ARIEL You are three men of sin, whom destiny,
That hath to instrument this lower world
And what is in’t, the never-surfeited sea
Hath caused to belch up you, and on this island
Where man doth not inhabit—you ’mongst men
Being most unfit to live—I have made you mad;
And even with such-like valour, men hang and drown
Their proper selves.
[Alonso, Sebastian and Antonio draw their swords.] (3.3.53-60SD)
As I’ve noted before, The Tempest is – perhaps unexpectedly – full of the language of sin and other theologically inflected vocabulary. But it’s striking that it’s Ariel who addresses the Neapolitans in these terms: is this a speech that Prospero has coached them in? Do they also have a concept of sin? (This is too realist a question, really.) Whatever, it’s a brilliantly fierce opening: You are three men of sin – three men, Alonso therefore included along with Antonio and Sebastian. A useful reminder to the audience, again, that he was involved in Antonio’s deposition of Prospero, for all that we might sympathise with his grief for Ferdinand, and to have decided that he’s nothing like as villainous as Antonio and Sebastian.
Ariel’s speech is dense. They are telling the Neapolitans that this is the moment at which all their sin catches up with them, because the lower world, that is, the material world and everything in it, is used as an instrument of destiny or fate. And accordingly they have been wrecked on this island, belched up by the never-surfeited, always hungry sea, in order to meet their doom. To describe the island as one where man doth not inhabit is obviously false, but the point that Ariel is making (or Prospero) is that these three men of sin are unfit to live among other people. They are uncivilised, barbaric, inhuman. (What that might mean is another question in which the play is interested.) They must be cast out, expelled, made abject. (This is a version of what Antonio did to Prospero.) I have made you mad, Ariel adds – and no matter how brave you think you are (they may already have drawn their swords at this point, with such-like valour) that madness might lead you to do desperate things, like hang and drown yourselves. The stage direction is editorial, but it seems reasonable that all three of Alonso, Antonio, and Sebastian, at least, draw their swords, and perhaps the others too. This is why the harpy needs to be properly frightening, otherworldly: Ariel here is a messenger, a dark angel, an agent of revenge, a fury. (Think of Philip Pullman’s terrifying, heart-breaking harpies in the land of the dead in The Amber Spyglass, too…)
