Cannot defend our own door from the dog,
Let us be worried; and our nation lose
The name of hardiness, and policy.
They tax our policy, and call it cowardice;
Count wisdom as no member of the war;
Forestall prescience, and esteem no act
But that of hand: the still and mental parts,-
That do contrive how many hands shall strike,
When fitness calls them on; and know, by measure
Of their observant toil, the enemies' weight,-
Why, this hath not a finger's dignity:
They call this-bed-work, mappery, closet-war.
So that the ram, that batters down the wall,
For the great swing and rudeness of his poise,
They place before his hand, that made the engine;
Or those, that with the fineness of their souls,
By reason guide his execution.
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.
20-i. 2.
Will you again unknit
This churlish knot of all-abhorred war ?
And move in that obedient orb again,
Where you did give a fair and natural light;
And be no more an exhaled meteor,
A prodigy of fear, and a portent
Of broached mischief to the unborn times? 18-v. 1.
'Tis better using France, than trusting:
Let us be back'd with God, and with the seas,
Which he hath given for fence impregnable,
And with their helps only defend ourselves;
In them, and in ourselves, our safety lies. 23-iv. 1.
The king-becoming graces,
Are justice, verity, temperance, stableness,
Bounty, perseverance, mercy, lowliness,
Devotion, patience, courage, fortitude.
That man, that sits within a monarch's heart,
And ripens in the sunshine of his favour,
Would he abuse the countenance of the king,
Alack, what mischiefs might be set abroach,
In shadow of such greatness!
Great princes' favourites their fair leaves spread,
But as the marigold at the sun's eye;
And in themselves their pride lies buried,
For at a frown they in their glory die.
The painful warrior famoused for fight,
After a thousand victories once foil'd,
Is from the book of honour razed quite,
And all the rest forgot for which he toil'd.
They do abuse the king that flatter him:
For flattery is the bellows blows up sin;
The thing the which is flatter'd, but a spark,
To which that breath gives heat and stronger glowing;
Whereas reproof, obedient and in order,
Fits kings, as they are men, for they may err.
Majesty might never yet endure
The moody frontier of a servant brow.
The strawberry grows underneath the nettle;
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.
The single and peculiar life is bound,
With all the strength and armour of the mind,
To keep itself from 'noyance; but much more
That spirit, upon whose weal depend and rest
The lives of many. The cease of majesty
Dies not alone; but, like a gulf, doth draw
What's near it, with it: it is a massy wheel,
Fix'd on the summit of the highest mount,
To whose huge spokes, ten thousand lesser things
Are mortised and adjoin'd; which, when it falls,
Each small annexment, petty consequence,
Attends the boist'rous ruin. Never alone
Did the king sigh, but with a general groan.
A sceptre, snatch'd with an unruly hand,
Must be as boisterously maintain'd as gain'd :
And he, that stands upon a slippery place,
Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up. 16-iii. 4.
The presence of a king engenders love
Amongst his subjects, and his loyal friends;
As it disanimates his enemies.
Never was monarch better fear'd and loved,
Than is your majesty; there's not, I think, a subject, That sits in heart-grief and uneasiness
Under the sweet shade of your government. 20-ii. 2.
Within the hollow crown,
That rounds the mortal temples of a king,
Keeps Death his court: and there the antic sits,
Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp;
Allowing him a breath, a little scene
To monarchize, be fear'd, and kill with looks;
Infusing him with self and vain conceit,-
As if this flesh, which walls about our life,
Were brass impregnable, and, humour'd thus,
Comes at the last, and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and farewell king!
We are no tyrant, but a Christian king;
Unto whose grace our passion is as subject,
As are our wretches, fetter'd in our prisons. 20-i. 2.
O hard condition! twin-born with greatness,
Subjected to the breath of every fool,
Whose sense no more can feel but his own wringing! What infinite heart's ease must kings neglect,
That private men enjoy ?
And what have kings that privates have not too,
Save ceremony, save general ceremony ?
And what art thou, thou idol ceremony?
What kind of god art thou, that suffer'st more
Of mortal griefs, than do thy worshippers?
What are thy rents? what are thy comings-in?
O ceremony, show me but thy worth!
What is the soul of adoration?
Art thou aught else but place, degree, and form,
Creating awe and fear in other men?
Wherein thou art less happy being fear'd
What drink'st thou oft, instead of homage sweet,
But poison'd flattery? O, be sick, great greatness,
And bid thy ceremony give thee cure!
Think'st thou, the fiery fever will go out
With titles blown from adulation?
Will it give place to flexure and low bending?
Canst thou, when thou command'st the beggar's knee,
Command the health of it? No, thou proud dream,
That play'st so subtly with a king's repose.
'Tis not the balm, the sceptre, and the ball, The sword, the mace, the crown imperial,
The enter-tissued robe of gold and pearl,
The farced title running 'fore the king.
The throne he sits on, nor the tide of pomp
That beats upon the high shore of this world-
No, not all these, thrice-gorgeous ceremony,
Not all these, laid in bed majestical,
Can sleep so soundly as the wretched slave:
Who, with a body fill'd, and vacant mind,
Gets him to rest, cramm'd with distressful bread;
Never sees horrid night, the child of hell;
But, like a lackey, from the rise to set,
Sweats in the eye of Phœbus, and all night
Sleeps in Elysium; next day, after dawn,
Doth rise, and help Hyperion to his horse;
And follows so the ever-running year
With profitable labour, to his grave:
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch,
Winding up days with toil, and nights with sleep,
Had the fore-hand and vantage of a king. 20-iv. 1.
Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade
To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep,
Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy
To kings, that fear their subjects' treachery?
O, yes, it doth; a thousand-fold it doth.
The shepherd's homely curds,
His cold thin drink out of his leather bottle,
His wonted sleep under a fresh tree's shade,
All which secure and sweetly he enjoys,
Is far beyond a prince's delicates,
His viands sparkling in a golden cup,
His body couched in a curious bed,
When care, mistrust, and treason wait on him.
The colour of the king doth come and go,
Between his purpose and his conscience,
Like heralds 'twixt two dreadful battles set.
O polish'd perturbation! golden care!
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