Angelo's lines in Measure for Measure

Angelo. Always obedient to your grace's will, I come to know your pleasure.

Angelo. Now, good my lord, Let there be some more test made of my metal, Before so noble and so great a figure Be stamp'd upon it.

Angelo. Yet give leave, my lord, That we may bring you something on the way.

Angelo. The heavens give safety to your purposes!

Angelo. 'Tis so with me. Let us withdraw together, And we may soon our satisfaction have Touching that point.

Angelo. We must not make a scarecrow 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.

Angelo. '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: what know the laws That thieves do pass on thieves?

'Tis very pregnant, The jewel that we find, we stoop and take't 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 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.

Angelo. Where is the provost?

Angelo. 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.

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

Angelo. Benefactors? Well; what benefactors are they? are they not malefactors?

Angelo. Go to: what quality are they of? Elbow is your name? why dost thou not speak, Elbow?

Angelo. What are you, sir?

Angelo. This will last out a night in Russia, When nights are longest there: I'll take my leave. And leave you to the hearing of the cause; Hoping you'll find good cause to whip them all.

Angelo. Now, what's the matter, Provost?

Angelo. Did not I tell thee yea? hadst thou not order? Why dost thou ask again?

Angelo. Go to; let that be mine: Do you your office, or give up your place, And you shall well be spared.

Angelo. Dispose of her To some more fitter place, and that with speed.

Angelo. Hath he a sister?

Angelo. Well, let her be admitted.

See you the fornicatress be removed: Let have needful, but not lavish, means; There shall be order for't.

Angelo. Stay a little while.

You're welcome: what's your will?

Angelo. Well; what's your suit?

Angelo. Well; the matter?

Angelo. Condemn the fault and not the actor of it? Why, every fault's condemn'd ere it be done: Mine were the very cipher of a function, To fine the faults whose fine stands in record, And let go by the actor.

Angelo. Maiden, no remedy.

Angelo. I will not do't.

Angelo. Look, what I will not, that I cannot do.

Angelo. He's sentenced; 'tis too late.

Angelo. Pray you, be gone.

Angelo. Your brother is a forfeit of the law, And you but waste your words.

Angelo. Be you content, fair maid; It is the law, not I condemn your brother: Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son, It should be thus with him: he must die tomorrow.

Angelo. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept: Those many had not dared to do that evil, If the first that did the edict infringe Had answer'd for his deed: now 'tis awake Takes note of what is done; and, like a prophet, Looks in a glass, that shows what future evils, Either new, or by remissness new-conceived, And so in progress to be hatch'd and born, Are now to have no successive degrees, But, ere they live, to end.

Angelo. Why do you put these sayings upon me?

Angelo. ([Aside]) She speaks, and 'tis such sense, that my sense breeds with it. Fare you well.

Angelo. I will bethink me: come again tomorrow.

Angelo. How! bribe me?

Angelo. Well; come to me to-morrow.

Angelo. ([Aside]) Amen: For I am that way going to temptation, Where prayers cross.

Angelo. At any time 'fore noon.

Angelo. From thee, even from thy virtue! What's this, what's this? Is this her fault or mine? The tempter or the tempted, who sins most? Ha! Not she: nor doth she tempt: but it is I That, lying by the violet in the sun, Do as the carrion does, not as the flower, Corrupt with virtuous season.

Can it be That modesty may more betray our sense Than woman's lightness? Having waste ground enough, Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary And pitch our evils there? O, fie, fie, fie! What dost thou, or what art thou, Angelo? Dost thou desire her foully for those things That make her good?

O, let her brother live! Thieves for their robbery have authority When judges steal themselves. What, do I love her, That I desire to hear her speak again, And feast upon her eyes? What is't I dream on? O cunning enemy, that, to catch a saint, With saints dost bait thy hook!

Most dangerous Is that temptation that doth goad us on To sin in loving virtue: never could the strumpet, With all her double vigour, art and nature, Once stir my temper; but this virtuous maid Subdues me quite. Even till now, When men were fond, I smiled and wonder'd how.

Angelo. 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 fear'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.

O place, O 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.

How now! who's there?

Angelo. Teach her the way.

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

How now, fair maid?

Angelo. That you might know it, would much better please me Than to demand what 'tis. Your brother cannot live.

Angelo. Yet may he live awhile; and, it may be, As long as you or I yet he must die.

