Enter the Lord Mayor, Aldermen, and Citizens. Enter, from the Castle, CATESBY. Now, Catesby! what says your lord to my request? To visit him to-morrow, or next day : He is within, with two right reverend fathers, Divinely bent to meditation: And in no worldly suit would he be mov'd, To draw him from his holy exercise. Buck. Return, good Catesby, to the gracious duke ; Tell him, myself, the mayor and aldermen, In deep designs, in matter of great moment, No less importing than our general good, Are come to have some conference with his grace. [Exit. Buck. Ah, ha! my lord, this prince is not an Edward! He is not lolling on a lewd day-bed", But on his knees at meditation; Not dallying with a brace of courtezans, Happy were England, would this virtuous prince But, sure, I fear, we shall ne'er win him to it. May. Marry, God defend, his grace should say us 5 God defend, his grace should say us nay!] This pious and courtly mayor was Edmund Shaw, brother to Dr. Shaw, whom Richard had employed to prove his title to the crown, from the pulpit at Saint Paul's Cross. Buck. I fear, he will: Here Catesby comes again.— Re-enter CATESBY. Now, Catesby, what says his grace? Cate. He wonders to what end you have assembled Such troops of citizens to come to him, His grace not being warn'd thereof before: [Exit CATESBY. When holy and devout religious men Enter GLOSTER, in a Gallery above, between Two May. See, where his grace stands 'tween two clergy men! Buck. Two props of virtue for a christian prince, To stay him from the fall of vanity: And, see, a book of prayer in his hand; True ornaments to know a holy man.- Of thy devotion, and right christian zeal. Glo. My lord, there needs no such apology: I rather do beseech you pardon me, Who, earnest in the service of my God, Neglect the visitation of my friends. But, leaving this, what is your grace's pleasure? Buck. Even that, I hope, which pleaseth God above, And all good men of this ungovern'd isle. VOL. VI. G Glo. I do suspect, I have done some offence, That seems disgracious in the city's eye; And that you come to reprehend my ignorance. Buck. You have, my lord; Would it might please your grace, On our entreaties to amend your fault! Glo. Else wherefore breathe I in a christian land? Buck. Know, then, it is your fault, that you resign The supreme seat, the throne majestical, The scepter'd office of your ancestors, Your state of fortune, and your due of birth, Your gracious self to take on you the charge And almost shoulder'd in the swallowing gulf-] Shoulder'd has the same meaning as rudely thrust into. 7 Which to recure,] To recure is to recover. If, not to answer,—you might haply think, Therefore, to speak, and to avoid the first; And then, in speaking, not to incur the last,- Your love deserves my thanks; but my desert First, if all obstacles were cut away, That I would rather hide me from my greatness,- The right and fortune of his happy stars, Which, God defend, that I should wring from him! Buck. My lord, this argues conscience in your grace; But the respects thereof are nice and trivial, All circumstances well considered. 8 And much I need to help you,] And I want much of the ability requisite to give you help, if help were needed. 9 — are nice and trivial,] Nice is generally used by Shakspeare in the sense of minute, trifling, of petty import. You say, that Edward is your brother's son; By her, in his unlawful bed, he got This Edward, whom our manners call-the prince. Save that, for reverence to some alive, I give a sparing limit to my tongue. Then, good my lord, take to your royal self This proffer'd benefit of dignity: If not to bless us and the land withal, May. Do, good my lord; your citizens entreat you. Buck. Refuse not, mighty lord, this proffer'd love. Cate. O, make them joyful, grant their lawful suit. Glo. Alas, why would you heap those cares on me? I am unfit for state and majesty :— I do beseech you, take it not amiss; I cannot, nor I will not, yield to you. Buck. If you refuse it,-as in love and zeal, Loath to depose the child, your brother's son ; 1 - loath'd bigamy ;] Bigamy, by a canon of the council of Lyons, A.D. 1274, (adopted in England by a statute in 4 Edw. I.) was made unlawful and infamous. It differed from polygamy, or having two wives at once: as it consisted in either marrying two virgins successively, or once marrying a widow. |