Complete Plays, The (288 page)

Katharine Queen of England, come into the court.

Griffith

Madam, you are call’d back.

Queen Katharine

What need you note it? pray you, keep your way:
When you are call’d, return. Now, the Lord help,
They vex me past my patience! Pray you, pass on:
I will not tarry; no, nor ever more
Upon this business my appearance make
In any of their courts.

Exeunt Queen Katharine and her Attendants

King Henry VIII

Go thy ways, Kate:
That man i’ the world who shall report he has
A better wife, let him in nought be trusted,
For speaking false in that: thou art, alone,
If thy rare qualities, sweet gentleness,
Thy meekness saint-like, wife-like government,
Obeying in commanding, and thy parts
Sovereign and pious else, could speak thee out,
The queen of earthly queens: she’s noble born;
And, like her true nobility, she has
Carried herself towards me.

Cardinal Wolsey

Most gracious sir,
In humblest manner I require your highness,
That it shall please you to declare, in hearing
Of all these ears,— for where I am robb’d and bound,
There must I be unloosed, although not there
At once and fully satisfied,— whether ever I
Did broach this business to your highness; or
Laid any scruple in your way, which might
Induce you to the question on’t? or ever
Have to you, but with thanks to God for such
A royal lady, spake one the least word that might
Be to the prejudice of her present state,
Or touch of her good person?

King Henry VIII

My lord cardinal,
I do excuse you; yea, upon mine honour,
I free you from’t. You are not to be taught
That you have many enemies, that know not
Why they are so, but, like to village-curs,
Bark when their fellows do: by some of these
The queen is put in anger. You’re excused:
But will you be more justified? You ever
Have wish’d the sleeping of this business; never desired
It to be stirr’d; but oft have hinder’d, oft,
The passages made toward it: on my honour,
I speak my good lord cardinal to this point,
And thus far clear him. Now, what moved me to’t,
I will be bold with time and your attention:
Then mark the inducement. Thus it came; give heed to’t:
My conscience first received a tenderness,
Scruple, and prick, on certain speeches utter’d
By the Bishop of Bayonne, then French ambassador;
Who had been hither sent on the debating
A marriage ’twixt the Duke of Orleans and
Our daughter Mary: i’ the progress of this business,
Ere a determinate resolution, he,
I mean the bishop, did require a respite;
Wherein he might the king his lord advertise
Whether our daughter were legitimate,
Respecting this our marriage with the dowager,
Sometimes our brother’s wife. This respite shook
The bosom of my conscience, enter’d me,
Yea, with a splitting power, and made to tremble
The region of my breast; which forced such way,
That many mazed considerings did throng
And press’d in with this caution. First, methought
I stood not in the smile of heaven; who had
Commanded nature, that my lady’s womb,
If it conceived a male child by me, should
Do no more offices of life to’t than
The grave does to the dead; for her male issue
Or died where they were made, or shortly after
This world had air’d them: hence I took a thought,
This was a judgment on me; that my kingdom,
Well worthy the best heir o’ the world, should not
Be gladded in’t by me: then follows, that
I weigh’d the danger which my realms stood in
By this my issue’s fail; and that gave to me
Many a groaning throe. Thus hulling in
The wild sea of my conscience, I did steer
Toward this remedy, whereupon we are
Now present here together: that’s to say,
I meant to rectify my conscience,— which
I then did feel full sick, and yet not well,—
By all the reverend fathers of the land
And doctors learn’d: first I began in private
With you, my Lord of Lincoln; you remember
How under my oppression I did reek,
When I first moved you.

Lincoln

Very well, my liege.

King Henry VIII

I have spoke long: be pleased yourself to say
How far you satisfied me.

Lincoln

So please your highness,
The question did at first so stagger me,
Bearing a state of mighty moment in’t
And consequence of dread, that I committed
The daring’st counsel which I had to doubt;
And did entreat your highness to this course
Which you are running here.

