Page 1133 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

ANGELO

Then must your brother die.

ISABELLA
And ’twere the cheaper way. [105]
Better it were a brother died at once,
Than that a sister, by redeeming him,

Should die for ever.

ANGELO
Were you not then as cruel as the sentence
That you have slander’d so? [110]

ISABELLA
Ignomy in ransom and free pardon
Are of two houses: lawful mercy

Is nothing kin to foul redemption.

ANGELO

You seem’d of late to make the law a tyrant,
And rather prov’d the sliding of your brother [115]
A merriment than a vice.

ISABELLA
O pardon me, my lord; it oft falls out

To have what we would have, we speak not what we mean.
I something do excuse the thing I hate
For his advantage that I dearly love. [120]

ANGELO
We are all frail.

ISABELLA
Else let my brother die,

If not a feodary but only he
Owe and succeed thy weakness.