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KING HENRY V.

ACT I.

SCENE I.-London. An Ante-chamber in the King's Palace. Enter the Archbishop of CANTERBURY, and Bishop of ELY.

Canterbury.

My lord, I'll tell you, that self bill is urg'd,
Which, in th' eleventh year o' th' last king's reign
Was like, and had indeed against us pass'd,
But that the scambling and unquiet time
Did push it out of further question.

Ely. But how, my lord, shall we resist it now?
Cant. It must be thought on. If it pass against us,
We lose the better half of our possession:
For all the temporal lands, which men devout
By testament have given to the church,

Would they strip from us; being valued thus,-
As much as would maintain, to the king's honour,
Full fifteen earls, and fifteen hundred knights;
Six thousand and two hundred good esquires ;
And, to relief of lazars, and weak age,
Of indigent faint souls, past corporal toil,
A hundred alms-houses, right well supplied;

And to the coffers of the king beside,

A thousand pounds by th' year: Thus runs the bill.
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 courses of his youth promis'd it not.
The breath no sooner left his father's body,
But that his wildness, mortified in him,
Seem'd to die too: yea, at that very moment,
Consideration like an angel came,

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

To envelop and contain celestial spirits."
Never was such a sudden scholar made :
Never came reformation in a flood,"
With such a heady current, scouring faults;
Nor never Hydra-headed wilfulness

So soon did lose his seat, and all at once,
As in this king.

Ely. We are blessed in the change.

Cant. Hear him but reason in divinity,
And, all-admiring, with an inward wish

You would desire, the king were made a prelate :
Hear him debate of commonwealth affairs,

You would say,—it hath been all-in-all his study :
List his discourse of war, and you shall hear
A fearful battle render'd you in music :
Turn him to any cause of policy,

The Gordian knot of it he will unloose,
Familiar as his garter; that, when he speaks,
The air, a charter'd libertine, is still,"
And the mute wonder lurketh in men's ears,
To steal his sweet and honeyed sentences;
So that the art and practic part of life,
Must be the mistress to this theoric :

Which is a wonder, how his grace should glean it,
Since his addiction was to courses 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 sequestration
From open haunts and popularity.'

Ely. The strawberry grows underneath the nettle ;
And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best,
Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality:
And so the prince obscur'd his contemplation
Under the veil of wildness; which, no doubt,
Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night,

out

[5] As paradise, when sin and Adam were driven out by the angel, became the his follies, is now the receptacle of wisdom and of virtue. JOHNSON. [6] Alluding to the method by which Hercules cleansed the famous stables, when be turned a river through them. Hercules is still in our author's head when be

mentions the Hydra. JOHNSON.

[7] This line is exquisitely beautiful. JOHNSON,

8Theoric is what terminates in speculation. STEEVENS.

19] Companies for companions. MALONE.

[1] That is plebeian intercourse. STEEVENS.

Unseen, yet cressive 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.

Ely. But, my good lord,

How now for mitigation of this bill

Urg'd by the commons? Doth his majesty
Incline to it, or no?

Cant. He seems indifferent ;

Or, rather, swaying more upon our part,
Than cherishing th' exhibiters against us :
For I have made an offer to his majesty,-
Upon our spiritual convocation;

And in regard of causes now in hand,
Which I have open'd to his grace at large,
As touching France,-to give a greater sum
Than ever at one time the clergy yet
Did to his predecessors part withal.

Ely. How did this offer seem receiv'd, my lord?
Cant. With good acceptance of his majesty ;
Save, that there was not time enough to hear
(As, I perceiv'd, his grace would fain have done)
The severals, and unhidden passages,3

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms;
And, generally, to the crown and seat of France,
Deriv'd from Edward, his great grandfather.

Ely. What was th' impediment that broke this off?
Cant. The French ambassador, upon that instant,
Crav'd audience: and the hour, I think, is come,
To give him hearing: Is it four o'clock ?
Ely. It is.

Cant. Then go we in, to know his embassy;
Which I could, with a ready guess, declare,
Before the Frenchman speak a word of it.

Ely. I'll wait upon you; and I long to hear it. [Exe.

SCENE II.-The same. A room of state in the same. Enter King HENRY, GLOSTER, BEDFORD, EXETER, WarWICK, WESTMORELAND, and Attendants.

K. Hen. Where is my gracious lord of Canterbury? Exe. Not here in presence.

[2] Increasing in its proper power. JOHNSON.

"Crescit occulto velut arbor ævo

"Fama Marcelli." STEEVENS.

[3] This line I suspect of corruption, though it may be fairly enough explained:

K. Hen. Send for him, good uncle.

West. Shall we call in th' ambassador, my liege? K. Hen. Not yet, my cousin; we would be resolv'd, Before we hear him, of some things of weight, That task our thoughts, concerning us and France. Enter the Archbishop of CANTERBURY, and Bishop of ELY. Cant. God, and his angels, guard your sacred throne, And make you long become it!

K. Hen. Sure, we thank you.

My learned lord, we pray you to proceed;
And justly and religiously unfold,

Why the law Salique, that they have in France,
Or should, or should not, bar us in our claim.
And God forbid, my dear and faithful lord,

you

That should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading,
Or nicely charge your understanding soul'

With opening titles miscreate, whose right.
Suits not in native colours with the truth;
For God doth know, how many, now in health,
Shall drop their blood in approbation

Of what your reverence shall incite us to:
Therefore take heed how you impawn our person,
How you awake the sleeping sword of war;
We charge you in the name of God, take heed:
For never two such kingdoms did contend,
Without much fall of blood; whose guiltless drops
Are every one a woe, a sore complaint,

'Gainst him, whose wrongs give edge unto the swords That make such waste in brief mortality.

Under this conjuration, speak, my lord:

And we will hear, note, and believe in heart,

That what you speak is in your conscience wash'd

As pure as sin with baptism.

Cant. Then hear me, gracious sovereign, and you peers, That owe your lives, your faith, and services,

To this imperial throne ;-There is no bar

the passages of his titles of the lines of succession by which his claims descended Unhidden is open, clear. JOHNSON.

[4] Take heed, lest by nice and subtle sophistry you burthen your knowing soul, or knowingly burthen your soul, with the guilt of advancing a false title, or of main taining, by specious fallacies, a claim which, if shown in its native and true colours, would appear to be false. JOHNSON.

[5] The allusion bere is to the game of chess, and to the disposition of the pawns with respect to the King, at the commencement of this mimetic contest. HENLEY. [6] This whole speech is copied (in a manner verbatim) from Hall's Chronicle, Henry V. year the second, folio iv. XX. XXX. xl. &c. POPE.

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