Measure for Measure, Act I, Scene 4 :|: Open Source Shakespeare

Measure for Measure

Act I, Scene 4

A nunnery.

[Enter ISABELLA and FRANCISCA]

Isabella. Yes, truly; I speak not as desiring more;
But rather wishing a more strict restraint
Upon the sisterhood, the votarists of Saint Clare.

Francisca. It is a man's voice. Gentle Isabella,
Turn you the key, and know his business of him;
You may, I may not; you are yet unsworn.
When you have vow'd, you must not speak with men
But in the presence of the prioress: 360
Then, if you speak, you must not show your face,
Or, if you show your face, you must not speak.
He calls again; I pray you, answer him.

[Exit]

[Enter LUCIO]

Lucio. Hail, virgin, if you be, as those cheek-roses
Proclaim you are no less! Can you so stead me
As bring me to the sight of Isabella,
A novice of this place and the fair sister 370
To her unhappy brother Claudio?

Isabella. Why 'her unhappy brother'? let me ask,
The rather for I now must make you know
I am that Isabella and his sister.

Lucio. Gentle and fair, your brother kindly greets you: 375
Not to be weary with you, he's in prison.

Lucio. For that which, if myself might be his judge,
He should receive his punishment in thanks:
He hath got his friend with child. 380

Lucio. It is true.
I would not—though 'tis my familiar sin
With maids to seem the lapwing and to jest,
Tongue far from heart—play with all virgins so: 385
I hold you as a thing ensky'd and sainted.
By your renouncement an immortal spirit,
And to be talk'd with in sincerity,
As with a saint.

Lucio. Do not believe it. Fewness and truth, 'tis thus:
Your brother and his lover have embraced:
As those that feed grow full, as blossoming time
That from the seedness the bare fallow brings
To teeming foison, even so her plenteous womb 395
Expresseth his full tilth and husbandry.

Isabella. Adoptedly; as school-maids change their names
By vain though apt affection. 400

Lucio. This is the point.
The duke is very strangely gone from hence;
Bore many gentlemen, myself being one, 405
In hand and hope of action: but we do learn
By those that know the very nerves of state,
His givings-out were of an infinite distance
From his true-meant design. Upon his place,
And with full line of his authority, 410
Governs Lord Angelo; a man whose blood
Is very snow-broth; one who never feels
The wanton stings and motions of the sense,
But doth rebate and blunt his natural edge
With profits of the mind, study and fast. 415
He—to give fear to use and liberty,
Which have for long run by the hideous law,
As mice by lions—hath pick'd out an act,
Under whose heavy sense your brother's life
Falls into forfeit: he arrests him on it; 420
And follows close the rigour of the statute,
To make him an example. All hope is gone,
Unless you have the grace by your fair prayer
To soften Angelo: and that's my pith of business
'Twixt you and your poor brother. 425

Lucio. Has censured him
Already; and, as I hear, the provost hath
A warrant for his execution.

Lucio. Our doubts are traitors
And make us lose the good we oft might win 435
By fearing to attempt. Go to Lord Angelo,
And let him learn to know, when maidens sue,
Men give like gods; but when they weep and kneel,
All their petitions are as freely theirs
As they themselves would owe them. 440

Isabella. I will about it straight;
No longer staying but to give the mother
Notice of my affair. I humbly thank you: 445
Commend me to my brother: soon at night
I'll send him certain word of my success.

[Exeunt]