Page:Richard III (1927) Yale.djvu/99

Richard the Third, III. vii

Your very worshipful and loving friends,

And by their vehement instigation,

In this just cause come I to move your Grace.

Rich. I cannot tell, if to depart in silence,

Or bitterly to speak in your reproof,

Best fitteth my degree or your condition:

If not to answer, you might haply think

Tongue-tied ambition, not replying, yielded

To bear the golden yoke of sovereignty,

Which fondly you would here impose on me;

If to reprove you for this suit of yours,

So season'd with your faithful love to me,

Then, on the other side, I check'd my friends.

Therefore, to speak, and to avoid the first,

And then, in speaking, not to incur the last,

Definitively thus I answer you.

Your love deserves my thanks; but my desert

Unmeritable shuns your high request.

First, if all obstacles were cut away,

And that my path were even to the crown,

As the ripe revenue and due of birth,

Yet so much is my poverty of spirit,

So mighty and so many my defects,

That I would rather hide me from my greatness,

Being a bark to brook no mighty sea,

Than in my greatness covet to be hid,

And in the vapour of my glory smother'd.

But, God be thank'd, there is no need of me;

And much I need to help you, were there need;

The royal tree hath left us royal fruit,

Which, mellow'd by the stealing hours of time,

Will well become the seat of majesty,

 140–172 Cf. n.

142 condition: rank

143 haply: perhaps

148 season'd with: rendered palatable by

149 check'd: should rebuke

154 Unmeritable: undeserving

157 ripe revenue: ready inheritance

165 And need; cf. n.

