SCENE II. The street before the prison. Measure for Measure  Shakespeare homepage  |  Measure for Measure  | Act 3, Scene 2 

 Previous scene  |  Next scene  SCENE II. The street before the prison. 

 Enter, on one side, DUKE VINCENTIO disguised as before; on the other, ELBOW, and Officers with POMPEY  ELBOW  Nay, if there be no remedy for it, but that you will 

 needs buy and sell men and women like beasts, we 

 shall have all the world drink brown and white bastard. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  O heavens! what stuff is here 

 POMPEY  'Twas never merry world since, of two usuries, the 

 merriest was put down, and the worser allowed by 

 order of law a furred gown to keep him warm; and 

 furred with fox and lamb-skins too, to signify, that 

 craft, being richer than innocency, stands for the facing. 

 ELBOW  Come your way, sir. 'Bless you, good father friar. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  And you, good brother father. What offence hath 

 this man made you, sir? 

 ELBOW  Marry, sir, he hath offended the law: and, sir, we 

 take him to be a thief too, sir; for we have found 

 upon him, sir, a strange picklock, which we have 

 sent to the deputy. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Fie, sirrah! a bawd, a wicked bawd! 

 The evil that thou causest to be done, 

 That is thy means to live. Do thou but think 

 What 'tis to cram a maw or clothe a back 

 From such a filthy vice: say to thyself, 

 From their abominable and beastly touches 

 I drink, I eat, array myself, and live. 

 Canst thou believe thy living is a life, 

 So stinkingly depending? Go mend, go mend. 

 POMPEY  Indeed, it does stink in some sort, sir; but yet, 

 sir, I would prove-- 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Nay, if the devil have given thee proofs for sin, 

 Thou wilt prove his. Take him to prison, officer: 

 Correction and instruction must both work 

 Ere this rude beast will profit. 

 ELBOW  He must before the deputy, sir; he has given him 

 warning: the deputy cannot abide a whoremaster: if 

 he be a whoremonger, and comes before him, he were 

 as good go a mile on his errand. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  That we were all, as some would seem to be, 

 From our faults, as faults from seeming, free! 

 ELBOW  His neck will come to your waist,--a cord, sir. 

 POMPEY  I spy comfort; I cry bail. Here's a gentleman and a 

 friend of mine. 



 Enter LUCIO  LUCIO  How now, noble Pompey! What, at the wheels of 

 Caesar? art thou led in triumph? What, is there 

 none of Pygmalion's images, newly made woman, to be 

 had now, for putting the hand in the pocket and 

 extracting it clutch'd? What reply, ha? What 

 sayest thou to this tune, matter and method? Is't 

 not drowned i' the last rain, ha? What sayest 

 thou, Trot? Is the world as it was, man? Which is 

 the way? Is it sad, and few words? or how? The 

 trick of it? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Still thus, and thus; still worse! 

 LUCIO  How doth my dear morsel, thy mistress? Procures she 

 still, ha? 

 POMPEY  Troth, sir, she hath eaten up all her beef, and she 

 is herself in the tub. 

 LUCIO  Why, 'tis good; it is the right of it; it must be 

 so: ever your fresh whore and your powdered bawd: 

 an unshunned consequence; it must be so. Art going 

 to prison, Pompey? 

 POMPEY  Yes, faith, sir. 

 LUCIO  Why, 'tis not amiss, Pompey. Farewell: go, say I 

 sent thee thither. For debt, Pompey? or how? 

 ELBOW  For being a bawd, for being a bawd. 

 LUCIO  Well, then, imprison him: if imprisonment be the 

 due of a bawd, why, 'tis his right: bawd is he 

 doubtless, and of antiquity too; bawd-born. 

 Farewell, good Pompey. Commend me to the prison, 

 Pompey: you will turn good husband now, Pompey; you 

 will keep the house. 

 POMPEY  I hope, sir, your good worship will be my bail. 

 LUCIO  No, indeed, will I not, Pompey; it is not the wear. 

 I will pray, Pompey, to increase your bondage: If 

 you take it not patiently, why, your mettle is the 

 more. Adieu, trusty Pompey. 'Bless you, friar. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  And you. 

 LUCIO  Does Bridget paint still, Pompey, ha? 

 ELBOW  Come your ways, sir; come. 

 POMPEY  You will not bail me, then, sir? 

 LUCIO  Then, Pompey, nor now. What news abroad, friar? 

 what news? 

