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A SISTER PLEADING FOR A BROTHER.

7. Yea! men may wonder when they scan
A living, thinking, feeling man,

In such a rest his heart to keep;
But angels say-and through the word
I ween' their blessèd smile is heard-
"He giveth His beloved, sleep!"

8. For me, my heart, that erst2 did go
Most like a tired child at a show,

That sees through tears the juggler's3 leap,
Would now its wearied vision close,
Would childlike on His love repose,

"Who giveth His beloved, sleep!"

9. And friends! dear friends! when it shall be
That this low breath is gone from me,
And round my bier ye come to weep,—

Let one, most loving of you all,

Say, "Not a tear must o'er her fall

HE GIVETH HIS BELOVED, SLEEP!"

387

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

168. A SISTER PLEADING FOR A CONDEMNED BROTHER Isabella. I am a woful suitor to your honor;

Please but your honor hear me.

Angelo.

Well; what's your suit?

Isab. There is a vice that most I do abhor,

And most desire should meet the blow of justice,
For which I would not plead, but that I must.

Ang. Well; the matter?

Isab. I have a brother is condemn'd to die;

I do beseech you, let it be his fault,

And not my brother.

Ang. Condemn the fault, and not the actor of it? Why, every fault's condemn'd ere it be done;

1 Ween, think; fancy; imagine.--2 Erst, at first; formerly; till now. -3 Jåg' gler, a cheat; a deceiver; one who practices or exhibits sleight of hand tricks.

Mine were the very cipher of a function,'

To find the faults, whose fine stands in record,
And let go by the actor.

Isab. O just but severe law!

I had a brother, then ;-must he needs die?

Ang. Maiden, no remedy.

Isab. Yes; I do think that you might pardon him, And neither Heaven nor man grieve at the mercy. Ang. I will not do't.

Isab.

But can you, if you

would?

Ang. Look; what I will not, that I can not do.

Isab. But might you do't, and do the world no wrong,

so your heart were touch'd with that remorse,

As mine is to him?

Ang.

Isab. Too late?

He's sentenced; 'tis too late.

Why, no; I, that do speak a word,

May call it back again: well, believe this,
No ceremony that to the great belongs,
Not the king's crown, nor the deputed sword,
The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe,
Becomes them with one half so good a grace,
As mercy does. If he had been as you,

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And you as he, you would have slipt like him;
But he, like you, would not have been so stern.
Ang. Pray you, begone.

Isab. I would to Heaven I had your potency,
And you were Isabel; should it then be thus?
No; I would tell what 'twere to be a judge,
And what a prisoner.

Ang. Your brother is a forfeit of the law, And you but waste your words.

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Why, all the souls that are, were forfeit once;
And He, that might the 'vantage best have took,
Found out the remedy. How would you be,

1 Function (fůngk' shun), duty; office; performance.-- Truncheon (trůn' shun), a short staff; a club.- Po' ten cy, power; authority.For' feit, that which is lost by an offense.

A SISTER PLEADING FOR A BROTHER.

If He, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are? Oh, think on that;
then will breathe within your lips,

And

mercy

Like man new made.

Ang.

Be you content, fair maid;

It is the law, not I, condemns your brother.

Were he my kinsman, brother, or my son,

It should be thus with him; he dies to-morrow.

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Isab. To-morrow? oh! that's sudden. Spare him, spare him. Good, good my lord, bethink you :

Who is it that hath died for this offense?

There's many have committed it.

Ang. The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept;
Those many had not dared to do that evil,

If the first man that did the edict1 infringe,2
Had answer'd for his deed. Now, 'tis awake;
Takes note of what is done; and, like a prophet,
Looks in a glass, that shows what future evils,
Or new, or by remissness new-conceived,

And so in progress to be hatch'd and born,
Are now to have no successive degrees;
But ere they live, to end.

Isab.

Yet show some pity.

