King: Dear Henrietta!

SCENE 3:

LAUD:Bring forth the prisoner Bastwick: let the clerkRecite his sentence.

CLERK:'That he pay five thousandPounds to the king, lose both his ears, be brandedWith red-hot iron on the cheek and forehead,And be imprisoned within Lancaster CastleDuring the pleasure of the Court.'

LAUD:Prisoner,If you have aught to say wherefore this sentenceShould not be put into effect, now speak.

JUXON:If you have aught to plead in mitigation,Speak.

BASTWICK:Thus, my lords. If, like the prelates, IWere an invader of the royal powerA public scorner of the word of God,Profane, idolatrous, popish, superstitious,Impious in heart and in tyrannic act,Void of wit, honesty, and temperance;If Satan were my lord, as theirs,--our GodPattern of all I should avoid to do;Were I an enemy of my God and KingAnd of good men, as ye are;--I should meritYour fearful state and gilt prosperity,Which, when ye wake from the last sleep, shall turnTo cowls and robes of everlasting fire.But, as I am, I bid ye grudge me notThe only earthly favour ye can yield,Or I think worth acceptance at your hands,--Scorn, mutilation, and imprisonment.even as my Master did,Until Heaven's kingdom shall descend on earth,Or earth be like a shadow in the lightOf Heaven absorbed--some few tumultuous yearsWill pass, and leave no wreck of what opposesHis will whose will is power.

LAUD:Officer, take the prisoner from the bar,And be his tongue slit for his insolence.

BASTWICK:While this hand holds a pen--

LAUD:Be his hands--

JUXON:Stop!Forbear, my lord! The tongue, which now can speakNo terror, would interpret, being dumb,Heaven's thunder to our harm;...And hands, which now write only their own shame,With bleeding stumps might sign our blood away.

LAUD:Much more such 'mercy' among men would be,Did all the ministers of Heaven's revengeFlinch thus from earthly retribution. ICould suffer what I would inflict.Bring upThe Lord Bishop of Lincoln.--Know you notThat, in distraining for ten thousand poundsUpon his books and furniture at Lincoln,Were found these scandalous and seditious lettersSent from one Osbaldistone, who is fled?I speak it not as touching this poor person;But of the office which should make it holy,Were it as vile as it was ever spotless.Mark too, my lord, that this expression strikesHis Majesty, if I misinterpret not.

STRAFFORD:'Twere politic and just that Williams tasteThe bitter fruit of his connection withThe schismatics. But you, my Lord Archbishop,Who owed your first promotion to his favour,Who grew beneath his smile--

LAUD:Would therefore begThe office of his judge from this High Court,--That it shall seem, even as it is, that I,In my assumption of this sacred robe,Have put aside all worldly preference,All sense of all distinction of all persons,All thoughts but of the service of the Church.--Bishop of Lincoln!

WILLIAMS:Peace, proud hierarch!I know my sentence, and I own it just.Thou wilt repay me less than I deserve,In stretching to the utmost

NOTE:Scene 3. 1-69 Bring...utmost 1870; omitted 1824.

SCENE 4:

HAMPDEN:England, farewell! thou, who hast been my cradle,Shalt never be my dungeon or my grave!I held what I inherited in theeAs pawn for that inheritance of freedomWhich thou hast sold for thy despoiler's smile:How can I call thee England, or my country?--Does the wind hold?

VANE:The vanes sit steadyUpon the Abbey towers. The silver lightningsOf the evening star, spite of the city's smoke,Tell that the north wind reigns in the upper air.Mark too that flock of fleecy-winged cloudsSailing athwart St. Margaret's.

HAMPDEN:Hail, fleet heraldOf tempest! that rude pilot who shall guideHearts free as his, to realms as pure as thee,Beyond the shot of tyranny,Beyond the webs of that swoln spider...Beyond the curses, calumnies, andOf atheist priests! ... And thouFair star, whose beam lies on the wide Atlantic,Athwart its zones of tempest and of calm,Bright as the path to a beloved homeOh, light us to the isles of the evening land!Like floating Edens cradled in the glimmerOf sunset, through the distant mist of yearsTouched by departing hope, they gleam! lone regions,Where Power's poor dupes and victims yet have neverPropitiated the savage fear of kingsWith purest blood of noblest hearts; whose dewIs yet unstained with tears of those who wakeTo weep each day the wrongs on which it dawns;Whose sacred silent air owns yet no echoOf formal blasphemies; nor impious ritesWrest man's free worship, from the God who loves,To the poor worm who envies us His love!Receive, thou young ... of Paradise.These exiles from the old and sinful world!

This glorious clime, this firmament, whose lightsDart mitigated influence through their veilOf pale blue atmosphere; whose tears keep greenThe pavement of this moist all-feeding earth;This vaporous horizon, whose dim roundIs bastioned by the circumfluous sea,Repelling invasion from the sacred towers,Presses upon me like a dungeon's grate,A low dark roof, a damp and narrow wall.The boundless universeBecomes a cell too narrow for the soulThat owns no master; while the loathliest wardOf this wide prison, England, is a nestOf cradling peace built on the mountain tops,--To which the eagle spirits of the free,Which range through heaven and earth, and scorn the stormOf time, and gaze upon the light of truth,Return to brood on thoughts that cannot dieAnd cannot be repelled.Like eaglets floating in the heaven of time,They soar above their quarry, and shall stoopThrough palaces and temples thunderproof.

ARCHY:I'll go live under the ivy that overgrows the terrace, and count thetears shed on its old [roots?] as the [wind?] plays the song of

'A widow bird sate mourningUpon a wintry bough.'Heigho! the lark and the owl!One flies the morning, and one lulls the night:--Only the nightingale, poor fond soul,Sings like the fool through darkness and light.

'A widow bird sate mourning for her loveUpon a wintry bough;The frozen wind crept on above,The freezing stream below.

There was no leaf upon the forest bare.No flower upon the ground,And little motion in the airExcept the mill-wheel's sound.'

NOTE:Scene 5. 1-9 I'll...light 1870; omitted 1824.