Page 214 - Shakespeare - Vol. 2

My lord − [230]

KING JOHN
Hadst thou but shook thy head or made a pause
When I spake darkly what I purposed,
Or turn’d an eye of doubt upon my face,
As bid me tell my tale in express words,

Deep shame had struck me dumb, made me break off, [235]
And those thy fears might have wrought fears in me:
But thou didst understand me by my signs

And didst in signs again parley with sin;
Yea, without stop, didst let thy heart consent,
And consequently thy rude hand to act [240]
The deed, which both our tongues held vild to name.
Out of my sight, and never see me more!

My nobles leave me, and my state is brav’d,
Even at my gates, with ranks of foreign powers:
Nay, in the body of this fleshly land, [245]

This kingdom, this confine of blood and breath,
Hostility and civil tumult reigns
Between my conscience and my cousin’s death.

HUBERT
Arm you against your other enemies,
I’ll make a peace between your soul and you. [250]

Young Arthur is alive: this hand of mine
Is yet a maiden and an innocent hand,
Not painted with the crimson spots of blood.
Within this bosom never ent’red yet

The dreadful motion of a murderous thought; [255]
And you have slander’d nature in my form,
Which, howsoever rude exteriorly,
Is yet the cover of a fairer mind

Than to be butcher of an innocent child.

KING JOHN
Doth Arthur live? O, haste thee to the peers, [260]
Throw this report on their incensed rage,