ACT III.

SCENE 1. A Room in the Prison.

Enter DUKE, as a Friar, CLAUDIO, and Provost.

Duke. So, then, you hope of pardon from lord Angelo ?

Claud. The miserable have no other medicine, But only hope :

I have hope to live, and am prepar'd to die.

Duke. Be absolute for death; either death or life Shall thereby be the sweeter.

life:

Reason thus with

If I do lose thee, I do lose a thing

That none but fools would keep: a breath thou

art,

Servile to all the skyey influences,

2

That dost this habitation, where thou keep'st,"
Hourly afflict: Merely, thou art death's fool;3
For him thou labour'st by thy flight to shun,
And yet runn'st toward him still: Thou art not no

ble;

1 Keep here means care for, a common acceptation of the word in Chaucer and later writers.

2 That is, dwellest.

See Act i. sc. 4, note 2, of this play.

Death and his fool were personages that once figured on the stage. Douce relates having seen a play at a fair, in which Death bore a part, attended by a fool or clown; the person that represented Death being habited in a close black vest so painted as to look like a skeleton. Douce also had an old wood-cut, one of a series representing the Dance of Death, in which the fool was engaged in combat with his adversary, and buffetting him with a bladder filled with peas or small pebbles. In all such performances, the rule appears to have been, that the fool, after struggling long against the stratagems of Death, at last became his victim.

H.

For all the accommodations that thou bear'st

4

Are nurs'd by baseness: Thou art by no means

valiant ;

For thou dost fear the soft and tender fork
Of a poor worm: Thy best of rest is sleep,
And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st
Thy death, which is no more. Thou art not thyself,
For thou exist'st on many a thousand grains
That issue out of dust: Happy thou art not;
For what thou hast not, still thou striv'st to get;
And what thou hast, forge st: Thou art not certain;
For thy complexion shifts to strange effects,
After the moon: If thou art rich, thou art poor;
For, like an ass whose back with ingots bows,
Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey,
And death unloads thee: Friend last thou none;
For thine own bowels, which do call thee sire,
The mere effusion of thy proper loins,

Do curse the gout, serpigo," and the rheum,
For ending thee no sooner: Thou hast nor youth,
nor age;

But, as it were, an after-dinner's sleep,
Dreaming on both: for all thy blessed youth

4 Upon this passage Johnson observes: "A minute analysis of life at once destroys that splendour which dazzles the imagination. Whatever grandeur can display, or luxury enjoy, is procured by baseness, by offices of which the mind shrinks from the contemplation. All the delicacies of the table may be traced back to the shambles and the dunghill, all magnificence of building was hewn from the quarry, and all the pomp of ornament from among the damps and darkness of the mine."

5 Worm is put for any creeping thing or serpent. Shakespeare adopts the vulgar error, that a serpent wounds with his tongue, and that his tongue is forked. In old tapestries and paintings the tongues of serpents and dragons always appear barbed like the point of an arrow.

6 Serpigo is a leprous eruption.

7 This is exquisitely imagined. When we are young, we busy ourselves in forming schemes for succeeding time, and miss the

Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms

8

Of palsied eld; and when thou art old and rich, Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty, To make thy riches pleasant.

That bears the name of life?

What's yet in this
Yet in this life

Lie hid more thousand deaths; yet death we fear, That makes these odds all even.

Claud.

I humbly thank you.

To sue to live, I find I seek to die;

And, seeking death, find life: Let it come on. Isab. [Without.] What, ho! Peace here; grace and good company!

:

Prov. Who's there? come in the wish deserves a welcome.

Enter ISABElla.

Duke. Dear sir, ere long I'll visit you again.
Claud. Most holy sir, I thank you.

Isab. My business is a word or two with Claudio.
Prov. And very welcome. Look, signior, here's

your sister.

Duke. Provost, a word with you.

Prov.

As many as you please.

gratifications that are before us; when we are old, we amuse the languor of age with the recollection of youthful pleasures or performances; so that our life, of which no part is filled with the business of the present time, resembles our dreams after dinner, when the events of the morning are mingled with the designs of the evening.

8 Old age. In youth, which is or ought to be the happiest time, man commonly wants means to obtain what he could enjoy; he is dependent on palsied eld; must beg alms from the coffers of hoary avarice; and, being very niggardly supplied, becomes as aged, looks like an old man on happiness beyond his reach. And when he is old and rich, when he has wealth enough for the purchase of all that formerly excited his desires, he has no longer the powers of enjoyment.

Duke. Bring me to hear them speak, where 1

may be conceal'd.

[Exeunt DUKE and Provost.

Claud. Now, sister, what's the comfort?

Isab.

Why, as all

Comforts are; most good, most good, indeed:

Lord Angelo, having affairs to heaven,

Intends you for his swift ambassador,

Where you shall be an everlasting lieger:9

Therefore your best appointment 10 make with speed; To-morrow you set on.

Claud.

Is there no remedy?

Isab. None, but such remedy, as to save a head To cleave a heart in twain.

Claud.

But is there any?

Isab. Yes, brother, you may live :

There is a devilish mercy in the judge,

If you'll implore it, that will free your life,

But fetter you till death.

Claud.

Perpetual durance?

Isab. Ay, just; perpetual durance: a restraint, Though all the world's vastidity" you had,

To a determin'd scope.12

Claud.

But in what nature?

Isab. In such a one as, you consenting to't, Would bark your honour from that trunk you bear, And leave you naked.13

Claud.

Let me know the point.

Isab. O! I do fear thee, Claudio; and I quake,

Lest thou a feverous life shouldst entertain,

And six or seven winters more respect

9 A lieger is a resident.

11 That is, vastness of extent.

10 That is, preparation.

12 A confinement of your mind to one idea; to ignominy, of which the remembrance can neither be suppressed nor escaped. 13 A metaphor, from stripping trees of their bark.

Becomes as aged, and doth beg the alms

8

Of palsied eld ; and when thou art old and rich,
Thou hast neither heat, affection, limb, nor beauty,
To make thy riches pleasant.
That bears the name of life?
Lie hid more thousand deaths;
That makes these odds all even.
Claud.

To sue to live, I find I seek to

What's yet in this
Yet in this life
yet death we fear,

I humbly thank you.

die;

Let it come on.

And, seeking death, find life: Tsab. [Without.] What, ho! Peace here; grace and good company !

Prov. Who's there? come in the wish deserves a welcome.

Enter ISABELLA.

Duke. Dear sir, ere long I'll visit you again.
Claud. Most holy sir, I thank you.

Isab. My business is a word or two with Claudio.
Prov. And very welcome. Look, signior, here's

your sister.

Duke. Provost, a word with you.

Prov.

As many as you please.

gratifications that are before us; when we are old, we amuse the languor of age with the recollection of youthful pleasures or performances; so that our life, of which no part is filled with the business of the present time, resembles our dreams after dinner, when the events of the morning are mingled with the designs of the evening.

8 Old age. In youth, which is or ought to be the happiest time, man commonly wants means to obtain what he could enjoy; he is dependent on pulsied eld; must beg alms from the coffers of hoary avarice; and, being very niggardly supplied, becomes as aged, looks like an old man on happiness beyond his reach. And when

he is old and rich, when he has wealth enough for the purchase of all that formerly excited his desires, he has no longer the powers of enjoyment.