Page images
PDF
EPUB

And, princes, all, believe me I beseech you
My father is gone wild into his grave;
For in his tomb lie my affections;
And with his fpirit fadly I furvive,
To mock the expectations of the world
To frustrate prophecies, and to raze out
Rotten opinion, which hath writ me down
After my feeming. Though my tide of blood
Hath proudly flow'd in vanity till now;
Now doth it turn and ebb back to the fea,
Where it shall mingle with the state of floods,
And flow henceforth in formal majesty.
Now call we our high court of parliament;
And let us choose fuch limbs of noble counfel,
That the great body of our state may go
In equal rank with the best govern'd nation ;
That war or peace, or both at once, may be
As things acquainted and familiar to us,
In which you, father, fhall have foremost hand.
Our coronation done, we will accite

(As I before remember'd) all our flate,
And (Heav'n configning to my good intents)
No prince, nor peer, fhall have juft caufe to fay,
Heav'n fhorten Harry's happy life one day.

SHAKESPEARE.

CHAP. XII.

ARCHBISHOP OF CANTERBURY AND BISHOP

OF ELY.

CANT. MY Lord, I'll tell you; that felf bill is urg'd,

Which, in th' eleventh year o' th' laft King's reign,

Was

[ocr errors][merged small]

Was like, and had indeed againft us pafs'd,
But that the fcrambling and unquiet time
Did push it out of further question.

ELY. But how, my Lord, fhall we resist it now?
CANT. It must be thought on. If it pass against us,
We lofe the better half of our poffeffions:

For all the temporal lands which men devout
By teftament have given to the church,
Would they strip from us: being valu'd thus ;
As much as would maintain, to the king's honour,
Full fifteen Earls, and fifteen hundred Knights,
Six thousand and two hundred good Efquires;
And to relief of lazars, and weak age

Of indigent faint fouls, paft corporal toil,
A hundred alms-houfes, right well fupply'd;
And to the coffers of the king, beside,

Thus runs the bill,

A thousand pounds by th' year.
ELY. This would drink deep.
CANT. 'Twould drink the cup and all.
ELY. But what prevention ?

CANT. The king is full of

grace and fair regard.

ELY. And a true lover of the holy church.

CANT. The courfes of his youth promis'd it not

The breath no fooner left his father's body,

But that his wildnefs, mortify'd in him,
Seem'd' to die too; yea, at the very moment,
Confideration, like an angel, came,

And whipp'd th' offending Adam out of him,
Leaving his body as a paradife,

'T invelope and contain celeftial spirits.
Never was such a sudden scholar made;
Never came reformation in a flood

With fuch a heady current, fcouring faults:
Nor ever Hydra-headed wilfulness

So foon did lofe his feat, and all at once,
As in this king.

ELY. We're bleffed in the change.

CANT. Hear him but reason in divinity,
And all admiring, with an inward wish
You would defire, the king were made a prelate,
Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs,
You'd fay, it had been all in all his study.
Lift his discourse of war, and you fhall hear
A fearful battle rendered you in music.
Turn him to any cause of policy,

The Gordian knot of it he will unloose,
Familiar as his garter. When he speaks,
The air, a charter'd libertine, is ftill;
And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears,
To steal his sweet and honey'd sentences:
So that the act, and practic part of life,
Must be the mistress to this theorique.
Which is a wonder how his grace fhould glean it,
Since his addiction was to courfes vain ;
His companies unletter'd, rude, and shallow;
His hours fill'd up with riots, banquets, sports;
And never noted in him any study,

Any retirement, any fequeftration,

From open haunts, and popularity.

ELY. The ftrawberry grows underneath the nettle,
And wholesome berries thrive and ripen beft,
Neighbour'd by fruit of bafer quality :
And fo the prince obfcur'd his contemplation
Under the veil of wildness; which, no doubt,

[blocks in formation]

Grew like the fummer-grass, fastest by night,
Unfeen, yet creffive in his faculty.

CANT. It must be so: for miracles are ceas'd:
And therefore we must needs admit the means,

How things are perfected.

SHAKSPEARE.

CHAP. XIII.

·HAMLET AND HORATIO.

~HOR. HAIL to your lordship !

HAM. I am glad to see you well; Horatio,or I do forget myself.

HOR. The fame, my lord, and your poor fervant ever. HAM. Sir, my good friend; I'll change that name with

you.

And what makes you from Wittenberg, Horatio ?

HOR. A truant difpofition, good my lord,
HAM. I would not hear your enemy say so;

Nor fhall you do mine ear that violence,
To make it trufter of your own report
Against yourself. I know you are no truant ;
But what is your affair in Elfinore ?

We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart.

HOR. My lord, I came to see your father's funeral.
HAM. I pr'ythee do not mock me, fellow-ftudent;

I think it was to fee my mother's wedding.

HOR. Indeed, my lord, it follow'd hard

upon.

HAM. Thrift, thrift, Horatio; the funeral bak'd meats Did coldly furnish forth the marriage-tables.

Would I had met my dearest foe in heav'n,

Or

[ocr errors]

Or ever I had feen that day, Horatio!

My father methinks I fee my father.
HOR. Oh! where, my lord ?

HAM. In my mind's eye, Horatio.

HOR. I faw him once, he was a goodly king.
HAM. He was a man, take him for all in all,
I fhall not look upon his like again.

HOR. My lord, I think I saw him yesternight.
HAM. Saw!-who?

HOR. My lord, the king your father.
HAM. The king, my father!

HOR. Season your admiration but a while,

With an attentive ear; till I deliver,

Upon the witness of these gentlemen,

This marvel to you.

HAM. For Heaven's love, let me hear.

HOR. Two nights together had these gentlemen,
Marcellus and Bernardo, on their watch,

In the dead waste and middle of the night,
Been thus encounter'd: A figure, like
Arm'd at all points exactly, cap-à-pè,

your

father,

Appears before them, and with folemn march
Goes flow and ftately by them; thrice he walk'd
By their opprefs'd and fear-surprised eyes,
Within his truncheon's length; whilst they (diftill'a
Almost to jelly with the effect of fear)

Stand dumb, and speak not to him. This to me
In dreadful fecrecy impart they did,

And I with them the third night kept the watch:
Where, as they had deliver'd both in time,
Form of the thing, each word made true and good,

[blocks in formation]
« PreviousContinue »