The Complete Poems of Percy Bysshe Shelley
Strafford. A rod in pickle for the Fool’s back!
Archy. Ay, and some are now smiling whose tears will make the brine; for the Fool sees—–
Strafford. Insolent! You shall have your coat turned and be whipped out of the palace for this.
Archy. When all the fools are whipped, and all the Protestant writers, while the knaves are whipping the fools ever since a thief was set to catch a thief. If all turncoats were whipped out of palaces, poor Archy would be disgraced in good company. Let the knaves whip the fools, and all the fools laugh at it. [Let the] wise and godly slit each other’s noses and ears (having no need of any sense of discernment in their craft); and the knaves, to marshal them, join in a procession to Bedlam, to entreat the madmen to omit their sublime Platonic contemplations, and manage the state of England. Let all the honest men who lie [pinched?] up at the prisons or the pillories, in custody of the pursuivants of the High-Commission Court, marshal them.
Enter Secretary LYTTELTON, with papers.
King (looking over the papers). These stiff Scots
His Grace of Canterbury must take order
To force under the Church’s yoke.—You, Wentworth,
Shall be myself in Ireland, and shall add
Your wisdom, gentleness, and energy,
To what in me were wanting.—My Lord Weston,
70
Look that those merchants draw not without loss
Their bullion from the Tower; and, on the payment
Of shipmoney, take fullest compensation
For violation of our royal forests,
Whose limits, from neglect, have been o’ergrown
75
With cottages and cornfields. The uttermost
Farthing exact from those who claim exemption
From knighthood: that which once was a reward
Shall thus be made a punishment, that subjects
May know how majesty can wear at will
80
The rugged mood.—My Lord of Coventry,
Lay my command upon the Courts below
That bail be not accepted for the prisoners
Under the warrant of the Star Chamber.
The people shall not find the stubbornness
85
Of Parliament a cheap or easy method
Of dealing with their rightful sovereign:
And doubt not this, my Lord of Coventry,
We will find time and place for fit rebuke.—
My Lord of Canterbury.
Archy. The fool is here.
90
Laud. I crave permission of your Majesty
To order that this insolent fellow be
Chastised: he mocks the sacred character,
Scoffs at the state, and—
King. What, my Archy?
He mocks and mimics all he sees and hears,
95
Yet with a quaint and graceful licence—Prithee
For this once do not as Prynne would, were he
Primate of England. With your Grace’s leave,
He lives in his own world; and, like a parrot
Hung in his gilded prison from the window
100
Of a queen’s bower over the public way,
Blasphemes with a bird’s mind:—his words, like arrows
Which know no aim beyond the archer’s wit,
Strike sometimes what eludes philosophy.—
(To ARCHY.) Go, sirrah, and repent of your offence
105
Ten minutes in the rain; be it your penance
To bring news how the world goes there.
[Exit ARCHY.
Poor Archy!
He weaves about himself a world of mirth
Out of the wreck of ours.
Laud. I take with patience, as my Master did,
All scoffs permitted from above.
110
King. My lord,
Pray overlook these papers. Archy’s words
Had wings, but these have talons.
Queen. And the lion
That wears them must be tamed. My dearest lord,
I see the new-born courage in your eye
115
Armed to strike dead the Spirit of the Time,
Which spurs to rage the many-headed beast.
Do thou persist: for, faint but in resolve,
And it were better thou hadst still remained
The slave of thine own slaves, who tear like curs
120
The fugitive, and flee from the pursuer;
And Opportunity, that empty wolf,
Flies at his throat who falls. Subdue thy actions
Even to the disposition of thy purpose,
And be that tempered as the Ebro’s steel;
125
And banish weak-eyed Mercy to the weak,
Whence she will greet thee with a gift of peace,
And not betray thee with a traitor’s kiss,
As when she keeps the company of rebels,
Who think that she is Fear. This do, lest we
130
Should fall as from a glorious pinnacle
In a bright dream, and wake as from a dream
Out of our worshipped state.
King. Belovèd friend,
God is my witness that this weight of power,
Which He sets me my earthly task to wield
135
Under His law, is my delight and pride
Only because thou lovest that and me.
