Act 4, Scene 2

Another part of the forest.

[Enter, from one side, Mowbray, attended; afterwards, the Archbishop, Hastings, and others; from the other side, Prince John of Lancaster, and Westmoreland; Officers, and others with them.]
Prince John of Lancaster
1891 You are well encounter'd here, my cousin Mowbray:
1892 Good day to you, gentle lord Archbishop;
1893 And so to you, Lord Hastings, and to all.
1894 My Lord of York, it better show'd with you
1895 When that your flock, assembled by the bell,
1896 Encircled you to hear with reverence
1897 Your exposition on the holy text
1898 Than now to see you here an iron man,
1899 Cheering a rout of rebels with your drum,
1900 Turning the word to sword and life to death.
1901 That man that sits within a monarch's heart,
1902 And ripens in the sunshine of his favour,
1903 Would he abuse the countenance of the king,
1904 Alack, what mischiefs might he set abroach
1905 In shadow of such greatness! With you, lord bishop,
1906 It is even so. Who hath not heard it spoken
1907 How deep you were within the books of God?
1908 To us the speaker in his parliament;
1909 To us the imagined voice of God himself;
1910 The very opener and intelligencer
1911 Between the grace, the sanctities of heaven
1912 And our dull workings. O, who shall believe
1913 But you misuse the reverence of your place,
1914 Employ the countenance and grace of heaven,
1915 As a false favourite doth his prince's name,
1916 In deeds dishonourable? You have ta'en up,
1917 Under the counterfeited zeal of God,
1918 The subjects of his substitute, my father,
1919 And both against the peace of heaven and him
1920 Have here up-swarm'd them.
Archbishop of York
1921 Good my Lord of Lancaster,
1922 I am not here against your father's peace;
1923 But, as I told my Lord of Westmoreland,
1924 The time misorder'd doth, in common sense,
1925 Crowd us and crush us to this monstrous form
1926 To hold our safety up. I sent your grace
1927 The parcels and particulars of our grief,
1928 The which hath been with scorn shoved from the court,
1929 Whereon this Hydra son of war is born;
1930 Whose dangerous eyes may well be charm'd asleep
1931 With grant of our most just and right desires,
1932 And true obedience, of this madness cured,
1933 Stoop tamely to the foot of majesty.
Lord Mowbray
1934 If not, we ready are to try our fortunes
1935 To the last man.
Lord Hastings
1936 And though we here fall down,
1937 We have supplies to second our attempt:
1938 If they miscarry, theirs shall second them;
1939 And so success of mischief shall be born
1940 And heir from heir shall hold this quarrel up
1941 Whiles England shall have generation.
Prince John of Lancaster
1942 You are too shallow, Hastings, much to shallow,
1943 To sound the bottom of the after-times.
Earl of Westmoreland
1944 Pleaseth your grace to answer them directly
1945 How far forth you do like their articles.
Prince John of Lancaster
1946 I like them all, and do allow them well,
1947 And swear here, by the honour of my blood,
1948 My father's purposes have been mistook,
1949 And some about him have too lavishly
1950 Wrested his meaning and authority.
1951 My lord, these griefs shall be with speed redress'd;
1952 Upon my soul, they shall. If this may please you,
1953 Discharge your powers unto their several counties,
1954 As we will ours; and here between the armies
1955 Let 's drink together friendly and embrace,
1956 That all their eyes may bear those tokens home
1957 Of our restored love and amity.
Archbishop of York
1958 I take your princely word for these redresses.
Prince John of Lancaster
1959 I give it you, and will maintain my word:
1960 And thereupon I drink unto your grace.
Lord Hastings
1961 Go, captain, and deliver to the army
1962 This news of peace: let them have pay, and part:
1963 I know it will please them. Hie thee, captain.
[Exit Officer.]
Archbishop of York
1964 To you, my noble Lord of Westmoreland.
Earl of Westmoreland
1965 I pledge your grace; and, if you knew what pains
1966 I have bestow'd to breed this present peace,
1967 You would drink freely: but my love to ye
1968 Shall show itself more openly hereafter.
Archbishop of York
1969 I do not doubt you.
Earl of Westmoreland
1970 I am glad of it.
1971 Health to my lord and gentle cousin, Mowbray.
Lord Mowbray
1972 You wish me health in very happy season,
1973 For I am, on the sudden, something ill.
Archbishop of York
1974 Against ill chances men are ever merry;
1975 But heaviness foreruns the good event.
Earl of Westmoreland
1976 Therefore be merry, coz; since sudden sorrow
1977 Serves to say thus, "some good thing comes tomorrow."
Archbishop of York
1978 Believe me, I am passing light in spirit.
Lord Mowbray
1979 So much the worse, if your own rule be true.
[Shouts within.]
Prince John of Lancaster
1980 The word of peace is render'd: hark, how they shout!
Lord Mowbray
1981 This had been cheerful after victory.
Archbishop of York
1982 A peace is of the nature of a conquest;
1983 For then both parties nobly are subdued,
1984 And neither party loser.
Prince John of Lancaster
1985 Go, my lord.
1986 And let our army be discharged too.
[Exit Westmoreland.]
Prince John of Lancaster
1987 And, good my lord, so please you, let our trains
1988 March by us, that we may peruse the men
1989 We should have coped withal.
Archbishop of York
1990 Go, good Lord Hastings,
1991 And, ere they be dismiss'd, let them march by.
[Exit Hastings.]
Prince John of Lancaster
1992 I trust, lords, we shall lie to-night together.
[Re-enter Westmoreland.]
Prince John of Lancaster
1993 Now, cousin, wherefore stands our army still?
Earl of Westmoreland
1994 The leaders, having charge from you to stand,
1995 Will not go off until they hear you speak.
Prince John of Lancaster
1996 They know their duties.
[Re-enter Hastings.]
Lord Hastings
1997 My lord, our army is dispersed already:
1998 Like youthful steers unyoked, they take their courses
1999 East, west, north, south; or, like a school broke up,
2000 Each hurries toward his home and sporting-place.
Earl of Westmoreland
2001 Good tidings, my Lord Hastings; for the which
2002 I do arrest thee, traitor, of high treason:
2003 And you, lord archbishop, and you, Lord Mowbray,
2004 Of capital treason I attach you both.
Lord Mowbray
2005 Is this proceeding just and honourable?
Earl of Westmoreland
2006 Is your assembly so?
Archbishop of York
2007 Will you thus break your faith?
Prince John of Lancaster
2008 I pawn'd thee none:
2009 I promised you redress of these same grievances
2010 Whereof you did complain; which, by mine honour,
2011 I will perform with a most Christian care.
2012 But for you, rebels, look to taste the due
2013 Meet for rebellion and such acts as yours.
2014 Most shallowly did you these arms commence,
2015 Fondly brought here and foolishly sent hence.
2016 Strike up our drums, pursue the scattr'd stray:
2017 God, and not we, hath safely fought to-day.
2018 Some guard these traitors to the block of death,
2019 Treason's true bed and yielder up of breath.
[Exeunt.]

