ARTHUR

Greater the Kings. Nay rather (Cador) let them run their raze, And leave the Heavens revengers of my wrong. Since Britons prosperous state is thus debased In servile sort to Mordred's cursed pride, Let me be thrall, and lead a private life: None can refuse the yoke his Country bears. But as for wars, insooth my flesh abhors, To bid the battle to my proper blood. Great is the love, which nature does enforce From kin to kin, but most from sire to son. How hard it is to rule th'aspiring mind, And what a kingly point it seems to those, Whose Lordly hands the stately Sceptre sways, Still to pursue the drift they first decreed: My wonted mind and kingdom lets me know. Think not, but if you driven this hazard on, He desperate will resolve to win or die: Whereof who knows which were the greater gilded, The sire to slay the son, or son the sire. Ah too severe, far from a Father's mind. Compassion is as fit for Kings as wrath. Laws must not lower. Rule oft admitteth ruth. So hate, as if there were yet cause to love: Take not their lives as foes, which may be friends. To spoil my son were to despoil my self: Oft, while we seek our foes, we seek our foils. Let's rather seek how to allure his mind With good deserts: deserts may win the worst. But yet where men with reconciled minds Renew their love with recontinued grace, Atonement frames them friends of former foes, And makes the moods of swelling wrath to suage. No faster friendship, than that grows from grief, When melting minds with mutual ruth relent. How close the severed skin unites again, When salves have smoothly healed the former hurts? Well, what avails to linger in this life, Which Fortune but reserves for greater grief? This breath draws on but matter of mishap: Death only frees the guiltless from annoys. Who so hath felt the force of greedy Fates, And dur'de the last decree of grisly death, Shall never yield his captive arms to chains, Ner drawn in triumph deck the victor's pomp. My youth (I grant) and prime of budding years Puffed up with pride and found desire of praise, Foreweéning nought what perils might ensue, Adventured all, and reached to will the reigns. But now this age requires a sager course, And will advised by harms to wisdom yeélds. Those swelling spirits the self same cause which first Set them on gog, even Fortune's favours quailed. And now mine oftenest scapes do skare me most, I fear the trap, whereat I oft have trip: Experience tells me plain that Chance is frail, And oft, the better passed, the worse to come. As safe sometime to fear, when most we dare. A causeless courage gives repentance place. Each way on me she frowns. For win I, lose I, both procure my grief. Admit I do, What joy? When I may Small if we covet nought. He that discerns The sword aloft. But by A hair. Wrong puls it do They sometime hurt. Sealed, if allegiance want. Not, if allegiance fail. Was mine till now. If Mordred list. Perhaps 'tis bettes lost. Indeéde, continual wars have chafte our minds, And good success hath bred impatient moods. Room puffs us up, and makes us too too fierce: There, Britons, there we stand, whence Room did fallen. Thou Lucius makest me proud, thou heavest my mind: But what? shall I esteem a Crown ought else, Then as a gorgeous Crest of easeless Helm, Or as some brittel mould of glorious pomp, Or glittering glass, which, while it shines, it breaks? All this a sudden Chance may dash, and not Perhaps with thirteéne Kings, or in nine years: All may not find so slow and lingering Fates. What, that my Country cries for endue remorse And some relief for long sustained toils? By Seas and Lands I daily wrought her wreck, And spareless spent her life on every foe. Eke where my Soldiers perished, whilst I won: Throughout the world my Conquest was their spoil. A fair reward for all their death's, for all Their wars abroad, to give them civil wars. What boots it them reserved from foreign foils To die at home? What end of ruthelesse rage? At least let age, and Nature worn to nought, Provide at length their graves with wished groans. Pity their hoary hairs, their feéble fists, Their withered limbs, their strengths consumed in Camp. Must they still end their lives amongst the blades? Rests there no other Fate while Arthur reigns? What deéme you me? a fury said with blood, Or some Ciclopian born and bred for braules? Think on the mind, that Arthur bears to peace: Can Arthur please you no where but in wars? Be witness Heavens how far t'is from my mind, Therewith to spoil or sack my native soil: I cannot yeélde, it brooks not in my breast, To seek her ruin, whom I erst have ruled. What relics now so e'r both civil broils, And foreign wars have left, let those remain: Th'are few enough, and Britons fallen too fast. Is this the choice my Son does send his Sire, And must I die? Or try it if I dare? To die were ill, thus to be dared is worse. Display my standart forth, let Trump and Drum Call Soldiers never, to hear their Sovereigns hest. Oh Friends and fellows of my weriest toils, Which have born out with me so many brunts, And desperate storms of wars and brainsick Mars. Lo now the hundredth month wherein we win. Hath all the blood we spent in foreign Coasts, The wounds, and death's, and winter's boad abroad, Deserved thus to be disgraced at home? All Britain rings of wars: No town, nor field But swarms with armed troops: the mustering trains Stop up the streétes: no less a tumult's raised, Then when Hengistus fell and Horsus fierce With treacherous truce did overrun the Realm. Each corner threatens