University of Virginia Library

Scene II.

The Council chamber, Whitehall. The Council assembled: the Spanish Ambassador.
Enter the Queen, followed by Gardiner, Winchester, Oxford, Pembroke, Bedford, Derby, &c.
QUEEN.
Ever regardful of our subjects' wishes,
And knowing that you hold our female nature
Too weak, unaided, to contend with treason,
We ask your counsel. Many seek our hand.
I am not prone to marriage. I know well
That mine is not the gift of comeliness;
And too much grief hath made my mind unpliant.
Therefore I fear to wed: but more I fear
Good men's mistrust, seeing a lonely woman
Amid so many factious, and no arm
Strong to repress them. What is your advice?
Speak, Chancellor.

GARDINER.
In this we are unanimous:
Praying your smiles upon the Emperor's suit.
We deem Prince Philip an auspicious match:
In whose alliance England shall have pride;
Your Grace abiding comfort; and the People
Tranquillity through an assured succession.

RENAUD.
Upon our knees we humbly pray your Grace
To grant Prince Philip's suit.

QUEEN.
Great God! direct me.
Gardiner, I would consult you. Is it past doubt
Our cousin—Reginald—the Cardinal—
In very truth is Pope? Deceive me not.

GARDINER.
Unquestionably, Madam. Is he a Christian
To spurn the captaincy of Christendom?
'Tis certain he was chosen. Holy Church
Needs him. Can he stand back?

QUEEN
[aloud].
It must be so?
My lord ambassador, we'll not refuse you.

RENAUD.
God save the Prince and Queen!

PEMBROKE.
Your pardon, Sir—
The Queen and Prince.

GARDINER.
Henceforth those names are mated.
The consort shall partake all royal titles
And powers: while this our Queen shall share with him
Reciprocal advantage; and their issue
Hold, not alone these kingdoms, but augmented
With the broad Netherlands and Burgundy.

RENAUD.
To this the imperial embassy consents,
Long live the royal pair!

GARDINER.
Amen!

QUEEN.
My Lords!
Being a woman, it beseems me not
To treat of my own marriage: but remember,
This ring, which with my crown I first put on,
Hath made the realm my husband before all.
The faith I then impledged unto my People
Must stand inviolate: look well to that;
And bind me to no inconsistent duties.
You will debate this leisurely. May God
Direct and bless your counsels.
[The lords retire.
Now, my lord Bishop,
Bring to our presence Ridley and Latimer.
They shall enjoy free speech, and patient hearing,
Ere we consign them to the secular arm.

GARDINER.
Your Grace shall find them obdurate.

QUEEN.
There may be
A way to soften worse asperities.

GARDINER.
Nay you shall find none rougher.

Enter Ridley and Latimer. They kneel.
QUEEN.
I am glad
That you can kneel.

RIDLEY.
Foully have they belied us,
And basely, madam, who would make you doubt
The loyalty of your true English Church.

QUEEN.
You speak, Sir, stoutly of your Church, as though
There were none greater.

LATIMER.
There is none.

QUEEN.
Methinks
Less arrogance might better suit that garb.

RIDLEY.
God knoweth none have cause to be more humble:
We stand corrected.

QUEEN.
I will task you, then.
You, Ridley, were deputed in my troubles
To tamper with my people.

RIDLEY.
May it please you—
I went with charge to reason with your Grace,
On points of doctrine: further I deny;
And would have scorned.

QUEEN.
Well, Sir, the men that used you—
How dealt they with me?

RIDLEY.
Wrongfully; I answer.

QUEEN.
You have good warrant to say so. Observe me.
Ye took my officers, my stewards, my maidens;
Ye put me to my desk to sum accounts;
Ye taught me how to bake and how to brew:
But there were some found faithful, who had served me,
Could I, without return, have taken service.

RIDLEY.
These were no acts of mine.

QUEEN.
When you had power
You strove to bar the service of my church,
Even in my household: nay, you wrought my brother
To twit me with contumacy—to threaten.
Then made I answer that my soul was God's—
My faith unchangeable—my thoughts mine own.
To this I pledged my head: and ye had ta'en it,
Had not my cousin Charles, the Emperor,
Dictated sufferance on pain of war.

RIDLEY.
The temper of the times in truth pressed hardly.
Somewhat to have yielded had been scarcely sinful.

QUEEN.
Shall I retort that on you? If 'twas then
An argument of worth, why not so now?
What then was my condition now is your's.
But I refrain. I ever have accounted
Death welcomer than life with troubled conscience.
I cannot think one thing and do another.

GARDINER.
The heretick falters.

RIDLEY.
Heretick I am not:
True servant of the living God.

GARDINER.
God's Passion!
Said I not how these fellows should be known?
The living God forsooth! as though there were
A dead one! All your babble is “the Lord!”—
“As the Lord liveth!”

RIDLEY
[to the Queen].
You would not hear God's word.

QUEEN.
What you now call God's word is not the same
As in my father's time.

RIDLEY.
It never alters:
Hath been, and is the same; but better known,
And practised, in some ages than in others.

QUEEN.
It is not as you make it that I take it;
But as the holy Fathers do interpret.

RIDLEY.
I have been wrong! God pardon me that ever
I rested, or ate food, beneath a roof
Where God's word was rejected. I should, rather,
Have shaken from my feet the dust, departing,
In testimony against you and your house!

QUEEN.
Fear ye not, masters Latimer and Ridley,
The secular arm?

RIDLEY.
No earthly arm fear I.

LATIMER.
I should look up and laugh at every stroke
Endured in the good cause.

QUEEN.
Fear ye not, Sirs,
The Church's condemnation?

RIDLEY.
If the true Church,
Assuredly.

QUEEN.
Sir, you are contumacious.
By your own constitutions am I not
Your lawful head ecclesiastical?
You'll not deny it. Hear me then. Albeit
My faith is fixed, I purpose not to shake
The faith of others, further than God shall show
The truth through worthy preachers: to which end
All rash discourses are forbad; and readings
Of Scripture, without license from ourself.
Answer ye not?—Will ye conform and live?

LATIMER.
In all things lawful we have ever been
Conformable: things evil we resist.

QUEEN.
I ask but abstinence from wrong.

RIDLEY.
Times are
When mere inaction is substantial wrong.

LATIMER.
I testify against your abstinence
Or physical, or moral:—thoughts, deeds, words;
All smack of evil. We must speak or die!

QUEEN.
You speak and die, perchance.

LATIMER.
Dear brother Ridley!
Be of good cheer. Whate'er betide we welcome
In the Lord's name! O Queen! that day is past
When spiritual knowledge was confined to priests,
Our very babes drink knowledge as they suck.
Each stripling, as he runs, plucks from each bough
The fruit of knowledge.

QUEEN.
Ah, Sirs, have a care!
The tree of knowledge was an evil thing,
With root in hell, and fruitage unto death.
But in the self-same garden likewise grew
Another mystery, the tree of life.
This too bore fruit, unseen till aftertime:
And this was Christ. Children of Adam, we,
Condemned to cultivate what first we stole,
Must tend the second tree with watchful love,
Or perish by the poison of the first!—
No more. I called you with a good intent:
Ponder what I have said; so shall ye live.
Against God's manifest will vainly ye strive.

[Exeunt severally.