Ang. I show it most of all, when I show justice; For then I pity those I do not know,

Which a dismiss'd offense would after gall;

And do him right, that, answering one foul wrong,

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Your brother dies to-morrow; be content.

Isab. So you must be the first that gives this sentence: And he, that suffers: oh! 'tis excellent

To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous3

To use it like a giant.- -Merciful Heaven!
Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt,
Splittest the unwedgeable and gnarlèd oak,
Than the soft myrtle: Oh, but man, proud man,

1E' dict, proclamation; law.- - In fringe', break; encroach upon.Tyr'an nous, cruel; unjustly severe.

Dress'd in a little brief authority,

Most ignorant of what he's most assured,

Plays such fantastic tricks before high Heaven,
As make the angels weep.

We can not weigh our brother with yourself:
Great men may jest with saints,-'tis wit in them;
But, in the less, foul profanation.'

That in the captain's but a choleric2 word,
Which in the soldier is flat blasphemy.3

Ang. Why do you put these sayings upon me?
Isab. Because authority, though it err like others,
Hath yet a kind of medicine in itself,

That skins the vice o' the top: go to your bosom;
Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know
That's like my brother's fault: if it confess
A natural guiltiness, such as is his,

Let it not sound a thought upon your tongue
Against my brother's life.

Ang. She speaks, 'tis such sense,

That my sense bleeds with it. Fare you well.

Isab. Gentle my lord, turn back.

Ang. I will bethink me; come again to-morrow.

Isab. Hark, how I'll bribe you; good my lord, turn back.

Ang. How! bribe me?

Isab. Ay, with such gifts, that Heaven shall share with you.

Not with fond shekels' of the tested gold,

Or stones, whose rate is either rich or poor,
As fancy values them; but with true prayers,
That shall be up at Heaven, and enter there,
Ere sunrise; prayers from preserved souls,
From fasting maids, whose minds are dedicate
To nothing temporal.

Ang. Well, come to-morrow.

Isab. Heaven keep your honor safe.

SHAKSPEARE

1 Prof a nå' tion, a violation of something sacred; treating with abuse or disrespect. Choleric (kol' er ik), angry; passionate.- Blås' phemy, irreverent or contemptuous words uttered wickedly against God.-'Shekel (shek' kl), a Jewish coin of the value of about half a dollar, or sixty cents. Test' ed, tried; purified.

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169. THE TRAVELER.

WITHDRAW yon curtain, look within that room,
Where all is splendor, yet where all is gloom:
Why weeps that mother? why, in pensive mood,
Group noiseless round, that little, lovely brood?
The battle-door is still, laid by each book,
And the harp slumbers in its custom'd nook.
Who hath done this? what cold, unpitying foe
Hath made this house the dwelling-place of woe

2. "Tis he, the husband, father, lost in care,
O'er that sweet fellow in his cradle there :
The gallant bark that rides by yonder strand
Bears him to-morrow from his native land.
Why turns he, half unwilling, from his home,
To tempt the ocean, and the earth to roam?
Wealth he can boast a miser's sigh would hush
And health is laughing in that ruddy blush ;
Friends spring to greet him, and he has no foe-
So honor'd and so bless'd, what bids him go?-

3. His eye must see, his foot each spot must tread,
Where sleeps the dust of earth's recorded dead;
Where rise the monuments of ancient time,
Pillar and pyramid in age sublime;
The Pagan's temple and the Churchman's tower,
War's bloodiest plain and Wisdom's greenest bower
All that his wonder woke in school-boy themes,
All that his fancy fired in youthful dreams:
Where Socrates' once taught he thirsts to stray,
Where Homer pour'd his everlasting lay;

1 Socrates, an illustrious Grecian philosopher and teacher of youth was born at Athens, in the year 468 B. C. Though the best of all the men of his time, and one of the wisest and most just of all men, he unjustly suffered the punishment of death for impiety at the age of seventy. Homer, the most distinguished of poets, called the "Father of Song." He is supposed to have been an Asiatic Greek, though his birth-place, and the period in which he lived, are not known.

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