How now, fair maid? ISABELLA. I am come to know your pleasure. ANGELO. That you might know it would much better please me Than to demand what 'tis. Your brother cannot live. ISABELLA. Even so! Heaven keep your honour! ANGELO. Yet may he live awhile, and, it may be, As long as you or I; yet he must die. ISABELLA. Under your sentence? ANGELO. Yea. ISABELLA. When? I beseech you; that in his reprieve, Longer or shorter, he may be so fitted That his soul sicken not. ANGELO. Ha! Fie, these filthy vices! It were as good To pardon him that hath from nature stol'n A man already made, as to remit Their saucy sweetness that do coin heaven's image In stamps that are forbid; 'tis all as easy Falsely to take away a life true made As to put metal in restrained means To make a false one. ISABELLA. 'Tis set down so in heaven, but not in earth. ANGELO. Say you so? Then I shall pose you quickly. Which had you rather- that the most just law Now took your brother's life; or, to redeem him, Give up your body to such sweet uncleanness As she that he hath stain'd? ISABELLA. Sir, believe this: I had rather give my body than my soul. ANGELO. I talk not of your soul; our compell'd sins Stand more for number than for accompt. ISABELLA. How say you? ANGELO. Nay, I'll not warrant that; for I can speak Against the thing I say. Answer to this: I, now the voice of the recorded law, Pronounce a sentence on your brother's life; Might there not be a charity in sin To save this brother's life? ISABELLA. Please you to do't, I'll take it as a peril to my soul It is no sin at all, but charity. ANGELO. Pleas'd you to do't at peril of your soul, Were equal poise of sin and charity. ISABELLA. That I do beg his life, if it be sin, Heaven let me bear it! You granting of my suit, If that be sin, I'll make it my morn prayer To have it added to the faults of mine, And nothing of your answer. ANGELO. Nay, but hear me; Your sense pursues not mine; either you are ignorant Or seem so, craftily; and that's not good. ISABELLA. Let me be ignorant, and in nothing good But graciously to know I am no better. ANGELO. Thus wisdom wishes to appear most bright When it doth tax itself; as these black masks Proclaim an enshielded beauty ten times louder Than beauty could, display'd. But mark me: To be received plain, I'll speak more gross- Your brother is to die. ISABELLA. So. ANGELO. And his offence is so, as it appears, Accountant to the law upon that pain. ISABELLA. True. ANGELO. Admit no other way to save his life, As I subscribe not that, nor any other, But, in the loss of question, that you, his sister, Finding yourself desir'd of such a person Whose credit with the judge, or own great place, Could fetch your brother from the manacles