Speaking with Escalus in his disguise as a traveling friar, Duke Vincentio speaks hyperbolically about the evils of the world:
ESCALUS
What news abroad i’ th’ world?DUKE, as Friar
None but that there is so great a fever
on goodness that the dissolution of it must cure it.
Novelty is only in request, and it is as dangerous to
be aged in any kind of course as it is virtuous to be
constant in any undertaking.
When Escalus asks him for news from abroad, the Duke responds that the “fever” or lack of goodness in the world is so “great” that nothing other than the “dissolution” or destruction of the world itself could solve the problem. Further, he suggests that the value of “novelty” or newness has replaced “goodness” in the world, and that to act in an ordinary manner is now “dangerous” in this novelty-craving world. The Duke’s exaggerated pessimism is a response to the unpleasant truths that he has discovered while disguised among the common people of his city. He has seen the harsh and merciless reign of his chosen successor, Angelo, and he has heard himself slandered by the citizens of Vienna, most notably by Lucio, who claimed that the old Duke was a womanizer. The disillusioned Duke therefore rails against the evils of the world in an exaggerated, emotional manner.
Lucio uses a hyperbole when complaining of Angelo’s policies as ruler to Duke Vincentio, who is disguised as a friar:
I would the Duke we talk of were returned again. This
ungenitured agent will unpeople the province with
continency. Sparrows must not build in his house
eaves, because they are lecherous.The duke
yet would have dark deeds darkly answered;
he would never bring them to light: would he were returned!
Here, Lucio hyperbolically claims that the kingdom will become entirely depopulated as a result of Angelo’s persecution of sexual crimes. The citizens of Vienna, he claims, will be too afraid to have sex and risk imprisonment or execution as a result of Angelo’s abstinence policy. Further, he states that even birds such as sparrows will not be permitted to procreate, as Angelo might consider such acts “lecherous,” or in other words, excessively lustful. Lucio, then, imagines Angelo’s harsh policies as inimical to the needs of the nation, the rules of nature, and even life itself. In contrast, he insists that the absent Duke was a better leader for the city. While he would “have dark deeds darkly answered,” or in other words, he would have punished serious crimes, he wouldn’t have exposed people for minor crimes.
