The which now since my dying daye,
Is Shoreditch call'd, as writers saye[741];
Which is a witness of my sinne, 135
For being concubine to a king.
You wanton wives, that fall to lust,
Be you assur'd that God is just;
Whoredome shall not escape his hand,
Nor pride unpunish'd in this land. 140
If God to me such shame did bring,
That yielded only to a king,
How shall they scape that daily run
To practise sin with every one?
You husbands, match not but for love, 145
Lest some disliking after prove;
Women, be warn'd when you are wives,
What plagues are due to sinful lives:
Then, maids and wives, in time amend,
For love and beauty will have end. 150
FOOTNOTES:
[739] After the death of Hastings, she was kept by the marquis of Dorset, son to Edward IV.'s queen. In Rymer's Fœdera is a proclamation of Richard's, dated at Leicester, Oct. 23, 1483, wherein a reward of 1000 marks in money, or 100 a year in land is offered for taking "Thomas late marquis of Dorset," who, "not having the fear of God, nor the salvation of his own soul, before his eyes, has damnably debauched and defiled many maids, widows, and wives, and lived in actual adultery with the wife of Shore." Buckingham was at that time in rebellion, but as Dorset was not with him, Richard could not accuse him of treason, and therefore made a handle of these pretended debaucheries to get him apprehended. Vide Rym. Fœd. tom. xij. pag. 204.
[The Rev. Mark Noble writes as follows of the charge made by Richard of Dorset's living in adultery with Jane Shore.—"It could not be before she was taken by Edward; it could not be during that king's life; it could not be afterwards, by Richard's own account, for by his proclamation she then was the mistress of Hastings to the night preceding his being put to death. It could not be after that catastrophe, for ever after then Richard kept her either in the Tower or in Ludgate a close prisoner."—Brayley's Graphic and Historical Illustrator, 1834, p. 55.]
[740] These words of Sir Thomas More probably suggested to Shakespeare that proverbial reflection in Hen. VIII. act iv. sc. 2.
"Men's evill manners live in brass: their virtues
We write in water."