King Henry VIII

I then moved you,
My Lord of Canterbury; and got your leave
To make this present summons: unsolicited
I left no reverend person in this court;
But by particular consent proceeded
Under your hands and seals: therefore, go on:
For no dislike i’ the world against the person
Of the good queen, but the sharp thorny points
Of my alleged reasons, drive this forward:
Prove but our marriage lawful, by my life
And kingly dignity, we are contented
To wear our mortal state to come with her,
Katharine our queen, before the primest creature
That’s paragon’d o’ the world.

Cardinal Campeius

So please your highness,
The queen being absent, ’tis a needful fitness
That we adjourn this court till further day:
Meanwhile must be an earnest motion
Made to the queen, to call back her appeal
She intends unto his holiness.

King Henry VIII

[Aside]
 
I may perceive
These cardinals trifle with me: I abhor
This dilatory sloth and tricks of Rome.
My learn’d and well-beloved servant, Cranmer,
Prithee, return: with thy approach, I know,
My comfort comes along. Break up the court:
I say, set on.

Exeunt in manner as they entered

A
CT
III

S
CENE
I. L
ONDON
. Q
UEEN
K
ATHARINE
’
S
APARTMENTS
.

Enter Queen Katharine and her Women, as at work

Queen Katharine

Take thy lute, wench: my soul grows sad with troubles;
Sing, and disperse ’em, if thou canst: leave working.

Song

Orpheus with his lute made trees,
And the mountain tops that freeze,
Bow themselves when he did sing:
To his music plants and flowers
Ever sprung; as sun and showers
There had made a lasting spring.
Every thing that heard him play,
Even the billows of the sea,
Hung their heads, and then lay by.
In sweet music is such art,
Killing care and grief of heart
Fall asleep, or hearing, die.

Enter a Gentleman

Queen Katharine

How now!

Gentleman

An’t please your grace, the two great cardinals
Wait in the presence.

Queen Katharine

Would they speak with me?

Gentleman

They will’d me say so, madam.

Queen Katharine

Pray their graces
To come near.

Exit Gentleman

What can be their business
With me, a poor weak woman, fall’n from favour?
I do not like their coming. Now I think on’t,
They should be good men; their affairs as righteous:
But all hoods make not monks.

Enter Cardinal Wolsey and Cardinal Campeius

Cardinal Wolsey

Peace to your highness!

Queen Katharine

Your graces find me here part of a housewife,
I would be all, against the worst may happen.
What are your pleasures with me, reverend lords?

Cardinal Wolsey

May it please you noble madam, to withdraw
Into your private chamber, we shall give you
The full cause of our coming.

Queen Katharine

Speak it here:
There’s nothing I have done yet, o’ my conscience,
Deserves a corner: would all other women
Could speak this with as free a soul as I do!
My lords, I care not, so much I am happy
Above a number, if my actions
Were tried by every tongue, every eye saw ’em,
Envy and base opinion set against ’em,
I know my life so even. If your business
Seek me out, and that way I am wife in,
Out with it boldly: truth loves open dealing.

Cardinal Wolsey

Tanta est erga te mentis integritas, regina serenissima,—

Queen Katharine

O, good my lord, no Latin;
I am not such a truant since my coming,
As not to know the language I have lived in:
A strange tongue makes my cause more strange, suspicious;
Pray, speak in English: here are some will thank you,
If you speak truth, for their poor mistress’ sake;
Believe me, she has had much wrong: lord cardinal,
The willing’st sin I ever yet committed
May be absolved in English.

Cardinal Wolsey

Noble lady,
I am sorry my integrity should breed,
And service to his majesty and you,
So deep suspicion, where all faith was meant.
We come not by the way of accusation,
To taint that honour every good tongue blesses,
Nor to betray you any way to sorrow,
You have too much, good lady; but to know
How you stand minded in the weighty difference
Between the king and you; and to deliver,
Like free and honest men, our just opinions
And comforts to your cause.

Cardinal Campeius

Most honour’d madam,
My Lord of York, out of his noble nature,
Zeal and obedience he still bore your grace,
Forgetting, like a good man your late censure
Both of his truth and him, which was too far,
Offers, as I do, in a sign of peace,
His service and his counsel.

