Enter PEMBROKE, SALISBURY, and Bioor. This gentle offer of the perilous time. Pem. Who brought that letter from the cardinal? Big. To-morrow morning let us meet him then. Bast. Once more to-day well met, distemper'd lords! The king, by me, requests your presence straight. Sal. The king hath dispossess'd himself of us; We will not line his thin bestained cloak With our pure honours, nor attend the foot That leaves the print of blood where'er it walks : Return, and tell him so; we know the worst. Bast. Whate'er you think, good words, I think, were best. Sal. Our griefs, and not our manners, reason now,3 Bast. But there is little reason in your grief; Therefore, 'twere reason, you had manners now. Pem. Sir, sir, impatience hath his privilege. Bast. 'Tis true; to hurt his master, no man else. Sal. This is the prison: What is he lies here ? [Seeing ARTHUR. Pem. O death, made proud with pure and princely beauty! The earth had not a hole to hide this deed. Sal. Murder, as hating what himself hath done, Doth lay it open, to urge on revenge. Big. Or, when he doom'd this beauty to a grave, Found it too precious-princely for a grave. Sal. Sir Richard, what think you? Have you beheld, Or have you read, or heard? or could you think? Or do you almost think, although you see, [1] i. e. whose private account of the Dauphin's affection to our cause is much more ample than the letters POPE. [2] This phrase, so frequent in our old writers, is not well understood. Or iş here the same as ere, i. e. before. PERCY. [3] To reason, in Shakespeare, is not so often to argue, as to talk. JOHNSON. 5 VOL. V. That you do see? could thought, without this object, Pem. All murders past do stand excus'd in this : Shall give a holiness, a purity, To the yet-unbegotten sin of time; Bast. It is a damned and a bloody work; Sal. If that be the work of any hand ?— Nor conversant with ease and idleness, By giving it the worship of revenge. Pem. Big. Our souls religiously confirm thy words. Hub. Lords, I am hot with haste in seeking you Hub. I am no villain. Sal. Must I rob the law? [Drawing his sword. Bast. Your sword is bright, sir; put it up again. Hub. Stand back, lord Salisbury, stand back, I say; [4] This is a copy of the vows made in the ages of superstition and chivalry. [5] The worship is the dignity, the honour. rates. JOHNSON. JOHNSON. We still say worshipful of magis By heaven, I think, my sword's as sharp as yours: Big. Out, dunghill! dar'st thou brave a nobleman ? Sal. Thou art a murderer. Hub. Do not prove me so; Yet, I am none? Whose tongue soe'er speaks false, Bast. Keep the peace, I say. Sal. Stand by, or I shall gall you, Faulconbridge. Hub. Lord Bigot, I am none. Big. Who kill'd this prince? Hub. 'Tis not an hour since I left him well : I honour'd him, I lov'd him; and will weep My date of life out, for his sweet life's loss. ; Sal. Trust not those cunning waters of his eyes, Big. Away, toward Bury, to the Dauphin there! Pem. There, tell the king, he may inquire us out. [Exeunt Lords. Bast. Here's a good world!-Knew you of this fair work? Beyond the infinite and boundless reach [6] Honest defence; defence in a good cause. JOHNSON. [7] Do not make me a murderer, by compelling me to kill you; I am hitherto not a murderer. JOHNSON. Of mercy, if thou didst this deed of death, Hub. Do but hear me, sir. Bast. Ha! I'll tell thee what; Thou art damn'd as black-nay, nothing is so black; As thou shalt be, if thou didst kill this child. Bast. If thou didst but consent To this most cruel act, do but despair, And, if thou want'st a cord, the smallest thread A beam to hang thee on; or would'st thou drown thyself, And it shall be as all the ocean, Enough to stifle such a villain up.— I do suspect thee very grievously. Hub. If I in act, consent, or sin of thought Bast. Go, bear him in thine arms.— [8] I remember once to have met with a book, printed in the time of Henry VIII, (which Shakespeare possibly might have seen,) where we are told that the defor mity of the condemned in the other world, is exactly proportioned to the degrees of their guilt The author of it observes how difficult it would be, on this account, to distinguish between Belzebub and Judas Iscariot. STEEVENS. [9] Scamble and scramble have the same meaning. STEEVENS. [1] That is, the interest which is not at this moment legally possessed by any one, However rightfully entitled to it. On the death of Arthur, the right to the English crown devolved to his sister, Eleanor. MALONE. Now powers from home, and discontents at home, [Exeunt ACT V. SCENE I.-The same. A room in the Palace. Enter King JOHN, PANDULPH with the Crown, and Attendants. King John. THUS have I yielded up into your hand, The circle of my glory. Pand. Take again [Giving Joux the Crown. From this my hand, as holding of the pope, Your sovereign greatness and authority. K. John. Now keep your holy word: ge meet the French; And from his holiness use all your power To stop their marches, 'fore we are inflam'd. Our discontented counties do revolt; Our people quarrel with obedience; Swearing allegiance, and the love of soul, Then pause not; for the present time's so sick, That present medicine must be minister'd, Or overthrow incurable ensues. Pand. It was my breath that blew this tempest up, Upon your stubborn usage of the pope : But, since you are a gentle convertite,3 My tongue shall hush again this storm of war, [2] Wrested pomp, is greatness obtained by violence. JOHNSON. |