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 almshouses right well supplied;
And to the coffers of the king beside,

A thousand pounds by the year: thus runs the bill.
ELY. This would drink deep.

CANT.

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"T would drink the cup and all. 20 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 promised 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 the offending Adam out of him,

Holinshed in making him the leader of the plot against Henry IV's bill for confiscating church property.

self] selfsame.

4 scambling] bustling, turbulent. Cf. V, ii, 202, infra.

15 lazars] lepers.

19 A thousand pounds by the year] The chroniclers estimate £20,000 to be the capital sum requisitioned by the bill for the royal coffers. This amount at five per cent would produce £1,000 a year.

26 wildness, mortified in him] Cf. 2 Hen. IV, V, ii, 123: "my father is gone wild into his grave." "Mortified" means "being done to death.” 28 Consideration] Reflection, repentance.

Leaving his body as a paradise,

To envelope and contain celestial spirits.
Never was such a sudden scholar made;
Never came reformation in a flood,

With such a heady currance, 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 honey'd sentences;
So that the art and practic part of life

34 heady currance] impetuous flow.

35 Hydra-headed wilfulness] many headed, infinitely varied, waywardness. 45 cause of policy] question of state affairs.

48 The air, a charter'd libertine] Cf. As you like it, II, vii, 47–49: “I

must have liberty Withal, as large a charter as the wind, To blow on whom I please." The air has prescriptive freedom from restraint. 51 art and practic part of life] practical experience of life; cf. Meas. for Meas., I, i, 13: "Art and practice."

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, 60 And wholesome berries thrive and ripen best Neighbour'd by fruit of baser quality:

And so the prince obscured his contemplation
Under the veil of wildness; which, no doubt,
Grew like the summer grass, fastest by night,
Unseen, yet crescive in his faculty.

CANT. It must be so; for miracles are ceased;
And therefore we must needs admit the means
How things are perfected.

ELY.

But, my good lord,
How now for mitigation of this bill

Urged by the commons? Doth his majesty
Incline to it, or no?

CANT.

He seems indifferent,

Or rather swaying more upon our part

52 mistress to this theoric] the inspirer or teacher of this theoretical knowledge.

55 companies] companions, associates.

59 popularity] intercourse with the common people.

63 obscured his contemplation] concealed his devotion to study.

66 crescive in his faculty] growing by virtue of its inherent force. 73 swaying] inclining.

70

Than cherishing the 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 received, my lord?
CANT. With good acceptance of his majesty;
Save that there was not time enough to hear,
As I perceived his grace would fain have done,
The severals and unhidden passages

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms,
And generally to the crown and seat of France,
Derived from Edward, his great-grandfather.

80

ELY. What was the impediment that broke this off? 90 CANT. The French ambassador upon that instant Craved 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.

[Exeunt.

74 exhibiters] movers or proposers of the obnoxious bill in Parliament. Cf. M. Wives, II, i, 23: "I'll exhibit a bill in the Parliament." 86 The severals... passages] The details and clear or undoubted steps in the lineage.

89 Edward, his great-grandfather] Edward II, whose wife Isabella was daughter of Philip the Fair, King of France.

SCENE II-THE SAME

THE PRESENCE CHAMBER

Enter KING HENRY, GLOUCESTER, BEDFORD, EXETER, WARWICK, WESTMORELAND, and Attendants

K. HEN. Where is my gracious Lord of Canterbury? EXE. Not here in presence.

K. HEN. Send for him, good uncle. WEST. Shall we call in the ambassador, my liege? K. HEN. Not yet, my cousin: we would be resolved, Before we hear him, of some things of weight That task our thoughts, concerning us and France.

Enter the ARCHBISHOP of CANTERBURY and the BISHOP of ELY

CANT. God and his angels guard your sacred throne And make you long become it!

K. HEN.
Sure, we thank
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 you should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading,
Or nicely charge your understanding soul

4 resolved] satisfied.

11 the law Salique] the Salic law against the succession of females, which is fully described in lines 38-51, infra.

15 nicely charge. . . soul] by subtlety or sophistry oppress or injure your conscience, which knows the truth.

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