Queen Katharine

[Aside]
 
To betray me.—
My lords, I thank you both for your good wills;
Ye speak like honest men; pray God, ye prove so!
But how to make ye suddenly an answer,
In such a point of weight, so near mine honour,—
More near my life, I fear,— with my weak wit,
And to such men of gravity and learning,
In truth, I know not. I was set at work
Among my maids: full little, God knows, looking
Either for such men or such business.
For her sake that I have been,— for I feel
The last fit of my greatness,— good your graces,
Let me have time and counsel for my cause:
Alas, I am a woman, friendless, hopeless!

Cardinal Wolsey

Madam, you wrong the king’s love with these fears:
Your hopes and friends are infinite.

Queen Katharine

In England
But little for my profit: can you think, lords,
That any Englishman dare give me counsel?
Or be a known friend, ’gainst his highness’ pleasure,
Though he be grown so desperate to be honest,
And live a subject? Nay, forsooth, my friends,
They that must weigh out my afflictions,
They that my trust must grow to, live not here:
They are, as all my other comforts, far hence
In mine own country, lords.

Cardinal Campeius

I would your grace
Would leave your griefs, and take my counsel.

Queen Katharine

How, sir?

Cardinal Campeius

Put your main cause into the king’s protection;
He’s loving and most gracious: ’twill be much
Both for your honour better and your cause;
For if the trial of the law o’ertake ye,
You’ll part away disgraced.

Cardinal Wolsey

He tells you rightly.

Queen Katharine

Ye tell me what ye wish for both,— my ruin:
Is this your Christian counsel? out upon ye!
Heaven is above all yet; there sits a judge
That no king can corrupt.

Cardinal Campeius

Your rage mistakes us.

Queen Katharine

The more shame for ye: holy men I thought ye,
Upon my soul, two reverend cardinal virtues;
But cardinal sins and hollow hearts I fear ye:
Mend ’em, for shame, my lords. Is this your comfort?
The cordial that ye bring a wretched lady,
A woman lost among ye, laugh’d at, scorn’d?
I will not wish ye half my miseries;
I have more charity: but say, I warn’d ye;
Take heed, for heaven’s sake, take heed, lest at once
The burthen of my sorrows fall upon ye.

Cardinal Wolsey

Madam, this is a mere distraction;
You turn the good we offer into envy.

Queen Katharine

Ye turn me into nothing: woe upon ye
And all such false professors! would you have me —
If you have any justice, any pity;
If ye be any thing but churchmen’s habits —
Put my sick cause into his hands that hates me?
Alas, has banish’d me his bed already,
His love, too long ago! I am old, my lords,
And all the fellowship I hold now with him
Is only my obedience. What can happen
To me above this wretchedness? all your studies
Make me a curse like this.

Cardinal Campeius

Your fears are worse.

Queen Katharine

Have I lived thus long — let me speak myself,
Since virtue finds no friends — a wife, a true one?
A woman, I dare say without vain-glory,
Never yet branded with suspicion?
Have I with all my full affections
Still met the king? loved him next heaven? obey’d him?
Been, out of fondness, superstitious to him?
Almost forgot my prayers to content him?
And am I thus rewarded? ’tis not well, lords.
Bring me a constant woman to her husband,
One that ne’er dream’d a joy beyond his pleasure;
And to that woman, when she has done most,
Yet will I add an honour, a great patience.

Cardinal Wolsey

Madam, you wander from the good we aim at.

Queen Katharine

My lord, I dare not make myself so guilty,
To give up willingly that noble title
Your master wed me to: nothing but death
Shall e’er divorce my dignities.

Cardinal Wolsey

Pray, hear me.

Queen Katharine

Would I had never trod this English earth,
Or felt the flatteries that grow upon it!
Ye have angels’ faces, but heaven knows your hearts.
What will become of me now, wretched lady!
I am the most unhappy woman living.
Alas, poor wenches, where are now your fortunes!
Shipwreck’d upon a kingdom, where no pity,
No friend, no hope; no kindred weep for me;
Almost no grave allow’d me: like the lily,
That once was mistress of the field and flourish’d,
I’ll hang my head and perish.