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SCENE VI.

Street near the City Gate.

Enter ISABELLA and MARIANA.

Isab. To speak so indirectly, I am loth;
I would say the truth; but to accuse him so,
That is your part: yet I'm advis'd to do it;
He says, to veil full purpose.*

Mari.

Be rul'd by him.
Isab. Besides, he tells me, that, if peradventure
He speak against me on the adverse side,

I should not think it strange; for 'tis a physic,
That's bitter to sweet end.

Mari. I would, friar Peter

Isab.

O, peace; the friar is come.

Enter Friar PETER.5

F. Peter. Come, I have found you out a stand most fit,

He says, to veil full purpose.] Mr. Theobald alters it to,
He says, t' availful purpose;

because he has no idea of the common reading. A good reason! Yet the common reading is right. Full is used for beneficial; and the meaning is, He says, it is to hide a beneficial purpose, that must not yet be revealed. Warburton.

To veil full purpose, may, with very little force on the words, mean, to hide the whole extent of our design, and therefore the reading may stand; yet I cannot but think Mr. Theobald's alteration either lucky or ingenious. To interpret words with such laxity, as to make full the same with beneficial, is to put an end at once, to all necessity of emendation, for stand in the place of another. Johnson. any word may then

I think Theobald's explanation right, but his amendment unnecessary. We need only read vailful as one word. Shakspeare, who so frequently uses cite for excite, bate for abate, force for enforce, and many other abbreviations of a similar nature, may well be supposed to use vailful for availful. M. Mason.

If Dr. Johnson's explanation be right, (as I think it is) the word should be written-veil, as it is now printed in the text. That vail was the old spelling of veil, appears from a line in The Merchant of Venice, folio, 1623:

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Vailing an Indian beauty

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for which in the modern editions veiling has been rightly substituted. Malone.

5 Enter Friar Peter.] This play has two friars, either of whom

VOL. III.

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Where you may have such vantage on the duke, He shall not pass you: Twice have the trumpets sounded;

The generous and gravest citizens

Have hent the gates, and very near upon
The duke is ent❜ring; therefore hence, away. [Exeunt.

ACT V.... SCENE I.

A public Place near the City Gate.

MARIANA (veil'd) ISABELLA, and PETER, at a distance. Enter at opposite doors, DUKE, VARRIUS, Lords; ANGELO, ESCALUS, LUCIO, Provost, Officers, and Citizens.

Duke. My very worthy cousin, fairly met:— Our old and faithful friend, we are glad to see you.

might singly have served. I should therefore imagine, that Friar Thomas, in the first act, might be changed, without any harm, to Friar Peter; for why should the Duke unnecessarily trust two in an affair which required only one? The name of Friar Thomas is never mentioned in the dialogue, and therefore seems arbitrarily placed at the head of the scene. Johnson.

The generous &c.] i. e. the most noble, &c. Generous is here used in its Latin sense. "Virgo generosa et nobilis." Cicero. Shakspeare uses it again in Othello:

the generous islanders
Steevens.

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By you invited

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• Have hent the gates,] Have seized or taken possession of the gates. Johnson.

So, in Sir A. Gorges' translation of the 4th book of Lucan: did prevent

"His foes, ere they the hills had bent."

Again, in T. Heywood's Rape of Lucrece, 1630:

"Lament thee, Roman land,

"The king is from thee bent "

Again, in the black-letter Romance of Syr Eglamoure of Artoys,

no date:

t

"But with the childe homeward gan ryde

"That fro the gryffon was bent."

Again, in the ancient metrical Romance of Syr Guy of Warwick, b. 1. no date :

"Some by the arms bent good Guy," &c.

Ang. and Escal. Happy return be to your royal grace! Duke Many and hearty thankings to you both. We have made inquiry of you; and we hear Such goodness of your justice, that our soul Cannot but yield you forth to public thanks, Fore-running more requital.

Ang.

You make my bonds still greater. Duke. O, your desert speaks loud; and I should wrong it,

To lock it in the wards of covert bosom,
When it deserves with characters of brass
A forted residence, 'gainst the tooth of time,
And razure of oblivion: Give me your hand,
And let the subject see, to make them know
That outward courtesies would fain proclaim
Favours that keep within.-Come, Escalus;
You must walk by us on our other hand;—
And good supporters are you.

PETER and ISABELLA come forward.

