Long ago,
When I was ruler in the patrimony,
I was too lenient to the Lutheran,
And I and learned friends among ourselves
Would freely canvass certain Lutheranisms.
What then, he knew I was no Lutheran.
A heretic!
He drew this shaft against me to the head,
When it was thought I might be chosen Pope,
But then withdrew it. In full consistory,
When I was made Archbishop, he approved me.
And how should he have sent me Legate hither,
Deeming me heretic? and what heresy since?
But he was evermore mine enemy,
And hates the Spaniard--fiery-choleric,
A drinker of black, strong, volcanic wines,
That ever make him fierier. I, a heretic?
Your Highness knows that in pursuing heresy
I have gone beyond your late Lord Chancellor,--
He cried Enough! enough! before his death.--
Gone beyond him and mine own natural man
(It was God's cause); so far they call me now,
The scourge and butcher of their English church.
MARY. Have courage, your reward is Heaven itself.
POLE. They groan amen; they swarm into the fire
Like flies--for what? no dogma. They know nothing;
They burn for nothing.
MARY. You have done your best.
POLE. Have done my best, and as a faithful son,
That all day long hath wrought his father's work,
When back he comes at evening hath the door
Shut on him by the father whom he loved,
His early follies cast into his teeth,
And the poor son turn'd out into the street
To sleep, to die--I shall die of it, cousin.
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