Measure for Measure by William Shakespeare
Act 1 - Scene 3
A monastery.
Vincentio : No, holy father; throw away that thought;
[p]Believe not that the
dribbling dart of love
[p]Can pierce a complete bosom. Why I desire
thee
[p]To give me secret harbour, hath a purpose
[p]More grave and
wrinkled than the aims and ends
[p]Of burning youth.
Friar Thomas : May your grace speak of it?
Vincentio : My holy sir, none better knows than you
[p]How I have ever loved the
life removed
[p]And held in idle price to haunt assemblies
[p]Where
youth, and cost, and witless bravery keeps.
[p]I have deliver'd to
Lord Angelo,
[p]A man of stricture and firm abstinence,
[p]My absolute
power and place here in Vienna,
[p]And he supposes me travell'd to
Poland;
[p]For so I have strew'd it in the common ear,
[p]And so it is
received. Now, pious sir,
[p]You will demand of me why I do this?
Friar Thomas : Gladly, my lord.
Vincentio : We have strict statutes and most biting laws.
[p]The needful bits and
curbs to headstrong weeds,
[p]Which for this nineteen years we have
let slip;
[p]Even like an o'ergrown lion in a cave,
[p]That goes not
out to prey. Now, as fond fathers,
[p]Having bound up the threatening
twigs of birch,
[p]Only to stick it in their children's sight
[p]For
terror, not to use, in time the rod
[p]Becomes more mock'd than
fear'd; so our decrees,
[p]Dead to infliction, to themselves are
dead;
[p]And liberty plucks justice by the nose;
[p]The baby beats the
nurse, and quite athwart
[p]Goes all decorum.
Friar Thomas : It rested in your grace
[p]To unloose this tied-up justice when you
pleased:
[p]And it in you more dreadful would have seem'd
[p]Than in
Lord Angelo.
Vincentio : I do fear, too dreadful:
[p]Sith 'twas my fault to give the people
scope,
[p]'Twould be my tyranny to strike and gall them
[p]For what I
bid them do: for we bid this be done,
[p]When evil deeds have their
permissive pass
[p]And not the punishment. Therefore indeed, my
father,
[p]I have on Angelo imposed the office;
[p]Who may, in the
ambush of my name, strike home,
[p]And yet my nature never in the
fight
[p]To do in slander. And to behold his sway,
[p]I will, as
'twere a brother of your order,
[p]Visit both prince and people:
therefore, I prithee,
[p]Supply me with the habit and instruct
me
[p]How I may formally in person bear me
[p]Like a true friar. More
reasons for this action
[p]At our more leisure shall I render
you;
[p]Only, this one: Lord Angelo is precise;
[p]Stands at a guard
with envy; scarce confesses
[p]That his blood flows, or that his
appetite
[p]Is more to bread than stone: hence shall we see,
[p]If
power change purpose, what our seemers be.
Previous: Act 1 - Scene 2
Next: Act 1 - Scene 4
