Baron Alfred Tennyson Tennyson

“ The State will die, the Church can never die. The King's not like to die for that which dies; But I must die for that which never dies. It will be so—my visions in the Lord: It must be so, my friend! the wolves of England Must murder her one shepherd, that the sheep May feed in peace. False figure, Map would say. Earth's falses are heaven's truths. And when my voice Is martyr'd mute, and this man disappears, That perfect trust may come again between us, And there, there, there, not here I shall rejoice To find my stray sheep back within the fold. ”

“ Exit with HERBERT. Enter KING HENRY. HENRY. Where's Thomas? hath he sign'd? show me the papers! Sign'd and not seal'd! How's that? JOHN OF OXFORD. He would not seal. And when he sign'd, his face was stormy-red— Shame, wrath, I know not what. He sat down there And dropt it in his hands, and then a paleness, Like the wan twilight after sunset, crept Up even to the tonsure, and he groan'd, 'False to myself! It is the will of God!' HENRY. God's will be what it will, the man shall seal, Or I will seal his doom. ”

“ Say of Aquitaine. I am no Queen of England. I had dream'd I was the bride of England, and a queen. HENRY. And,—while you dream'd you were the bride of England,— Stirring her baby-king against me? ha! ELEANOR. The brideless Becket is thy king and mine: I will go live and die in Aquitaine. HENRY. Except I clap thee into prison here, Lest thou shouldst play the wanton there again. Ha, you of Aquitaine! O you of Aquitaine! You were but Aquitaine to Louis—no wife; You are only Aquitaine to me—no wife. ELEANOR. And why, my lord, should I be wife to one That only wedded me for Aquitaine? ”

“ Serve by force? No force Could make me serve by force. SYNORIX. How then, my lord? The Roman is encampt without your city— The force of Rome a thousand-fold our own. Must all Galatia hang or drown herself? And you a Prince and Tetrarch in this province— SINNATUS. Province! SYNORIX. Well, well, they call it so in Rome. SINNATUS (angrily) . Province! SYNORIX. A noble anger! but Antonius To-morrow will demand your tribute—you, Can you make war? Have you alliances? Bithynia, Pontus, Paphlagonia? We have had our leagues of old with Eastern kings. ”

“ DORA (to DOBSON) . Peace, let him be: it is the chamber of Death! Sir, you are tenfold more a gentleman, A hundred times more worth a woman's love, Than this, this—but I waste no words upon him: His wickedness is like my wretchedness— Beyond all language. (To HAROLD.) You—you see her there! Only fifteen when first you came on her, And then the sweetest flower of all the wolds, So lovely in the promise of her May, So winsome in her grace and gaiety, So loved by all the village people here, So happy in herself and in her home— DOBSON (agitated) . Theer, theer! ”

“ All rise. SYNORIX (aside) . Thunder! Ay, ay, the storm was drawing hither Across the hills when I was being crown'd. I wonder if I look as pale as she? CAMMA. Art thou—still bent—on marrying? SYNORIX. Surely—yet These are strange words to speak to Artemis. CAMMA. Words are not always what they seem, my King. I will be faithful to thee till thou die. SYNORIX. I thank thee, Camma,—I thank thee. CAMMA (turning to ANTONIUS) . Antonius, Much graced are we that our Queen Rome in you Deigns to look in upon our barbarisms. ”

“ ELEANOR (seeing chart on table) . This chart with the red line! her bower! whose bower? HENRY. The chart is not mine, but Becket's: take it, Thomas. ELEANOR. Becket! O—ay—and these chessmen on the floor—the king's crown broken! Becket hath beaten thee again—and thou hast kicked down the board. I know thee of old. HENRY. True enough, my mind was set upon other matters. ELEANOR. What matters? State matters? love matters? HENRY. My love for thee, and thine for me. ELEANOR. Over! the sweet summer closes, The reign of the roses is done; Over and gone with the roses, And over and gone with the sun. ”

“ I may as well avoid him. Ladylike! Lilylike in her stateliness and sweetness! How came she by it?—a daughter of the fields, This Dora! She gave her hand, unask'd, at the farm-gate; I almost think she half return'd the pressure Of mine. What, I that held the orange blossom Dark as the yew? but may not those, who march Before their age, turn back at times, and make Courtesy to custom? and now the stronger motive, Misnamed free-will—the crowd would call it conscience— Moves me—to what? I am dreaming; for the past Look'd thro' the present, Eva's eyes thro' her's— A spell upon me! ”

