Henry VI, Part I - William Shakespeare (ink ebook reader .txt) 📗
- Author: William Shakespeare
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Or aught intend’st to lay unto my charge,
Do it without invention, suddenly;
As I with sudden and extemporal speech
Purpose to answer what thou canst object. Gloucester
Presumptuous priest! this place commands my patience,
Or thou shouldst find thou hast dishonour’d me.
Think not, although in writing I preferr’d
The manner of thy vile outrageous crimes,
That therefore I have forged, or am not able
Verbatim to rehearse the method of my pen:
No, prelate; such is thy audacious wickedness,
Thy lewd, pestiferous and dissentious pranks,
As very infants prattle of thy pride.
Thou art a most pernicious usurer,
Forward by nature, enemy to peace;
Lascivious, wanton, more than well beseems
A man of thy profession and degree;
And for thy treachery, what’s more manifest?
In that thou laid’st a trap to take my life,
As well at London bridge as at the Tower.
Beside, I fear me, if thy thoughts were sifted,
The king, thy sovereign, is not quite exempt
From envious malice of thy swelling heart.
Gloucester, I do defy thee. Lords, vouchsafe
To give me hearing what I shall reply.
If I were covetous, ambitious or perverse,
As he will have me, how am I so poor?
Or how haps it I seek not to advance
Or raise myself, but keep my wonted calling?
And for dissension, who preferreth peace
More than I do?—except I be provoked.
No, my good lords, it is not that offends;
It is not that that hath incensed the duke:
It is, because no one should sway but he;
No one but he should be about the king;
And that engenders thunder in his breast
And makes him roar these accusations forth.
But he shall know I am as good—
As good!
Thou bastard of my grandfather!
Ay, lordly sir; for what are you, I pray,
But one imperious in another’s throne?
Yes, as an outlaw in a castle keeps
And useth it to patronage his theft.
Thou art reverent
Touching thy spiritual function, not thy life.
Methinks my lord should be religious
And know the office that belongs to such.
Methinks his lordship should be humbler;
It fitteth not a prelate so to plead.
State holy or unhallow’d, what of that?
Is not his grace protector to the king?
Aside. Plantagenet, I see, must hold his tongue,
Lest it be said “Speak, sirrah, when you should;
Must your bold verdict enter talk with lords?”
Else would I have a fling at Winchester.
Uncles of Gloucester and of Winchester,
The special watchmen of our English weal,
I would prevail, if prayers might prevail,
To join your hearts in love and amity.
O, what a scandal is it to our crown,
That two such noble peers as ye should jar!
Believe me, lords, my tender years can tell
Civil dissension is a viperous worm
That gnaws the bowels of the commonwealth. A noise within, “Down with the tawny-coats!”
What tumult’s this?
An uproar, I dare warrant,
Begun through malice of the bishop’s men. A noise again, “Stones! stones!”
O, my good lords, and virtuous Henry,
Pity the city of London, pity us!
The bishop and the Duke of Gloucester’s men,
Forbidden late to carry any weapon,
Have fill’d their pockets full of pebble stones
And banding themselves in contrary parts
Do pelt so fast at one another’s pate
That many have their giddy brains knock’d out:
Our windows are broke down in every street
And we for fear compell’d to shut our shops.
We charge you, on allegiance to ourself,
To hold your slaughtering hands and keep the peace.
Pray, uncle Gloucester, mitigate this strife.
You of my household, leave this peevish broil
And set this unaccustom’d fight aside.
My lord, we know your grace to be a man
Just and upright; and, for your royal birth,
Inferior to none but to his majesty:
And ere that we will suffer such a prince,
So kind a father of the commonweal,
To be disgraced by an inkhorn mate,
We and our wives and children all will fight
And have our bodies slaughtered by thy foes.
Ay, and the very parings of our nails
Shall pitch a field when we are dead. Begin again.
Stay, stay, I say!
And if you love me, as you say you do,
Let me persuade you to forbear awhile.
O, how this discord doth afflict my soul!
Can you, my Lord of Winchester, behold
My sighs and tears and will not once relent?
Who should be pitiful, if you be not?
Or who should study to prefer a peace,
If holy churchmen take delight in broils?
Yield, my lord protector; yield, Winchester;
Except you mean with obstinate repulse
To slay your sovereign and destroy the realm.
You see what mischief and what murder too
Hath been enacted through your enmity;
Then be at peace, except ye thirst for blood.
Compassion on the king commands me stoop;
Or I would see his heart out, ere the priest
Should ever get that privilege of me.
Behold, my Lord of Winchester, the duke
Hath banish’d moody discontented fury,
As by his smoothed brows it doth appear:
Why look you still so stern and tragical?
Fie, uncle Beaufort! I have heard you preach
That malice was a great and grievous sin;
And will not you maintain the thing you teach,
But prove a chief offender in the same?
Sweet king! the bishop hath a kindly gird.
For shame, my lord of Winchester, relent!
What, shall a child instruct you what to do?
Well, Duke of Gloucester, I will yield to thee;
Love for thy love and hand for hand I give.
Aside. Ay, but, I fear me, with a hollow heart.—
See here, my friends and loving countrymen;
This token serveth for a flag of truce
Betwixt ourselves
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