For a king bears the office of a God
To all the under world; and to his God
Alone he must deliver up his trust,
140
Unshorn of its permitted attributes.
[It seems] now as the baser elements
Had mutinied against the golden sun
That kindles them to harmony, and quells
Their self-destroying rapine. The wild million
145
Strike at the eye that guides them; like as humours
Of the distempered body that conspire
Against the spirit of life throned in the heart,—
And thus become the prey of one another,
And last of death.
Strafford. That which would be ambition in a subject
150
Is duty in a sovereign; for on him,
As on a keystone, hangs the arch of life,
Whose safety is its strength. Degree and form,
And all that makes the age of reasoning man
More memorable than a beast’s, depend on this—
155
That Right should fence itself inviolably
With Power; in which respect the state of England
From usurpation by the insolent commons
Cries for reform.
Get treason, and spare treasure. Fee with coin
160
The loudest murmurers; feed with jealousies
Opposing factions,—be thyself of none;
And borrow gold of many, for those who lend
Will serve thee till thou payest them; and thus
Keep the fierce spirit of the hour at bay,
165
Till time, and its coming generations
Of nights and days unborn, bring some one chance,
· · · · · · ·
Or war or pestilence or Nature’s self,—
By some distemperature or terrible sign,
Be as an arbiter betwixt themselves.
170
Nor let your Majesty
Doubt here the peril of the unseen event.
How did your brother Kings, coheritors
In your high interest in the subject earth,
Rise past such troubles to that height of power
175
Where now they sit, and awfully serene
Smile on the trembling world? Such popular storms
Philip the Second of Spain, this Lewis of France,
And late the German head
of many bodies,
And every petty lord of Italy,
180
Quelled or by arts or arms. Is England poorer
Or feebler? or art thou who wield’st her power
Tamer than they? or shall this island be—
[Girdled] by its inviolable waters—
To the world present and the world to come
185
Sole pattern of extinguished monarchy?
Not if thou dost as I would have thee do.
King. Your words shall be my deeds:
You speak the image of my thought. My friend
(If Kings can have a friend, I call thee so),
190
Beyond the large commission which [belongs]
Under the great seal of the realm, take this:
And, for some obvious reasons, let there be
No seal on it, except my kingly word
And honour as I am a gentleman.
195
Be—as thou art within my heart and mind—
Another self, here and in Ireland:
Do what thou judgest well, take amplest licence,
And stick not even at questionable means.
Hear me, Wentworth. My word is as a wall
200
Between thee and this world thine enemy—
That hates thee, for thou lovest me.
Strafford. I own
No friend but thee, no enemies but thine:
Thy lightest thought is my eternal law.
How weak, how short, is life to pay—–
King. Peace, peace.
Thou ow’st me nothing yet.
205
(To LAUD.) My lord, what say
Those papers?
Laud. Your Majesty has ever interposed,
In lenity towards your native soil,
Between the heavy vengeance of the Church
210
And Scotland. Mark the consequence of warming
This brood of northern vipers in your bosom.
The rabble, instructed no doubt
By Loudon, Lindsay, Hume, and false Argyll
(For the waves never menace heaven until
215
Scourged by the wind’s invisible tyranny),
Have in the very temple of the Lord
Done outrage to His chosen ministers.
They scorn the liturgy of the Holy Church,
Refuse to obey her canons, and deny
220
The apostolic power with which the Spirit
Has filled its elect vessels, even from him
Who held the keys with power to loose and bind,
To him who now pleads in this royal presence.—
Let ample powers and new instructions be
225
Sent to the High Commissioners in Scotland.
To death, imprisonment, and confiscation,
Add torture, add the ruin of the kindred
Of the offender, add the brand of infamy,
Add mutilation: and if this suffice not,
230
Unleash the sword and fire, that in their thirst
They may lick up that scum of schismatics.
