University of Virginia Library

SCENE I.

—Before the Castle of St Andrews.
Enter Cardinal Beaton.
It must not be—that this our Holy Church,
Whose pointed pinnacles stand high in heaven,
And whose foundations lie cemented fast
With blood of canonized saints in earth,
Shall be assaulted, pelted, and gainsay'd,
By contradictious tongues, that vibrate loud
In vile derision, sputtering round full fast
The poison they have lapp'd from the green pool
Of heresy. No longer, unaveng'd,
Shall this unshaven, sly, heresiarch,
This fox in lamb's skin, this mob-tickling Wishart,
Creep round the land, with sermons in his teeth,
Calling me fool and glutton. Am I fool?
Too long have I been fool, to idle thus;
Suspending judgment on these piping knaves,
These grashoppers, that from their dunghills chirp
Contemptuously against my Primacy,
Mocking my very tolerance with jeers.—
I have him caged, and ready for the fire,
That only waits my bidding, to enwrap
His renegado limbs with scorching folds,
And eat him into ashes. But there needs,
For this bold point, the sanction of the Church,
Gather'd in convocation, to subscribe
The doom of death; and, by the general vote,
To turn the rabble's envy and dislike
From my partic'lar to the Catholic.
Yet, at the Papal seat, our throne of Rome,
To me alone the praise shall be ascribed,
Of cleaning out thus daringly with fire,
The docks and weeds that Luther's herd have sown
In the plantation of the good St Peter.
I shall be lauded at the Vatican,
And here in Scotland dreaded; maugre all
The spite and jealousy of milk-sop Arran,
Who bustles in his childish fits to pull
The power unto himself, yet palt'ring plays
A poor vicegerent, trembling to light up
The goodly bonfire of an heretic.
Why should I fear him? Have I not his son,
An hostage, messing at my daily table;
Whose life, dependent on my eye-lid's wink,
Warrants the fickle father's full compliance?
Then light the vengeance sore, and light it soon,
Upon my en'mies scalps! and blossoms grow
Upon my Card'nalship! as I'm a man
Not to melt down into a coward's grease,
Before the hot wrath of an adversary!—
But who is this that hither stately comes,
Magnificent in his habiliments,
As if t'outdazzle and to challenge me
In mine own diocese? 'Tis the King's master,
I'faith, my peacock Archbishop of Glasgow;
That to my word of call comes posting on,
Even like a spaniel to his master's whistle.—
Enter Dunbar, Archbishop of Glasgow.
Good day, my Lord of Glasgow! I am glad
Here to salute you at my palace gate,
And bid you welcome. How with Mother Church
Fares it i'th'rainy west? Sprouts there as yet,
On the sweet banks of Clyde, a thriving crop
Of scripture-water'd heretics, to take
Your darling, old St Mungo, by the beard?

ARCHBISHOP DUNBAR.
My good Lord Cardinal, I return your greetings;
And come to thank you for inviting me
Thus courteously, as colleague, to assist
Your arm, too weak alone, t'outroot the growth
Of error, that upsends his poison'd twigs,
O'ertopping ev'n your tree of Primacy.—
The gentle west rains down upon my church
No rotting showers, t'engender and bloat up
The toads of disaffection and revolt.
St Mungo sits rejoicing; 'tis St Rule
That sweats with terror in his golden shrine,
Spite of the Legate's breath; that has no pith
To counter-blow these eastern blasts, that come
Puffing the German's vile infection on you,
And tainting all your coast with the vile seed,
That breeds damnation and the death of souls.

CARDINAL.
Softly, Dunbar; I only ask return
Of service due me for that day, whereon
I purified your putrid west with fire;
By singeing honestly unto the death,
Russel, and ballad-making Kennedy.
Their pyre's destructive flame has hitherto
Frighten'd your district into sound belief;
Whilst here within my circuit up has risen,
From pure impunity, a crew of rebels,
That dare me on to martyr them to Satan,
And send them mewling to his pit in smoke.
For sure God's grace permits it so, that I,
Advantaged by their churlish misbelief,
Home and abroad may signalize my zeal
For th'Apostolic Church, by cutting off
Some dozens of these surly schismatics.

ARCHBISHOP DUNBAR.
Heaven wills it so, my Lord; and each dead saint,
Even from the bottom of his golden coffin,
Wherein he has for ages silent slept,
Now cries out Wrath; the very Maries, nich'd
Along your walls, as if to life arous'd,
And feeling, by the passengers' insults,
Totter with indignation, and shout Shame
Upon your inactivity and slowness.
Dead things seem live, and living things seem dead,
To feel and vindicate the church's wrongs.

CARDINAL.
With me the blame resides not—that tame Regent,
Perch'd on the summit of the State's affairs,
By Grange and his lay-faction, shifts and veers,
Passive to every gust of freakish humour,
That blows across him, like the useless vane
Of gold on our Cathedral's turret yonder,
Shewing the wind alone. He has not vigour
To jerk a Lutheran into the fire,
And work out his salvation by the deed.
Ev'n now, abused into faint-heartedness,
By some vain Bible-reading kinsman, who
Hath crawl'd by quoting texts into his heart,
He writes me saucily a letter, sauced
With tender mercies most unmerciful,
Iniquitous, incongruous, absurd,
Saying, He will not shed the innocent blood
Of this good man, this Wishart.—On your head,
O Cardinal, be th'abominable stain
Of this George Wishart's cruel taking off!—
And so he rubs his hands, and sits him down
At ease in his mock-royal elbow chair,
Leaving good Cardinal to do the job.

DUNBAR.
And let us do it fearlessly, my lord.
Rome looks upon us from her Papal heights;
France and the Guises cheer and chide us on
To energy; and Europe in the example
Expects a quieter to still the broils
That agitate with tossing controversies
Her universal people.

CARDINAL.
For the work
Then let us tuck ourselves, and plough such sores
Upon the backs of these New-Test'ment knaves,
As no salvation-salve shall ever heal.
For this fair purpose have I craved your presence,
My Lord Archbishop, and have summon'd all
My suffragans, and their officials,
T'appear to-morrow to the accusation,
And sit assessors on the judgment-bench;
Back'd as we shall be with a garrison
Of College-doctors, that shall come equipt
With pond'rous sentences from all the Fathers,
Authoritative of our sage decree.
Ev'n now already crowd the churchmen in
From cowl to mitre, for the diet hot;
Hepburn is come, and at the hostelry;
Panter of Ross has from his travell'd mule
Just lighted; and my Lord Abbot of Paisley,
He the surnamed “Chaster than my Maiden,”
Is just gone down to taste his sweetheart's lip,
In the Foul Waist where he had set th'appointment
Six weeks ago, as mine own Marion told me.
As for your Lordship, 'twill, I think, be better
To taste my castle's pantry, and the store
Of good Canary I have treasured up
To entertain such liegemen of the Pope,
As like to snuff a burning Lollard's smoke.
Be pleased to enter then, my gracious lord,
And bless your stomach with some goodly fare:
Then shall we talk more of to-morrow's business!