Act 3, Scene 6

London. A street.

[Enter a SCRIVENER.]
Scrivener
2059 Here is the indictment of the good Lord Hastings;
2060 Which in a set hand fairly is engross'd,
2061 That it may be to-day read o'er in Paul's.
2062 And mark how well the sequel hangs together:—
2063 Eleven hours I have spent to write it over,
2064 For yesternight by Catesby was it sent me;
2065 The precedent was full as long a-doing:
2066 And yet within these five hours Hastings liv'd,
2067 Untainted, unexamin'd, free, at liberty.
2068 Here's a good world the while! Who is so gross
2069 That cannot see this palpable device!
2070 Yet who so bold but says he sees it not!
2071 Bad is the world; and all will come to naught,
2072 When such ill dealing must be seen in thought.
[Exit.]

Notes

TLN 2060archaic vocab
“set hand fairly is engross'd”
'Engrossed' means copied out in a formal legal script, not merely written. A 'set hand' is a deliberate, standardized bookhand used for official documents — as opposed to the cursive Secretary hand of ordinary business. The Scrivener has spent eleven hours making this fair copy because the indictment has to be publicly legible when it is posted.
TLN 2061cultural context
“to-day read o'er in Paul's”
'Paul's' is St. Paul's Cathedral in London, whose outdoor churchyard and the pillars inside the nave served as the city's main public bulletin board. Official proclamations, legal indictments, and news were posted or read aloud there so the whole city could hear them. Reading Hastings's indictment 'in Paul's' is the official publication of his guilt to the people of London.
TLN 2065archaic vocab
“The precedent was full as long a-doing”
Here 'precedent' does not mean a legal precedent in the modern sense; it means the original rough draft that the Scrivener has been copying from. The logic exposes Richard's fraud: the draft took just as long to prepare as the fair copy did, but the fair copy was delivered to the Scrivener by Catesby 'yesternight' — meaning the draft must have been composed before Hastings was arrested. The indictment was written before the crime it charges was even alleged.
historical More's History of King Richard III
TLN 2068rhetorical device
“who is so gross That cannot see this palpable device! Yet who so bold but says he sees it not”
'Gross' here means dull, stupid, or slow-witted (not large or obscene). 'Palpable device' means an obvious trick or contrivance — palpable literally means 'touchable,' hence something blatant enough to feel. The lines form a sharp chiasmus: everyone is clever enough to see the fraud, yet no one is bold enough to say they see it. Richard's tyranny works not because it deceives anyone but because fear makes witnesses pretend to be deceived.
TLN 2071archaic vocab
“all will come to naught, When such ill dealing must be seen in thought”
'Seen in thought' means seen only in the mind — kept private, never spoken aloud. The Scrivener is closing with a grim observation: when crimes this obvious can only be acknowledged in silent thought and never said out loud, the world is heading toward ruin ('come to naught'). It is a statement about enforced silence under tyranny.