SCENE III. A room in a prison. Measure for Measure  Shakespeare homepage  |  Measure for Measure  | Act 2, Scene 3 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE III. A room in a prison. 

 Enter, severally, DUKE VINCENTIO disguised as a friar, and Provost  DUKE VINCENTIO  Hail to you, provost! so I think you are. 

 Provost  I am the provost. What's your will, good friar? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Bound by my charity and my blest order, 

 I come to visit the afflicted spirits 

 Here in the prison. Do me the common right 

 To let me see them and to make me know 

 The nature of their crimes, that I may minister 

 To them accordingly. 

 Provost  I would do more than that, if more were needful. 



 Enter JULIET  Look, here comes one: a gentlewoman of mine, 

 Who, falling in the flaws of her own youth, 

 Hath blister'd her report: she is with child; 

 And he that got it, sentenced; a young man 

 More fit to do another such offence 

 Than die for this. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  When must he die? 

 Provost  As I do think, to-morrow. 

 I have provided for you: stay awhile, 



 To JULIET  And you shall be conducted. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Repent you, fair one, of the sin you carry? 

 JULIET  I do; and bear the shame most patiently. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  I'll teach you how you shall arraign your conscience, 

 And try your penitence, if it be sound, 

 Or hollowly put on. 

 JULIET  I'll gladly learn. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Love you the man that wrong'd you? 

 JULIET  Yes, as I love the woman that wrong'd him. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  So then it seems your most offenceful act 

 Was mutually committed? 

 JULIET  Mutually. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Then was your sin of heavier kind than his. 

 JULIET  I do confess it, and repent it, father. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  'Tis meet so, daughter: but lest you do repent, 

 As that the sin hath brought you to this shame, 

 Which sorrow is always towards ourselves, not heaven, 

 Showing we would not spare heaven as we love it, 

 But as we stand in fear,-- 

 JULIET  I do repent me, as it is an evil, 

 And take the shame with joy. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  There rest. 

 Your partner, as I hear, must die to-morrow, 

 And I am going with instruction to him. 

 Grace go with you, Benedicite! 



 Exit  JULIET  Must die to-morrow! O injurious love, 

 That respites me a life, whose very comfort 

 Is still a dying horror! 

 Provost  'Tis pity of him. 



 Exeunt  Shakespeare homepage  |  Measure for Measure  | Act 2, Scene 3 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene 