ha' married un garçon, a boy; un paysan, by gar, a boy; it is not Anne Page: by gar, I am cozened. 189 Mrs. Page. Why, did you take her in green? Caius. Ay, by gar, and 't is a boy: by gar, I'll raise all Windsor. [Exit. Ford. This is strange. Who hath got the right Anne? Page. My heart misgives me here comes Master Fenton. Enter FENTON and ANNE PAGE. How now, Master Fenton ! Anne. Pardon, good father! good my mother, pardon! Page. Now, mistress, how chance you went not with Master Slender? 200 Mrs. Page. Why went you not with Master Doctor, maid? Fent. You do amaze her: hear the truth of it. You would have married her most shamefully, Where there was no proportion held in love. The truth is, she and I, long since contracted, Are now so sure that nothing can dissolve us. The offence is holy that she hath committed; And this deceit loses the name of craft, Of disobedience, or unduteous title, Since therein she doth evitate and shun A thousand irreligious cursed hours, Which forced marriage would have brought upon her. In love the heavens themselves do guide the state; 210 Fal. I am glad, though you have ta'en a special stand to strike at me, that your arrow hath glanc'd. Page. Well, what remedy? Fenton, heaven give thee joy! What cannot be eschew'd must be embrac'd. Master Fenton, Fal. When night-dogs run, all sorts of deer are chas'd. your word; Ford. 220 [Exeunt. 207 evitate=shun; the French éviter. Such a use of two words of the same meaning one generally of Latin origin and the other English, was common until a late period. MEASURE FOR MEASURE. INTRODUCTION. MEASURE FOR MEASURE is a product of Shakespeare's most thoughtful period; and we might also say of his gloomiest mood, were it not that his mood seems to have been always determined by the tale that he dramatized or the play that he re-wrote. Yet his choice of these may have been influenced by his prevailing tone of mind at the time of choosing. It is to be remarked, however, that the plot of this play, which casts over it a shadow that cannot be lifted, is broken up and relieved by scenes of humor which are in Shakespeare's lightest and most mirth-provoking style. The plot and the principal personages are taken from George Whetstone's Promos and Cassandra, a drama published in 1578, but not acted. The story is also told in the same writer's Heptameron, a collection of tales published in 1582. Whetstone himself found the story in Giraldi Cinthio's Hecatommithi, but he amplified and improved it much; and then came Shakespeare to touch it with immortality. This, however, he did, not by changes in construction or in motive, as to which he was always reserved, but merely by the elevation of his thought and the magic of his style. Measure for Measure was first printed in the folio of 1623, and no contemporary reference to it has been discovered; a record, in a book of accounts of Revels at Court, of its performance before James in 1604, upon which conclusions were formerly rested as to the date of its production, having proved to be a forgery. But its style, its tone of thought, its versification, and an allusion in the first scene to King James's personal reserve, combine to indicate 1603 or 1604 as the time of its production. The text is on the whole well printed in the folio; but there are some very obscure passages, and a few which are surely corrupt, the corruption being a consequence of the obscurity. The period of the action is about 1485, when Corvinus, the King of Hungary mentioned in Act I. Sc. 2, marched upon Vienna and took it. 12 MEASURE FOR MEASURE. ACT I. SCENE I. An apartment in the DUKE's palace. Enter DUKE, ESCALUS, Lords, and Attendants. Duke. Escalus. Escal. My lord. Duke. Of government the properties to unfold, Would seem in me to affect speech and discourse; Since I am put to know that your own science Exceeds, in that, the lists of all advice My strength can give you: then no more remains, And let them work. ... as your worth is able, The nature of our people, Our city's institutions, and the terms For common justice, you 're as pregnant in As art and practice hath enriched any That we remember. There is our commission, From which we would not have you warp. Call hither, I say, bid come before us Angelo. What figure of us think you he will bear? For you must know, we have with special soul Lent him our terror, dress'd him with our love, Duke. Look where he comes. Enter ANGELO. Ang. Always obedient to your grace's will, I come to know your pleasure. Duke. Angelo, There is a kind of character in thy life, [Exit an Attendant. But that to your sufficiency. . . . This passage is hopelessly mutilated. |