Characteristics of Women: Moral, Poetical, and Historical

ANGELO.

What would you do?

ISABELLA.

As much for my poor brother as myself; That is, were I under the terms of death, The impression of keen whips I'd wear as rubies, And strip myself to death as to a bed That, longing, I have been sick for, ere I'd yield My body up to shame.

ANGELO.

Then must your brother die.

ISABELLA.

And 'twere the cheaper way; Better it were a brother died at once, Than that a sister, by redeeming him, Should die forever.

ANGELO.

Were you not then cruel as the sentence, That you have slander'd so!

ISABELLA.

Ignominy in ransom, and free pardon, Are of two houses: lawful mercy is Nothing akin to foul redemption.

ANGELO.

You seem'd of late to make the law a tyrant; And rather proved the sliding of your brother A merriment than a vice.

ISABELLA.

O pardon me, my lord; it oft falls out, To have what we'd have, we speak not what we mean: I something do excuse the thing I hate, For his advantage that I dearly love.

Towards the conclusion of the play we have another instance of that rigid sense of justice, which is a prominent part of Isabella's character, and almost silences her earnest intercession for her brother, when his fault is placed between her plea and her conscience. The Duke condemns the villain Angelo to death, and his wife Mariana entreats Isabella to plead for him.

Sweet Isabel, take my part, Lend me your knees, and all my life to come I'll lend you all my life to do you service.

Isabella remains silent, and Mariana reiterates her prayer.

MARIANA.

Sweet Isabel, do yet but kneel by me, Hold up your hands, say nothing, I'll speak all! O Isabel! will you not lend a knee?

Isabella, thus urged, breaks silence and appeals to the Duke, not with supplication, or persuasion, but with grave argument, and a kind of dignified humility and conscious power, which are finely characteristic of the individual woman.

Most bounteous Sir, Look, if it please you, on this man condemn'd, As if my brother liv'd; I partly think A due sincerity govern'd his deeds Till he did look on me; since it is so Let him not die. My brother had but justice, In that he did the thing for which he died. For Angelo, His art did not o'ertake his bad intent, That perish'd by the way: thoughts are no subjects. Intents, but merely thoughts.

In this instance, as in the one before mentioned, Isabella's conscientiousness is overcome by the only sentiment which ought to temper justice into mercy, the power of affection and sympathy.

Isabella's confession of the general frailty of her sex, has a peculiar softness, beauty, and propriety. She admits the imputation with all the sympathy of woman for woman; yet with all the dignity of one who felt her own superiority to the weakness she acknowledges.

ANGELO.

Nay, women are frail too.

ISABELLA.

Ay, as the glasses where they view themselves; Which are as easy broke as they make forms. Women! help heaven! men their creation mar In profiting by them. Nay, call us ten times frail, For we are soft as our complexions are, And credulous to false prints.

Nor should we fail to remark the deeper interest which is thrown round Isabella, by one part of her character, which is betrayed rather than exhibited in the progress of the action; and for which we are not at first prepared, though it is so perfectly natural. It is the strong under-current of passion and enthusiasm flowing beneath this calm and saintly self-possession; it is the capacity for high feeling and generous and strong indignation, veiled beneath the sweet austere composure of the religious recluse, which, by the very force of contrast, powerfully impress the imagination. As we see in real life that where, from some external or habitual cause, a strong control is exercised over naturally quick feelings and an impetuous temper, they display themselves with a proportionate vehemence when that restraint is removed; so the very violence with which her passions burst forth, when opposed or under the influence of strong excitement, is admirably characteristic.

Thus in her exclamation, when she first allows herself to perceive Angelo's vile design--

ISABELLA.

Ha! little honor to be much believed, And most pernicious purpose;--seeming!--seeming I will proclaim thee, Angelo: look for it! Sign me a present pardon for my brother, Or with an outstretched throat I'll tell the world Aloud, what man thou art!

And again, where she finds that the "outward tainted deputy," has deceived her--

O I will to him, and pluck out his eyes! Unhappy Claudio! wretched Isabel! Injurious world! most damned Angelo!

She places at first a strong and high-souled confidence in her brother's fortitude and magnanimity, judging him by her own lofty spirit:

I'll to my brother; Though he hath fallen by prompture of the blood, Yet hath he in him such a mind of honor, That had he twenty heads to tender down, On twenty bloody blocks, he'd yield them up Before his sister should her body stoop To such abhorr'd pollution.

But when her trust in his honor is deceived by his momentary weakness, her scorn has a bitterness, and her indignation a force of expression almost fearful; and both are carried to an extreme, which is perfectly in character:

O faithless coward! O dishonest wretch! Wilt thou be made a man out of my vice? Is't not a kind of incest to take life From thine own sister's shame? What should I think? Heaven shield, my mother play'd my father fair! For such a warped slip of wilderness Ne'er issued from his blood. Take my defiance; Die! perish! might but my bending down, Reprieve thee from thy fate, it should proceed. I'll pray a thousand prayers for thy death. No word to save thee.

The whole of this scene with Claudio is inexpressibly grand in the poetry and the sentiment; and the entire play abounds in those passages and phrases which must have become trite from familiar and constant use and abuse, if their wisdom and unequalled beauty did not invest them with an immortal freshness and vigor, and a perpetual charm.