F. Peter. Now is your time; speak loud, and kneel before him.

Isab. Justice, O royal duke! Vail your regard3
Upon a wrong'd, I'd fain have said, a maid!
O worthy prince, dishonour not your eye
By throwing it on any other object,

Again,

"And some by the bridle him bent.”

Spenser often uses the word bend for to seize or take and overbend for to overtake. Steevens.

Hent, henten, bende, (says Junius in his Etymologicon) Chaucero est, capere, assequi, prehendere arripere, ab A. S. bendan. Malone.

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·Vail your regard -] That is, withdraw your thoughts from higher things, let your notice descend upon a wronged woman. To vail is to lower. Johnson.

This is one of the few expressions which might have been borrowed from the old play of Promos and Cassandra, 1578:

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vail thou thine ears."

So, in Stanyhurst's translation of the 4th book of Virgil's Æneid: Phrygio liceat servire marito."

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"Let Dido vail her heart to bed-fellow Trojan."

Thus also, in Hamlet:

"Do not for ever, with thy vailed lids,

Steevens.

"Seek for thy noble father in the dust." Henley.

Till you have heard me in my true complaint,
And given me justice, justice, justice, justice!

Duke. Relate your wrongs: In what? By whom?
Be brief:

Here is lord Angelo shall give you justice;
Reveal yourself to him.

Isab.

O, worthy duke,

You bid me seek redemption of the devil:

Hear me yourself; for that which I must speak
Must either punish me, not being believ'd,

Or wring redress from you; hear me, O, hear me,

here.

Ang. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm: She hath been a suitor to me for her brother,

Cut off by course of justice.

Isab.

By course of justice!

Ang. And she will speak most bitterly, and strange. Isab. Most strange, but yet most truly, will I speak: That Angelo 's forsworn; is it not strange?

That Angelo's a murderer; is 't not strange?

That Angelo is an adulterous thief,

An hypocrite, a virgin-violater;

Is it not strange, and strange?

Duke.

Nay, it is ten times strange.

Isab. It is not truer he is Angelo,

Than this is all as true as it is strange:

Nay, it is ten times true; for truth is truth
To the end of reckoning.9

Duke.

Away with her:-Poor soul,

She speaks this in the infirmity of sense.

Isab. O prince, I cónjure thee, as thou believ'st There is another comfort than this world,

That thou neglect me not, with that opinion

That I am touch'd with madness: make not impos

sible

That which but seems unlike: 'tis not impossible,
But one, the wicked'st caitiff on the ground,

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To the end of reckoning.] That is, truth has no gradations; nothing which admits of increase can be so much what it is, as truth is truth. There may be a strange thing, and a thing more strange, but if a proposition be true, there can be none more true.

Johnson

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May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,1
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,

In all his dressings, characts,3 titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain; believe it, royal prince,
If he be less, he 's nothing; but he's more,
Had I more name for badness.

Duke.
By mine honesty,
If she be mad, (as I believe no other)
Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,
Such a dependency of thing on thing,

As e'er I heard in madness.4

Isab.

O, gracious duke,

Harp not on that; nor do not banish reason
For inequality:5 but let your reason serve

as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,] As shy; as reserv. ed, as abstracted: as just; as nice, as exact: as absolute; as complete in all the round of duty. Johnson.

In all bis dressings, &c.] In all his semblance of virtue, in all his habiliments of office. Johnson.

3 characts,] i. e. characters. See Dugdale, Orig. Furid. "That he use ne hide, no charme, ne carecte.

p. 81:

So, in Gower, De Confessione Amantis, B. I:
"With his carrecte would him enchaunt."

Again, B. V, fol. 103:

"And read his carecte in the wise."

Again, B. VI, fol. 140.

Again:

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Through his carectes and figures."

"And his carecte as he was taught,

"He rad," &c. Steevens.

Tyrwhitt.

Charact signifies an inscription. The stat. 1 Edward VI, c. 2, directed the seals of office of every bishop to have "certain characts under the king's arms for the knowledge of the diocese." Characters are the letters in which the inscription is written. Charactery is the materials of which characters are composed. "Fairies use flowers for their charactery."

Merry Wives of Windsor. Blackstone. 4 As e'er I beard &c.] I suppose Shakspeare wrote: As ne'er I beard in madness.

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do not banish reason

Malone.

For inequality:] Let not the high quality of my adversary prejudice you against me. Johnson.

Inequality appears to me to mean, in this place, apparent inconsistency; and to have no reference to the high rank of Angelo, as Johnson supposes. M. Mason.

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