“ PHOEBE. Great Artemis! O Camma, can it be well, Or good, or wise, that you should clasp a hand Red with the sacred blood of Sinnatus? CAMMA. Good! mine own dagger driven by Synorix found All good in the true heart of Sinnatus, And quench'd it there for ever. Wise! Life yields to death and wisdom bows to Fate, Is wisest, doing so. Did not this man Speak well? We cannot fight imperial Rome, But he and I are both Galatian-born, And tributary sovereigns, he and I Might teach this Rome—from knowledge of our people— Where to lay on her tribute—heavily here And lightly there. ”

“ Antonius, If you had found him plotting against Rome, Would you have tortured Sinnatus to death? ANTONIUS. No thought was mine of torture or of death, But had I found him plotting, I had counsell'd him To rest from vain resistance. Rome is fated To rule the world. Then, if he had not listen'd, I might have sent him prisoner to Rome. SYNORIX. Why do you palter with the ceremony? Go on with the marriage rites. CAMMA. They are finish'd. SYNORIX. How! CAMMA. Thou hast drunk deep enough to make me happy. Dost thou not feel the love I bear to thee Glow thro' thy veins? ”

“ Yet—lest there should be flashes And fulminations from the side of Rome, An interdict on England—I will have My young son Henry crown'd the King of England, That so the Papal bolt may pass by England, As seeming his, not mine, and fall abroad. I'll have it done—and now. BECKET. Surely too young Even for this shadow of a crown; and tho' I love him heartily, I can spy already A strain of hard and headstrong in him. Say, The Queen should play his kingship against thine! HENRY. I will not think so, Thomas. Who shall crown him? Canterbury is dying. BECKET. The next Canterbury. ”

“ But Becket ever moves against a king. The Church is all—the crime to be a king. We trust your Royal Grace, lord of more land Than any crown in Europe, will not yield To lay your neck beneath your citizens' heel. HENRY. Not to a Gregory of my throning! No. FOLIOT. My royal liege, in aiming at your love, It may be sometimes I have overshot My duties to our Holy Mother Church, Tho' all the world allows I fall no inch Behind this Becket, rather go beyond In scourgings, macerations, mortifyings, Fasts, disciplines that clear the spiritual eye, And break the soul from earth. ”

“ EDGAR. And here Is the most beautiful morning of this May. Nay, you must smile upon me! There—you make The May and morning still more beautiful, You, the most beautiful blossom of the May. EVA. Dear Philip, all the world is beautiful If we were happy, and could chime in with it. EDGAR. True; for the senses, love, are for the world; That for the senses. EVA. Yes. EDGAR. And when the man, The child of evolution, flings aside His swaddling-bands, the morals of the tribe, He, following his own instincts as his God, Will enter on the larger golden age ”

“ Slave, if he love thee, Thy life is worth the wrestle for it: arise, And dash thyself against me that I may slay thee! The worm! shall I let her go? But ha! what's here? By very God, the cross I gave the King! His village darling in some lewd caress Has wheedled it off the King's neck to her own. By thy leave, beauty. Ay, the same! I warrant Thou hast sworn on this my cross a hundred times Never to leave him—and that merits death, False oath on holy cross—for thou must leave him To-day, but not quite yet. ”

“ Exit DAN SMITH. (Seeing HAROLD on bridge.) Some madman, is it, Gesticulating there upon the bridge? I am half afraid to pass. HAROLD. Sometimes I wonder, When man has surely learnt at last that all His old-world faith, the blossom of his youth, Has faded, falling fruitless—whether then All of us, all at once, may not be seized With some fierce passion, not so much for Death As against Life! all, all, into the dark— No more!—and science now could drug and balm us Back into nescience with as little pain As it is to fall asleep. ”

“ ELEANOR. Our Becket, who will not absolve the Bishops. I think ye four have cause to love this Becket. FITZURSE. I hate him for his insolence to all. DE TRACY. And I for all his insolence to thee. DE BRITO. I hate him for I hate him is my reason, And yet I hate him for a hypocrite. DE MORVILLE. I do not love him, for he did his best To break the barons, and now braves the King. ELEANOR. Strike, then, at once, the King would have him—See! Re-enter HENRY. HENRY. No man to love me, honour me, obey me! Sluggards and fools! The slave that eat my bread has kick'd his King! ”

