Page:The Psychology of Shakespeare.pdf/280

Rh fact, except in Measure for Measure, when Isabella throws herself before the Duke, praying for justice upon his hypocrite deputy, the saintly Angelo. The imputation of disordered intellect is here made in all seriousness, to discredit the

accuser, and avert the punishment of crime. Angelo replies to the maiden's denunciation. “Angelo. My lord, her wits, I fear me, are not firm. She hath been a suitor to me for her brother

Cut off by cause of justice

By cause of justice Angelo. And she will speak most bitterly and strange. Isabel. Most strange, and yet most truly will I speak.” Isabel.

The accusation is made, and the Duke answers in well

assumed belief in Angelo's truth and Isabella's distractedness; thus eliciting from her that discrimination between the impossible and the improbable, which ought never to be lost sight of, in estimating dubious statements of suspected minds. “Duke.

Away with her ;-Poor soul,

She speaks this in the infirmity of sense. Isabel. 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 touched with madness; make not impossible That which but seems unlike.”

The duke accepts the distinction, and applies the best possible test to the reasonableness of the statement, namely, the just consequence of one idea on another, the “dependency of thing on thing.” “Duke. By mine honesty, If she is mad as I believe no other, Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense,

Such a dependency of thing on thing As e'er I heard in madness. Isabel. O gracious

duke,

Harp not on that ; nor do not banish reason For inequality; but let your reason serve To make the truth appear where it seems hid.”