Henry VI, Part III quotes

The queen this day here holds her parliament, But little thinks we shall be of her council:

By words or blows here let us win our right.

Arm’d as we are, let’s stay within this house.

But when the duke is slain, they’ll quickly fly.

Far be the thought of this from Henry’s heart, To make a shambles of the parliament-house!

Cousin of Exeter, frowns, words and threats Shall be the war that Henry means to use. Thou factious Duke of York, descend my throne, and kneel for grace and mercy at my feet; I am thy sovereign.

I took an oath that he should quietly reign.

But for a kingdom any oath may be broken: I would break a thousand oaths to reign one year.

No; God forbid your grace should be forsworn.

Five men to twenty! though the odds be great, I doubt not, uncle, of our victory.

Many a battle have I won in France, When as the enemy hath been ten to one: Why should I not now have the like success?

Alarum. Exeunt.

Alarum. Enter King Henry alone.

This battle fares like to the morning’s war, When dying clouds contend with growing light, What time the shepherd, blowing of his nails, Can neither call it perfect day nor night.

Now sways it this way, like a mighty sea Forced by the tide to combat with the wind; Now sways it that way, like the selfsame sea Forced to retire by fury of the wind: Sometime the flood prevails, and then the wind;

So many years ere I shall shear the fleece: So minutes, hours, days, months, and years, Pass’d over to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. Ah, what a life were this! how sweet! how lovely!

Gives not the hawthorn-bush a sweeter shade To shepherds looking on their silly sheep, Than doth a rich embroider’d canopy To kings that fear their subjects’ treachery?

O, yes, it doth; a thousandfold it doth.

Thy place is fill’d, thy sceptre wrung from thee, Thy balm wash’d off wherewith thou wast anointed: No bending knee will call thee Caesar now, No humble suitors press to speak for right, No, not a man comes for redress of thee;

For how can I help them, and not myself?

Ay, here’s a deer whose skin’s a keeper’s fee: This is the quondam king; let’s seize upon him.

Ay, here’s a deer whose skin’s a keeper’s fee: This is the quondam king; let’s seize upon him.

Let me embrace thee, sour adversity, For wise men say it is the wisest course.

Why linger we? let us lay hands upon him.

Say, what art thou that talk’st of kings and queens?

More than I seem, and less than I was born to: A man at least, for less I should not be; And men may talk of kings, and why not I?

Ay, but thou talk’st as if thou wert a king.

But, if thou be a king, where is thy crown?

My crown is in my heart, not on my head; Not deck’d with diamonds and Indian stones, Nor to be seen: my crown is called content: A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy.

Well, if you be a king crown’d with content, Your crown content and you must be contented To go along with us; for, as we think, You are the king King Edward hath deposed;

To tell thee plain, I aim to lie with thee.

To tell you plain, I had rather lie in prison.

Why, then thou shalt not have thy husband’s lands.

Why, then thou shalt not have thy husband’s lands.

Why, then mine honesty shall be my dower; For by that loss I will not purchase them.

Therein thou wrong’st thy children mightily.

Not knowing how to find the open air, But toiling desperately to find it out— Torment myself to catch the English crown: And from that torment I will free myself, Or hew my way out with a bloody axe.

Why, I can smile, and murder whiles I smile, And cry “Content” to that which grieves my heart, And wet my cheeks with artificial tears, And frame my face to all occasions.

I’ll drown more sailors than the mermaid shall; I’ll slay more gazers than the basilisk; I’ll play the orator as well as Nestor, Deceive more slyly than Ulysses could, And, like a Sinon, take another Troy.

The more I stay, the more I’ll succour thee.

O, but impatience waiteth on true sorrow.

And see where comes the breeder of my sorrow!

To prove him tyrant this reason may suffice, That Henry liveth still: but were he dead, Yet here Prince Edward stands, King Henry’s son. Look, therefore, Lewis, that by this league and marriage Thou draw not on thy danger and dishonour;

For though usurpers sway the rule awhile, Yet heavens are just, and time suppresseth wrongs.

And why not queen?

’Tis the more honour, because more dangerous.

Ay, but give me worship and quietness; I like it better than a dangerous honour.

If Warwick knew in what estate he stands, ’Tis to be doubted he would waken him.

Let’s levy men, and beat him back again.

A little fire is quickly trodden out; Which, being suffer’d, rivers cannot quench.

In Warwickshire I have true-hearted friends, Not mutinous in peace, yet bold in war; Those will I muster up: and thou, son Clarence, Shalt stir up in Suffolk, Norfolk and in Kent, The knights and gentlemen to come with thee:

March. Enter Queen Margaret, Prince Edward, Somerset, Oxford, and soldiers.

Great lords, wise men ne’er sit and wail their loss, But cheerly seek how to redress their harms.

What though the mast be now blown overboard, The cable broke, the holding-anchor lost, And half our sailors swallow’d in the flood? Yet lives our pilot still.

So flies the reckless shepherd from the wolf; So first the harmless sheep doth yield his fleece And next his throat unto the butcher’s knife. What scene of death hath Roscius now to act?

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind; The thief doth fear each bush an officer.

The bird that hath been limed in a bush, With trembling wings misdoubteth every bush; And I, the hapless male to one sweet bird, Have now the fatal object in my eye Where my poor young was limed, was caught and kill’d.