[_Isab_. Yet shew some pity.
_Ang_. I shew it most of all, when I shew justice;
For then I pity those I do not know]
This was one of Bale's memorials. _When I find myself swayed to
mercy, let me remember, that there is a mercy likewise due to
the country_.
II.ii.126 (45,2) [We cannot weigh our brother with ourself] [W: yourself]
The old reading is right. _We_ mortals proud and foolish cannot
prevail on our passions to _weigh_ or compare _our brother_, a
being of like nature and frailty, with _ourself_. We have different
names and different judgments for the same faults committed by
persons of different condition. (1773)
II.ii.141 (46,3) [She speaks, and 'tis Such sense, that my sense
breeds with it] Thus all the folios. Some later editor has
changed _breeds_ to _bleeds_, and Dr. Warburton blames poor Mr. Theobald
for recalling the old word, which yet is certainly right.
_My sense_ breeds _with her sense_, that is, new thoughts are stirring
in my mind, new conceptions are _hatched_ in my imagination.
So we say to _brood_ over thought.
II.ii.149 (46,4) [tested gold] Rather cupelled, brought to the _test_,
refined, (see 1765,I,299,6)
II.ii.157 (47,6) [For I am that way going to temptation, Where
prayers cross] Which way Angelo is going to temptation, we begin
to perceive; but how _prayers cross_ that way, or cross each other,
at that way, more than any other, I do not understand.
Isabella prays that his _honour_ may be safe, meaning only to
give him his title: his imagination is caught by the word _honour_;
he feels that his _honour_ is in danger, and therefore, I believe,
answers thus:
_I am that way going to temptation_,
Which your _prayers cross_.
That is, I am tempted to lose that honour of which thou implorest
the preservation. The temptation under which I labour is that
which thou hast unknowingly _thwarted_ with thy prayer. He uses the
same mode language a few lines lower. Isabella, parting, says,
Save your _honour_!
Angelo catches the word--_Save it_! _From what_?
_From thee; even from thy virtue_!--(rev. 1778,II,52,3)