LITMIR.BIZ

       CHORUS. O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend

         The brightest heaven of invention,

         A kingdom for a stage, princes to act,

         And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!

         Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,

         Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,

         Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword, and fire,

         Crouch for employment. But pardon, gentles all,

         The flat unraised spirits that hath dar'd

         On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth

         So great an object. Can this cockpit hold

         The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram

         Within this wooden O the very casques

         That did affright the air at Agincourt?

         O, pardon! since a crooked figure may

         Attest in little place a million;

         And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,

         On your imaginary forces work.

         Suppose within the girdle of these walls

         Are now confin'd two mighty monarchies,

         Whose high upreared and abutting fronts

         The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder.

         Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts:

         Into a thousand parts divide one man,

         And make imaginary puissance;

         Think, when we talk of horses, that you see them

         Printing their proud hoofs i' th' receiving earth;

         For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,

         Carry them here and there, jumping o'er times,

         Turning th' accomplishment of many years

         Into an hour-glass; for the which supply,

         Admit me Chorus to this history;

         Who prologue-like, your humble patience pray

         Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play. Exit

       CANTERBURY. My lord, I'll tell you: that self bill is urg'd

         Which in th' eleventh year of the last king's reign

         Was like, and had indeed against us pass'd

         But that the scambling and unquiet time

         Did push it out of farther question.

       ELY. But how, my lord, shall we resist it now?

       CANTERBURY. It must be thought on. If it pass against us,

         We lose the better half of our possession;

         For all the temporal lands which men devout

         By testament have given to the church

         Would they strip from us; being valu'd thus-

         As much as would maintain, to the King's honour,

         Full fifteen earls and fifteen hundred knights,

         Six thousand and two hundred good esquires;

         And, to relief of lazars and weak age,

         Of indigent faint souls, past corporal toil,

         A hundred alms-houses right well supplied;

         And to the coffers of the King, beside,

         A thousand pounds by th' year: thus runs the bill.

       ELY. This would drink deep.

       CANTERBURY. 'T would drink the cup and all.

       ELY. But what prevention?

       CANTERBURY. The King is full of grace and fair regard.

       ELY. And a true lover of the holy Church.

       CANTERBURY. The courses of his youth promis'd it not.

         The breath no sooner left his father's body

         But that his wildness, mortified in him,

         Seem'd to die too; yea, at that very moment,

         Consideration like an angel came

         And whipp'd th' offending Adam out of him,

         Leaving his body as a paradise

         T'envelop and contain celestial spirits.

         Never was such a sudden scholar made;

         Never came reformation in a flood,

         With such a heady currance, scouring faults;

         Nor never Hydra-headed wilfulnes

         So soon did lose his seat, and all at once,

         As in this king.

       ELY. We are blessed in the change.

       CANTERBURY. Hear him but reason in divinity,

         And,

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