“ And for these Royal customs, These ancient Royal customs—they are Royal, Not of the Church—and let them be anathema, And all that speak for them anathema. HERBERT. Thomas, thou art moved too much. BECKET. O Herbert, here I gash myself asunder from the King, Tho' leaving each, a wound; mine own, a grief To show the scar for ever—his, a hate Not ever to be heal'd. Enter ROSAMUND DE CLIFFORD, flying from SIR REGINALD FITZURSE. Drops her veil. BECKET. Rosamund de Clifford! ROSAMUND. Save me, father, hide me—they follow me— and I must not be known. BECKET. Pass in with Herbert there. ”

“ But may not a girl's love-dream have too much romance in it to be realised all at once, or altogether, or anywhere but in Heaven? And yet I had once a vision of a pure and perfect marriage, where the man and the woman, only differing as the stronger and the weaker, should walk hand in hand together down this valley of tears, as they call it so truly, to the grave at the bottom, and lie down there together in the darkness which would seem but for a moment, to be wakened again together by the light of the resurrection, and no more partings for ever and for ever. ”

“ While, had you left him free use of his wings, Who knows that he had ever dream'd of flying? EVA. But all that sounds so wicked and so strange; 'Till death us part'—those are the only words, The true ones—nay, and those not true enough, For they that love do not believe that death Will part them. Why do you jest with me, and try To fright me? Tho' you are a gentleman, I but a farmer's daughter— EDGAR. Tut! you talk Old feudalism. When the great Democracy Makes a new world— EVA. And if you be not jesting, Neither the old world, nor the new, nor father, Sister, nor you, shall ever see me more. ”

“ BECKET. Cursed be John of Oxford, Roger of York, And Gilbert Foliot! cursed those De Brocs That hold our Saltwood Castle from our see! Cursed Fitzurse, and all the rest of them That sow this hate between my lord and me! Voices from the Crowd. Blessed be the Lord Archbishop, who hath withstood two Kings to their faces for the honour of God. BECKET. Out of the mouths of babes and sucklings, praise! I thank you, sons; when kings but hold by crowns, The crowd that hungers for a crown in Heaven Is my true king. HERBERT. Thy true King bad thee be A fisher of men; thou hast them in thy net. ”

“ DORA Could I love him else? EVA. And are you quite sure that after marriage this gentleman will not be shamed of his poor farmer's daughter among the ladies in his drawing-room? DORA. Shamed of me in a drawing-room! Wasn't Miss Vavasour, our schoolmistress at Littlechester, a lady born? Were not our fellow-pupils all ladies? Wasn't dear mother herself at least by one side a lady? Can't I speak like a lady; pen a letter like a lady; talk a little French like a lady; play a little like a lady? Can't a girl when she loves her husband, and he her, make herself anything he wishes her to be? ”

“ Cold after warm, winter after summer, and the golden leaves, these earls and barons, that clung to me, frosted off me by the first cold frown of the King. Cold, but look how the table steams, like a heathen altar; nay, like the altar at Jerusalem. Shall God's good gifts be wasted? None of them here! Call in the poor from the streets, and let them feast. HERBERT. That is the parable of our blessed Lord. BECKET. And why should not the parable of our blessed Lord be acted again? Call in the poor! The Church is ever at variance with the kings, and ever at one with the poor. ”

“ Dan John, how much we lose, we celibates, Lacking the love of woman and of child. JOHN OF SALISBURY. More gain than loss; for of your wives you shall Find one a slut whose fairest linen seems Foul as her dust-cloth, if she used it—one So charged with tongue, that every thread of thought Is broken ere it joins—a shrew to boot, Whose evil song far on into the night Thrills to the topmost tile—no hope but death; One slow, fat, white, a burthen of the hearth; And one that being thwarted ever swoons And weeps herself into the place of power ”

“ All face the Goddess. Priestesses, Children, Populace, and Guards kneel—the others remain standing. SYNORIX. O Thou, that dost inspire the germ with life, The child, a thread within the house of birth, And give him limbs, then air, and send him forth The glory of his father—Thou whose breath Is balmy wind to robe our hills with grass, And kindle all our vales with myrtle-blossom, And roll the golden oceans of our grain, And sway the long grape-bunches of our vines, And fill all hearts with fatness and the lust Of plenty—make me happy in my marriage! ”

