Henry V

libertine, is still,

And the mute wonder lurketh in men’s ears,

To steal his sweet and honey’d sentences;

So that the art and practic part of life

Must be the mistress to this theoric:

Which is a wonder how his grace should glean it,

Since his addiction was to courses vain,

His companies unletter’d, rude and shallow,

His hours fill’d up with riots, banquets sports,

And never noted in him any study,

Any retirement, any sequestration

From open haunts and popularity.

Ely

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.



Canterbury

It must be so; for miracles are ceased;

And therefore we must needs admit the means

How things are perfected.



Ely

But, my good lord,

How now for mitigation of this bill

Urged by the commons? Doth his majesty

Incline to it, or no?



Canterbury

He seems indifferent,

Or rather swaying more upon our part

Than cherishing the exhibitors against us;

For I have made an offer to his majesty,

Upon our spiritual convocation

And in regard of causes now in hand,

Which I have open’d to his grace at large,

As touching France, to give a greater sum

Than ever at one time the clergy yet

Did to his predecessors part withal.



Ely
How did this offer seem received, my lord?


Canterbury

With good acceptance of his majesty;

Save that there was not time enough to hear,

As I perceived his grace would fain have done,

The severals and unhidden passages

Of his true titles to some certain dukedoms

And generally to the crown and seat of France

Derived from Edward, his great-grandfather.



Ely
What was the impediment that broke this off?


Canterbury

The French ambassador upon that instant

Craved audience; and the hour, I think, is come

To give him hearing: is it four o’clock?



Ely
It is.


Canterbury

Then go we in, to know his embassy;

Which I could with a ready guess declare,

Before the Frenchman speak a word of it.



Ely
I’ll wait upon you, and I long to hear it. Exeunt.


Scene II
The same. The Presence chamber.




Enter King Henry, Gloucester, Bedford, Exeter, Warwick, Westmoreland, and Attendants.


King Henry
Where is my gracious Lord of Canterbury?


Exeter
Not here in presence.


King Henry
Send for him, good uncle.


Westmoreland
Shall we call in the ambassador, my liege?


King Henry

Not yet, my cousin: we would be resolved,

Before we hear him, of some things of weight

That task our thoughts, concerning us and France.




Enter the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Ely.


Canterbury

God and his angels guard your sacred throne

And make you long become it!



King Henry

Sure, we thank you.

My learned lord, we pray you to proceed

And justly and religiously unfold

Why the law Salique that they have in France

Or should, or should not, bar us in our claim:

And God forbid, my dear and faithful lord,

That you should fashion, wrest, or bow your reading,

Or nicely charge your understanding soul

With opening titles miscreate, whose right

Suits not in native colours with the truth;

For God doth know how many now in health

Shall drop their blood in approbation

Of what your reverence shall incite us to.

Therefore take heed how you impawn our person,

How you awake our 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 gives edge unto the swords

That makes such waste in brief mortality.

Under this conjuration speak, my lord;

For we will hear, note and believe in heart

That what you speak is in your conscience wash’d

As pure as sin with baptism.



Canterbury

Then hear me, gracious sovereign, and you peers,

That owe yourselves, your lives and services

To this imperial throne. There is no bar

To make against your highness’ claim to France

But this, which they produce from Pharamond,

“In terram Salicam mulieres ne succedant:”

“No woman shall succeed in Salique land:”

Which Salique land the French unjustly glose

To be the realm of France, and Pharamond

The founder of this law and female bar.

Yet their own authors faithfully affirm

That the land Salique is in Germany,

Between the floods of Sala and of Elbe;

Where Charles the Great, having subdued the Saxons,

There left behind and settled certain French;

Who, holding in disdain the German women

For some dishonest manners of their life,

Establish’d then this law; to wit, no female

Should be inheritrix in Salique land:

Which Salique, as I said, ’twixt Elbe and Sala,

Is at this day in Germany call’d Meissen.

Then doth it well appear the Salique law

Was not devised for the realm of France;

Nor did the French possess the Salique land

Until four hundred one and twenty years

After defunction of King Pharamond,

Idly supposed the founder of this law;

Who died within the year of our redemption

Four hundred twenty-six; and Charles the Great

Subdued the Saxons, and did seat the French

Beyond the river Sala, in the year

Eight hundred five. Besides, their writers say,

King Pepin, which deposed Childeric,

Did, as heir general, being descended

Of Blithild, which was daughter to King Clothair,

Make claim and title to the crown of France.

Hugh Capet also, who usurp’d the crown

Of Charles the duke of Lorraine, sole heir male

Of the true line and stock of Charles the Great,

To find his title with some shows of truth,

Though, in pure truth, it was corrupt and naught,

Convey’d himself as the heir to the Lady Lingare,

Daughter to Charlemain, who was the son

To Lewis the emperor, and Lewis the son

Of Charles the Great. Also King Lewis the Tenth,

Who was sole heir to the usurper Capet,

Could not keep quiet in his conscience,

Wearing the crown of France, till satisfied

That fair Queen Isabel, his grandmother,

Was lineal of the Lady Ermengare,

Daughter to Charles the foresaid duke of Lorraine:

By the which marriage the line of Charles the Great

Was reunited to the crown of France.

So that, as clear as is the summer’s sun,

King Pepin’s title and Hugh Capet’s claim,

King Lewis his satisfaction, all appear

To hold in right and title of the female:

So do the kings of France unto this day;

Howbeit they would hold up this Salique law

To bar your highness