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Notes

TLN 1895historical topical
“your flock, assembled by the bell”
Prince John contrasts the Archbishop's proper role — a pastor summoning his 'flock' (congregation) by the church bell for a sermon — with the sight of him rallying soldiers to a rebellion. 'Flock' is the standard biblical term for a bishop's congregation (from John 10 and Acts 20), making the contrast deliberate: a shepherd leading sheep has become a general leading rebels.
historical Holinshed's Chronicles
TLN 1900rhetorical device
“Turning the word to sword and life to death”
Prince John packs two wordplays into one line. 'Word' and 'sword' differ by a single letter, and the Archbishop's office is precisely to preach the Word of God — so turning the Word into a sword means corrupting scripture into a call to arms. 'Life to death' extends the inversion: a bishop is supposed to bring spiritual life, and he has brought killing instead.
TLN 1904archaic vocab
“what mischiefs might he set abroach”
'Set abroach' means to broach — to start flowing or running, as you would broach a barrel of wine by driving a tap into it. Prince John is saying: what a flood of harm could a man with the king's trust unleash if he chose to tap it for treachery. The metaphor pictures rebellion as liquid that had only to be opened.
TLN 1910archaic vocab
“The very opener and intelligencer”
Prince John calls the Archbishop the authorised interpreter between heaven and the common people. An 'opener' is someone who explains or unlocks hidden meaning — in this context, a preacher who opens up scripture. An 'intelligencer' is a go-between or messenger; in ecclesiastical use, the one who carries intelligence (news, meaning) between parties. John's point is that the Archbishop was God's appointed spokesman to ordinary people ('our dull workings'), making his rebellion a grotesque betrayal of that office.
TLN 1918historical topical
“The subjects of his substitute, my father”
Prince John calls King Henry 'his substitute' — God's deputy or viceroy on earth. The theological idea behind the phrase is the divine right of kings: the monarch holds authority delegated from God, so to rebel against the king is to rebel against God himself. The Archbishop, who of all men should understand this doctrine, has 'up-swarm'd' the very people over whom God's substitute rules.
historical The divine right of kings
TLN 1929classical allusion
“this Hydra son of war is born”
The Hydra was a many-headed water-serpent of Greek myth: chop off one head and two grew back. The Archbishop uses it to argue that the rebellion is inherently regenerative — cut it down and grievances multiply. The phrase means: when the court ignored the rebels' petitions, a new head of war grew in their place.
TLN 1942rhetorical device
“You are too shallow, Hastings, much to shallow, To sound the bottom of the after-times”
Prince John rebukes Hastings with an extended nautical metaphor: 'shallow' means both lacking foresight and literally not deep enough; 'sound' means to measure depth with a plumb-line (a weighted rope dropped into water). Hastings boasts that the rebellion can outlast any defeat, heir to heir — John dismisses this as a man too shallow of understanding to fathom what the future ('the after-times') holds. The play on 'shallow/sound' makes the insult punning as well as contemptuous.
TLN 1974cultural context
“Against ill chances men are ever merry; But heaviness foreruns the good event”
The Archbishop voices a popular Elizabethan proverb: when disaster is near, spirits are unnaturally high; depression before an event is actually a sign it will go well. This is the opposite of common sense, and the exchange grows ironic at once: Mowbray has just said he feels ill (a bad omen), Westmoreland spins this as a good sign (per the proverb), and the Archbishop declares he feels 'passing light in spirit' — which Mowbray immediately turns back on him: by the Archbishop's own rule, that lightness is the worst possible sign.
TLN 1998rhetorical device
“Like youthful steers unyoked, they take their courses East, west, north, south; or, like a school broke up”
Hastings reports the rebel army's dispersal with two quick similes: newly freed young bullocks bolting in all directions once the yoke is off, and schoolchildren scattering at the end of the day. Both images capture joyful, purposeless scattering — which is exactly Prince John's trap. Hastings thinks he is describing an orderly discharge; he is describing an irreversible, leaderless rout that leaves the lords completely exposed.
TLN 2017historical topical
“God, and not we, hath safely fought to-day”
Prince John concludes by attributing the victory not to his own cleverness but to God's agency. This is the standard formula of godly kingship: the king as instrument of divine providence, not the author of his own success. The claim is morally pointed given what John has just done — the audience is left to weigh whether God's hand is really in a stratagem that exploited an enemy's trust.
historical The divine right of kings