Page 1188 - Shakespeare - Vol. 3

By course of justice!

ANGELO
And she will speak most bitterly and strange.

ISABELLA
Most strange: but yet most truly will I speak.
That Angelo’s forsworn, is it not strange? [40]
That Angelo’s a murderer, is’t not strange?

That Angelo is an adulterous thief,
An hypocrite, a virgin-violator,
Is it not strange, and strange?

DUKE
Nay, it is ten times strange! [45]

ISABELLA
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 th’end of reck’ning.

DUKE
Away with her. Poor soul,
She speaks this in th’infirmity of sense. [50]

ISABELLA
O Prince, I conjure 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 impossible

That which but seems unlike. ’Tis not impossible [55]
But one, the wicked’st caitiff on the ground,
May seem as shy, as grave, as just, as absolute,
As Angelo; even so may Angelo,

In all his dressings, caracts, titles, forms,
Be an arch-villain. Believe it, royal Prince, [60]