BETWEEN GUILFORD AND LADY JANE

GRAY.

Guil. Oh teach me! fay, what energy divine
Infpires thy fofter fex and tender years
With fuch unfhaken courage?

L. Jane. Truth and innocence ;

A confcious knowledge rooted in my heart,.
That to have fav'd my country was my duty.
Yes, England, yes, my country, I would fave thee ;;
But heav'n forbids, heav'n difallows my weakness,,
And to fome dear felected hero's hand.
Referves the glory of thy great deliverance.
Lieut. My Lords, my orders-

Guil. See! we must-must part.

L. Jane. Yet furely we shall meet again..

Guil. Oh! Where !

L. Jane. If not on earth, among yon golden stars.

Where other funs arife on other earths,

And happier beings rest in happier seats :

Where, with a reach enlarg'd, the foul fhall view

The great creator's never-ceafing hand

Pour forth new worlds to all'eternity,

And people the infinity of space.

Guil. Fain wou'd I chear my heart with hopes like

thefe ;

But my fad thought turns ever to the grave,

To

To that last dwelling, whither now we hafte,
Where the black fhade shall interpofe betwixt us,
And veil thee from these eyes for ever.

L. Jane. 'Tis true, by thofe dark paths our jour

ney leads,

And thro' the vale of death we pass to life:

But what is there in death to blast our hopes ?
Behold the univerfal works of Nature,

Where life still springs from death. To us the fun
Dies every night, and every morn revives.
The flowers, which winter's icy hand destroy'd,
Lift their fair heads, and live again in spring..
Mark, with what hopes upon the furrow'd plain
The careful plowman cafts the pregnant grain ;
There hid as in a grave a while it lies,
Till the revolving season bids it rise,
Till Nature's genial pow'rs command a birth,
And potent call it from the teeming earth:
Then large increase the bury'd treasures yield,
And with full harveft crown the plenteous field.

SCENE FROM SHAKSPEARE'S KING HENRY VIII.

Enter Catharine Dowager, fick, led between Griffith, her Gentleman-Ufher, and Patience, her Woman. Grif. How does your Grace?

Cath. O Griffith, fick to death:

My legs, like loaded branches, bow to the earth,

willing

Willing to leave their burden: reach a chair;-
So-now methinks, I feel a little ease.

Didst thou not tell me, Griffith, as thou led'ft me,
That the great child of honour, Cardinal Wolfey,
Was dead?

Griff. Yes, madam; but I think your Grace,
Out of the pain you fuffer'd, gave no ear to 't.

Cath. Pr'ythee, good Griffith, tell me how he died; If well, he stepp'd before me, happily, For my example.

Griff. Well, the voice goes, madam:

For after the ftout Earl Northumberland

Arrested him at York, and brought him forward

(As a man forely tainted) to his answer,

He fell fick suddenly, and grew fo ill,

He could not fit his mule.

Cath, Alas, poor man!

Griff. At last, with eafy roads, he came to Leicester, Lodg'd in the abbey; where the reverend abbot, With all his convent, honourably receiv'd him To whom he gave these words :-" O father abboth «An old man, broken with the storms of state, " Is come to lay his weary bones among je "Give him a little earth for charity!" So went to-bed: where eagerly his fickness Parfu'd him ftill; and, three nights after this, About the hour of eight (which he himself Foretold fhould be his laft) full of repentance,

Continual meditations, tears, and forrows,

He

He gave his honours to the world again,

His bleffed part to heav'n, and slept in peace.

Cath. So may he reft; his faults lie gently on him!

Yet thus far, Griffith, give me leave to speak him,
And yet with charity-he was a man

Of an unbounded ftomach, ever ranking
Himself with Princes; one, that by fuggestion
Ty'd all the kingdom; fimony was fair play;
His own opinion was his law: i'the presence
He would fay untruths; and be ever double,
Both in his words and meaning: he was never,
But where he meant to ruin, pitiful:

His promifes were, as he then was, mighty;
But his performance, as he now is, nothing.
Of his own body he was ill, and

The clergy ill example.

Griff. Noble madam,

gave

Men's evil manners live in brass; their virtues
We write in water. May it please your Highness

To hear me speak his good now?

Cath. Yes, good Griffith;

I were malicious elfe.

Griff. This Cardinal,

Though from an humble stock, undoubtedly

Was fashion'd to much honour. From his cradle
He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one :
Exceeding wife, fair fpoken, and perfuading:
Lofty, and four to them that lov'd him not:
But, to thofe men that fought him, fweet as fummer,
And though he were unfatisfy'd in getting,

(Which was a fin) yet in bestowing, Madam,
He was most princely: ever witness for him
Thole twins of learning, that he rais'd in you,
Ipfwich and Oxford; one of which fell with him,
Unwilling to outlive the good he did it ;
The other, though unfinish'd, yet fo famous,
So excellent in art, and still so rifing,
That Christendom fhall ever speak his virtue.
His overthrow heap'd happiness upon him;
For then, and not till then, he felt himself,
And found the bleffedness of being little :
And, to add greater honours to his age
Than man could give him, he died fearing God.
Cath. After my death I with no other herald,
No other speaker of my living actions,
To keep mine honour from corruption,
But fuch an honest chronicler as Griffith,
Whom I most hated living, thou hast made me,
With thy religious truth, and modesty,
Now in his ashes honour: Peace be with him :-
Patience, be near me ftill; and set me lower:
Phave not long to trouble thee.-Good Griffith,
Cause the musicians play me that fad note
I nam'd my knell, whilft I fit meditating
On that celeftial harmony I go to.

Sad and folemn Mufic.

Griff. She is afleep. Good wench, let's fit down quiet,

For fear we wake her. Softly, gentle Patience.

Vifion,