Death: both far and never Is Arthur vexed. What if my force had failed, And standard fallen, and ensigns all been torn, And Roman troops pursued me at the heéles, With luckless wars assayed in foreign soils? Now that our Fortune heaves us up thus High, And Heavens themselves renew our old renown: Must we be darde? Nay, let that Princock come, That knows not yet himself, nor Arthurs force, That never yet waged wars, that's yet to learn To give the charge: Yea let that Princock come, With sudden Soldiers pampered up in peace, And gowned troops, and wantons worn with ease: With sluggish Saxons crew, and Irish kerns, And Scottish aid, and false redshanked Picts, Whose slaughters yet must teach their former foil. They shall perceive with sorrow e'r they partly, When all their toils be told, that nothing works So great a wast and ruin in this age, As do my wars. Oh Mor read blessed Son: No doubt, these market mates so highly hier'd Must be the stay of thy usurped state. And least my head inclining now to years, Should joy the rest, which yet it never reaped: The Traitor Gilla, trained in treacherous jars, Is chief in arms, to reave me of my Realm. What corner (ah) for all my wars shall shroud My bloodless age? what seat for endue deserts? What town, or field for ancient Soldiers rest? What house? What rooffe? What walls for wearied limbs? Stretch out again, stretch out your conquering hands, Still must we use the force so often used. To those, that will pursue a wrong with wreke, He gives all, that once denies the right. Thou soil which erst Diana did ordain The certain seat and bower of wandering Brutus : Thou Realm which ay I reverence as my Saint, Thou stately Britain ancient tipe of Troy, Bear with my forced wrongs: I am not he, That willing would impeach thy peace with wars. Lo here both far and wide I Conqueror stand, Arthur each where thine own, thy Liege, thy King. Condemn not mine attempts: he, only he Is sole in fault, that makes me thus thy foe. Here I renounce all leagues and treats of truce, Thou Fortune henceforth art my guard and guide. Hence peace, on wars, run Fates, let Mars be judge, I erst did trust to right, but now to rage. Go: tell the boy that Arthur fears no brags, In vain he seeks to brave it with his Sire. I come (Mordred) I come, but to thy pain. Yea, tell the boy his angry father comes, To teach a Novist both to die, and dare. Herault Exit. Since thus (my faithful mates) with vows alike, And equal love to Arthurs cause you join In common care, to wreak my private wrongs: Lift up your Ensigns efts, stretch out your strengths, Pursue your Fates, perform your Hope's to Mars, Lo here the last and outmost work for blades. This is the time that all our valour craves. This time by endue desert restores again Our goods, our lands, our lives, our weal and all. This time declares by Fates whose cause is best, This, this condemns the vanquished side of gilded. Wherefore if for my sake you scorn your selves, And spare no sword nor fire in my defence: Then while my censure justifies your cause, Fight, fight amain: and clear your blades from crime, The Judge once change, no wars are free from gilded. The better cause gives us the greater hope Of prosperous wars, wherein if once I hap To spy the wonted signs, that never failde Their guide, your threatening looks, your firy eyes, And bustling bodies pressed to present spoil: The field is won. Even then me thinks I see The wonted wasts, and scattered heads of foes, The Irish carcase kicked, and Picts oppressed, And Saxons slain, to swim in streams of blood. I quake with hope. I can assure you all, We never had a greater match in hand. March on: delay no Fates while Fortune fawns, The greatest praise of wars consists in speed. In sooth (good Cador ) so our Fortune fares, As needs we must return to wonted force. To wars we must: but such unhappy wars, As yeéld no hope for right or wrong to escape. My self foreseés the Fate, it cannot fallen Without our dearest blood: much may the mind Of pensive Sire presage, whose Son so sins. All truth, all trust, all blood, all bans be broke, The seédes are sown that spring to future spoil, My Son, my Nephew, yea each side my self, Nearer then all (woe's me) too never, my foe. Well: t'is my plague for life so lewdly led, The price of gilded is still a heavier gilded. For were it light, that even by birth my self Was bade, I made my sister bade: nay were That also light, I have begotten as bade. Yea worse, and heir assigned to all our sins. Such was his birth: what base, what vulgar vice Could once be looked for of so noble blood? The deéper gilded descends, the more it roots: The younger imps affect the huger crimes. Exeunt. COme Cador, as our friendship was most firm Throughout our age, so now let's link as fast. Thus did we live in wars, thus let us die In peace, and arm in arm partake our Fates. Our wounds, our greéfe, our wish, our hap alike, Our end so near, all crave eke others help. Rue not my Britons what my rage hath wrought, But blame your King, that thus hath rend your Realm. My meanelesse moods have made the Fates thus fell, And too much anger wrought in me too much. For had impatient ire indu'rde abuse, And yeélded where resistance threatened spoil? I might have lived in foreign coasts vnfoilde, And six score thousand men had be vnmoande. But wrong incensing wrath to take revenge Preferred Chance before a better choice. I claimed my Crown, the cause of claim was good, The means to claim it in such sort was bade. Yea: rather then my Realm and native