here is Lord Angelo shall give you justice,
Reveal yourself to him.
ISABELLA O worthy Duke,
You bid me seek redemption of the devil.
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Hear me yourself: for that which I must speak
Must either punish me, not being believ’d,
Or wring redress from you.
Hear me! O hear me, hear!
ANGELO My lord, her wits I fear me are not firm.
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She hath been a suitor to me for her brother,
Cut off by course of justice.
ISABELLA By course of justice!
ANGELO And she will speak most bitterly and strange.
ISABELLA Most strange: but yet most truly will I speak.
That Angelo’s forsworn, is it not strange?
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That Angelo’s a murderer, is’t not strange?
That Angelo is an adulterous thief,
An hypocrite, a virgin-violator,
Is it not strange, and strange?
DUKE Nay, it is ten times strange!
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ISABELLA It is not truer he is Angelo,
Than this is all as true as it is strange;
Nay, it is ten times true, for truth is truth
To th’end of reck’ning.
DUKE Away with her. Poor soul,
She speaks this in th’infirmity of sense.
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ISABELLA O Prince, I conjure thee, as thou believ’st
There is another comfort than this world,
That thou neglect me not with that opinion
That I am touch’d with madness. Make not impossible
That which but seems unlike. ’Tis not impossible
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But one, the wicked’st caitiff on the ground,
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,
In all his dressings, caracts, titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain. Believe it, royal Prince,
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If he be less, he’s nothing; but he’s more,
Had I more name for badness.
DUKE By mine honesty,
If she be mad, as I believe no other,
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,
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As e’er I heard in madness.
ISABELLA O gracious Duke,
Harp not on that; nor do not banish reason
For inequality; but let your reason serve
To make the truth appear where it seems hid,
And hide the false seems true.
DUKE Many that are not mad
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Have, sure, more lack of reason. What would you say?
ISABELLA I am the sister of one Claudio,
Condemn’d upon the act of fornication
To lose his head; condemn’d by Angelo.
I – in probation of a sisterhood –
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Was sent to by my brother; one Lucio
As then the messenger.
LUCIO That’s I, and’t like your Grace.
I came to her from Claudio, and desir’d her
To try her gracious fortune with Lord Angelo
For her poor brother’s pardon.
ISABELLA That’s he indeed.
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DUKE [to Lucio] You were not bid to speak.
LUCIO No, my good lord,
Nor wish’d to hold my peace.
DUKE I wish you now, then;
Pray you take note of it;
And when you have a business for yourself,
Pray heaven you then be perfect.
LUCIO I warrant your honour.
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DUKE The warrant’s for yourself: take heed to’t.
ISABELLA This gentleman told somewhat of my tale.
LUCIO Right.
DUKE It may be right, but you are i’ the wrong
To speak before your time. – Proceed.
ISABELLA I went
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To this pernicious caitiff Deputy.
DUKE That’s somewhat madly spoken.
ISABELLA Pardon it;
The phrase is to the matter.
DUKE Mended again. The matter: proceed.
ISABELLA In brief, to set the needless process by –
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How I persuaded, how I pray’d and kneel’d,
How he refell’d me, and how I replied
(For this was of much length) – the vile conclusion
I now begin with grief and shame to utter.
He would not, but by gift of my chaste body
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To his concupiscible intemperate lust,
Release my brother; and after much debatement,
My sisterly remorse confutes mine honour,
And I did yield to him. But the next morn betimes,
His purpose surfeiting, he sends a warrant
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For my poor brother’s head.
DUKE This is most likely!
ISABELLA O, that it were as like as it is true.
DUKE
By heaven, fond wretch, thou know’st not what thou speak’st,
Or else thou art suborn’d against his honour
In hateful practice. First, his integrity
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Stands without blemish; next, it imports no reason
That with such vehemency he should pursue
Faults proper to himself. If he had so offended,
He would have weigh’d thy brother by himself,
And not have cut him off. Someone hath set you on:
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Confess the truth, and say by whose advice
Thou cam’st here to complain.
ISABELLA And is this all?
Then, O you blessed ministers above,
Keep me in patience, and with ripen’d time
Unfold the evil which is here wrapt up
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In countenance! Heaven shield your Grace from woe,
As I, thus wrong’d, hence unbelieved go.
DUKE I know you’d fain be gone. An officer!
To prison with her! [Isabella is placed under guard.]