Angelo. When, I beseech you? that in his reprieve, Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted That his soul sicken not.

Angelo. 'Tis set down so in heaven, but not in earth.

Angelo. Sir, believe this, I had rather give my body than my soul.

Angelo. How say you?

Angelo. Pleased you to do't at peril of your soul, Were equal poise of sin and charity.

Angelo. Nay, but hear me. Your sense pursues not mine: either you are ignorant, Or seem so craftily; and that's not good.

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

Angelo. And his offence is so, as it appears, Accountant to the law upon that pain.

Angelo. Admit no other way to save his life,-- As I subscribe not that, nor any other, But in the loss of question,--that you, his sister, Finding yourself desired of such a person, Whose credit with the judge, or own great place, Could fetch your brother from the manacles Of the all-building 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 supposed, or else to let him suffer; What would you do?

Angelo. Then must your brother die.

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

Angelo. You seem'd of late to make the law a tyrant; And rather proved the sliding of your brother A merriment than a vice.

Angelo. We are all frail.

Angelo. Nay, women are frail too.

Angelo. 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 destined livery.

Angelo. Plainly conceive, I love you.

Angelo. He shall not, Isabel, if you give me love.

Angelo. elieve me, on mine honour, My words express my purpose.

Angelo. Who will believe thee, Isabel? My unsoil'd name, the austereness of my life, My vouch against you, and my place i' the state, Will so your accusation overweigh, That you shall stifle in your own report And smell of calumny.

I have begun, And now I give my sensual race the rein: Fit thy consent to my sharp appetite; Lay by all nicety and prolixious blushes, That banish what they sue for; redeem thy brother By yielding up thy body to my will; Or else he must not only die the death, But thy unkindness shall his death draw out To lingering sufferance.

Answer me to-morrow, Or, by the affection that now guides me most, I'll prove a tyrant to him. As for you, Say what you can, my false o'erweighs your true.

Angelo. In most uneven and distracted manner. His actions show much like to madness: pray heaven his wisdom be not tainted! And why meet him at the gates, and redeliver our authorities there

Angelo. And why should we proclaim it in an hour before his entering, that if any crave redress of injustice, they should exhibit their petitions in the street?

Angelo. Well, I beseech you, let it be proclaimed betimes i' the morn; I'll call you at your house: give notice to such men of sort and suit as are to meet him.

Angelo. Good night.

This deed unshapes me quite, makes me unpregnant And dull to all proceedings. A deflower'd maid! And by an eminent body that enforced The law against it!

But that her tender shame Will not proclaim against her maiden loss, How might she tongue me! Yet reason dares her no; For my authority bears of a credent bulk, that no particular scandal once can touch But it confounds the breather.

He should have lived, Save that riotous youth, with dangerous sense, Might in the times to come have ta'en revenge, By so receiving a dishonour'd life With ransom of such shame. Would yet he had lived! A lack, when once our grace we have forgot, Nothing goes right: we would, and we would not.

Angelo. Happy return be to your royal grace!

Angelo. You make my bonds still greater.

Angelo. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm: She hath been a suitor to me for her brother Cut off by course of justice,--

Angelo. And she will speak most bitterly and strange.

Angelo. Charges she more than me?

Angelo. This is a strange abuse. Let's see thy face.

Angelo. My lord, I must confess I know this woman: 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 disvalued In levity: since which time of five years I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her, Upon my faith and honour.

Angelo. I did but smile till now: Now, good my lord, give me the scope of justice My patience here is touch'd. I do perceive These poor informal women are no more But instruments of some more mightier member That sets them on: let me have way, my lord, To find this practise out.

Angelo. What can you vouch against him, Signior Lucio? Is this the man that you did tell us of?

Angelo. Hark, how the villain would close now, after his treasonable abuses!

Angelo. What, resists he? Help him, Lucio.

Angelo. O my dread lord, I should be guiltier than my guiltiness, To think I can be undiscernible, When I perceive your grace, like power divine, Hath look'd upon my passes. Then, good prince, No longer session hold upon my shame,

But let my trial be mine own confession: Immediate sentence then and sequent death Is all the grace I beg.

Angelo. I was, my lord.

Angelo. I am sorry that such sorrow I procure: And so deep sticks it in my penitent heart That I crave death more willingly than mercy; 'Tis my deserving, and I do entreat it.