soil Should wounded fallen, thus bruised with these wars: I should have left both Realm, and right, and all: Or dured the death ordained by ordreds oath. Well: so it was: it cannot be redressed: The greater is my grief, that seés it so. My life (I feel) does fade, and sorrows flow, The rather that my name is thus extinct. In this respect, so Mordred did succeed, Oh, that my self had fallen, and Mordred lived That having conquered all my foes but him, I might have left you him, that conquered me. Oh heavy wretched lot: to be the last That falls, to view the burial of my Realm. Where each man else hath fealt his several Fate, I only pine oppressed with all their Fates. A causeless foe. When wars did call me hence He was in years but young, in wit too old. As virtue shines most in comliest wights, When inward gifts are decked with outward grace: So did his wit and feature f ede that hope, Which falsely trainde me to this woeful hap. His mind transformed thus, I cannot choose But long to see what change his face sustains. My blood and kindred doubled in his birth, Inspir S a mixed, and t'wice descending love, Which drives my dying veins to wish his view. Unhealme his luckless head, set bore his face: That face which erst pleased me and mine to much. I see (alas) I see (hide, hide again: Oh spare mine eyes) a witness of my crimes: A fearful vision of my former guilt: A dreadful horror of a future doom: A present gaul of mind. Oh happy they, Whose spotless lives attain a dreadless death. And thou, Oh hapless boy, Oh spite of Fates, (What might I term thee, Nephew, Son, or both?) Alas, how happy should we both have be, If no ambitious thought had vexed thy head, Nor thou thus st m'de to reave thy Father's rule, But stai e thy time, and not forstalde us both? Wha ruth, (ah,) rend the woeful Father's heart, That saw himself thus made a Sonnelesse Sire? Well: since both Heavens and Hell conspired in one, To make our ends a mirror to the world, Both of incestuous life, and wicked birth: Would Gods the Fates that linked our faults alike, Had also fram'de our minds of frendlier moulds: That, as our lineage had approached too near, So our affections had not swerved to far. Then might I lived enlarge the Britons praise, In rearing efts the first triumphant Troy And after thou succeéding mine attempts, Have spent thy courage in a juster cause. But would not be: Ambition grew to great: We could not join our minds: our Fates we joined: And through thy blood, a way was made to mine. Yea sure: since thus (Oh Fates ) your censure seems, That freé from force of foreign foes, there rests, That Mordred reap the glory of our death's: B'it so: driven on your doom, work your decreé: We fearless bide what bane so e'r you bid. And though our ends thus hastened through your hests, Abruptly break the course of great attempts: Yet go we not inglorious to the ground: Set wish a partly: we have perfourmd enough. The Irish King and Nation wild we tamde: The Scots and Picts, and Orcade Isles we won: The Danes and Goths and Friseland men, with all The Isles inserted never those Seas, And next The Germane King, and Saxons we subdued. Not France, that could prevail against our force, Nor lastly Room, that rues her pride suppressed. Each foreign power is parcel of our praise, No titles want to make our foes afraid. This only now I crave (Oh Fortune erst My faithful friend) let it be soon forgotten, Nor long in mind, nor mouth, where Arthur fell Yea: though I Conqueror die, and full of Fame : Yet let my death and parture rest obscure. No graven I need (Oh Fates ) nor burial rights, Nor stately hearce, nor tomb with haughty top: But let my Carcase lurk: yea, let my death Be ay unknown, so that in every Coast I still be feared, and looked for every hour. IS this the welcome that my Realm prepares? Be these the thanks I win for all my wars? Thus to forbid me land? to slay my friends? To make their blood distain my Country shores? My son (belike) least that our force should faint For want of wars, prepared us wars himself. He thought (perhaps) it might impair our fame, If none rebelled, whose fotle might praise our power. Is this the fruit of Mordred's forward youth, And tender age discreet beyond his years? Oh false and guileful life, Oh crafty world: How cunningly conuaiest thou fraud unseen? Thambicious seems meek, the wanton chased, Disguised vice for virtue vaunts it self. Thus (Art ) thus hath Fortune played her partly, Blind for thy weal, clear sighted for thy woe. Thy kingdom's gone, thy phere affords no faith, Thy son rebels, of all thy wonted pomp No ot is left, and Fortune hides her face. No place is left for prosperous plighted, mishaps Have room and ways to run and walk at will. Lo (Cador) both our states, your daughter's trust, My son's respect, our Hope's reposed in both. Trust me, bade things have often glorious names. A dangerous good that wisdom would eschew. Small credit will be given of matters passed To Fame, the Flatterer of the former age. Were all believed which antique bruit imports, Yet wisdom weighs the peril joined to praise: Rare is the Fame (mark well all ages gone) Which hath not hurt the house it most enhaun'st. Beside, Fame's but a blast that sounds a while, And quickly stints, and then is quite forgotten. Look whatsoever our virtues have achieved, The Chaos vast and greédy time devours. To day all Europe rings of Arthurs praise: Will be as hushed, as if I never had been. What boots it then to venture life or limb, For that, which needs e'r long we leave, or lose,