“ Returns with this Antonius. SYNORIX. What is Synorix? SINNATUS. Galatian, and not know? This Synorix Was Tetrarch here, and tyrant also—did Dishonour to our wives. SYNORIX. Perhaps you judge him With feeble charity: being as you tell me Tetrarch, there might be willing wives enough To feel dishonour, honour. CAMMA. Do not say so. I know of no such wives in all Galatia. There may be courtesans for aught I know Whose life is one dishonour. Enter ATTENDANT. ATTENDANT (aside) . My lord, the men! SINNATUS (aside) . Our anti-Roman faction? ATTENDANT (aside) . Ay, my lord. SYNORIX (overhearing) . ”

“ She sits at his feet. HENRY. I had them clear A royal pleasaunce for thee, in the wood, Not leave these countryfolk at court. ROSAMUND. I brought them In from the wood, and set them here. I love them More than the garden flowers, that seem at most Sweet guests, or foreign cousins, not half speaking The language of the land. I love them too, Yes. But, my liege, I am sure, of all the roses— Shame fall on those who gave it a dog's name— This wild one (picking a briar-rose) —nay, I shall not prick myself— Is sweetest. Do but smell! HENRY. Thou rose of the world! Thou rose of all the roses! ”

“ This did Henry. Shall I do less for mine own Canterbury? And thou, De Broc, that holdest Saltwood Castle— DE BROC. And mean to hold it, or— BECKET. To have my life. DE BROC. The King is quick to anger; if thou anger him, We wait but the King's word to strike thee dead. BECKET. Strike, and I die the death of martyrdom; Strike, and ye set these customs by my death Ringing their own death-knell thro' all the realm. HERBERT. And I can tell you, lords, ye are all as like To lodge a fear in Thomas Becket's heart As find a hare's form in a lion's cave. ”

“ HERBERT. What's here? BECKET. A notice from the priest, To whom our John of Salisbury committed The secret of the bower, that our wolf-Queen Is prowling round the fold. I should be back In England ev'n for this. HERBERT. These are by-things In the great cause. BECKET. The by-things of the Lord Are the wrong'd innocences that will cry From all the hidden by-ways of the world In the great day against the wronger. I know Thy meaning. Perish she, I, all, before The Church should suffer wrong! HERBERT. Do you see, my lord, There is the King talking with Walter Map? ”

“ JOHN OF SALISBURY. You should have taken counsel with your friends Before these bandits brake into your presence. They seek—you make—occasion for your death. BECKET. My counsel is already taken, John. I am prepared to die. JOHN OF SALISBURY We are sinners all, The best of all not all-prepared to die. BECKET. God's will be done! JOHN OF SALISBURY. Ay, well. God's will be done! GRIM (re-entering) . My lord, the knights are arming in the garden Beneath the sycamore. BECKET. Good! let them arm. GRIM. And one of the De Brocs is with them, Robert, The apostate monk that was with Randulf here. ”

“ Oh, last night, Tired, pacing my new lands at Littlechester, I dozed upon the bridge, and the black river Flow'd thro' my dreams—if dreams they were. She rose From the foul flood and pointed toward the farm, And her cry rang to me across the years, 'I call you, Philip Edgar, Philip Edgar! Come, you will set all right again, and father Will not die miserable.' I could make his age A comfort to him—so be more at peace With mine own self. Some of my former friends Would find my logic faulty; let them. Colour Flows thro' my life again, and I have lighted On a new pleasure. ”

“ CAMMA. No, not one step with thee. Where is Antonius? (Louder.) SYNORIX (advancing towards her) . Then for your own sake, Lady, I say it with all gentleness, And for the sake of Sinnatus your husband, I must compel you. CAMMA (drawing her dagger) . Stay!—too near is death. SYNORIX (disarming her) . Is it not easy to disarm a woman? Enter SINNATUS (seizes him from behind by the throat) . SYNORIX (throttled and scarce audible) . Rome! Rome! SINNATUS. Adulterous dog! SYNORIX (stabbing him with CAMMA'S dagger) . What! will you have it? ”