Shall we thus permit
A blasting and a scandalous breath to fall
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On him so near us? This needs must be a practice.
Who knew of your intent and coming hither?
ISABELLA One that I would were here, Friar Lodowick.
Exit guarded.
DUKE
A ghostly father, belike. – Who knows that Lodowick?
LUCIO My lord, I know him. ’Tis a meddling friar;
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I do not like the man; had he been lay, my lord,
For certain words he spake against your Grace
In your retirement, I had swing’d him soundly.
DUKE Words against me! This’ a good friar belike.
And to set on this wretched woman here
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Against our substitute! Let this friar be found.
LUCIO But yesternight, my lord, she and that friar,
I saw them at the prison: a saucy friar,
A very scurvy fellow.
FRIAR PETER Bless’d be your royal Grace!
I have stood by, my lord, and I have heard
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Your royal ear abus’d. First hath this woman
Most wrongfully accus’d your substitute,
Who is as free from touch or soil with her
As she from one ungot.
DUKE We did believe no less.
Know you that Friar Lodowick that she speaks of?
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>
FRIAR PETER I know him for a man divine and holy,
Not scurvy, nor a temporary meddler,
As he’s reported by this gentleman;
And, on my trust, a man that never yet
Did, as he vouches, misreport your Grace.
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LUCIO My lord, most villainously; believe it.
FRIAR PETER
Well, he in time may come to clear himself;
But at this instant he is sick, my lord:
Of a strange fever. Upon his mere request,
Being come to knowledge that there was complaint
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Intended ‘gainst Lord Angelo, came I hither,
To speak, as from his mouth, what he doth know
Is true and false; and what he with his oath
And all probation will make up full clear
Whensoever he’s convented. First, for this woman,
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To justify this worthy nobleman
So vulgarly and personally accus’d,
Her shall you hear disproved to her eyes,
Till she herself confess it.
DUKE Good friar, let’s hear it.
Do you not smile at this, Lord Angelo?
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O heaven, the vanity of wretched fools!
Give us some seats. – Come, cousin Angelo,
In this I’ll be impartial: be you judge
Of your own cause.
Enter MARIANA, veiled.
Is this the witness, friar?
First, let her show her face, and after, speak.
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MARIANA Pardon, my lord; I will not show my face
Until my husband bid me.
DUKE What, are you married?
MARIANA No, my lord.
DUKE Are you a maid?
MARIANA No, my lord.
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DUKE A widow, then?
MARIANA Neither, my lord.
DUKE Why, you are nothing then: neither maid, widow, nor wife!
LUCIO My lord, she may be a punk; for many of them
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are neither maid, widow nor wife.
DUKE Silence that fellow! I would he had some cause to
prattle for himself.
LUCIO Well, my lord.
MARIANA My lord, I do confess I ne’er was married;
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And I confess besides, I am no maid.
I have known my husband; yet my husband
Knows not that ever he knew me.
LUCIO
He was drunk then, my lord; it can be no better.
DUKE
For the benefit of silence, would thou wert so too.
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LUCIO Well, my lord.
DUKE This is no witness for Lord Angelo.
MARIANA Now I come to’t, my lord.
She that accuses him of fornication
In self-same manner doth accuse my husband,
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And charges him, my lord, with such a time
When I’ll depose I had him in mine arms
With all th’effect of love.
ANGELO Charges she moe than me?
MARIANA Not that I know.
DUKE No? You say your husband.
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MARIANA Why just, my lord, and that is Angelo,
Who thinks he knows that he ne’er knew my body,
But knows, he thinks, that he knows Isabel’s.
ANGELO This is a strange abuse. Let’s see thy face.
MARIANA [unveiling]
My husband bids me; now I will unmask.
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This is that face, thou cruel Angelo,
Which once thou swor’st was worth the looking on:
This is the hand which, with a vow’d contract,
Was fast belock’d in thine: this is the body
That took away the match from Isabel
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And did supply thee at thy garden-house,
In her imagin’d person.
DUKE Know you this woman?
LUCIO Carnally, she says.
DUKE Sirrah, no more!
LUCIO Enough, my lord.
ANGELO My lord, I must confess I know this woman;
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And five years since, there was some speech of marriage
Betwixt myself and her; which was broke off,
Partly for that her promised proportions
Came short of composition; but in chief
For that her reputation was disvalu’d
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In levity: since which time of five years
I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her,
Upon my faith and honour.
The Arden Shakespeare Complete Works Page 360