Page 178 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

And hang a calve’s-skin on those recreant limbs.

KING JOHN
We like not this; thou dost forget thyself.

Enter Pandulph.

KING PHILIP
Here comes the holy legate of the pope. [135]

PANDULPH
Hail, you anointed deputies of heaven!
To thee, King John, my holy errand is.

I Pandulph, of fair Milan cardinal,
And from Pope Innocent the legate here,
Do in his name religiously demand [140]
Why thou against the church, our holy mother,

So wilfully dost spurn; and force perforce
Keep Stephen Langton, chosen archbishop
Of Canterbury, from that holy see:
This, in our foresaid holy father’s name, [145]

Pope Innocent, I do demand of thee.

KING JOHN
What earthy name to interrogatories
Can taste the free breath of a sacred king?
Thou canst not, cardinal, devise a name
So slight, unworthy and ridiculous, [150]

To charge me to an answer, as the pope.
Tell him this tale; and from the mouth of England
Add thus much more, that no Italian priest

Shall tithe or toll in our dominions;
But as we, under God, are supreme head, − [155]
So under Him that great supremacy,
Where we do reign, we will alone uphold
Without th’ assistance of a mortal hand:

So tell the pope, all reverence set apart
To him and his usurp’d authority. [160]