 ELBOW  Come your ways, sir; come. 

 LUCIO  Go to kennel, Pompey; go. 



 Exeunt ELBOW, POMPEY and Officers  What news, friar, of the duke? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  I know none. Can you tell me of any? 

 LUCIO  Some say he is with the Emperor of Russia; other 

 some, he is in Rome: but where is he, think you? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  I know not where; but wheresoever, I wish him well. 

 LUCIO  It was a mad fantastical trick of him to steal from 

 the state, and usurp the beggary he was never born 

 to. Lord Angelo dukes it well in his absence; he 

 puts transgression to 't. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  He does well in 't. 

 LUCIO  A little more lenity to lechery would do no harm in 

 him: something too crabbed that way, friar. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  It is too general a vice, and severity must cure it. 

 LUCIO  Yes, in good sooth, the vice is of a great kindred; 

 it is well allied: but it is impossible to extirp 

 it quite, friar, till eating and drinking be put 

 down. They say this Angelo was not made by man and 

 woman after this downright way of creation: is it 

 true, think you? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  How should he be made, then? 

 LUCIO  Some report a sea-maid spawned him; some, that he 

 was begot between two stock-fishes. But it is 

 certain that when he makes water his urine is 

 congealed ice; that I know to be true: and he is a 

 motion generative; that's infallible. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  You are pleasant, sir, and speak apace. 

 LUCIO  Why, what a ruthless thing is this in him, for the 

 rebellion of a codpiece to take away the life of a 

 man! Would the duke that is absent have done this? 

 Ere he would have hanged a man for the getting a 

 hundred bastards, he would have paid for the nursing 

 a thousand: he had some feeling of the sport: he 

 knew the service, and that instructed him to mercy. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  I never heard the absent duke much detected for 

 women; he was not inclined that way. 

 LUCIO  O, sir, you are deceived. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  'Tis not possible. 

 LUCIO  Who, not the duke? yes, your beggar of fifty; and 

 his use was to put a ducat in her clack-dish: the 

 duke had crotchets in him. He would be drunk too; 

 that let me inform you. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  You do him wrong, surely. 

 LUCIO  Sir, I was an inward of his. A shy fellow was the 

 duke: and I believe I know the cause of his 

 withdrawing. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  What, I prithee, might be the cause? 

 LUCIO  No, pardon; 'tis a secret must be locked within the 

 teeth and the lips: but this I can let you 

 understand, the greater file of the subject held the 

 duke to be wise. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Wise! why, no question but he was. 

 LUCIO  A very superficial, ignorant, unweighing fellow. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Either this is the envy in you, folly, or mistaking: 

 the very stream of his life and the business he hath 

 helmed must upon a warranted need give him a better 

 proclamation. Let him be but testimonied in his own 

 bringings-forth, and he shall appear to the 

 envious a scholar, a statesman and a soldier. 

 Therefore you speak unskilfully: or if your 

 knowledge be more it is much darkened in your malice. 

 LUCIO  Sir, I know him, and I love him. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Love talks with better knowledge, and knowledge with 

 dearer love. 

 LUCIO  Come, sir, I know what I know. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  I can hardly believe that, since you know not what 

 you speak. But, if ever the duke return, as our 

 prayers are he may, let me desire you to make your 

 answer before him. If it be honest you have spoke, 

 you have courage to maintain it: I am bound to call 

 upon you; and, I pray you, your name? 

 LUCIO  Sir, my name is Lucio; well known to the duke. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  He shall know you better, sir, if I may live to 

 report you. 

 LUCIO  I fear you not. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  O, you hope the duke will return no more; or you 

 imagine me too unhurtful an opposite. But indeed I 

 can do you little harm; you'll forswear this again. 

 LUCIO  I'll be hanged first: thou art deceived in me, 

 friar. But no more of this. Canst thou tell if 

 Claudio die to-morrow or no? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Why should he die, sir? 

 LUCIO  Why? For filling a bottle with a tundish. I would 

 the duke we talk of were returned again: the 

 ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with 

 continency; sparrows must not build in his 

 house-eaves, because they are lecherous. The duke 

 yet would have dark deeds darkly answered; he would 

 never bring them to light: would he were returned! 

 Marry, this Claudio is condemned for untrussing. 

 Farewell, good friar: I prithee, pray for me. The 

 duke, I say to thee again, would eat mutton on 

 Fridays. He's not past it yet, and I say to thee, 

 he would mouth with a beggar, though she smelt brown 

 bread and garlic: say that I said so. Farewell. 