I laugh at those weak rebels who, desiring
What we possess, still prate of Christian peace,
As if those dreadful arbitrating messengers
235
Which play the part of God ’twixt right and wrong,
Should be let loose against the innocent sleep
Of templed cities and the smiling fields,
For some poor argument of policy
Which touches our own profit or our pride
240
(Where it indeed were Christian charity
To turn the cheek even to the smiter’s hand);
And, when our great Redeemer, when our God,
When He who gave, accepted, and retained
Himself in propitiation of our sins,
245
Is scorned in His immediate ministry,
With hazard of the inestimable loss
Of all the truth and discipline which is
Salvation to the extremest generation
Of men innumerable, they talk of peace!
250
Such peace as Canaan found, let Scotland now;
For, by that Christ who came to bring a sword,
Not peace, upon the earth, and gave command
To His disciples at the Passover
That each should sell his robe and buy a sword,—
255
Once strip that minister of naked wrath,
And it shall never sleep in peace again
Till Scotland bend or break.
King. My Lord Archbishop,
Do what thou wilt and what thou canst in this.
Thy earthly even as thy heavenly King
260
Gives thee large power in his unquiet realm.
But we want money, and my mind misgives me
That for so great an enterprise, as yet,
We are unfurnished.
Strafford. Yet it may not long
Rest on our wills.
Cottington. The expenses
265
Of gathering shipmoney, and of distraining
For every petty rate (for we encounter
A desperate opposition inch by inch
In every warehouse and on every farm),
Have swallowed up the gross sum of the imposts;
270
So that, though felt as a most grievous scourge
Upon the land, they stand us in small stead
As touches the receipt.
Strafford. ’Tis a conclusion
Most arithmetical: and thence you infer
Perhaps the assembling of a parliament.
275
Now, if a man should call his dearest enemies
To sit in licensed judgement on his life,
His Majesty might wisely take that course.
[Aside to COTTINGTON.
It is enough to expect from these lean imposts
That they perform the office of a scourge,
280
Without more profit. (Aloud.) Fines and confiscations,
And a forced loan from the refractory city,
Will fill our coffers: and the golden love
Of loyal gentlemen and noble friends
For the worshipped father of our common country,
285
With contributions from the catholics,
Will make Rebellion pale in our excess.
Be these the expedients until time and wisdom
Shall frame a settled state of government.
Laud. And weak expedients they! Have we not drained
290
All, till the which seemed
A mine exhaustless?
Strafford. And the love which is,
If loyal hearts could turn their blood to gold.
Laud. Both now grow barren: and I speak it not
As loving parliaments, which, as they have been
295
In the right hand of bold bad mighty kings
The scourges of the bleeding Church, I hate.
Methinks they scarcely can deserve our fear.
Strafford. Oh! my dear liege, take back the wealth thou gavest:
With that, take all I held, but as in trust
300
For thee, of mine inheritance: leave me but
This unprovided body for thy service,
And a mind dedicated to no care
Except thy safety:—but assemble not
A parliament. Hundreds will bring, like me,
305
Their fortunes, as they would their blood, before—–
King. No! thou who judgest them art but one. Alas!
We should be too much out of love with Heaven,
Did this vile world show many such as thee,
Thou perfect, just, and honourable man!
310
Neve
r shall it be said that Charles of England
Stripped those he loved for fear of those he scorns;
Nor will he so much misbecome his throne
As to impoverish those who most adorn
And best defend it. That you urge, dear Strafford,
Inclines me rather—
315
Queen. To a parliament?
Is this thy firmness? and thou wilt preside
Over a knot of censurers,
To the unswearing of thy best resolves,
And choose the worst, when the worst comes too soon?
320
Plight not the worst before the worst must come.
Oh, wilt thou smile whilst our ribald foes,
Dressed in their own usurped authority,
Sharpen their tongues on Henrietta’s fame?
It is enough! Thou lovest me no more!
[Weeps.
King. Oh, Henrietta!
[They talk apart.
325
Cottington (to LAUD). Money we have none:
And all the expedients of my Lord of Strafford
Will scarcely meet the arrears.
Laud. Without delay
An army must be sent into the north;
Followed by a Commission of the Church,
330
With amplest power to quench in fire and blood,
And tears and terror, and the pity of hell,
The intenser wrath of Heresy. God will give
Victory; and victory over Scotland give
The lion England tamed into our hands.
That will lend power, and power bring gold.