[Flinging up caps.]
DOLL.
And Doll desires it from her very heart,
More’s name may live for this right noble part;
And whensoere we talk of ill May day,
Praise More….
SURREY.
In hope his highness’ clemency and mercy,
Which in the arms of mild and meek compassion
Would rather clip you, as the loving nurse
Oft doth the wayward infant, then to leave you
To the sharp rod of justice, so to draw you
To shun such lewd assemblies as beget
Unlawful riots and such traitorous acts,
That, striking with the hand of private hate,
Maim your dear country with a public wound:—
Oh God, that Mercy, whose majestic brow
Should be unwrinkled, and that awful Justice,
Which looketh through a vail of sufferance
Upon the frailty of the multitude,
Should with the clamours of outrageous wrongs
Be stirred and wakened thus to punishment!—
But your deserved death he doth forgive:
Who gives you life, pray all he long may live.
ALL.
God save the king, God save the king!
My good Lord Chancellor, and the Earl of Surrey!
[Exeunt.]
SCENE II. Chelsea. A Room in More’s House.
[A table being covered with a green carpet, a state cushion on it, and the Purse and Mace lying thereon, enter Sir Thomas More.]
MORE.
it is in heaven that I am thus and thus;
And that which we profanely term our fortunes
Is the provision of the power above,
Fitted and shaped just to that strength of nature
Which we are borne withal. Good God, good Go,
That I from such an humble bench of birth
Should step as twere up to my country’s head,
And give the law out there! I, in my father’s life,
To take prerogative and tithe of knees
From elder kinsmen, and him bind by my place
To give the smooth and dexter way to me
That owe it him by nature! Sure, these things,
Not physicked by respect, might turn our blood
To much corruption: but, More, the more thou hast,
Either of honor, office, wealth, and calling,
Which might excite thee to embrace and hub them,
The more doe thou in serpents’ natures think them;
Fear their gay skins with thought of their sharp state;
And let this be thy maxim, to be great
Is when the thread of hayday is once ’spon,
A bottom great wound up great undone.—
Come on, sir: are you ready?
[Enter Randall, attired like Sir Thomas More.]
RANDALL. Yes, my lord, I stand but on a few points; I shall have done presently. Before God, I have practised your lordship’s shift so well, that I think I shall grow proud, my lord.