 Exit  DUKE VINCENTIO  No might nor greatness in mortality 

 Can censure 'scape; back-wounding calumny 

 The whitest virtue strikes. What king so strong 

 Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue? 

 But who comes here? 



 Enter ESCALUS, Provost, and Officers with MISTRESS OVERDONE  ESCALUS  Go; away with her to prison! 

 MISTRESS OVERDONE  Good my lord, be good to me; your honour is accounted 

 a merciful man; good my lord. 

 ESCALUS  Double and treble admonition, and still forfeit in 

 the same kind! This would make mercy swear and play 

 the tyrant. 

 Provost  A bawd of eleven years' continuance, may it please 

 your honour. 

 MISTRESS OVERDONE  My lord, this is one Lucio's information against me. 

 Mistress Kate Keepdown was with child by him in the 

 duke's time; he promised her marriage: his child 

 is a year and a quarter old, come Philip and Jacob: 

 I have kept it myself; and see how he goes about to abuse me! 

 ESCALUS  That fellow is a fellow of much licence: let him be 

 called before us. Away with her to prison! Go to; 

 no more words. 



 Exeunt Officers with MISTRESS OVERDONE  Provost, my brother Angelo will not be altered; 

 Claudio must die to-morrow: let him be furnished 

 with divines, and have all charitable preparation. 

 if my brother wrought by my pity, it should not be 

 so with him. 

 Provost  So please you, this friar hath been with him, and 

 advised him for the entertainment of death. 

 ESCALUS  Good even, good father. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Bliss and goodness on you! 

 ESCALUS  Of whence are you? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Not of this country, though my chance is now 

 To use it for my time: I am a brother 

 Of gracious order, late come from the See 

 In special business from his holiness. 

 ESCALUS  What news abroad i' the world? 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  None, but that there is so great a fever on 

 goodness, that the dissolution of it must cure it: 

 novelty is only in request; and it is as dangerous 

 to be aged in any kind of course, as it is virtuous 

 to be constant in any undertaking. There is scarce 

 truth enough alive to make societies secure; but 

 security enough to make fellowships accurst: much 

 upon this riddle runs the wisdom of the world. This 

 news is old enough, yet it is every day's news. I 

 pray you, sir, of what disposition was the duke? 

 ESCALUS  One that, above all other strifes, contended 

 especially to know himself. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  What pleasure was he given to? 

 ESCALUS  Rather rejoicing to see another merry, than merry at 

 any thing which professed to make him rejoice: a 

 gentleman of all temperance. But leave we him to 

 his events, with a prayer they may prove prosperous; 

 and let me desire to know how you find Claudio 

 prepared. I am made to understand that you have 

 lent him visitation. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  He professes to have received no sinister measure 

 from his judge, but most willingly humbles himself 

 to the determination of justice: yet had he framed 

 to himself, by the instruction of his frailty, many 

 deceiving promises of life; which I by my good 

 leisure have discredited to him, and now is he 

 resolved to die. 

 ESCALUS  You have paid the heavens your function, and the 

 prisoner the very debt of your calling. I have 

 laboured for the poor gentleman to the extremest 

 shore of my modesty: but my brother justice have I 

 found so severe, that he hath forced me to tell him 

 he is indeed Justice. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  If his own life answer the straitness of his 

 proceeding, it shall become him well; wherein if he 

 chance to fail, he hath sentenced himself. 

 ESCALUS  I am going to visit the prisoner. Fare you well. 

 DUKE VINCENTIO  Peace be with you! 



 Exeunt ESCALUS and Provost  He who the sword of heaven will bear 

 Should be as holy as severe; 

 Pattern in himself to know, 

 Grace to stand, and virtue go; 

 More nor less to others paying 

 Than by self-offences weighing. 

 Shame to him whose cruel striking 

 Kills for faults of his own liking! 

 Twice treble shame on Angelo, 

 To weed my vice and let his grow! 

 O, what may man within him hide, 

 Though angel on the outward side! 

 How may likeness made in crimes, 

 Making practise on the times, 

 To draw with idle spiders' strings 

 Most ponderous and substantial things! 

 Craft against vice I must apply: 

 With Angelo to-night shall lie 

 His old betrothed but despised; 

 So disguise shall, by the disguised, 

 Pay with falsehood false exacting, 

 And perform an old contracting. 



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