Of Mercy and of Justice

Another of my studies this year has been Shakespeare. The play we are looking at at present is Measure for Measure. It has been an interesting play to study in that it deals with Justice and Mercy.

In the second scene of the second act, Isabella is appealing to the current ruler, Angelo, who has cast Isabella's brother into prison for a crime under a law that had long sat mouldering but which was suddenly revived for the sake of reforming the city. She begs for mercy, he unwaveringly points out the neccessity for justice.

[Isabella] Too late? why, no, I, that do speak a word,
May call it back again. Well believe this,
No ceremony that to great ones 'longs,
Not the King's crown, nor the deputed sword,
...
Become them with one half so good a grace
As mercy does.
If he had been as you and you as he,
You would have slipt like him; but he, like you,
Would not have been so stern.
...
[Angelo] Your brother is a forfeit of the law
...
[Isabella] Alas, alas!
Why, all the souls that were were forfeit once;
And He that might the vantage best have took
Found out the remedy. How would you be,
If He, which is the top of judgement, should
But judge you as you are? O, think on that;
And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.
[Angelo]... It is the law, not I condemn your brother
...
The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept:
Those many had not dared to that evil,
If the first that did the edict infringe
Had answer'd for his deed...
[Isabella] Yet show some pity.
[Angelo] I show it most of all when I show justice;
For then I pity those I do not know,
Which a dismiss'd offence would after gall;
And do him right that, answering one foul wrong,
Lives not to act another...
[Isabella] ... O, it is excellent
To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant...
Could great men thunder
As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet,
For every pelting, petty officer
Would use his heaven for thunder;
Nothing but thunder! Merciful Heaven,
Thou rather with thy sharp and suphurous bolt
Split'st the unwedgedable and gnarled oak
Than the soft myrtle: but man, proud man,
Drest in a little brief authority,
Most ignorant of what he's most assured,
His glassy essence, like an angry ape,
Plays such fantastic tricks before hight heaven
As make the angels weep; who, with our spleens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal.
...
[Angleo] Why do you put these sayings upon me?
[Isabella] 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.

It is truly a hard question as to which of the two ought to have more sway over our law system since we are all fallible humans, yet laws are necessary (much as the argument went on before).

But the beautiful thing about God's plan is that both His justice and His mercy are perfectly satisfied in Christ's act of propitiation! He is both the Lawgiver and the loving God we read about in Psalm 103:

He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities. For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.
-Psalm 103:10-12

Christ not only took our sins upon Himself and paid for them perfectly, but He gives us His righteousness in exchange! The first is His act of mercy in satisfying justice, the second of grace. We can never praise Him enough; it is no wonder that we will want to glorify and honour Him through all eternity!